WATER
Water is an absolute necessity to man, as much as the air he breathes or
the food he eats. Water comes to us in the form of rain or snow. We
usually think of it as unlimited, but we must come to think of it as a
resource that can be abused and wasted or made useful and profitable as
is the soil itself.
The amount of water is fixed and passes in an endless round from cloud
to river or land and back to the clouds again. The average yearly
rainfall of the United States is estimated at thirty inches, about forty
inches in the eastern half, an average of eighteen inches in the western
part, and in many places not more than ten or twelve inches. One inch of
rain would amount to nearly one hundred and one tons per acre, or on a
roof twenty feet long by twenty feet wide, one inch of rain would be two
hundred and fifty gallons. With a rainfall of forty inches, this would
amount to 10,000 gallons in a year, or an average, over every bit of
land twenty feet square, of twenty-seven gallons for every day in the
year. This is about the quantity that falls in the eastern part of the
United States.
It varies slightly from year to year, but there is no more--there is no
possible way of adding to it, though we may lessen it by allowing it to
rush out to sea, giving no service to the land. As the land waters
diminish the rainfall also grows less.
This two hundred trillions cubic feet of water which falls on our land
every year constitutes our entire water resource, is the source of all
our rivers and streams, of the moisture in the air, of our rains and
snows, and our water for plant and animal growth.
To understand how much this is, we may say that it is about equal to ten
times the amount of water that flows through the Mississippi River
system. The water of the Mississippi and its branches is nearly half of
all the water in the United States that flows through waterways to the
sea. This water that flows through our streams is sometimes called the
run-off. The run-off is increasing every year as we cut our forests and
cultivate our land. It is used for navigation, irrigation and power, but
the increase is not an advantage for these purposes as might be
supposed, because it comes in disastrous floods, tearing away dams,
ruining power sites, and not only preventing navigation during the flood
season, but by filling up the rivers and changing the channels, making
navigation difficult and dangerous throughout the year. The run-off is
controlled to some extent and may be brought under almost as complete
control as may be desired.
As much as the water of five or six Mississippis, or a little more than
half of our supply, is evaporated to moisten and temper the air, to fall
as rain or snow, or to form dews. This is sometimes called the fly-off,
and except for some changes caused by management of the land, is
entirely beyond control.
A part of the remainder sinks into the soil below the surface. A large
portion of this helps to cause the slow rock-decay that forms the soil,
and which is known as ground water. It is estimated that within the
first hundred feet below the surface of the earth there is a quantity of
water that has seeped down; and that would form, if it were collected, a
vast reservoir sixteen or seventeen feet in depth spreading over all the
3,000,000 square miles of the area of our country. This is equal to
about seven years' rainfall and is a very important part of our water
resources. In many places it forms into underground streams or lakes. It
feeds all the springs and many of the lakes. Our wells are dug or
drilled into this underground water system. It carries away the excess
of salts and mineral matter from the soil, the trees strike their roots
deep into the earth and draw from it, and last and most important of
all, that which sinks immediately below the surface supplies all our
plant growth. So that it is this last portion, that which sinks below
the ground, and which is sometimes termed the cut-off, amounting to
about one-tenth of all our water resource, or about the quantity that
flows through the Mississippi River system, that forms the really
important part.
On this depends all that makes a land habitable, the water for drinking
purposes and for plant and animal growth. On it depends the rate of
production of every acre of farm and forest land and the life of every
animal. Every full-grown man of one hundred and fifty pounds takes into
his system not less than a ton of water each year, and every bushel of
corn requires for its making fifteen or twenty tons of water.
Of the importance of this Professor Chamberlain says: "The key to the
problem of soil conservation lies in due control of the water that falls
on every acre. This water is an asset of great value. It should be
counted by every land owner as a possible value, saved if turned where
it will do good, lost if permitted to run away, doubly lost if it also
carries away the soil and does destructive work below."
The uses of rainfall are given thus:
A due portion should go through the soil to its bottom to promote rock
decay. Some of it should go into the underdrainage to carry away harmful
matter, another portion goes up to the surface carrying solutions needed
by the plants. A portion goes into the plants to nourish them, and still
another part runs off the surface, carrying away the worn-out parts of
the soil.
Crops can use to advantage all the rain that falls during the growing
season; and in most cases crops are all the better for all the water
that can be carried over from the winter. There are many local
exceptions, but in general crops are best when the soil can be made to
absorb as much of the rainfall and snowfall as possible. This also
causes the least possible amount of wash from the land.
Doctor N. J. McGee says: "Scarcely anywhere in the United States is the
rainfall excessive, that is, greater than is needed by growing plants,
living animals and men. Nearly everywhere it falls below this standard.
