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| Coolidge Dam creation involved a wide-ranging cast of characters.* |
Few
Arizonans have heard of Coolidge Dam. Fewer Arizonans have been there
and far fewer know the story.
The
Story of Coolidge Dan is all about People.
Historic
Coolidge Dam was built in the late 1920's where the fabled Gila River
runs through San Carlos Apache Tribal land straddling the Pinal-Gila
County Line at the head of Box Canyon..
The
epic water rights plight of the Pima & Maricopa Indians
foreshadowed Coolidge Dam's creation.
An
uncommon alliance of Indians, politicians, missionaries, farmers,
civic boosters and ordinary Arizonans finally pushed legislation
through Congress enabling construction of a Gila River dam.
Celebration
and rejoicing broke out when President Calvin Coolidge signed the
legislation into law June 7, 1924.
A
unique multi-dome design quickly set Coolidge Dam apart and helped
contractors finish dam construction one year ahead of schedule in
late 1928.
The
dam's namesake Calvin Coolidge spoke at a gala dedication March 4,
1930, attended by about 10,000 people.
Coolidge
dedicated the dam "to the advancement of the nation, to the
benefits of education, to the making of better homes, and the making
of a better country."
The
reservoir behind Coolidge Dam eventually spawned a once regionally
renowned sport fishery but it was a bittersweet benefit for San
Carlos Apache Tribal members who received practically no compensation
for loss of ancestral lands, grave sites, displacement of over 500
Natives and the total destruction of Old San Carlos.
Coolidge
Dam has survived the slings and shocks of several major floods.
Numerous retrofits and engineering tweaks have helped the iconic
arched domes weather tough times and stand tall at the head of rugged
San Carlos Box Canyon.
As
Coolidge Dam approaches a Centennial, its legacy remains a remarkable
chapter in the cavalcade of Arizona history.
What this blog is...and what it isn't...
Hello, I am John Parsons, a history enthusiast and 70-something retiree who lives in Rimrock, Arizona. Early in 2022 I became very interested in the history of Coolidge Dam. The more I studied that history the more I realized both its complexity and its obscurity. I have found not a single source that tells the full Big Picture Story of Coolidge Dam. There are lots of sources that have plenty of bits and pieces of Coolidge Dam history but none cover all the bases.
That's when I decided to create this blog as a means to discuss each segment of the story. No man made object exists in a vacuum and certainly not Coolidge Dam. It was created as a product of its times and involved so much more than simply designing and building a dam on a desert river.
This blog is not a scholarly article. Nor is it an opinion piece. I have no agenda in studying Coolidge Dam. While I have tried to cite sources for much of my material, I fall far short in providing complete and comprehensive primary reference sources.
I have subdivided the Coolidge Dam Story into ten segments, not including this introduction. Each segment starts out with a 200-300 word personal narrative. For this project I read seemingly countless scholarly dissertations, government reports, journal articles, media accounts and so much more. In each segment's introductory narrative, I have tried to summarize my understanding of what I have read into an interpretation I hope everyone can understand.
I make no claim that my interpretation of what I have read is THE only and final word on the subject. My narratives are simply my own view and synthesis of what I have studied. I hope that perhaps some of my readers will be motivated to begin their own study of The Coolidge Dam Story. The more the merrier!
I would like to emphasize this is a totally non-commercial blog. It has no ads and will never have any ads. Likewise, I am not connected, affiliated, recognized, assisted or otherwise associated with any private, county, state, federal, college or university entities of any kind. This blog has been created and is maintained solely by John Parsons, Rimrock, Arizona.
As always, this and any other of my many blogs will forever be considered a "work-in-progress". If you have comments, suggestions, edits, corrections or other need to contact John Parsons, please use:
arizonahistorystories@gmail.com
The following is a list of topics discussed here. Additional topics may be added to this list as the blog develops.
*The photo collage at the top of this post shows those I believe to be the so-called "major players" in The Coolidge Dam Story ranked in order of importance top to bottom. In the top row (l-r) we have Rev. Dirk Lay, a Gila River Indian Community ancestor and Judge Baughn.
