0:00:00.010,0:00:07.730
>> I have no apologies. I was a crusader for the development of water. I was the

0:00:07.750,0:00:15.449
Messiah! I was the evangelist that went out and argued persuasively to develop

0:00:15.469,0:00:45.469
our rivers and water supplies for the benefit of the people.

0:00:49.979,0:00:55.369
>> In the American desert, we have built a great new civilization in less than a

0:00:55.390,0:01:09.219
century. Where none could possibly be in the natural order of things. We have

0:01:09.239,0:01:15.709
made the land wet where it was dry and dry where it was wet. We have lifted

0:01:15.729,0:01:20.730
great rivers out of their ancient beds and moved them over half a continent. Our

0:01:20.750,0:01:43.950
great cities stand in a desert that is drier than the plains of North Africa. It

0:01:43.969,0:01:54.000
would all be impossible without the breathtaking manipulation of water. We

0:01:54.019,0:01:55.339
fought over water, thrived on water, and finally we engineered the desert out of

0:01:55.339,0:02:03.769
existence.>> Next to God, there's water.>> Everybody is conscious of water. If

0:02:03.789,0:02:06.449
you head for the river with a bucket-- an empty bucket, you are liable to get

0:02:06.449,0:02:15.249
shot.>> Can you imagine today in American city acquiring an entire river?

0:02:15.269,0:02:20.239
>> The idea of subduing nature has captivated the whole country.

0:02:20.259,0:02:38.739
>> Congress cannot appropriate enough money fast enough to build more dams.

0:02:38.759,0:02:39.759
>> We built the dams for all the right reasons when they were desperately needed

0:02:39.759,0:02:53.239
with little thought to the consequences. The developing world watched and envied

0:02:53.259,0:03:03.219
our success.>> The engineering marvel that is inaudible dam inspected by Emperor

0:03:03.239,0:03:04.259
Haile Selassie of Ethiopia.>> Supplying water to the population growing that

0:03:04.259,0:03:09.019
fast is extremely difficult.>> It's a little bit like the sorcerer's

0:03:09.039,0:03:11.479
apprentice. You've got to have more water, more water, more water.

0:03:11.479,0:03:16.839
>> They are going to dam this canyon.>> There is no end to these people who had

0:03:16.859,0:03:23.479
plans to dam San Francisco Bay,pipelines beyond your wildest dreams. This wasn't

0:03:23.500,0:03:30.841
about curing oil. This was about carrying water.>> We have forgotten that the

0:03:30.861,0:03:37.181
natural West is barren and fatally dry. And that our new bountiful West is a

0:03:37.201,0:03:47.109
fragile construction. Here and there are reminders

0:03:47.129,0:03:55.151
of what happens when the water is turned off. Or when the water works fail.

0:03:55.171,0:04:00.131
>> Somehow the water stopped flowing. You have a desert again overnight.

0:04:00.151,0:04:02.351
>> The dam's gone.>> The whole thing is gone now?

0:04:02.351,0:04:05.201
>> The whole thing is gone. It rolled over about five minutes ago.

0:04:05.201,0:04:10.481
>> Okay.>> If you can give us any help on radio or whatnot get the people

0:04:10.501,0:04:14.091
started there out.>> All right. Where do you want the people evacuated?

0:04:14.111,0:04:36.692
>> Well, we would like to get them off the river in low-lying inaudible

0:04:36.711,0:04:40.851
>> Well, it's 6:22 at 710 Talk KMPC, I'm Dominic with Air Watch Traffic and I've

0:04:40.851,0:04:44.219
got to tell you the jackknifed big rig in Pasadena has the 210 eastbound in

0:04:44.219,0:04:47.719
trouble right at Rosemead where the right three lanes are out of commission, the

0:04:47.721,0:04:50.752
jackknifed big rig there and about a quarter-mile slow. On the westbound side

0:04:50.752,0:04:54.602
almost across the fence from it right at Sierra Madre. Right lane is blocked to

0:04:54.622,0:04:57.741
the inaudible so get ready it's slow from the 605 and how are things in Orange

0:04:57.741,0:05:02.742
County?>> Hey, Scott! inaudible>> -- in Ronald Reagan Freeway on the west

0:05:02.762,0:05:13.531
inaudible Reseda Boulevard inaudible Foreign Language Spoken

0:05:13.551,0:05:14.719
>> A car that spun out and hit the center divider and the two left lanes are

0:05:14.719,0:05:20.502
protected by CHP vehicles.>> Use alternate routes such as Laurel Canyon or even

0:05:20.521,0:05:32.230
Mulholland today.>> I think my grandfather has a vision with the city like

0:05:32.250,0:05:39.120
Dublin. Which was the city of his childhood. And it was a vision I think of a

0:05:39.139,0:05:49.899
19th century city. Where people ambled on streets and a new one another and

0:05:49.919,0:05:59.230
enjoyed the theater and the opera and the University. A civilized 19th century

0:05:59.250,0:06:05.240
city.>> No other Buick dealership in California has been best in its class for

0:06:05.259,0:06:09.319
seven years. That's because no other Buick dealership has sold more than 10,000

0:06:09.339,0:06:13.430
Buicks in the last 10 years. The list goes on and on. Right now we have lots of

0:06:13.430,0:06:18.670
traffic to talk about, too. First of all the KABC traffic alert--

0:06:18.689,0:06:23.579
>> The thing that you have to remember about Los Angeles is that it never really

0:06:23.599,0:06:29.839
had a reason to be there. It had no minerals, no metals, no forests, and other

0:06:29.859,0:06:38.519
words, everything that any major American city used to develop itself, LA

0:06:38.539,0:06:47.689
lacked. And above all it lacked water.>> Since the beginning of time this was a

0:06:47.709,0:06:54.870
place of earthquakes and perpetual drought. First claimed by the Spaniards, and

0:06:54.889,0:07:03.120
then conquered by the Americans.Virtually everyone here had come from somewhere

0:07:03.139,0:07:10.800
else. In 1878 William Mulholland arrived from the Green Hills of Ireland. He had

0:07:10.819,0:07:13.459
stowed away on a sailing ship worked as a lumberjack failed as a gold miner and

0:07:13.459,0:07:18.589
had walked across Panama to save $25 and train fare. He was fond of one armed

0:07:18.609,0:07:25.779
chin-ups and grand Opera.Mulholland found work as a ditch digger on the growing

0:07:25.799,0:07:31.750
town's dilapidated water system.>> LA was desperate to become a modern city. It

0:07:31.769,0:07:35.910
had been a backwater for so many decades.>> But its water system, on the other

0:07:35.930,0:07:39.939
hand, was pretty much the same old Jerry built thing. A bunch of old

0:07:39.959,0:07:46.819
waterwheels. The falling apart system.>> He worked hard, read Shakespeare, and

0:07:46.839,0:07:57.649
hydraulic engineering late into the night. Taught himself to keep the entire LA

0:07:57.669,0:07:58.759
water system in his head and climbed through the ranks. In 1886 when his boss

0:07:58.759,0:08:02.139
suddenly dropped dead, William Mulholland found himself superintendent of the LA

0:08:02.159,0:08:09.439
water system. The little desert Pueblo had grown to 100,000 people thanks to the

0:08:09.459,0:08:18.319
Chamber of Commerce and a new railroad. And by 1903 LA had sucked dry the tiny

0:08:18.339,0:08:25.110
Los Angeles River. It's only source of water.>> My mother would tell me these

0:08:25.129,0:08:31.379
stories of growing up without water. One bath a week on Saturday night and I

0:08:31.399,0:08:34.389
washed in a big zinc tub that was dragged into the

0:08:34.409,0:08:40.909
kitchen and water heated and Poppa got the first bath, mama got the second and

0:08:40.929,0:08:44.980
the kids-- mother told me you know they were not what you would call white trash

0:08:45.000,0:08:52.779
but she told me she never had a bath in pure clean water. Now I was raised with

0:08:52.799,0:08:59.659
a real sense that water was a precious item and not to be squandered.

0:08:59.679,0:09:03.179
>> Superintendent Mulholland tried to make Los Angeles live within its means.

0:09:03.199,0:09:11.480
But growth sabotaged everything he did. By 1903, the chief knew that LA would

0:09:11.500,0:09:18.819
have to stop growing or he would have to find a new source of water. His friend,

0:09:18.839,0:09:23.500
Mayor Fred Eaton and told him of a great Valley 200 miles to the north.

