The Parker post., 1913-11-29


now associate editor of the West
Coast Magazine, is the author of the
following sketch of Mr.. c. K. Clarke.
Mr.. Kelley is intimately acquainted
with the work of Mr.. Clarke during
the past few years, and especially
that period when the engineer was
battling with the Colorado to save
Imperial country. The story is pub
lished in these columns with the per-
mission of the author.
1t is an interesting fact that some
of the greatest and most difficult
engineering achievements in the
West were conceived and accomplish
ed by men who got their education
IN Dame Natures school of scienC
and no academic diplomas or degrees
emitting them to write a string of
capital letters after their names. Not
that these conspicuously competent
men affect to despise academic train
study as a preparation for practice
Of their profession; they simply had
no opportunity for book study before
taking up their work, and were oblig-
ed to get their knowledge at first
hand. Like some of the most eff
cient generals of the American army,
they began as privates and were edu-
Gated on the firing line.
Mulholland, the constructive gen
ius of the Los Angeles aqueduct, put
Trautwine's dictum, that civil en-
gineering is applied common sense"
into his own quaint phrasing when he
qualified as an expert witness in
water case. Other engineers had
qualified by naming the colleges, tecls
nical schools and universities from
which they had graduated, and Null
holland was asked by Stephen M.
White what had been his profession
al education. There was a twinkle
in Bills Irish blue eyes as he an
sWered: Il was born in Dublin and
went to the day school, where I
learned the three RS and ten com
mandments-or most of them. l
made a pilgrimage to the Blarney
stone, received my fathers blessing
and went to sea-and here l am"
There must have been an epidemic
of common sense in Dublin about half
century ago, for four little Irish
tads, who scuffled and tussled their
way through that day school togeth
er turned out big civil engineers.
O'Shaughnessy, chief engineer of the
San Francisco water project, was
one of Bills school mates; another
is engineer of Londons water works
and a third is in charge of the Liv-
erpool system.
The foregoing is by way of intro
duction or preface to a brief pen
sketch of one of the Vests most
efficient ''firing line engineers" who
for about forty years to put himself
in the way Of the beams of the spot
light. There are two ways to find
him; you might run him down with
dogs if the dogs have noses to pick
up scent on the desert sands, or you
could trail him by his works.
When the Colorado river circum-
vented the Southern Pacific's levee
builders and manifested it's pertin-
acious purpose to run the settlers
cut of Imperial valley and make a
fine, big lake of the Salton basin, as
it had been in the habit of doing
every century or two for nobody
knows how many thousands of centu-
ries, President Roosevelt asked E.
H. Hartman to stop it, Hartman
told Epes Randolph to get on the job,
Randolph gave the word to engi-
neer Cory to get equipment and ma
terial to the front, and then looked
around for a man to put on the fir
ing line.
There was no lack of engineering
talent that works with plans, log
rithms and blue prints, but the Col
orado was not waiting for prelimi-
nary surveys and complicated calcu-
lations of strains, stresses and pres
sures. Men who had built levees on
the Mississippi and acquired skill
reputation, declined to tackle the
job because there was neither time
nor available material for the con-
struction of the brush mattresses
that they deemed indispensable. En-
inent engineers from all parts of
the country looked at the great flood
flowing through it, and said it |
was physical impossibility to close
it. He sent for Clarence K. Clarke. |
engineer of the desert division of the
Southern Pacific, who for ten years !