Imperial (215 page)

Alice Woodside’s memory of her father’s alkali dread, and Edith Karpen’s subsequent remarks on the city of Imperial—Based on an interview in January 2004.

Experiment results at Imperial Valley Field Station; salinity of the Colorado River in 1975—
California Farmer
, January 4, 1975, p. 1 (“Irrigating with salty water”).

Phil Swing: “God in his infinite wisdom . . .”—Senate Committee on the Colorado River Basin (1925), p. 190.

The 1944 treaty and Minute 242—104th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Calendar No. 46, report no. 104-24, “Control of Salinity Upsteam [
sic
] of Imperial Dam, April 3 (legislative day, March 27, 1995).

Increasing salinity of Mexican water; TDS of Wellton-Mohawk water and result at Morelos—Munguía, pp. 78, 89 (Gerardo Garcia Saillé, Ángel López López and J. A. Navarro Urbina).

Footnote on same: The 2 Coachella wells—USDA Yearbook (1955), p. 321 (Milton Fireman and H. E. Hayward, “Irrigation Water and Saline and Alkaline Soils”).

TDS (total dissolved solids) figures in Upper Colorado and the Colorado at the Mexican line—Committee on Irrigation-Induced Water Quality Problems, p. 40.

“The major problem affecting California agriculture . . .”—Diamond, p. 502. Mares,
Encyclopedia of Deserts
(1999), p. 494, entry on salinization: “About 25 percent of irrigated soils in the western United States are affected by salinization to the point where crop yields are reduced. Globally 25-30 percent of irrigated soils in arid regions are salinized. Human-induced soil salinization is usually the result of applying excessive amounts of water to irrigated lands and raising water tables. Evaporation of groundwater concentrates the salts that are always present in soils . . .”

Yolanda Sánchez Ogás—Interviewed in Mexicali, 2003. Terrie Petree interpreted.

Amounts of water bypassed at Morelos, and the water consultant’s opinions of that—ICHSPM, document cat. #A84.48.1, William E. Warne, Water Resources Consultant, Sacramento, California, “The Stormy Past and Clouded Future of Desalting in the Colorado River Basin,” repr. from
WSIA Journal
, July 1984. Pp. 1-2, 11.

142 . Subdelineations: Poisonscapes (1888 -2003)

Epigraph: “That is Imperial Valley . . .”—Imperial Valley Directory (1952), p. 320.

“The function of the State Board of Health . . .”—California State Archives. Margaret C. Felts papers. Box 1. Koebig, answer to Goudy (cited in full in the source notes to “Los Angeles [1925]”), p. 8.

City of Los Angeles: “final plans for grease skimming tanks should now be made . . .”—California State Archives. Margaret C. Felts papers. Box 1. Loose typescript. City of Los Angeles, Annual Report, 1929-30, p. 38.

The “pretty graph” of area, population and sewer mileage—Ibid., p. 45.

“We take it as a matter of course nowadays that plumbing has passed for a luxury.”—Felts papers. Box 1. State of California. Department of Public Health. Bureau of Sanitary Engineering. C. G. Gillespie, Chief, Bureau of Sanitary Engineering.
The Sewage Situation in California
(prepared April 22, 1929, for the School of Public Administration, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California), p. 1.

Annual acre-feet of sewage into ocean from Los Angeles and Orange counties—Felts papers. Box 1. A. H. Koebig, Charles Kirby Fox, Arthur W. Cory, November 15, 1930, letter to the President and Directors of the Southwest Water League, p. 2.

“A SURVEY OF SEWAGE DISPOSAL IN CALIFORNIA . . .”—Felts papers. Op. cit., unnumbered p. 29.

“There are no set standards of sewage disposal.”—Ibid., p. 18.

“The arrangement is essentially contractual . . .” and “embrace thirteen cities entirely . . .”—Ibid., p. 5.

“Canneries, milk-plants . . .” and “run their cannery wastes, raw . . .”—Ibid., p. 15.

“In some respects a stream is like a woman . . .”—
California Farmer
, January 4, 1975 (vol. info no longer given), page before p. 1, “The reality of natural resource use,” quoting “an editorial written in Georgia.”

Outfall sewer of El Centro and Imperial, 1916—Farr, p. 280 (Edgar F. Howe, “El Centro”).

“Chollas Creek is a heavily urbanized watershed tributary . . .”—At
www.dgs.ca.gov
\contracts (?). Printout is incomplete. But this website was generated by the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board, CWA Section 205(j) Grant Program, January 20, 2000.