In the second row (l-r) you see Representative Carl Hayden at Sacaton in 1913; a San Carlos Apache man at Omaha's 1898 Indian Congress and the shadowy face of Charles Real Olberg, Coolidge Dam designer and engineer.
In the third row at bottom (l-r) we placed Senator Henry Ashurst, President Calvin Coolidge and, finally Senator Ralph Cameron.
Millions of years before the Gila River had a name or fluvial face, powerful, earth-shattering geologic forces were ripping apart and thrusting mountain ranges into the sky. Cavernous, yawning basins between those ranges became giant catcher's mitts for rocks, gravel, sand and soil being washed down from the mighty mountains. A few thousand years go when the first humans finally set foot into the verdant valleys between those old mountain ranges, the water, land, plants and animals had reached a steady state of equilibrium. Although those early people had their own names for the water flowing across the land, it was the Spanish who gave The Gila River its name.
The Pima People who first happily greeted Spanish, Mexicans and Americas traveling through their homelands are descendants of pre-historic people who began began farming along The Gila River at least two thousand years ago. Over the centuries that farming flourished along The Gila River, Natives learned to be ever more successful at coaxing crops from the sun-baked desert soils. In fact, farms of The Pima People were widely considered a veritable cornucopia of life-sustaining foodstuffs. The Pima People probably reached their zenith of agricultural success in 1860 when they produced over 11-million pounds of wheat! When homesteaders by the score and then the 100's began hodgepodge farming and haphazard diversion of The Gila River upstream, the handwriting was on the wall for the Pima culture. Meanwhile cattle ranchers flocked to the illusion of easy money in Arizona, bringing nearly two million ungulates many of which overgrazed the pristine rangelands of The Upper Gila River. The combination of upriver diversions and destruction of native grasslands sparked a precipitous decline in Pima culture which nearly disintegrated because of the resulting lack of life-giving water from The Gila River.
The inevitable march of progress had largely tamed, civilized and developed the sprawling region of which Coolidge Dam would become a part. San Carlos Apache Reservation lands occupied the dam site and all of its proposed reservoir. A bustling railroad ran alongside The Gila and San Carlos Rivers. Wagon roads had morphed into automobile routes which connected the mining, tribal and agricultural settlements scattered through the valleys and mountains. San Carlos Apache Tribal members had long since settled into a sedentary lifestyle on an old U.S. Army post located at the confluence of the Gila and San Carlos Rivers. Once pioneer outposts in Arizona's Gila Valley were now prospering agricultural communities that also profited from trade with nearby mining camps. Downriver, most of the arable land in the Middle Gila was occupied by either Native or white farmers who tried to eek out a living with unpredictable water supplies. Discussion of a Gila River dam began in the late 1880's and the Coolidge Dam site was actually first identified and described in the 1890's. The water rights plight of The Pima People was well known among local political and ecclesiastical leaders.
The long and winding road that eventually led to creation of Coolidge Dam was far more than a so-called legislative process. It had its roots in sensitive awareness of the water rights plight of The Pima People. Famed Carl Hayden actually had a Pima nanny as a child. The legendary Pima missionary Charles H. Cook began quietly working to raise awareness in the 1890's. As soon as Hayden took office as Arizona's first Representative following 1912 Statehood, he began working legislation that laid the foundation for Coolidge Dam. Rev. Dirk Lay arrived on The Pima Reservation in September 1910 and he quickly picked up the baton from Rev. Cook. Prominent local Middle Gila community leaders worked together to scheme and plot ways to get a dam on The Gila River. Rev. Lay toured the Nation to build support for The Pima People. Judge Baughn wisely assessed the 1920 Senatorial election and provided candidate Ralph Cameron with a tailor-made campaign issue---getting a dam on The Gila. It fit right into Cameron's devious endeavors to take over the Colorado River. Finally, Hayden and equally legendary Senator Henry Ashurst saw their "window" and called together The Players in December 1923. They convinced Ralph Cameron to introduce the bill in his name and then they completely unleashed Dirk Lay. He and his wife moved to Washington D.C. and operated out of a room in Cameron's office complex. They coordinated a mass national lobbying effort from church assemblies of many faiths. Their face-to-face lobbying remains the stuff of legend. After Cameron's bill passed both chambers by unanimous vote, Silent Cal Coolidge balked at signing it. Hayden and Ashurst took him out in the hallway and offered to name the dam for him if he signed it.