0:09:23.519,0:09:32.799
Pomacentrus phonetic Paiutes had lived along the Owens River. White settlers who

0:09:32.819,0:09:38.159
colonized Owens Valley found Paiutes irrigating natural grasses with several

0:09:38.179,0:09:44.799
miles of small irrigation canals.>> My grandmother told my only sister that when

0:09:44.819,0:09:52.159
the whites came they started to push the Indians up into the rocky places where

0:09:52.179,0:10:00.250
the water was scarce because they wanted the other for their cattle and things.

0:10:00.269,0:10:05.460
And they came in and they fenced everything up. They start saying if you want to

0:10:05.480,0:10:09.620
use my water, you have to have special permission and the Indians always let the

0:10:09.639,0:10:15.169
water run. It was never something that belonged to one individual person. It

0:10:15.189,0:10:23.730
belonged to the whole community.>> By 1904, settlers from New England,

0:10:23.750,0:10:28.490
Switzerland, and Scotland had taken the Indians land, established farms in a

0:10:28.509,0:10:39.519
dozen towns and a steamboat service on the age old Owens Lake. They dug and

0:10:39.539,0:10:54.250
elaborate irrigation system diverting the Owens River into hundreds of miles of

0:10:54.269,0:10:55.269
ditches. Former Mayor Fred Eaton convinced Mulholland to set out northward

0:10:55.269,0:10:56.819
across the Mojave Desert in the fall of 1904 toward Owens Valley.

0:10:56.819,0:10:59.980
>> They went by Buck boy phonetic which was the only way you can go it took them

0:10:59.980,0:11:04.110
about two weeks to get there. I think there was a trail of whiskey bottles all

0:11:04.129,0:11:11.389
the way out.>> In two weeks, Mulholland and Eaton were on the banks of the Owens

0:11:11.409,0:11:19.259
River.>> At certain times of the year, in what years, anyway, you can get a

0:11:19.279,0:11:33.669
little glimpse of what the river must've been like then and how it must have

0:11:33.689,0:11:37.830
impressed Mulholland. The Owens Valley is one of the most dramatic places in the

0:11:37.850,0:11:47.059
world.You have on the one side the Sierra Nevada, virtually every mountain over

0:11:47.079,0:11:56.009
14,000 feet, and then you have a drop of 2 miles to the valley floor and then a

0:11:56.029,0:12:04.240
rise of almost 2 miles up to the White Mountain range. Because the mountains

0:12:04.259,0:12:10.059
stop virtually all weather, it is in the rain-- and there is no rain in the

0:12:10.079,0:12:16.639
Owens Valley. It is a true desert looking up onto huge snow-covered peaks. And

0:12:16.659,0:12:21.539
through the middle of it comes what you almost could call a-- Mississippi River

0:12:21.559,0:12:30.539
given the setting. It is so improbable in this harsh desert to see River that

0:12:30.559,0:12:41.759
used to be as engorged-- And not only was this river that could take care of the

0:12:41.779,0:12:48.759
next 20, 30, probably inaudible 50 years of population growth in LA but it could

0:12:48.779,0:12:58.029
flow all the way by gravity.Inaudible>> -- so full of enthusiasm he said you

0:12:58.049,0:13:05.210
know I've seen something here-- water that will last us into the next century.

0:13:05.230,0:13:11.319
>> And I think Mulholland suddenly must have changed and he saw himself as a

0:13:11.339,0:13:19.389
sort of a builder of a Roman masterwork as somebody who kept a great hydraulic

0:13:19.409,0:13:23.870
engineering tradition alive. I can't tell you what went through his head, but

0:13:23.889,0:13:28.240
suddenly he was a convert. Having been more of an efficiency guy and a

0:13:28.259,0:13:36.029
conservationist, suddenly he became an empire builder almost overnight.

0:13:36.049,0:13:40.529
>> And now, they were going to capture a river. The only River that kind of

0:13:40.549,0:13:46.639
accidentally flowed through this desert and they were going to move the whole

0:13:46.659,0:13:52.779
river across this 200-plus miles of terrain that they just covered at some risk

0:13:52.799,0:13:59.120
probably to their lives.>> The problem facing Mulholland was at the river was

0:13:59.139,0:14:04.059
owned. All the water rights were owned by farmers who were irrigating something

0:14:04.079,0:14:09.759
like 60,000 acres.This was a thriving agricultural area at the time and it was

0:14:09.779,0:14:17.720
being further developed by the Bureau of reclamation. Now how in the world were

0:14:17.740,0:14:21.429
you going to arrest that water away from these farmers and the federal

0:14:21.449,0:14:26.419
government? That was the dilemma.>> Can you imagine today and American city

0:14:26.439,0:14:33.769
acquiring an entire River for its future? Of course. It goes without saying. It

0:14:33.789,0:14:39.840
could be done but it was done then.>> inaudible his ages for a federal project

0:14:39.860,0:14:45.169
meant to irrigate Owens Valley Holland's men went to the county courthouse.

0:14:45.189,0:14:52.039
There they convinced clerks to show them these, maps, and records the stream

0:14:52.059,0:15:09.169
flows. Within days, Eaton was quietly buying property and water rights.

0:15:09.189,0:15:21.699
Inaudible-- to a local irrigation project but to the city of Los Angeles.

0:15:21.719,0:15:24.370
Without telling Mulholland, former Mayor Fred Eaton about the only dam site in

0:15:24.370,0:15:29.069
Owens Valley for himself.>> Once the city knew who had the best water rights and

0:15:29.089,0:15:32.840
who was likeliest to sell those rights, it was basically a done deal.

0:15:32.860,0:15:38.360
>> It didn't take very long for them to capture most of that river.

0:15:38.379,0:15:42.189
>> Two people who had ultimately benefited and who knew the whole story of this

0:15:42.209,0:15:46.649
scheme were the publishers of the Los Angeles times. Harrison Gray Otis and

0:15:46.669,0:15:52.470
Harry Chandler. They were the big promoters and boosters but they were sworn to

0:15:52.490,0:15:56.740
secrecy as this was going on. They did not let the cat out of the bag until they

0:15:56.740,0:16:01.100
couldn't help themselves and finally under a headline that said Titanic project

0:16:01.120,0:16:07.059
to give the city River they talked about how the whole thing had gone. And you

0:16:07.079,0:16:10.799
know when you read that today and imagine a major city newspaper just kind of

0:16:10.799,0:16:20.149
gloating over the triumph of you know it's artifice and chicanery, it makes you

0:16:20.169,0:16:25.829
real in a sense. But that was what Los Angeles was like in those days. It was--

0:16:25.849,0:16:43.029
the climate was one of just getting what you want any way you can get it.

0:16:43.049,0:16:44.049
>> The Owens Valley paper saw the future differently. The still secret aqueduct

0:16:44.049,0:16:47.129
route would pass through the San Fernando Valley on its way to LA. And someone

0:16:47.149,0:16:56.629
was buying up near worthless land in the San Fernando. Now, another cat out of

0:16:56.649,0:17:02.279
the bag. It was a real estate syndicate that would make millions of Owens River

0:17:02.299,0:17:07.118
water irrigated their newly acquired San Fernando Valley land.

0:17:07.138,0:17:11.398
>> What was happening all the while these water rights in the Owens Valley were

0:17:11.419,0:17:15.009
being acquired was that the San Fernando Valley is being bought up by a

0:17:15.029,0:17:20.378
syndicate of people who represented the power structure of Los Angeles with the

0:17:20.398,0:17:26.559
kind of exquisite sense of proportion.>> I suppose you could make a case for

0:17:26.579,0:17:31.710
this being this incestuous cabal of hidden you know Jonathan inaudible

0:17:31.730,0:17:39.930
California inaudible oligarchy. Old boys' wasp network-- no Jews, darks,

0:17:39.950,0:17:46.240
Blacks, Mexicans allowed.>> Quietly, the entire San Fernando Valley was bought

0:17:46.259,0:17:52.799
up by the arch capitalists of Los Angeles for the purpose of irrigating it when

0:17:52.819,0:17:56.529
the Owens River finally arrived because Los Angeles would need all that water

0:17:56.549,0:18:00.960
for a long time.>> If water could be brought to the San Fernando, from the Owens

0:18:00.980,0:18:07.170
Valley, that rangy grassland that semi-arid terrain could be turned into an

0:18:07.190,0:18:15.839
absolute Inaudible>> With all the cats out of all the bags, citizens would now

0:18:15.859,0:18:28.889
vote on the inaudible. Mulholland campaigned with a vengeance. Opponents spread

0:18:28.909,0:18:33.509
rumors that he was secretly dumping water at night to create a shortage but in

0:18:33.529,0:18:38.549
the middle of a drought, with the temperature climbing toward 105, the people of

0:18:38.569,0:18:43.980
LA voted 10 to 1 to pay for Mulholland's aqueduct to bring them the river they

0:18:44.000,0:18:54.789
had just purchased.>> I think one thing that gets overlooked in discussing the

0:18:54.809,0:19:02.409
aqueduct is that it was a popular move from the President of the United States

0:19:02.429,0:19:09.420
down to the voters in the city of Los Angeles. This was highly approved project.

