The River Took the Whole Calispel Crop. Now the Farmers Want a Dike.
After backwater from the Pend Oreille drowned nearly every acre in the Calispel valley — a loss of $50,000 to $75,000 — landowners meet, hire a Spokane lawyer and move to organize a diking district under state law.
Residents of the Calispel valley, practically all of which is this year inundated by the back water of the Pend Oreille river, are taking steps to organize diking districts under the state laws for the purpose of protecting their lands against a recurrence of similar conditions.
Last year a considerable portion of the crops in the valley was lost through high water, and this year practically the whole crop is gone, entailing a loss of from $50,000 to $75,000. The water of this year was higher than at any time since 1894, but had it not been for the abnormal conditions brought about by the Montana floods, it is doubtful if much damage would have occurred.
However, the people realize the necessity of guarding against these conditions if they would bring their lands to the value and productiveness that the fertile soil of the valley makes possible.
A meeting was held last week, at which plans for diking the valley were discussed, and D. H. Atherton, of Cusick, was appointed to visit Spokane and secure legal advice as to the method of procedure for the forming of a diking district under the laws of the state. Mr. Atherton was in Spokane Saturday and secured the services of Attorney Jos. B. Lindsley, who will begin the necessary legal measures.
In this week's issue of The Miner there appears a lengthy article written by a resident of the valley, discussing the proposed plans and offering some suggestions. The Miner is pleased to chronicle the beginning of a movement looking toward the protection of the fertile lands of the valley, and will give space to similar discussions of the proposed diking schemes. That some such measures are absolutely necessary will be generally conceded, and it is well to thoroughly discuss the matter, to the end that no mistake be made in adopting a plan for the improvement.
“The water of this year was higher than at any time since 1894 … this year practically the whole crop is gone, entailing a loss of from $50,000 to $75,000.”
Two years of drowned hay ground were enough to push Calispel farmers into forming one of the state's earliest diking districts — a legal tool that still governs floodplain agriculture in Pend Oreille County more than a century later. Then as now, the argument was not whether the river would rise, but who would pay to hold it back.
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