In the western part the average rainfall is only about eighteen inches;
in the extreme eastern part the fall averages forty-eight inches. In the
western part much of the land is unable to produce crops at all except
when artificially watered. The eastern part might produce more abundant
crops, develop greater industries and support a larger population with a
rainfall of sixty inches than it is able to do with a rainfall of
forty-eight inches." As may readily be seen, the fly-off can be
controlled only in a very small degree, by conserving the moisture that
is in the soil, and so preventing it from evaporating too rapidly.
The cut-off can be controlled to a considerable extent through forestry
and scientific farming and it is very important that the supply should
be as carefully conserved as possible.
But it is in the run-off that the great waste of water occurs, and also
that great saving is possible. It has been found by careful estimate
that from eighty-five per cent. to ninety-five per cent. of the water
that flows to the sea is wasted in freshets or destructive floods.
We are not accustomed to think of the water as wasted, since it seems
beyond our control, but as we are taking a careful account of stock, and
seeing how our forests, our fuels and our minerals are disappearing, and
our soil being carried out to sea by the rushing waters, it is well to
consider, also, whether this great resource may not be so used as to
benefit mankind in many ways and at the same time lessen the drain on
other resources.
The water of streams may be divided as to use into four great classes.
The most important is that used by cities for general supply, for
household and drinking purposes; next, that which is used for navigation
and the running of boats to carry commerce; third, that which is used
for artificial watering or irrigation, and lastly, that which is used
for power in manufacturing.
In the past, when water has been used it has seldom been employed for
more than one of these purposes, but as we come to understand more the
nature, value and possibilities of this great resource, we shall learn
to make the money spent for one of these lines of activity supply
several other needs.
As we study each of these separately we shall see this interrelation
among them.
The cities of the United States have expended $250,000,000 in waterworks
and nearly as much more in land for reservoirs, and for canals for
conveying the water from these reservoirs to the cities. The better
managed systems protect the drained lands from erosion by planting
forests or grass and the water is completely controlled, so that all the
water, even the storm overflow, is saved. There is very little waste in
these city water systems until it comes to the consumer, where, except
when it is sold through meters, the waste is often great.
The failure to provide the greatest good lies in the fact that the
water systems have been used for water supply only and have not been
made profitable in other ways. The drainage basins should be heavily
planted with trees, which will in time yield a large return, or with
hay, which can be marketed each year. Whenever possible, the canals
carrying the water supply should also be used to furnish power.
The city of Los Angeles, when it had a population of only 150,000,
undertook to provide pure water from a point two hundred and fifty miles
distant. To do so it must take on itself a debt of $23,000,000, a large
sum for a city ten times its size. Yet the people were ready to assume
this great burden to insure an unending supply of pure water, for they
realized that without it their city could not continue to grow. It was
not until the plans for piping water to the city were almost completed
that the value of the water-power along the route was realized. It has
been disposed of at a rate that pays ten per cent. interest on the debt
each year, and has made what seemed a dangerous risk, a profitable
business arrangement. All these other uses of water which are
profitable, help to lower the price of water to the users.
The matter of supreme importance in the water supply, however, is not
whether the water is cheap, but whether it is pure. If refuse from
factories is allowed to drain into a stream, the water becomes loaded
with poisonous chemicals, acids, or minerals. If city sewage or
barn-yards are allowed to drain into it, the germs of typhoid and other
fevers enter the water supply. To insure the purity of water supply from
a stream, no factory waste, city sewage or country refuse should be
allowed to enter any part of the stream. In addition to this it should
be carefully filtered.
The disposal of waste is a serious problem, and the easiest way is to
divert it into the nearest water course and trust to the old maxim,
"Running water purifies itself."
This, while true as a general fact, has so many exceptions that it is
not safe to trust to it. The Sanitary District Canal of Chicago has
proved positively that even the most heavily germ-laden water becomes
pure by running many miles at a regulated speed through the open
country, but the conditions are altogether different from those of an
ordinary river. First, in a river, sewage may enter at any point
down-stream to add to the germs already present in the water, while
nothing is allowed to enter the Drainage Canal after it leaves the city.
Second, some germs live for several days and may be carried many miles.
Only a microscopic test can prove whether water contains such germs.
Usually such tests are not made and water is used without people knowing
whether it is pure or not, but the water of the Sanitary Canal is tested
at many points to determine its purity. Each hour and each mile of its
journey it grows purer. This proves that although running water does
purify itself, a stream that is drained into all along its course is not
a fit source of water supply.
Factory refuse, instead of being allowed to pollute the waters, should
be turned to good use by extracting the chemicals, which form valuable
by-products. All farm waste should be taken to a remote part of the
farm, placed in an open shed or vat with cement floor and screened from
flies to form a compost heap for fertilizers for the farm. This will
amply repay the extra trouble and expense by increasing the farm crops.
The sooner such refuse, especially manure, is returned to the land, the
more valuable it is as a fertilizer.