0:19:09.440,0:19:16.700
>> Pres. Theodore Roosevelt citing the greatest good for the greatest number

0:19:16.720,0:19:21.319
made Owens Valley off-limits to further development by surrounding it with a

0:19:21.339,0:19:25.220
national forest.>> It suddenly became part of the Inyo National forest the only

0:19:25.240,0:19:29.180
national forest in America with hardly any trees. The only trees were the

0:19:29.200,0:19:33.690
orchard trees that were being irrigated and were about to die.

0:19:33.710,0:19:39.259
>> With the law and the president on his side, Mulholland set out in 1905 to

0:19:39.279,0:19:51.839
build his aqueduct across the desert.>> It was a great drama. It was a great

0:19:51.859,0:19:55.849
epic drama the building of that aqueduct. You had kneeled teams and you had

0:19:55.869,0:20:07.180
men. And they were working in desert heat, arid conditions, water was a

0:20:07.200,0:20:12.779
problem. Ironically enough, here in this giant water project they had to worry

0:20:12.799,0:20:19.319
about adequate water for the working stock and the men.

0:20:19.339,0:20:28.710
>> It could be almost freezing at night and then 110 degrees in the daytime,

0:20:28.730,0:20:33.379
practically. Mulholland was there all the time.>> Chief engineer Mulholland had

0:20:33.399,0:20:38.480
no formal training in civil engineering. He had in fact never graduated from

0:20:38.500,0:20:43.399
grade school.>> The automobile had barely been invented. Clipper ships were

0:20:43.419,0:20:47.779
still sailing the seas and this was an engineering project the likes of which

0:20:47.799,0:20:55.869
the world had really never seen before.>> Mulholland ordered the 12 foot steel

0:20:55.889,0:21:01.000
pipe forged in Germany and shipped around the horn. 100,000 men and women worked

0:21:01.019,0:21:05.599
on the aqueduct but never more than a few thousand at a time because the

0:21:05.619,0:21:13.139
exhausting and dangerous work kept turnover so high. They had been farmhands,

0:21:13.159,0:21:18.250
cowboys and hard rock miners but now they were city employees civil servants

0:21:18.269,0:21:25.759
like the chief himself. With no air conditioning, no refrigeration, no

0:21:25.779,0:21:30.279
hardhats, in 110 degree heat they crossed the Mohave in five years with a pipe

0:21:30.299,0:21:37.670
big enough to hold a locomotive.>> This was, you know, and aqueduct that would

0:21:37.690,0:21:43.579
have reached all the way across Massachusetts and then almost all the way back.

0:21:43.599,0:21:50.309
Through a desert with mountains.What they were really building was the world's

0:21:50.329,0:21:57.119
largest garden hose.>> Surveyors said they could build the aqueduct simply by

0:21:57.139,0:22:02.000
following the trail of whiskey bottles Mulholland and Eaton has thrown off the

0:22:02.019,0:22:19.069
back of their buckboard in 1904. In the end, the chief and his lieutenants

0:22:19.089,0:22:21.129
finish the job under budget and ahead of schedule. William Mulholland built his

0:22:21.129,0:22:23.309
original aqueduct so well that to this day it still carries the Owens River to

0:22:23.309,0:22:35.309
the people of Los Angeles.>> The phrase grandpa's aqueduct were among my first

0:22:35.329,0:22:41.849
words. The day of the dedication of the aqueduct was without a doubt the high

0:22:41.869,0:22:51.690
point of my grandfather's life.>> A crowd of 30,000 to 40,000 Los Angelenos

0:22:51.710,0:22:55.839
phonetic had gathered at the base of the spillway. There was a formal program

0:22:55.859,0:23:02.529
but once the water spilled down the Cascade the formal program was abandoned

0:23:02.549,0:23:09.919
because thousands of people rushed with their tin cups to drink the water.

0:23:09.939,0:23:13.220
>> When the water came cascading down, Mulholland who was really exhausted at

0:23:13.240,0:23:19.659
the time gave what I think is the most concise dedication speech in history. He

0:23:19.679,0:23:37.629
unfurled an American flag he turned to the water and he said, there it is. Take

0:23:37.649,0:23:39.669
it.>> Based on Mulholland's predictions, it was four times more water than Los

0:23:39.669,0:23:50.319
Angeles could use.>> Oh, so slow from oso parkway. If you are on to San Diego

0:23:50.339,0:23:53.799
South at Magnolia that accident clear to the right shoulder. We are clear back

0:23:53.799,0:23:57.599
to the Westminster Mall with bumper-to-bumper through the beat cities. And you

0:23:57.619,0:23:58.619
are going to be making your way on the 91 freeway--

0:23:58.619,0:24:03.069
>> That moment actually has to be seen not just in terms of human history

0:24:03.089,0:24:06.609
however brief human history is. It has to be seen in terms of geological time.

0:24:06.609,0:24:13.619
Here you have the eons-old environment now being profoundly changed by the

0:24:13.639,0:24:20.049
changing course of the river and that water in effect created contemporary Los

0:24:20.069,0:24:24.409
Angeles.>> It's your earthquake damage repair at remodeling headquarters.

0:24:24.429,0:24:28.549
>> This week get inaudible to Honolulu for only 199+ tax round-trip. Sun trips

0:24:28.569,0:24:33.210
your pipeline to paradise. With air watch traffic--

0:24:33.230,0:24:39.549
>> One of the big banquets in the city celebrating this great event he made a

0:24:39.569,0:24:45.069
speech and made the very interesting observation he said we are doomed to

0:24:45.089,0:24:53.769
success. Might be a motto for the city, do you think?

0:24:53.789,0:25:00.441
>> When water came after 1913, it prepared for an absolute golden age of

0:25:00.461,0:25:20.310
building and construction that lasted through-- Inaudible

0:25:20.330,0:25:24.019
At one point in the early 20s there was some 67 lumber ships at the San Pedro

0:25:24.019,0:25:27.460
Harbor lined up just waiting to get the wood off so they could keep the

0:25:27.460,0:25:31.409
construction going. You also had the beginnings of the great Hollywood figures

0:25:31.429,0:25:39.990
coming out-- DW Griffith, Cecil B DeMille coming just a few months after the

0:25:40.009,0:25:47.269
water. At nowhere as you moved to Los Angeles were you not in the presence of

0:25:47.289,0:25:55.009
lawns, hedges, palm trees-- great palm trees which sway above Los Angeles now

0:25:55.029,0:25:59.529
like nodding giraffes are taken as the signature of the city. Palm trees were

0:25:59.549,0:26:01.929
not native to the region they were planted by the hundreds in the hundreds in

0:26:01.929,0:26:09.970
this era. Here you had a semi-arid region where coyotes roamed where tumbleweeds

0:26:09.990,0:26:15.720
were blown by the wind which in a very short time was turned into arguably the

0:26:15.740,0:26:20.849
most exquisite invented garden in history. Now if you link that with the

0:26:20.869,0:26:26.679
adjacent citrus groves, which were still in full bloom in the teens and 20s, I

0:26:26.699,0:26:33.849
wasn't there, but it must've been wonderful.>> You had a general sensibility of

0:26:33.869,0:26:43.569
that time of turning the desert into and Eden.>> Charlie Chaplin and Alice

0:26:43.589,0:26:48.299
Huxley came from England. William Faulkner from Mississippi. Frank Lloyd Wright

0:26:48.319,0:27:04.250
from Wisconsin. Everyone came from everywhere.LA was suddenly growing 11 times

0:27:04.269,0:27:14.970
faster than New York. Faster even than Calcutta. A million people by 1922 of

0:27:14.990,0:27:17.319
whom 31,000 were licensed real estate agents. Now over Mulholland's objections,

0:27:17.319,0:27:22.119
Los Angeles began annexing 52 surrounding communities. Soon the city limits

0:27:22.139,0:27:28.370
would cover 400 mi.? more than any city in America.

