Farmers Build Their Own Dam in Record Time
After two grueling days of labor, local landowners successfully turn the Yakima River into their new irrigation canal.
Howard Amon and Lee Amsbury came down last night from Benton and are jubilant over the successful and rapid completion of their dam at the headgate of the Benton Water Co.'s canal. A gang of 30 men, all landowners under the ditch, went at the job with a grim determination that knows no failure. In two days they put in a dam 112 feet long, requiring 14,000 feet of lumber, working a good deal of the time under water. While the stress was on, they worked from 3 o'clock in the morning to 8 o'clock at night. So certain were they of the solidity of their ditch that a 10-inch flow was turned in with a rush. Howard Amon says there is sufficient water in the Yakima River to supply a dozen ditches yet and beyond the wing of their dam, in a depth of five feet, the current is still so swift and strong that no man can stand against it.
“A gang of 30 men, all landowners under the ditch, went at the job with a grim determination that knows no failure.”
The infrastructure built by early Kennewick farmers remains the lifeblood of the region. Today, the management of water rights in the arid Yakima River basin continues to be one of the most critical civic and legal arguments in Washington State.
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