In cities the sewage should be disposed of in such a way as to yield a
profit to the city, and also promote the health of the people. The
sewage of a city of 100,000 people is supposed to be worth, in Germany,
about $900,000 a year for fertilizer on account of the phosphorus it
contains. The city of Berlin operates large sewage farms, using as
laborers men condemned to the workhouse. The expense for land and sewer
system was $13,000,000, but it pays for the money invested, with $60,000
yearly profit over all expenses.
On the other hand the cost of impure water to the city of Pittsburg was
reckoned at $3,850,000, and in the city of Albany, New York, the annual
loss was estimated at $475,000.
In the early settlement of our country all towns were built on streams,
and the ones which grew and flourished were all on rivers large enough
to carry commerce by boat. After the invention of steamboats, daily
packet lines were run on all the principal rivers.
Albert Gallatin planned a complete system of improved waterways,
including many canals, that was intended to establish a great commercial
route. Many canals were built and put into actual operation and dozens
of others had been planned, when the building of railways began. This
new system of transportation at once became popular. Not only were no
more canals dug and no more steamboat lines built, but many of those
actually in operation were abandoned.
In order to encourage railroad building and develop new regions, the
government has given land and money to the extent of hundreds of
millions of dollars, until now the railroads form one-seventh of all our
national wealth, having 228,000 miles of tracks and earning
$2,500,000,000 each year, while the waterways owned by the government
have fallen into disuse.
Within the last four or five years another change has come about in the
general attitude toward the waterways. At the time that the crops are
moved in the fall, and when coal is needed for the winter supply, there
are not nearly enough cars in the country to handle the volume of
business, neither are there enough locomotives to move the necessary
cars, nor tracks, nor stations. In short, the railways are entirely
unable to handle the vast products of the country during the busiest
seasons. Many persons in the West have suffered for fuel, and commerce
has been greatly checked by the shortage; and the situation is growing
worse each year as production increases.
James J. Hill estimates that the cost of equipping the railroads to
carry the commerce of the country would be from five to eight billion
dollars. This means a heavy tax on iron and coal and timber as well as
on the labor resources of the country, and it would then be only a
question of time until still further extensions were needed.
With these facts in view, interest in the waterways of the country has
been revived.
It is estimated that it will require five hundred million dollars, or
fifty million dollars a year for ten years completely to improve the
waterways of the country. This is not more than one-tenth of what would
be needed to equip the railroads. The cost of carrying freight by rail
is from four to five times that of carrying it by water.
Much of the heavy freight of the country,--coal, iron, grain and
lumber,--should be carried in this way, in order to reduce freight rates
and so, indirectly, the cost to the people, and further to relieve the
burden on the railways.
The railways, it might be added, would still have a large and increasing
package-freight business, besides the handling of heavy freight in parts
of the country where there are no navigable rivers.
For these reasons it would seem clearly the only wise policy to adopt a
general plan for waterway improvement and carry it into effect at once.
But there are many things to be considered.
Millions of dollars (in all about five hundred and fifty-two millions)
have been spent for the improvement of waterways. Some of it has
resulted in great gain, but a large part of it has been wasted through
lack of an organized plan. Work has been begun and not enough money
appropriated to finish it. In the course of a few years much of the
value of the work is destroyed by the action of the current or by
shifting sands, or if a stretch of river is finished in the most
approved manner, often it is not used much, in some cases actually less
after than before the work was begun, and these things have created a
prejudice against waterway improvements.
The other reason is that in spite of the overcrowding of the railroads,
the traffic on many of our large rivers is steadily growing less. The
Inland Waterways Commission finds as a reason for the decrease, the
relations existing between the railways and the waterways. A railway,
they consider, has two classes of advantages. First, those that come
from natural conditions. A railroad line can be built in any direction
to any part of the country except the extremely mountainous parts, while
a river runs only in a single direction.
If a new region distant from a large water course is opened up, as is
being done rapidly in the West through irrigation and dry farming, the
people are entirely dependent on the railways to develop it, to bring
them all the conveniences of the outside world, and to carry the
products of their land to the market.
Branch lines and switches can be built to factories and warehouses,
while boats can reach only those situated along the water-front.
Another advantage of the railroads is that they bill freight all the way
through, and that freight is much more easily transferred from one road
to another. It is much more difficult and expensive to load and reload
freight from boats and barges on account of the high and low water
stages of the river. This difference amounts to as much as sixty feet in
the Ohio River at Cincinnati. Railways make faster time, and the
distance between two points is usually shorter, though sometimes during
the busy season of the railways the river freight reaches its
destination much sooner.
The other class of reasons relates to the railways themselves, which
have always been in open competition with the waterways, and to gain
traffic for themselves, usually charge lower rates to those points to
which boats also carry freight. In many cases they have bought the
steamboat lines so that rates might be kept up, and then, unable to
operate the two lines as cheaply as one, have abandoned the steamboat
lines.