0:27:28.390,0:27:29.679
>> There are going to be a lot of irate citizens when they find out that they

0:27:29.679,0:27:32.961
are paying for water that they are not going to get.

0:27:32.980,0:27:37.530
>> Oh, that's all taken care of. See, Mr. Gitts phonetic, either you bring the

0:27:37.550,0:27:47.789
water to LA or you bring LA to the water.>> What he simply meant was that you

0:27:47.809,0:27:55.859
would bring the water to where you wanted to bring it and call that place LA and

0:27:55.879,0:28:03.889
therefore you could get Los Angeles taxpayers to pay what in effect were a cabal

0:28:03.909,0:28:11.039
of real estate speculators to have the city pay millions of dollars for them to

0:28:11.059,0:28:14.799
pump water down to land that was not in fact part of the city and then cause

0:28:14.799,0:28:19.200
them to vote that is part of the city and thereby increase the value of that

0:28:19.220,0:28:26.389
land which they had purchased and held 1000 fold. So they were causing one city

0:28:26.409,0:28:30.939
in effect to pay for them to develop another city by-- and then saying well,

0:28:30.959,0:28:37.419
it's really same city.>> As the Owens River was finally being relocated across a

0:28:37.439,0:28:44.429
quarter of the state of California, it became immediately obvious that there was

0:28:44.449,0:28:49.929
way more water than Los Angeles needed. And so because the water was coming in

0:28:49.949,0:28:54.439
to the San Fernando Valley, it ended up irrigating the San Fernando Valley. It

0:28:54.459,0:29:00.049
was basically an artificial imported River for agriculture there rather than the

0:29:00.069,0:29:03.379
agriculture that had been essentially put out of business in the Owens Valley.

0:29:03.399,0:29:11.639
>> A syndicates arid tracks in the San Fernando Valley blossomed into orange and

0:29:11.659,0:29:18.399
lemon groves, peach orchards, fields of winter tomatoes by 1920, LA County was

0:29:18.419,0:29:26.220
the most productive farm county in America.>> It may have been legal, but move a

0:29:26.240,0:29:31.909
whole River ostensibly for public good and end up making a bunch of capitalists

0:29:31.929,0:29:36.889
even richer than they already were by giving them brand-new water supply was

0:29:36.909,0:29:42.379
really a kind of a remarkable feat.>> They are conning LA into building it but

0:29:42.399,0:29:45.169
the water is not going to go to LA.It's coming right here..

0:29:45.169,0:29:50.389
>> What?>> Everything you can see. Everything around us. I was at the Hall of

0:29:50.409,0:29:58.710
records today.>> The original title for Chinatown I actually had-- was going to

0:29:58.730,0:30:05.759
call it water and power. Because you know that's what it came. And water was

0:30:05.779,0:30:19.339
power. It was money. And those who knew how to manipulate it like much more

0:30:19.359,0:30:22.099
directly than anybody could ever manipulate a stock market could make money off

0:30:22.099,0:30:28.679
of it. And you could see it. It was a palpable thing. Running through your

0:30:28.699,0:30:35.259
movie. You know? I mean just a river of greed.>> Do you have any idea what this

0:30:35.279,0:30:40.730
land would be worth with the study water supply? About 30 million more than they

0:30:40.750,0:30:46.970
paid for it.>> The syndicate began plowing under their newly developed San

0:30:46.990,0:30:52.669
Fernando orange groves for tract homes. Advance guard of the largest subdivision

0:30:52.689,0:30:59.049
in history. The value of their land had gone up tenfold.

0:30:59.069,0:31:04.159
>> This is a great age of salesmanship. Because these were masters of the art of

0:31:04.179,0:31:09.710
encouraging people to envision on an empty hillside the great cities, the towns,

0:31:09.730,0:31:14.289
the schools, the churches, the synagogues, which would one day be there had they

0:31:14.309,0:31:19.460
but the faith that the salesman had. Owning your own home in this region was

0:31:19.480,0:31:23.619
given an almost quasi-religious value that your children would not be delinquent

0:31:23.639,0:31:27.319
if you had a home. That your marriage would be happy but many of the ills of our

0:31:27.319,0:31:32.950
society were due to the fact that people lived in cities and rented.

0:31:32.970,0:31:37.549
>> Mulholland himself did not profit directly from the syndicates dealings but

0:31:37.569,0:31:43.679
he was now the highest-paid public employee in California. The University of

0:31:43.699,0:31:47.990
California gave an honorary degree to a doctor Mulholland the penniless

0:31:48.009,0:31:52.109
immigrant who never finished grade school but could keep the entire LA water

0:31:52.129,0:31:59.720
system in his head. LA now had a Mulholland school, Mulholland dam, Mulholland

0:31:59.740,0:32:09.250
reservoir. And it named its new winding scenic drive the Mulholland Highway.

0:32:09.269,0:32:12.719
>> Every kid in LA knew-- it was one of the first names you learned when you

0:32:12.719,0:32:17.159
hit-- when you were old enough to get a junior operator's license because that's

0:32:17.179,0:32:23.689
where you parked your car to make out. You know? So you know that's one

0:32:23.709,0:32:28.819
association with Mulholland is where you took your girl.

0:32:28.839,0:32:33.089
>> The men in the family that was a staple of conversation-- waterworks. There

0:32:33.109,0:32:38.439
was always a Dodge to get the family to go out and it was usually either to see

0:32:38.459,0:32:42.859
the wildflowers in the spring but it somehow always ended up that we were

0:32:42.879,0:32:50.269
standing in front of some big turbine or waterworks and with the men discussing

0:32:50.289,0:32:55.879
all of just the way you know I had to discuss impressionist paintings with a

0:32:55.899,0:33:01.939
friend at the County Museum.>> The city which never had a reason to be now had

0:33:01.959,0:33:08.230
1000 oil wells, its own automobile and airplane factories, and before long, 90%

0:33:08.250,0:33:14.579
of all the worlds movies would be made in LA. The imported Owens River allow the

0:33:14.599,0:33:18.939
city to expand and three times the rate Mulholland had used in his aqueduct

0:33:18.959,0:33:24.929
calculations.>> It wasn't a prophet. He couldn't foresee that LA would grow the

0:33:24.949,0:33:28.059
way it did.And that's what upset a lot of the balance.

0:33:28.059,0:33:34.039
>> A inaudible committee tried to nominate William Mulholland for mayor. He said

0:33:34.059,0:33:37.939
he would rather give birth to a porcupine backwards than the mayor of Los

0:33:37.959,0:33:44.939
Angeles.>> It was a scramble. I mean the city kept growing and the Chamber of

0:33:44.959,0:33:49.659
Commerce kept booming and there were all these marvelous come-ons from to the

0:33:49.679,0:33:54.419
railroad companies and from the Chamber of Commerce and he used to joke and say

0:33:54.439,0:33:58.449
that he thought the only thing that can stop LA from growing was to kill Frank

0:33:58.469,0:34:03.490
Wiggins and Frank Wiggins was the president of the Chamber of Commerce who spent

0:34:03.509,0:34:10.500
his lifetime booming LA all over the country. And encouraging more people and so

0:34:10.518,0:34:16.590
it was a little bit like the sorcerer's apprentice. You start the process going

0:34:16.610,0:34:20.659
and you got to have more water and more water and more water. And you, the

0:34:20.679,0:34:25.500
father of the city's water system are supposed to continue to provide this

0:34:25.518,0:34:29.900
water. It's a terrible place to be. And you've got to be ingenious and inventive

0:34:29.920,0:34:38.289
and come up with new ideas for getting water.>> Now there were 60,000 realtors.

0:34:38.309,0:34:42.500
The Chamber of Commerce sent millions of promotional brochures to the Midwest

0:34:42.518,0:34:49.590
and New England to Guatemala City and Paris. Only 10 years after Mulholland

0:34:49.610,0:34:54.949
finished his great aqueduct with a fourfold surplus, LA was running out of

0:34:54.969,0:35:03.009
water. And he was pondering new sources.The Colorado, Mono Lake, or the Sierras.

