Desert Land Dreams Turn to Dust
A failed irrigation scheme in Franklin County leaves thousands of acres of claims in limbo after a scathing government report.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
An adverse report has been made by the government as to the Glade High Line Canal company, a private irrigation project which contemplated the reclamation of some 50,000 acres of lands in Franklin county north of Pasco. There are a large number of desert land entrymen holding claims which it was hoped might ultimately be watered from the ditches of this concern who are directly affected by the decision of the General Land office. Many annual proofs of expenditures made by entrymen covering a period of nearly four years, based upon payments made to the company, have been nullified. The decision, signed by commissioner Clay Tallman, states: 'Unless the Glade High Line Canal company is reorganized with sufficient financial backing to insure the ultimate success of the project, there is absolutely no way by which the entrymen thereunder can ever secure water.' The report also notes the company's water rights are of doubtful validity and no rights of way were ever secured.
“Unless the Glade High Line Canal company is reorganized with sufficient financial backing... there is absolutely no way by which the entrymen thereunder can ever secure water.”
The struggle for water rights and the collapse of speculative irrigation schemes defined the development of the Tri-Cities. Today, that same land is highly productive through the Columbia Basin Project, but the 1914 collapse serves as a reminder of how vulnerable early settlers were to corporate exploitation under the Desert Land Act.
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