Another method by which the railroads have driven out the water traffic,
is by charging extremely heavy rates for freight hauled a short distance
to or from boats, making it quite as cheap as well as more convenient to
send freight all the way by rail.
Lastly, railroad warehouses, terminals and machinery for handling
freight are all much better than those of inland steamboat lines, except
at some points on the Great Lakes where the traffic is very heavy.
Some of these disadvantages might be overcome by law. In France, where
the waterways are managed better than in any other country, the law
requires that railroad rates be twenty per cent. higher on all heavy
freight than the rates on the same freight if carried by water, and in
several countries railroad companies are not permitted to own or manage
a steamboat line.
These measures are suggestive of what may be done by law to correct
abuses, but laws alone can not accomplish everything. The rivers belong
to all the people, and every one who wishes may operate steamboat or
barge lines, but before these can become profitable, and before first
class warehouses and machinery are installed, there must appear on the
part of the people a desire to patronize them. The best results are
found in those cases where there is harmony between the railways and the
steamboat lines; those in which the steamboat lines relieve the railways
of much of the heavy freight which they are not able to handle without
greatly increasing their present equipment.
There should be coöperation on the part of the people. The towns and
cities along the banks of many European rivers provide suitable
terminals, warehouses and wharves with free use of the service. In other
cases this is done by private capital with a charge for use to shippers.
Sometimes it is done by the steamboat companies themselves, but unless
one or the other method is assured all along the river it is not wise
for the government to undertake the improvement of a stream.
Intelligent improvement of the waterways of the United States demands
first that a careful survey of the needs of the whole country be made,
then that a systematic plan be carried out providing for the improvement
of important streams first.
The state and nation should work together, and any work that is begun
should be completed as promptly as possible so that its full benefit may
be realized.
Certain work, such as the improvement of the channel, should be done by
the national government, since the waters belong to the nation; but the
expense of constructing levees or dykes should be borne by the land
owners along the banks, because the land thus protected is greatly
increased in value; or by the state, which gets the return in increased
taxes.
In many instances, the improvement of a stream would be a great benefit
to one state or part of a state, but it would be impossible in many
years to improve all the desirable streams, so that the larger ones of
most general importance must be considered first.
In such cases the improvement is often undertaken by the state. Some
navigable rivers have been thus improved and many canals are the
property of states or of private companies.
Only a few rivers have a steady flow throughout the year at a depth
sufficient to carry large boats. On most streams destructive floods at
certain seasons and low waters at others interfere with navigation
during a considerable part of the year. Most rivers have sand-bars,
sunken rocks or logs in the channel, making the passage of boats
difficult and dangerous. Others are well suited for navigation, except
at points where rapids and falls make it impossible for boats to pass.
The Ohio, the Tennessee, the Missouri and the upper Mississippi abound
in such dangerous places and these should be canalized. It is the
improving of rivers in these ways, dredging harbors to make them safer,
and digging canals to provide a short passage between two bodies of
water, that constitute what is known as the Improvement of Inland
Waters.
If you look at a map showing the navigable streams of the United States
you will see that nearly all of them lie in the eastern part.
The Mississippi is like a great artery with branches extending in all
directions, east and west. The Great Lakes, with their outlet, the St.
Lawrence River, and the many important rivers emptying into the Atlantic
Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, such as the Merrimac, Hudson, Delaware,
Susquehanna, Potomac and Rio Grande, form great highways for all the
commerce of the eastern part of the country, while the Columbia,
Sacramento and Colorado Rivers, with their branches, are the only
navigable streams of any importance west of the Mississippi River
system.
In some places a small portion of land divides two important water
areas, and canals dug through this neck of land change the commercial
routes of the whole world. Such are the Isthmus of Suez, eighty-seven
miles wide, through which a canal was cut that saves a sailing distance
of 3,700 miles from England to India. Only the Isthmus of Panama,
forty-nine miles in width, divides the Atlantic from the Pacific Ocean.
When the canal across this narrow strip is completed, the sailing
distance from New York to San Francisco will be shortened 8,000 miles,
the entire distance around South America.
The Sault Ste. Marie Canal, connecting Lakes Superior and Huron, is only
a little more than a mile and a half long, but it opens up the entire
iron, copper, lumber and wheat resources of the Northwest to cheap water
passage through the other lakes to the manufacturing region of the East.
The Erie Canal, by connecting Lake Erie with the Hudson River from
Buffalo to Albany, New York, makes the only water passage from the Great
Lakes to the ocean that lies within the borders of the United States.
If you will turn to the map again, you will see still other places where
a short canal may open up an entirely new and important water route.
From Chicago to Lockport, Illinois, is only thirty-seven miles, but
Chicago is on Lake Michigan, while Lockport is on the Illinois River, a
branch of the Mississippi. This canal, a large part of which is now in
operation, is a part of the Lakes to Gulf waterway. One plan is to
broaden and deepen the channel so that large vessels may pass, without
unloading, from the Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico.