0:35:03.029,0:35:07.639
>> Maybe the best example of the metamorphosis of Mulholland into an obsessive

0:35:07.659,0:35:15.429
water seeker was described to me by Horace Albright who was back in the 20s a

0:35:15.449,0:35:19.610
superintendent at Yosemite national Park. And he was at a banquet table with

0:35:19.630,0:35:26.179
Mulholland and Mulholland started waxing eloquent about how beautiful the valley

0:35:26.199,0:35:31.329
is and then he said what he would do if he were in charge is he would send

0:35:31.349,0:35:36.569
photographers into the valley and let them photograph all day long all night

0:35:36.589,0:35:42.199
every season and just have the most astounding collection of Yosemite

0:35:42.219,0:35:46.159
photographs that you could ever imagine. Put them in books and send them free to

0:35:46.179,0:35:52.239
every library in the world and then he would go in there and build a great big

0:35:52.259,0:36:22.259
dam and stop the God damned waste.>> Just to the north of Yosemite, late John

0:36:39.710,0:36:48.460
Muir's beloved Hetch Hetchy Valley.Here, LA's rival San Francisco was in fact

0:36:48.480,0:36:53.549
planning a dam which would soon permanently submerge Hetch Hetchy under 300 feet

0:36:53.569,0:37:03.079
of water. Owens Valley had in fact gotten off easy compared to Hetch Hetchy.

0:37:03.099,0:37:06.719
Mulholland's aqueduct had only dewatered the southern half of the valley.

0:37:06.739,0:37:12.179
Leaving the northern towns and farms to flourish during World War I.

0:37:12.199,0:37:15.819
>> Well, Owens Valley was an absolute you might say showplace. It produced

0:37:15.839,0:37:21.150
fruit-- of the people from LA would go nuts over to get this fruit from here. I

0:37:21.170,0:37:24.630
can remember when the sky would get black with flights of ducks. This was one of

0:37:24.630,0:37:30.170
the major flyaways. Oh, absolutely black with them. I mean that. The sky would

0:37:30.190,0:37:33.769
be black and even for a day or two or for hours and hours.

0:37:33.789,0:37:40.929
>> It was a great time to live up here. It was a very close knit community. You

0:37:40.949,0:37:42.289
know? Every Saturday night they would keep the opera house open all night and

0:37:42.289,0:37:48.130
they would show the movie and when the movie was over they would push the chairs

0:37:48.150,0:37:51.489
back and everybody would dance all night. Then they'd have a breakfast and

0:37:51.489,0:37:54.739
everybody would go home back to their branches at sunup, you know? Did this

0:37:54.739,0:38:07.659
every Saturday night and it was a great time to live in the Owens Valley.

0:38:07.679,0:38:15.690
>> What few people knew was that William Mulholland was about to turn his

0:38:15.710,0:38:22.670
attention to what remained of the Owens River.>> This growing city of Los

0:38:22.690,0:38:29.259
Angeles becomes like a vampire making a direct connection to the major artery of

0:38:29.279,0:38:34.079
the Owens Valley which is the Owens River. And of course imagine those ranchers

0:38:34.099,0:38:37.839
who were initially told that Los Angeles would be their partner, their friend,

0:38:37.859,0:38:41.539
that they would grow and prosperity along with the city began to see that the

0:38:41.539,0:38:45.679
vampire was sucking the lifeblood and that their fertile fields were becoming

0:38:45.699,0:38:52.469
parched and nonproductive.>> In the wet years since 1905, relations between the

0:38:52.489,0:38:58.299
city and the Valley had been surprisingly cordial but now there was drought. The

0:38:58.319,0:39:03.139
city sunk 52 turbine wells into the valley floor to pump groundwater into the

0:39:03.159,0:39:07.449
aqueduct crippling surrounding ranches.>> What people resented here is they

0:39:07.469,0:39:11.210
didn't have the option. They didn't have a choice. And the pressure that had

0:39:11.210,0:39:15.150
built over 20 years and the inaudible was done and this whole water we're

0:39:15.170,0:39:20.819
talking about they could care nothing about this property.

0:39:20.839,0:39:25.199
>> On Sunday my mother would take me for drives and she would always talk about

0:39:25.219,0:39:30.599
apple orchards and peach orchards. And it wasn't until years later that I

0:39:30.619,0:39:34.000
realized because growing up in Bishop, there was always a-- we were surrounded

0:39:34.019,0:39:39.279
by sagebrush. It was always dry. It was always dusty. There was always dust in

0:39:39.299,0:39:43.589
the air. And I couldn't even imagine what my mother was talking about. I

0:39:43.609,0:39:49.839
couldn't imagine. And it took me until a young adult to realize that it was much

0:39:49.859,0:40:01.730
different at one time. I would have liked to have seen what my grandparents saw

0:40:01.750,0:40:07.069
there. I'd like to see the green. I'd like to see the orchards. It must've been

0:40:07.089,0:40:11.389
gorgeous. It must've been gorgeous. I mean I think that the Owens Valley is

0:40:11.409,0:40:18.579
beautiful now. I grew up there. And is beautiful now. So can you imagine what it

0:40:18.599,0:40:24.130
was like when my grandfather was there? When my great-grandfather was there? It

0:40:24.150,0:40:36.269
could make me cry.>> Anger mounted as Mulholland's men cut ranchers canals. The

0:40:36.289,0:40:41.449
city bought more land, siphoned off more and more water. Half the crops were

0:40:41.469,0:40:48.000
gone by 1924.Schools and businesses began to close. Owens Lake went bone dry.

0:40:48.019,0:41:00.199
Rumors of resistance began to fly. Someone blew a hole in the siphon. And then,

0:41:00.219,0:41:05.480
just before Thanksgiving in 1924, the local bank president and 100 citizens

0:41:05.500,0:41:13.670
seize the aqueduct. They opened the floodgates and sent the entire flow of the

0:41:13.690,0:41:26.860
Owens River down a ditch and back into its ancient channel in the valley floor.

0:41:26.880,0:41:30.949
>> They organized a caravan of these old model T's that drove I think probably

0:41:30.969,0:41:37.159
dozens of cars down to the Alabama gates on the aqueduct where there was a

0:41:37.179,0:41:39.779
turnout valve will they could basically stop the flow of water to Los Angeles.

0:41:39.779,0:41:46.219
>> Talk about community involvement. I know that my grandfather was there. I

0:41:46.239,0:41:51.960
have spoken recently with my mother's cousin and she said that she remembers

0:41:51.980,0:41:58.360
that it was a party that her mother got her up early and got her dressed up and

0:41:58.380,0:42:06.460
she was only four. So, there was a-- I me that was a great step and those people

0:42:06.480,0:42:12.900
didn't move from the Alabama gates. They didn't move. That took a lot of

0:42:12.920,0:42:13.920
courage. That did.Inaudible>> There wasn't any guns involved. There wasn't that

0:42:13.920,0:42:24.759
type of thing. There'd only been a inaudible from there and he was sympathetic

0:42:24.779,0:42:33.159
to his inaudible if you will.So there was a whole bunch of oh, arbitration but

0:42:33.179,0:42:44.009
discussion but interest focused on this thing is mainly what they were after.

0:42:44.029,0:42:45.809
>> The crowd grew to 700 picnicking, singing Onward Christian Soldiers, playing

0:42:45.809,0:42:57.789
Enrico Caruso on a hand cranked phonograph. Superintendent Mulholland sent city

0:42:57.809,0:43:27.809
police to take back the water but the local sheriff stood between the officers

0:43:28.679,0:43:30.500
and the citizens.>> This news did travel around the world. This was a great big

0:43:30.500,0:43:36.230
story at the time. And it was embarrassing for Los Angeles. Because they were

0:43:36.250,0:43:46.949
being cast as the villain. And you know it was hard to see that any other way.

0:43:46.969,0:43:51.909
>> Mulholland saw this as number one an instance of civil insurrection but saw

0:43:51.929,0:43:56.179
that nothing less than the survival of Los Angeles itself was at stake and that

0:43:56.199,0:44:02.219
basically that had to be a cleansing of farmers from that region. That the two

0:44:02.239,0:44:06.779
communities were incompatible. And that they would have to be bought out.

0:44:06.799,0:44:10.619
>> And so they decided to try to sit down with some of the leaders of the Owens

0:44:10.619,0:44:16.549
Valley and negotiate some kind of a settlement.>> After week, the local bank

0:44:16.569,0:44:20.769
president told the Raiders that a Los Angeles consortium would negotiate a fair

0:44:20.789,0:44:25.779
price for the remaining water rights in Owens Valley. LA would even consider

0:44:25.799,0:44:30.969
sharing the water. With cheers and congratulations, the ranchers and their

0:44:30.989,0:44:36.719
families went home. Only to learn later that the deal had fallen through.