“There are also instances of trouble . . .”—Felts papers. Box 1. Gillespie report, loc. cit.

Pollution caused by the Arrowhead manufactured-gas plant—Felts papers. Box 12: “Pollution Files. Manu. Gas Plants; Water Quality. Dept of Water & Power (L.A.) 1881-1943.” Loc.: B4384. Folder: “1/1/1881: San Bernardino. manufactured gas plant. Pollution docs, Felts files.” Undated 6-page typescript: “San Bernardino (Arrowhead Site Summary)” evidently a legal document. In margin: “Troop Meisinger Steuber & Paisch, LLP,” Los Angeles.

Footnote:
Appletons’ Annual Cyclopaedia
on petroleum-producing states—1892 ed., p. 72, entry on California. The 1902
Cyclopaedia
informs us (p. 700, entry for United States of America [California]) that in that year there were 2,152 producing oil wells in California, making 13,692,514 barrels of black gold.

Pollution caused by the Riverside manufactured-gas plant—Felts papers. Same box. Folder: “1/1/1888: Riverside manufactured gas plant. Pollution docs, Felts files.” Undated 3-page typescript: “Riverside Site Summary,” evidently a legal document. In margin: “Troop Meisinger Steuber & Paisch, LLP,” Los Angeles.

Pollution caused by the Long Beach, Colton, Los Angeles and Santa Ana manufactured-gas plants—Same box, counterpart legal site summaries.

“In order that the matter of water pollution . . . be handled under one uniform plan . . .”—Felts papers. Box 12: Folder: “1916 POLLUTION.” Circular letter #2079, on letterhead of State of California, Fish and Game Commission, dated at San Francisco, June 7, 1916, to Mr. Scofield, from the Executive Officer, whose name is appropriately illegible.

“FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE” (1927)—Felts papers. Box 12: Folder: “1927 POLLUTION.” “FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.” 2-page typescript.

“My dear Mr. Page: . . . ”—Felts papers. Same folder. Letter from the Director (who in this file copy didn’t give his name, but is probably J. Spencer), Bureau of Hydraulics, Natural Resources Division, Fish & Game Division, to Mr. A. G. Page, Manager of Refineries, Union Oil Co., Los Angeles; San Francisco, September 27, 1927.

“Taking the liberty of again calling this to your attention.”—Felts papers. Same folder. Letter from the Director (again nameless, and again probably J. Spencer), Bureau of Hydraulics, Natural Resources Division, Fish & Game Division, to Mr. William Groundwater, Manager of Transportation at the Union Oil Building, dated at San Francisco, October 10, 1927.

Almost a hundred oil companies in Huntington Beach receive injunctions for oil pollution—Information from Felts papers. Same folder. “FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.” Probably a Fish & Game press release, 1927.

Shell’s reassurance about Wilmington Refinery—Felts papers. Same folder. Letter on Shell Company of California letterhead, dated at San Francisco, August 2, 1929, to Mr. Spencer at the Fish & Game Commission.

“The matter of Federal interference by the U.S. Public Health Service . . .”—California State Archives. Margaret C. Felts papers. Box 17: “Pollution Files. Misc. Docs 1950s-1980s.” Loc: B4386. Loose typescript. Department of Water and Power. For Intradepartmental Use Only. Sanitary Engineering Division. December 9, 1954. To Mr. Burton S. Grant, Chief Engineer of Water Works and Assistant manager, BUILDI N G. From Ray L. Derby, Principal Sanitary Engineer.

Department of the Interior: “The general objective is maintenance of a minimum dissolved-oxygen content . . .”—Department of the Interior. U.S. Geological Survey (1963), p. 88.

Edith Karpen’s memories of the New River—Interview of January 2004.

Richard Brogan—Interviewed in Calexico, April 2004.

Fortune
’s assertion—March 1950, p. 115 (Lawrence Lessing, “The Chemical Century”).

Gifford Price’s DDT cost—California State Archives. Department of Food and Agriculture. Bureau of Marketing. Marketing-order files, Box 4. State of California, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets hearing on proposed marketing order for desert-area green corn. Tuesday, March 18, 1954, 10:00 o’clock, a.m., Coachella Valley Water District Building. P. 53.

Lockheed: “Wastes from certain processes, such as degreasing and chemical milling . . .”—California State Archives. Margaret C. Felts papers. Box 1
Master Plan for USAF Plant 14
(cited in detail in notes to “Los Angeles [1925]”), p. 77.