Another proposed canal which would be undertaken largely by individual
states and a part of which is already completed, would afford a safe
inside passage connecting the many bays, channels and navigable rivers
of the Atlantic coast.
Still another proposed measure is the cutting of a canal from the
southern end of Lake Michigan to the western end of Lake Erie at Toledo,
Ohio, to avoid the long haul up Lake Michigan and down Lake Huron again.
The United States now has 25,000 miles of navigable rivers and a nearly
equal mileage of rivers not now navigable but which might be made
commercially important; five great lakes that have a combined length of
1,410 miles, 2,120 miles of operated canals, and 2,500 miles of sounds,
bays and bayous, that might be joined by tidewater canals easily
constructed, less than 1,000 miles long altogether, and making a
continuous passage from New England to the Gulf of Mexico.
In all, our waterways at the present time are 55,000 to 60,000 miles
long, the greatest system in the world, but almost unused.
The most important waterway improvement so far completed, is the Sault
Ste. Marie, or the "Soo" canal which cost $96,000,000. A depth of eight
feet was increased to twenty-one feet. The traffic has risen in sixteen
years from a million and a quarter tons to forty-one and a quarter
million tons.
A large proportion of the United States is not naturally fitted to be
the home of man; at least, it is not fitted to produce his food, and
except on the lofty mountains the reason for this will almost always be
found to be either a lack or an excess of water.
In some parts of the country, there is, as we have seen, little
rainfall. These arid or semi-arid lands must be provided with water for
drinking purposes and for agriculture. The diverting of water courses
into canals and ditches so that water can be carried to these waste
lands is called irrigation.
In other parts of the country where rains are abundant, serious floods
occur every year, often many times in a year. Thousands of acres of
land thus subject to overflow are lost to use. The holding back of these
flood waters in the upper part of the rivers, and so preventing these
overflows, is termed storage of waters.
In still other regions the rainfall is abundant, and the land low-lying.
Large areas are always covered with water. Such lands are called swamps
or bogs, and when drained, they become the richest of agricultural
lands. Irrigation, storage and drainage are the three methods employed
to make waste lands valuable and useful. The land is saved or reclaimed,
so all these methods of balancing and distributing the water supply are
called reclamation.
In general it may be said that irrigation is more generally needed in
the West, storage of flood waters in the central and eastern states, and
drainage in the South.
By thus distributing the rainfall, hundreds of millions of acres have
been or may be reclaimed, and large regions, formerly unfit to inhabit,
have been turned into profitable farms. Three-fourths of one per cent.
of our total rainfall, or two per cent. of all that falls in the West,
is used for irrigating 13,000,000 acres.
There are several methods of irrigation which are adapted to different
regions and different crops. The rice fields of South Carolina,
Georgia, Louisiana and Texas are irrigated by allowing the land to
remain continually flooded to a depth of several inches. When the
irrigation season is over the levees are opened, and the water runs off
rapidly, and the crop is soon ready to be harvested. Tidal rivers are
used to supply water in most cases, but in Texas many flowing wells are
employed for irrigation.
In Florida, where irrigation is used largely for intensive farming,
various means are employed, some of which are also used in the western
and southwestern states. Mechanical pumps, operated by turbine wheels,
pump the water from the rivers if a lift be required. Sometimes the
water is pumped direct to the fields in iron pipes and applied by means
of hydrants and hose, as in a city water system.
Overhead pipe lines are now recognized as the most perfect and
satisfactory form of artificial watering. Two-inch pipes are run over
frames several feet in height. These are arranged in parallel lines all
over the fields about forty feet apart. At intervals of forty feet, a
small iron pipe, ending with a fine spraying attachment, extends upward.
The water is turned on in the evening and comes out of the sprayer in a
fine mist and falls upon the plants like a gentle rain.
By another form of irrigation, the fields are divided at regular
intervals by wide wooden troughs from which water is directed between
the rows of plants. Main canals leading from the streams and intersected
by short canals extend in all directions through the fields and
orchards, and are distributed in various ways. This system is in general
use throughout the arid portions of the West. The methods are said to be
the most scientific and varied in southern California.
When water for irrigation is supplied from wells some underground system
is generally used. One common method is to lay continuous pipes from the
wells all over the fields and distribute from hydrants, plugs and
standpipes.
By still another system, the water is carried below the surface through
pipes which are broken every few inches and laid in beds of charcoal.
In the eastern states irrigation is only employed in dry weather to
increase the yield of vegetable crops. In the arid western region it
transforms what would otherwise be a dreary desert into fertile valleys.
William J. Bryan, speaking at the first Conservation Congress, said,
"Last September, I visited the southern part of Idaho and saw there a
tract that has been recently reclaimed. I had been there before. I had
looked upon these lands as so barren that it seemed as if it were
impossible that they could ever be made useful.