0:44:36.739,0:44:43.119
>> As these negotiations such as they were are going on, the city is busily

0:44:43.139,0:44:48.769
buying more rights, land and water rights in the Valley. Basically buying the

0:44:48.789,0:44:55.400
whole place up.>> While ranchers occupied the aqueduct, city agents had secured

0:44:55.420,0:44:59.699
legal options on virtually all remaining land and water rights in Owens Valley.

0:44:59.719,0:45:08.769
They bought whole towns. Even the county seat and County jail.

0:45:08.789,0:45:15.059
>> More trouble. And it's not the first time either. The last bombing was four

0:45:15.079,0:45:20.710
years ago and ranchers objecting to the city cutting across their property are

0:45:20.730,0:45:26.909
suspected. It's one of the main line pipes about 150 miles north of Los Angeles

0:45:26.929,0:45:31.469
that supplies water to the big town. It's a lucky Los Angeles has an emergency

0:45:31.489,0:45:36.909
watershed or this might have resulted in a terrible drought disaster. The police

0:45:36.929,0:45:41.179
are after the fiends who did this rotten job let's hope they get them. There is

0:45:41.179,0:45:51.119
no punishment too strong for them.>> They received a phone call and this is like

0:45:51.139,0:45:56.349
telling Leonardo da Vinci that someone has just slashed the Mona Lisa. I mean he

0:45:56.369,0:46:08.849
was just appalled outraged and furious and at that point, a certain ugly turn of

0:46:08.869,0:46:15.449
events occurred. The mood changed.>> Now, night after night, saboteurs dynamited

0:46:15.469,0:46:20.170
Mulholland's masterwork. The great aqueduct inaudible

0:46:20.190,0:46:30.529
>> They had numerous stories about my grandfather taking off and blowing up

0:46:30.549,0:46:39.079
dynamiting the aqueduct. It took great pride in the fact of that the many raids

0:46:39.099,0:46:43.679
to blow up the aqueduct.>> They would go along and dynamite sections and then

0:46:43.699,0:46:48.009
they'd go right off back up into the hills, would camp out for weeks and weeks

0:46:48.029,0:46:53.279
and weeks after they had bombed it they were afraid to come home and have them

0:46:53.299,0:46:58.480
have their wives and kids had to basically hold family and Fort together.

0:46:58.500,0:47:03.920
>> The city named three women and 15 men as ringleaders. But could never win a

0:47:03.940,0:47:08.960
single conviction.>> They were heroes you know in your own mind. You know, those

0:47:08.980,0:47:13.259
guys are great for what they did and everything. But we always thought that you

0:47:13.279,0:47:16.789
wish we'd been there if we were kids, you know, but--

0:47:16.809,0:47:22.109
>> Interestingly enough, then he went on to be a California State Sen. So he

0:47:22.129,0:47:26.349
wasn't a crazy man. He was just a man on a mission and a purpose.

0:47:26.369,0:47:35.139
>> Mulholland and his colleagues said look, this can't go on. This is-- you are

0:47:35.159,0:47:41.889
threatening the water supply for a great city. This is criminal. And they sent

0:47:41.909,0:47:46.670
machine guns up there and it stopped.>> Train loads of them were going up to the

0:47:46.690,0:47:50.769
Owens Valley and basically imposing martial law. There were searchlights and

0:47:50.789,0:47:57.429
floodlights up and down that Valley sweeping across the aqueduct all night long.

0:47:57.449,0:48:02.239
>> Mulholland sent 600 heavily armed police to secure the city's water supply.

0:48:02.259,0:48:07.920
Backed by the full force of state and federal law, endorsed by the Chamber of

0:48:07.940,0:48:16.389
Commerce.>> As Jean Renoir said, everyone has his reasons. And I'm sure he had

0:48:16.409,0:48:22.869
his reasons and he justified it because he had to. I can see how it would've

0:48:22.889,0:48:27.639
been very easy to get carried away by powerful men saying see what you can do

0:48:27.659,0:48:32.380
for the city. You know? What a great man you will be. You know?

0:48:32.400,0:48:39.549
>> When I was a kid, you know, he was a bad guy. He was the guy with the black

0:48:39.569,0:48:44.319
hat. He was-- we all hated him, you know? I mean we all talked about a lot and

0:48:44.339,0:48:50.730
you know what evil guy he was, but he had a fantastic vision but he didn't care

0:48:50.750,0:48:54.089
who he stepped over to get it. He didn't care what happened to the Owens Valley.

0:48:54.089,0:48:57.989
>> I would say that when I was a little girl it was not good to be a Mulholland

0:48:57.989,0:49:04.170
in Owens Valley and I was never taken there and my folks if they should chance

0:49:04.190,0:49:09.579
to travel my mother told me they always registered at a hotel using her maiden

0:49:09.599,0:49:17.150
name. Because we were just not well liked in Owens Valley and it was not a good

0:49:17.170,0:49:23.859
name to carry.>> Well, Mulholland was a very honest man. Because he said that

0:49:23.879,0:49:28.889
everyone in Bishop was a son of a bitch and that there wasn't enough pine trees

0:49:28.909,0:49:33.599
to hang the natives on which they deserved whereas the rest of them they went

0:49:33.619,0:49:38.059
with the protocol and with inaudible and so on but not Mulholland.

0:49:38.079,0:49:44.170
>> He knew that it was a vein hope I mean to think that they could go back I

0:49:44.190,0:49:50.489
mean the water had been taken. It was the fait accompli. There was no turning

0:49:50.509,0:49:56.000
back. Owens Valley was not going to be reverted back to what it had been in

0:49:56.019,0:50:01.289
1905. That deed had been done.>> Somebody did put up a sign and that said Los

0:50:01.309,0:50:07.009
Angeles city limits way out in the Owens Valley as kind of a bitter joke. It was

0:50:07.029,0:50:11.859
really than everyone knew William Mulholland had triumphed. He had one the

0:50:11.879,0:50:18.000
Valley was really his.>> Before long, city bulldozers began knocking down

0:50:18.019,0:50:25.799
farmhouses and feeling and irrigation ditches.>> Well first we had the Valley

0:50:25.819,0:50:29.399
then the sellers came in and took away from us in the city of Los Angeles came

0:50:29.399,0:50:43.529
and they took it away from them.>> All Mulholland needed now was a place to

0:50:43.549,0:50:49.480
store water for the growing city.But former LA Mayor Fred Eaton owned the only

0:50:49.500,0:50:53.980
reservoir site in Owens Valley.And was demanding $1 million for it. So

0:50:54.000,0:51:01.219
Mulholland build a huge dam in the hills just 40 miles from downtown LA. It was

0:51:01.239,0:51:06.279
the largest arch support dam in North America. The final link in a decade of

0:51:06.299,0:51:13.480
triumph. By the spring of 1928, the reservoir in San Francisquito Canyon was a

0:51:13.500,0:51:18.109
full to the brim with a year's supply of Owens River water. Far from the scene

0:51:18.129,0:51:24.949
of battle. On March 12, workers noticed a small leak on the north side.

0:51:24.969,0:51:32.529
Mulholland inspected the leak pronounced the dam sound and went home to bed.

0:51:32.549,0:51:39.440
>> My grandfather was awakened from his sleep with a phone call saying the dam

0:51:39.460,0:51:47.449
had gone out. And his first response was he stumbled toward the phone was oh

0:51:47.469,0:52:00.739
please God don't let people be killed.>> There was no warning. There was no

0:52:00.759,0:52:08.699
warning system. And it started wiping out whole communities.

0:52:08.719,0:52:19.139
>> You had so much water in that dam. That there were 1000 ton blocks of

0:52:19.159,0:52:26.650
concrete riding the crest. It was not water at a certain point. It was trees,

0:52:26.670,0:52:36.629
homes, blocks of concrete, rocks, rubble. It was a semisolid wall advancing at

0:52:36.649,0:52:53.619
20 or 30 miles an hour 40 and 50, 60 feet high. You couldn't run from it.

