1928

This week in 1928, the walls of the St. Francis Dam in San Francisquito Canyon near Saugus gave way, unleashing a 12 billion-gallon torrent that claimed more than 400 lives as it raced toward the Pacific Ocean. The failure of the dam, built to house water that the Los Angeles Aqueduct had begun carrying south from the Owens River 15 years earlier, ruined the reputation and spirit of its chief designer, William Mulholland. The dam, and Mulholland himself, are among the characters in Cedric Belfrage’s 1938 novel “Promised Land.” Another is Old Si, who leaves the Owens Valley, its greenness having been carried off to “the empire of Los Angeles,” in search of a new home. He finds it in San Francisquito Canyon, where “by man’s engineering genius,” his river has found a new home, too.

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A few adobe houses could be seen dotted about. In the distance, on the floor of the canyon, a herd of cows and some horses grazed. It was very quiet. A warm evening breeze stirred the chaparral. The mountains framing the scene faded into empurpled haze where the sun was setting. . . .

It wasn’t at all the same, it was artificial in a way, and yet this settlement in the canyon reminded Si of Owens Valley as it had been during his early years. That was funny, considering that it was just there, 250 miles away from Owens Valley, that it had been decided to imprison Si’s stolen river. . . .

The creek ran down past Old Si’s new place. It was only a trickle compared with what his lost river had been. Si liked to wander up and down listening to it tinkle as it ran down. But better he liked to get himself a ride on one of the lorries up to where the dam was slowly rearing its great pyramided wall. He lounged about up there, joking with the workmen or just looking at the dam. He looked at it and laughed, chewing on his pipe. That was where his river would soon be imprisoned. It would have come a long way, but so would he, and there they would be together again, he and his river.

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(Copyright Copyright 1938 by Cedric Belfrage (Gollancz). Printed by permission of Susan Bergholz Literary Services, New York. All rights reserved.)