"When I went back this time and found that in three years 1,700,000
acres of land had been reclaimed, that where three years ago nothing but
sage-brush grew, they are now raising seven tons of alfalfa to the acre,
and more than a hundred bushels of oats; when I found that ten thousand
people are living on that tract, that in one town that has grown up in
that time there are more than 1,900 inhabitants, and in three banks they
had deposits of over half a million dollars, I had some realization of
the magic power of water when applied to these desert lands."
The same thing might be said of other regions throughout the West. In
the Salton district of California a marvelous change has been brought
about by irrigation. A few years ago that was one of the most desolate
and forbidding regions on our continent. Now it is covered with several
thousands of acres of alfalfa and other crops, and it bids fair to be a
great fruit region. Of southern California it is said, "The irrigation
systems of this part of the state are known all over the world, and have
created a prosperous commonwealth in a region which would be a scene of
utter desolation without them."
This locality presents a better opportunity for the scientific study of
farming by irrigation than exists anywhere else in the world. Here all
land values depend directly on ability to obtain a water supply. So
precious is the water and so abundant are the rewards that follow its
application to the soil that the most careful consideration is given to
the various sources of supply and distribution.
As land becomes scarcer and the cost of living greater on account of the
increase in population, men are turning more and more to irrigation to
solve the problem of food supply.
As showing what may be accomplished by irrigation, the report of the
last census says: "The construction of large irrigation works on the
Platte, Yellowstone and Arkansas Rivers would render fertile an area
equal to that of some eastern states. Engineers are grappling with the
great problems of conserving the flood waters of these streams, which
now are wasted and help to increase the destructive floods of the
Mississippi. The solving of these problems will change a vast area of
country, now practically worthless, into valuable farms."
The "Great Bend" country, drained by the Columbia River, contains
several million acres of land which only requires water to make it of
great agricultural value.
The Gila River basin contains more than 10,000,000 acres of fertile
land, capable of producing immense crops if irrigated, but without
irrigation it is a desert land where only sage-brush and cactus
flourish.
From arid lands capable of producing excellent crops but lacking in the
magical element of water, we pass to the consideration of lands where
the richest of soils are shut off from productiveness because they are
covered with water. On the lower Mississippi the soil is richer than in
any other part of the United States, but much of it is overflowed so
frequently that it is unfit for cultivation. Dykes and levees have
reclaimed thousands of acres of such overflow land. Many states control
large marshy sections that have been or may be reclaimed.
In southern Florida lie the Everglades, a vast country which has been
worse than valueless; a malarial region abounding in alligators,
rattlesnakes, scorpions and other dangerous animals and insects. The
state of Florida has undertaken the work of draining this great swamp,
and when the task is completed, Florida will have added to its resources
3,000,000 acres of the richest soil for the raising of winter vegetables
and fruits.
Florida is engaged in another great project--the digging of an inside
passage connecting its inland tidal waters by a canal system which will
open to navigation a continuous inland waterway six hundred miles in
length. In digging these canals through the marshes bordering the
coast, thousands of acres of exceedingly fertile land have been
reclaimed and are now producing valuable crops.
The Kankakee marshes in Indiana have been drained, adding many thousands
of acres of rich soil to the agricultural area of the state.
In all, about 80,000,000 acres are so wet that they must be drained in
order to make them produce good farm crops, but which, while now covered
only with marsh grass or undergrowth, is capable of being made the most
fertile of all land.
This swamp land is ten times the area of Holland, which supports a
population of 5,000,000 people. It is therefore easy to see how greatly
we may add to our productive territory and our national wealth by
reclamation through drainage.
We now come to the use of water as power; and although in the last fifty
years this subject has received little attention, as manufacturing
increases and as fuel decreases and becomes higher, the value of water
becomes more evident, and water-power sites are being eagerly sought.
Our age may come to be known in the future as the age of power, because
through the application of mechanical power man has gained such
marvelous control over the world about him. Wind and water led in the
production of power until about 1870, since which time they have
scarcely increased at all, the greater advantages of steam and
electricity having driven them out.
As long as all factories had to be built by the side of streams having
suitable water-power, the number and size of factories were always
extremely limited. With the introduction of steam it became possible to
build factories at mines, in forests, in fruit or grain regions,
wherever the supply of raw material was plentiful, and to multiply
factories of all kinds in cities near the markets for their product, or
where labor was cheap and abundant. But power could only be used where
it was developed, and the size of the power plant depended on the amount
of business done by each individual user.
Now a new era of power has again enlarged the possibilities of
manufacturing. By means of electricity the work, not only of factories,
but also of the home and the farm may be done in any place where
electricity can be installed. We must bear in mind that electricity is
never a source of power, but is only the agent that carries power to the
user. The source of all electric power is either steam or water,
produced by water-wheels, turbines, steam-engines or gas-engines. The
economical way to furnish electric power is to establish central power
plants, and electricity may be conveyed from them for many miles. An
electric railway, telegraph, or telephone system many miles in length
is operated from a single power plant. Electric light and power are
transmitted all over the largest cities. It is no longer necessary that
a factory be of any specified size nor that it have any waste power. If
it be within reach of the electrical current it may use as much or as
little as is needed.