0:52:53.639,0:53:06.619
>> I was five years old when the St. Francis dam broke. And with my limited

0:53:06.639,0:53:11.079
perceptions I realized some dreadful thing. It was like bringing a dark curtain

0:53:11.099,0:53:20.400
down over a lighted area. My father took me-- he was-- my father was stunned and

0:53:20.420,0:53:26.299
he took me in the car. My mother was not well at the time. And we drove up to

0:53:26.319,0:53:33.710
the dam site and on the way up, he taught me how to say San Francisquito Canyon

0:53:33.730,0:53:38.929
and we rehearsed it over and over as if it were some kind of a catechism lesson

0:53:38.949,0:53:46.289
of what it did for me was imprint that name forever in my mind as a scene of

0:53:46.309,0:53:55.489
some terrible fate which had befallen our family.

0:53:55.509,0:54:08.429
>> Mulholland surveyed the greatest man-made disaster in California history. His

0:54:08.449,0:54:38.449
St. Francis dam had killed as many people as the San Francisco earthquake.

0:54:39.139,0:54:44.529
>> I've always been moved all my life at the pictures that were taken of in the

0:54:44.549,0:54:52.379
morning that he was-- went up and surveyed the ruins of the dam failure. It's

0:54:52.399,0:54:59.389
like looking at the most stricken human being I've ever seen. It's a dead stark

0:54:59.409,0:55:04.849
look at his on his face as he stands amid the rubble of something he had

0:55:04.869,0:55:11.009
created. It was an engineer's most horrible fate any engineer could have to

0:55:11.029,0:55:21.359
build a structure that fails and also kills.>> So Mulholland was in a state of

0:55:21.379,0:55:28.420
shock. He made an initial effort really. It wasn't much of an effort-- to blame

0:55:28.440,0:55:31.500
the whole thing on dynamiters phonetic which was the term he now used

0:55:31.500,0:55:35.199
generically to refer to anybody in the Owens Valley.

0:55:35.219,0:55:40.989
But it was soon very obvious that the dam had failed by itself and nobody had

0:55:41.009,0:55:48.309
sabotaged it and that Mulholland had paid a visit to the dam just hours earlier

0:55:48.329,0:55:55.609
and said that the dam was fine. So his reputation which had-- he had been a God

0:55:55.629,0:56:02.159
figure in Los Angeles.>> Mulholland went from being of the father of the city,

0:56:02.179,0:56:17.529
the founder of the city to standing possible indictment.

0:56:17.549,0:56:23.769
>> The precise cause was never found. No criminal charges were ever filed, but

0:56:23.789,0:56:30.059
the coroner's jury held William Mulholland responsible. He accepted the blame.

0:56:30.079,0:56:33.309
Broke down in sobs and said that he envied the dead.

0:56:33.329,0:56:51.089
>> They kept slowly taking away the water from the canals and the ditches and

0:56:51.109,0:56:55.309
everything slowly but surely they got everything siphoned down and so the land

0:56:55.329,0:57:00.319
of the trees and the whole form says they all died off and all the old orchards

0:57:00.339,0:57:02.759
died off and they are all gone now all the houses are all gone. So they just

0:57:02.759,0:57:11.899
turned back into a desert as it was, basically.>> When we traveled to Los

0:57:11.919,0:57:16.009
Angeles we watched the aqueduct. My parents would

0:57:16.029,0:57:23.539
always say, there is our water. Girls, that water came from the Owens Valley.

0:57:23.559,0:57:31.719
And as a child I remember feeling animosity towards Los Angeles. You always

0:57:31.739,0:57:38.809
knew. He always felt that they took our water.>> Mulholland resigned in

0:57:38.829,0:57:43.710
disgrace. His real achievements clouded by the disaster and by the suffering in

0:57:43.730,0:57:49.239
Owens Valley. His plans for still greater aqueducts lay on the drawing board but

0:57:49.259,0:57:54.119
to the people of LA he was an embarrassment. Officials began referring to the

0:57:54.139,0:58:02.039
Mulholland reservoir as the Hollywood reservoir. Owens Valley was history but

0:58:02.059,0:58:06.539
fantasy and folklore lived on.The myth of rampaging bullies destroying a

0:58:06.559,0:58:10.009
paradise, gallant ranchers defending their homes.>> These gentlemen bring word

0:58:10.029,0:58:14.559
from the capital. The inaudible Valley has been condemned.

0:58:14.579,0:58:18.940
>> Condemned?>> What do you mean?>> It seems that Metripol phonetic City needs

0:58:18.960,0:58:23.960
more water and power. So the state has decided to build a dam across cut stone

0:58:23.980,0:58:28.059
Canyon and turn the Valley into a reservoir.>> Just let them start trying to

0:58:28.079,0:58:32.629
build a dam around here.>> The state authorized me to build a dam. And it's

0:58:32.649,0:58:38.349
going to be built whether you like it or not.>> Take it easy, you don't know the

0:58:38.369,0:58:54.489
kind of people you're dealing with, Mister.>> But he will find out.

0:58:54.509,0:58:59.589
>> In 1934 using Mulholland's original plans, the Metropolitan water District

0:58:59.609,0:59:03.980
lasted a new aqueduct all the way to the Arizona State line to its second River,

0:59:04.000,0:59:14.659
the Colorado.>> Unless we take immediate steps to bring in water from an outside

0:59:14.679,0:59:20.029
source, the people of Southern California will be up against a serious water

0:59:20.049,0:59:24.670
shortage. But we are fortunate in having within our reach a water source capable

0:59:24.690,0:59:31.170
of supplying our needs. This source is the Colorado River.

0:59:31.190,0:59:35.869
Inaudible>> The governor of Arizona deployed his state militia to the river's

0:59:35.889,0:59:44.629
bank to stop Los Angeles from taking Colorado River water.

0:59:44.649,0:59:57.839
>> It was to no avail.>> Final resolution would not come until 30 years later

0:59:57.859,1:00:01.309
after one of the longest court cases in American history.

1:00:01.329,1:00:05.809
>> On the day when the waters of the Colorado River rushes into this aqueduct

1:00:05.829,1:00:12.029
the greatest engineering feat of its kind ever accomplished will take its place

1:00:12.049,1:00:18.569
among the wonders of the world.>> It is a wonderful thing to contemplate this

1:00:18.589,1:00:24.369
new conquest of the great Southwest were everything that man desires is

1:00:24.389,1:00:29.969
present. Everything except sufficient water. With sufficient water we can be

1:00:29.989,1:00:37.969
assured of a great and a stable civilization.>> Wow. What a day. I'm afraid

1:00:37.989,1:00:43.250
we're going to be busy. Hi, Greg. It was a high-speed pursuit earlier this

1:00:43.269,1:00:46.469
morning. They have the San Bernardino westbound on and off ramps at Atlantic

1:00:46.469,1:01:08.670
closed down because of a police investigation.Bumper to bumper to Puente.

1:01:08.690,1:01:10.269
Foreign Language Spoken>> -- we'd like to welcome you all aboard Universal

1:01:10.269,1:01:13.379
Studios Hollywood super trim presented by Texaco. Oh, yeah. Uh-oh. I think I

1:01:13.379,1:01:27.940
hear something. It might get a little bit wet.>> Hey, watch out for that tree

1:01:27.960,1:01:36.920
back there!>> He brought enough elements together, water, population, wealth so

1:01:36.940,1:01:43.579
that Los Angeles was now almost condemned to grow and grow and grow.