Coolidge used a pen inscribed to Rev. Dirk Lay to ink the bill into law.
Ralph Cameron continues to get credit for the so-called 'Cameron Bill" which was signed into law to create Coolidge Dam. Cameron had used a Gila River Dam as a campaign issue, promising to get it done in his first year. Of course, he forgot all about his campaign promise as soon as he was sworn in.
Cameron was 100% out for himself. He used what we now call Dark Money to get himself elected. The primary reason he ran for Senate in the first place was to use the influence of his office to further his personal schemes on the Colorado River. Cameron has filed many, many bogus mining claims to tie up public access at Grand Canyon and also practically all of the prime dam sites on the river. He skirted the razor's edge of the law for many years, using a bogus salted platinum mining claim as a lynchpin of his river schemes. He filed numerous placer mining claims on the bed of the Colorado River to try to personally profit from hydro development. The 20-20 spotlight of history's hindsight has not been kind to Ralph Cameron. He has come out looking and acting like a cheap charlatan willing to dupe the public any chance he had. We suspect he was "all in" on the Gila River dam because he thought it might bode well for his Colorado River schemes and dreams. Hayden defeated Cameron in 1926 and went on to be Arizona's longest serving Senator.
People throughout Arizona and especially in the Middle Gila were following the epic lawmaking process almost like it was a sporting event. Newspapers carried regular reports and editorials. Local leaders held meetings to discuss progress... or lack thereof. Many large church congregations nationwide kept abreast of the process. When President Coolidge signed the bill into law on June 7, 1924, all of the pent up energy burst loose in a wave of joyous celebrations, especially in the Middle Gila. Newspaper accounts of the celebrations still convey the sheer excitement of those times.
After the euphoria of Coolidge's signature faded away, the hard work and heavy lifting began. The Indian Service has never designed anything remotely resembling what would become Coolidge Dam. Big Dams were the work of the US Bureau of Reclamation. Privately, engineers and politicians scoffed at the idea the Indian Service could design such a big dam. Luckily, the Indian Service had a secret weapon--Charles Real Olberg, a brilliant, out-of-the-box thinker and designer. Olberg shocked even his colleagues when he unveiled the multiple dome-buttress design for the dam. The higher-ups at the Indian Service were so skeptical they had to run the design past all sorts of reviewers. But Olberg's design passed with flying colors and so design specs were finalized and a call for bids put out. There's quite a story about the winner bidder's bid submission! Anyway, the contractor really knew the ropes and put together an All Star Team which quite literally knocked out the dam in amazing time, finishing a year ahead of schedule.
Even after the dam was finished and turned over to the government, there were quite a few smaller details to be worked out before the dam could be called truly complete. By late 1929, Indian Service functionaries were already hard at work planning a gala Dedication. The March 4, 1930, event came off without a hitch. Former President Calvin Coolidge attended and spoke. However, he made it clear he really didn't want to be there. His was a truly remarkably dull address! Will Rogers was Master of Ceremonies and provided everyone's most memorable quotes of the day. About 10,000 people attended and dozens of them were fed a VIP lunch on tables set up in the roadway across the top of the dam.
We have included a separate segment on the live radio broadcast of the Dedication Ceremony, even though technically a live radio remote is not part of Coolidge Dam itself. Coolidge Dam's Dedication provided the impetus for media movers and shakers of the era to set up and facilitate the radio remote. It was a major milestone in early Arizona media operations.
In this section we will discuss such things are reservoir levels, the epic 1993 fill and spill, and various "improvement" projects that have taken place over the decades.