The cheapness of electric power must always depend on nearness to the
source of supply or to the market. Until a short time ago it was
customary to locate electric power-houses near the market, that is, in
cities. But the benefits to be derived from having the electric plant
near the source of power, so that the cost of production is greatly
lessened, are becoming better recognized. This will make water-power
increasingly valuable.
It is even now practicable to develop water-power, wherever located, for
the production of electricity. Although the lowest grade coals are used
for electric power at the mines yet they can now be used for still other
purposes. Coal or other fuel once used can not be replaced, but when
electricity is derived from water-power only energy otherwise wasted is
used. This energy, if derived from water-power, is all added to our
assets instead of being lost.
For many years the amount of power used for manufacturing and other
purposes has doubled about once in ten years, and the steady pace kept
by different lines of development shows how closely they are related.
Our power, our forest cut, the use of our iron and other minerals, our
coal and petroleum, the railroad earnings, freight and passenger
traffic, and our agricultural products all double themselves every ten
years. This means that in ten years we shall require twice as much power
as now, but will have far less coal to use. This raises the
question,--have we available water-power to conserve our coal supply?
Let us see. It is estimated that we are now using 26,000,000 horse-power
of energy derived from steam, 3,000,000 horse-power derived from water,
and 800,000 from gas or oil, a total of 29,800,000 horse-power. It is
also estimated that there is now running idly over dams, falls, and
rapids 30,000,000 horse-power of energy. In other words, we are wasting
every day enough water to run every factory and mill, and to turn every
wheel, to move every electric car and to supply every electric light or
power-station in the country.
The amount of water-power is gauged solely by the low-water stage of the
stream. A river is considered to produce only as much power as it can
furnish at its season of lowest water. At other times factories may be
operated more actively, but usually most of the extra power is wasted
during a large part of the year.
If these storm or flood waters can be stored in reservoirs, the
stream-flow throughout the year can be made fairly uniform and the power
possibilities greatly increased. The Geological Survey believes that by
storing the flood waters and regulating the flow of the streams, the
large rivers of the United States may be made to furnish 150,000,000
horse-power, enough, if it could be utilized, to supply every power need
of our country for many years to come without using a ton of our coal,
and without in any way decreasing the water.
Of course this can never be practicable. Much power will always be
needed where no stream for power is available. But the lesson is plain
that where water can be used it should be, both in order to save the
coal and because it can be produced more cheaply. The 30,000,000
horse-power now available, if produced in our most modern electric
plants, would require the burning of nearly 225,000,000 tons of coal,
and if in the average plant run by steam-engines, more than 650,000,000
tons of coal, which is fifty per cent. more than all the coal that is
now produced in this country. At three dollars per ton it would cost
$2,000,000,000 a year to supply the coal to furnish the power that we
might have, one might almost say, as a by-product from the improving of
the rivers for navigation. The development of the water-power
possibilities of the country is now going forward at a rapid rate,
however.
Dams on the Susquehanna River will soon make 30,000 horse-power
available, which could be increased to 200,000 by building storage
reservoirs.
A dam just begun at the rapids of the Mississippi River at Keokuk, Iowa,
will, when completed, furnish 200,000 horse-power. Niagara is producing
56,000 horse-power on the United States side. The Muscle Shoals Falls
rapids in the Tennessee River is furnishing 188,000 horse-power.
Illinois will greatly increase its possibilities for offering cheap
power to factories, when the Lakes to Gulf Canal with 173,000,000
horse-power worth $12,750,000 yearly, and the Chicago Drainage or
Sanitary Canal, which has nearly 60,000 horse-power, are complete. Both
of these projects were undertaken by the state.
In California 250,000 horse-power is now in operation, and 5,000,000
horse-power might easily be developed in that state alone, which at the
price of coal would be worth a billion dollars a year.
New England has the oldest system of water-power control, because before
the era of steam it was the chief manufacturing region of the country.
The Merrimac, flowing through New Hampshire and Massachusetts, is the
most carefully conserved river in the world, and Governor Dingley of
Maine said that the water-power of Maine is equal to the working energy
of 13,000,000 men.
The money value is counted at twenty dollars a year per horse power, but
it frequently brings as high as one hundred or even one hundred and
fifty dollars a year in a good manufacturing region, so that the value
of our water-power facilities can hardly be computed.