Characteristics and disposition of southern California wastes, 1966—Lilliard, p. 132.

Information on pesticides and nematicides in California groundwater, 1985—California State Archives. Margaret C. Felts papers. Box 17: “Pollution Files. Misc. Docs 1950s-1980s.” Loc: B4386. Folder “1/1/85. Ground Water Contamination . . .” David B. Cohen, Ph.D., Chief, Pollutant Investigations Branch, State Water Resources Control Board, “Ground Water Contamination by Toxic Substances: A California Assessment.” Pp. 20, 3, 15 (footnote), 18, 1, 4, 2, 23, 29.

Dr. Thomas H. Horiagon: “Probably a combination of factors, culture, genetics and environment”—
Imperial Valley Weekly
, vol. 98, no. 13 (Thursday, March 27, 2003), p. 1 (“New Doctor at ECRMC to Help Fight Pulmonary Disease in Imperial Valley”).

The Mexican private detective—Señor A. See the chapter “The
Maquiladora
.” His name is on file at the California State Archives.

“We are approaching the point where toxic pollution . . .”—Felts papers. Box 17, op. cit., p. 5.

Advertisement for “Black Leaf 40”
—California Cultivator
, vol. LXIV, no. 14, April 4, 1925, p. 412: Aphis Insurance for all Citrus Fruits . . .

Good work of potassium cyanate in 1950—
California Farmer
, vol. 192, no. 8 (April 22, 1950), p. 358, “Agricultural News Notes of the Pacific Coast”: “Southern California.”

Fumigation of dates with menthyl bromide—Dunham, pp. 99-100 (referring presumably to 1948, when the book was published).

Dangers of methyl bromide (in grape production)—César Chávez, p. 195 (“Wrath of Grapes,” 1986).

Poisons applied in Imperial County, 1948—Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers. B. A. Harrigan, Agricultural Commissioner, annual report for 1948. Final unnumbered typescript page, headed “WEED CONTROL.”

“Cattle like the salt and somewhat sweetish taste . . .” and Los Angeles produce-contamination breakdown, 1938—California Board of Agriculture (1938), pp. 626, 636.

Poisons applied in Imperial County, 1948-49, 1951, 1954, 2000—Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers. B. A. Harrigan, Agricultural Commissioner, annual report for 1949, p. 7. The poundage per acre of insecticide was my computation, based on an “area in irrigated district” given as 612,658 acres (p. 6). There is also a “1942 inclusion” of 272,330 acres. I have not been able to find out what this was, but I assume from the name that it was not irrigated, hence not farmland, so I did not count it. As for the 1950 insecticide figure, that obviously came from the 1950 annual report. Remarks on chlordane, oil emulsion, coyote trapping, 1954 activities: B. A. Harrigan, Agricultural Commissioner, annual report for 1949, p. 7; annual report for 1951, unnumbered p.; annual report for 1954, unnumbered p. The century’s end figure comes from DeBuys and Myers, p. 7, sourcing an oral presentation at a workshop in San Luis.

According to the Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers, pesticide applications in Imperial County at midcentury were as follows:

Rumors that permission will be required for some pesticides; the grower in Merced; E. F. Kirkpatrick—
California Farmer
, vol. 193, no. 1 (July 1, 1950), p. 7 (“Proposed Spray Permits Arouse Strong Criticism”).

Warning notices for parathion—
California Farmer
, January 4, 1975, p. 22.

Boysie Day’s reminder—
California Farmer
, April 5, 1975, p. 16E, “California Weed Conference Report—Taking a look at farm chemicals,” quoting Boysie Day from the University of California, Berkeley.

143 . The Salton Sea (1944 -1986)

Epigraph: “. . . it seems, in tragedy . . .”—White, p. 312.

The lovely color photograph from 1968—Windsor Publications, inside front cover.

Gallons per minute into the Salton Sea in 1968; arrival of barnacles and effects—
Westways
, March 1968, p. 33ff. (some page numbers cut off ) (V. Lee Oertie, “Some Salton Sea Tales”).

Mrs. Finnell—Interviewed with her husband in their home in El Centro, April 2004. Shannon Mullen was present.

Anecdotes of Patton and of the Coachella girl—Laflin,
Coachella Valley
, p. 109.

“The public has been rather slow in adopting the area . . .”—Dunham, pp. 67-68.

The words of M. Penn Philips, and his proclivity for cigars—DeBuys and Myers, pp. 206-7.