The Sauk Centre herald., 1937-02-11
Flood Control
BY Clifford Pinchot
Copyright, 1887, The Washinton
Post.)

copyright, 1887, The Washinton
Post.)
published by RequesD
A flood is like an epidemic. The
time to stop it is before it begins.
Until now, however, we have
been, so to speak, providing hos
pitals to take care of the victims in
stead of establishing quarantines
to keep out the disease. We have
been bilding engineering works to
take care of the floods after they
occur and have done practically
nothing to prevent the floods from
occurring or to reduce their height
and destructiveness when they do
take place.
Levees and other engineering
works on the lower rivers are alb
solutely necessary, just as hospitals
are necessary. But a million flood
sufferers know today that such
engineering works are not enough.
We are like a man trying to
work with only one arm. The arm
we have not used is flood quaran-
tine at the headwaters. 1t win
take both arms to do this job, and
hard work at that.
rkkorquarters 1.-TWO FIX aoi Cd
American Floods Increasingly
Worse.
The history of floods in America
is proof positive that they are get
ting worse and worse. They are
worse not only because they are
higher, but because there are more
people to suffer and more property
to be destroyed. And the present
flood is the worst of all.
There were floods in this country
long before Columbus sailed the
ocean blue. And I suppose there
always will be floods, just as there
always were and always will be
accidents and diseases. But floods
like accidents and diseases, can be
| controlled and reduced. And the
time to do it is not after they
happen but before they begin.
Before we began to ravage ouI
natural resources, even in flood
time the streams ran fairly clear
| The soil was protected and kept
porous and absorbent by the forests
and the prairie sod. To all intents
and purposes there was no bare
ground at all, and so the enormous
mass of soil and sand, now carried
| by our rivers in flood, remained
| where nature put it.
Since then we have cut and
burned and cleared and plowed sc
! unwisely that we have laid our
soil upen to the little fingers OF
the rain, which for years have been
picking up and carrying away the
richness of our land.
And not only carrying it off from
where we need it, but making OF
| it a deadly weapon to destroy the
safety, wealth, and happiness of oul
people.
Billion Tons of Soil Washed Away
Annually.
Every ton of earth that is washed
into the tributaries of river ir
flood increases by just so much the
height and weight and fury of the
waters. And every year the rain
washes into our rivers, and oul
rivers carry to the sea, billion
tons of soil or more-eight tons
each year for every man, woman
and child in America.
These billion tons become files
and chisels and battering rams
driven by the power of the stream
Nobody knows how much they add
to the height or the damage Of the
flood.
But we do know that they cut
away the land, fill great dams with
silt and make them useless, cover
rich bottoms with barren sand
raise the level Of river beds and SO
increase the peaks of floods, and
must be dredged out of our rivers
| and harbors at the cost Of millions
every year. And in every flooded
house along the Ohio and the Mis-
| eiceipni the waters will leave a