An ideal picture of the harmonious development of our water resources
for all purposes is one that is not too difficult to realize. It is the
ideal that should be always before us in the improvement of our
waterways, and we should bear in mind that although the expense will be
heavy, it will not cost more than one-tenth as much to improve all the
important waterways as to equip the railways to carry the traffic they
will be called on to carry in the next ten years; and also that in the
past, for every dollar that has been spent on waterways, almost
twenty-five dollars has been spent on railways. The railways are a great
and important part of our national development, but the waterways should
not be neglected. Rather, the two should be so harmonized and adjusted
as to make one great commercial system that will furnish cheap and
abundant transportation for all our commerce.
The most complete plan for conserving our waters is as follows: First,
build storage reservoirs along the upper stretches of the river to hold
the overflow waters of the flood season which are to be turned into the
main channel when the water becomes too low for ordinary navigation.
These storage reservoirs should be on the lowest grade of land, that
which would be least productive. The reservoirs should be well stocked
with the best varieties of fish to make them profitable. The banks
should be planted with forest trees and made as attractive as they can
be made to form public parks and pleasure grounds for the people, where
boating, fishing and bathing may be enjoyed.
The next point is to remove all obstructions from the river, to canalize
it at shallow places or rapids, so that the whole river will be
navigable, and, if necessary, to deepen the channel so that it will
carry large vessels between two important points.
Dams should be built to take advantage of every opportunity for
water-power. One of the worst mistakes in the past has been the failure
to use the power that might have been developed in improving the streams
for navigation.
Rivers should be made profitable still further by stocking with fish and
should be kept clear of factory refuse and sewage. Soil-wash should be
lessened by planting trees and shrubs along the banks; and where
overflow or erosion lowers the value of the land or repeatedly ruins the
crops, dykes and levees should be built.
The rivers most important commercially should be improved first. Canals
should be cut between waterways where large benefits will result;
overflow and swamp land should be drained, and in arid regions every
particle of water conserved for irrigation purposes.
The irrigation canals may also be used to supply water-power, and the
canals may be used as are other canals for towing barges. If electric
power is produced, electric towing is cheap and very desirable as a
means of transportation.
In short, our water supply should be as carefully used and with as
little waste as the land of forests. The most important improvements
needed are, a Lakes to Gulf Waterway that shall be safe and practicable
at least for vessels of moderate size; the improvement of the Ohio,
Missouri, Tennessee and Upper Mississippi Rivers; an inner coast passage
from New England to Florida, and in navigable rivers dredging and
deepening if necessary, to make many outlets to the sea which will
afford cheap transportation.
In the West, the Columbia, San Joaquin and Sacramento Rivers with their
branches should be made navigable. Many western rivers have been almost
ruined by filling with rocks in hydraulic mining, but this is now
prohibited by law and if the channels were cleared they would again
become navigable.
Appropriations for much of this work have already been made by Congress,
but the work is not systematically planned. The cost of all of it would
be about sixty-two and a half cents a year for each man, woman and child
in the country and every one would receive some benefit.
The National Conservation Commission on Waterways found that the average
family pays for transportation or freight on all its food and clothing
and the necessities of life, nearly or quite one-third their actual
cost. "It is estimated that the direct benefits would be a yearly saving
in freight handling of $250,000,000, a yearly saving in flood damage of
$150,000,000, a saving in forest fires of at least $25,000,000, a
benefit through cheapened power of fully $75,000,000 and a yearly saving
in farm production of $500,000,000; a total of $1,000,000,000, or twelve
dollars and fifty cents for each person--twenty times the cost! And this
does not take into account the benefits from irrigation, drainage, and
the lessening of disease by a pure water supply."
REFERENCES
Waters. Report of the National Conservation Commission.
Report of Inland Waterways Commission, 1908.
American Inland Waterways. H. Quick.
Waterways and Water Transportation. J. S. Jeans.
Waterway Transportation in Europe. L. G. McPherson.
Highways of Progress. J. J. Hill.
Navigation Resources of the United States. (Johnson.) Report, Governor's
Conference.
Conservation of Power Resources. (H. St. Clair Putnam.) Report,
Governor's Conference.
Florida's Waterways. (Miles.) Report, Governor's Conference.
Our Water Resources. (Lyman Cooley.) Report, Governor's Conference.
The Lakes-to-Gulf Waterway. (Randolph.) Report, Governor's Conference.
Water Resources. (Kummel.) Report, Governor's Conference.
Necessity for Waterway Improvement. (Austin.) Report, Governor's
Conference.
Report Congressional Committee on European Waterways. Senate Document,
1910.
River and Harbor Bill. Senate Document. Burton, 1910.
Forests, Water Storage, Power and Navigation. (Taylor.) Proceedings of
the Am. Hydrochemical Society.
Our Inland Waterways. (McGee.)
Outlines of Hydrology. (McGee.)
Natural Movement of Water in Semi-arid Regions. (McGee.)
Irrigation in the United States. Dept. Commerce and Labor Census Bureau.
Irrigation Projects of the U. S. Reclamation Service.
Reports of Irrigation in various states. Apply to Governor.