1:01:43.599,1:01:55.440
>> So after the 1920s, Los Angeles' history is almost defined by an obsessive

1:01:55.460,1:02:02.549
constant search for more and more water. Hoover dam was authorized in 1928,

1:02:02.569,1:02:09.829
finished by the mid-30s then Mono Lake which is north of the Owens Valley was

1:02:09.849,1:02:13.839
hooked up to the aqueduct. And began draining all the streams that feed this

1:02:13.859,1:02:20.029
irreplaceable natural wonder out there.>> Mulholland had long had his eye on

1:02:20.049,1:02:26.009
Mono Lake, 100 miles north of Owens Valley. In 1936, his successors dusted off

1:02:26.029,1:02:31.449
his plans and pushed the aqueduct north to mono seeking again the greatest good

1:02:31.469,1:02:35.039
for the greatest number.>> People really shouldn't have any problem with our

1:02:35.059,1:02:40.339
water system and take it for granted or the water people are doing their job

1:02:40.359,1:02:46.629
well. I always felt that I was working for a good purpose. I wasn't doing

1:02:46.649,1:02:53.929
something that in my view really didn't basically benefit society. I felt that I

1:02:53.949,1:02:58.789
was working on something that was a fundamental benefit to society. I was proud

1:02:58.809,1:03:04.389
of that.>> The people of LA could not depend on water from ancient streams

1:03:04.409,1:03:16.009
feeding Mono Lake.>> This is the desert. This is the grim waterless waste that

1:03:16.029,1:03:20.250
covered most of Los Angeles even within the memory of living men. Here between

1:03:20.269,1:03:21.329
the mountains and the sea, Los Angeles was built. Here is a living breathing

1:03:21.329,1:03:25.960
proof that energy and vision can build a metropolis almost overnight. Angelenos

1:03:25.980,1:03:33.359
phonetic are likely to live on a ranch still within city limits. Perhaps a few

1:03:33.379,1:03:37.299
years ago they were residents of Iowa, Illinois, New Jersey. Here they quickly

1:03:37.319,1:03:41.769
abandon old conventions of inaudible. Dress as they please make the most of

1:03:41.789,1:03:48.099
their mild seductive climate. The inaudible introduction to this promised land

1:03:48.119,1:03:55.480
of exotic people, sunshine, stucco, money, optimism. Success is her pattern.

1:03:55.500,1:04:09.699
This is LA.This is America.>> The rise of Nazis in Germany and the fleeing of

1:04:09.719,1:04:10.939
all that talent have the creation of a euro Southern California. Otto Preminger

1:04:10.939,1:04:13.719
who was of course fleeing the Nazis was at the Hillcrest country club and people

1:04:13.719,1:04:16.619
playing cards and people were talking. And these two people started talking in

1:04:16.619,1:04:22.029
Hungarian and they were talking white Hungarian phonetic. Otto Preminger said,

1:04:22.049,1:04:23.569
what's the matter, he says, why are you talking in Hungarian? This is Los

1:04:23.569,1:04:39.000
Angeles. He said, talk German.>> From Berlin, New York, Alabama, from all over

1:04:39.019,1:04:45.889
the world people flooded into Southern California. They said it was just like

1:04:45.909,1:04:57.559
everyone else only more so.>> There was a new paradise. It's something like--

1:04:57.579,1:05:01.349
you know love and good health. You really miss it by its absence very often. I

1:05:01.349,1:05:06.929
mean it just wasn't aware-- I was never aware growing up, but how wonderful it

1:05:06.949,1:05:20.629
was until it was gone and that was the air itself. The air was wonderful. If you

1:05:20.649,1:05:28.299
stop and think about the mean temperature of the climate here year-round, it's

1:05:28.319,1:05:33.419
probably the most perfect climate to you know, sort of walk around and with

1:05:33.439,1:05:48.440
almost no clothing because the air you just feel that is almost an extension of

1:05:48.460,1:05:49.460
your own skin. It doesn't-- it's not too hot, it's not too cold.

1:05:49.460,1:05:51.579
>> The machinery of water acquisition overworked the Owens River, the Colorado,

1:05:51.599,1:05:58.559
and the Mono basin. In 1964, the Metropolitan water District proposed diverting

1:05:58.579,1:06:03.359
the Columbia River to Southern California. The future had arrived.

1:06:03.379,1:06:08.629
>> Somebody finally decided rather than just go after another source of water

1:06:08.649,1:06:13.250
every 10 or 20 years, why don't we go to where there's so much water we will

1:06:13.250,1:06:19.039
have enough for 200 years. And where was that place? Alaska. It would have

1:06:19.059,1:06:25.449
brought this water down in huge jolts, irrigated Nevada, irrigated Eastern

1:06:25.469,1:06:28.429
Oregon on the way. Some of it would've gone all the way to Mexico. It was going

1:06:28.429,1:06:33.569
to go to Arizona, it was going to go to Texas.>> Nobody really blinked. There

1:06:33.589,1:06:37.029
were lots of people in the business who thought well, yeah. It's maybe a little

1:06:37.029,1:06:39.689
premature, but this is going to happen someday because it has to.

1:06:39.689,1:06:47.469
>> This is not a mirage. But rather a preview of an atomic Marvel of tomorrow. A

1:06:47.489,1:06:53.079
milestone in man's development. A nuclear powered Agro industrial complex. With

1:06:53.099,1:06:58.559
a nuclear reactor as the energy source, and a D salting plant as the fresh water

1:06:58.579,1:07:03.699
source, the desert may be transformed into a nuclear powered Agro industrial

1:07:03.719,1:07:11.980
complex.>> There were plans to last so you know icebergs and tell them down. You

1:07:12.000,1:07:18.679
know,it was like the flimflam man. I mean there was no end to these people who

1:07:18.699,1:07:27.919
had plans to dam San Francisco Bay, to pipelines beyond your wildest dreams.

1:07:27.939,1:07:32.199
These-- and this wasn't about carrying oil. This was about carrying water. This

1:07:32.219,1:07:38.779
is water.>> When these reactors are coupled to a desalting plant, approximately

1:07:38.799,1:07:41.960
1 billion gallons of fresh water will be produced per day.

1:07:41.980,1:07:51.379
>> Of course at the time, nobody was challenging the idea of using 8 gallons of

1:07:51.399,1:07:59.019
water per flush in a toilet. Or irrigating your lawn to the point where it's

1:07:59.039,1:08:03.039
standing an inch deep in water. Nobody thought about conservation. People only

1:08:03.059,1:08:08.210
thought about supply.>> The city had long since exhausted supply from the tiny

1:08:08.230,1:08:16.988
Los Angeles River and cemented over its channel by 1960. The DWP built a

1:08:17.010,1:08:20.569
reservoir to store supply of Owens River water near the center of Los Angeles.

1:08:20.590,1:08:23.609
>> The Los Angeles city police helicopter is here. The Los Angeles city fire

1:08:23.609,1:08:31.269
department helicopters here. The police are on the ground with motorcycles and

1:08:31.288,1:08:35.969
automobiles. Trying to effectively activate people from here so there can't

1:08:35.988,1:08:42.029
possibly be any more loss of life than there is. Property no telling how much

1:08:42.050,1:08:49.519
property has already been lost.>> A triangle shaped wedge tears out of the

1:08:49.538,1:08:50.679
asphalt and concrete lined wall of the earth-filled phonetic dam of the Baldwin

1:08:50.679,1:08:51.679
Hills reservoir. And millions of gallons of water raced down the canyon toward

1:08:51.679,1:08:53.429
the homes below in the community between downtown Los Angeles and International

1:08:53.429,1:09:08.828
Airport. Almost 300 million gallons of water in 77 minutes. An incredible

1:09:08.849,1:09:20.359
disaster.>> The Department of water and power had no choice but to carry on

1:09:20.380,1:09:29.109
since it now served 3 million people. In 1966, LA acquired its third River like

1:09:29.130,1:09:33.109
a giant version of Mulholland's Owens Valley project, the California State

1:09:33.130,1:09:37.849
aqueducts now brought the Feather River from 600 miles north. Enough water to

1:09:37.868,1:09:46.559
fill the Rose Bowl every 90 minutes.>> Los Angeles by the 70s was reaching 200

1:09:46.578,1:09:51.759
miles in one direction, 250 miles in another direction and 600 miles in a third

1:09:51.779,1:10:01.209
direction. For water. And it still wasn't enough.>> In 1970 the Department of

1:10:01.229,1:10:05.689
water and power using Mulholland's original sketches finished the second

1:10:05.710,1:10:16.959
barrel, a parallel aqueduct not far from the original. Sucking now twice as much

1:10:16.979,1:10:18.329
water from Mono Lake. The million year old Lake now fell 2 feet every year. It

1:10:18.329,1:10:24.819
was the only stop for a million migrating seabirds on their way from the Arctic

1:10:24.840,1:10:31.149
to Bolivia.>> You could see the lake going down and down and down. Pretty soon

1:10:31.170,1:10:33.849
it it was not even growing around the lake anymore. Everything was drying up all

1:10:33.849,1:10:41.129
the little springs were dying. You know. That was really devastating because we

1:10:41.149,1:10:47.149
thought the whole Lake is going to be like this. And when you think of God's

1:10:47.170,1:10:51.209
given like you think it should be like it was.>> The local people had already

1:10:51.229,1:10:54.809
resigned themselves to the fact that the lake was going to dry up or get to a

1:10:54.809,1:11:05.819
very small level. Just because of the adversary Department of water and power is

1:11:05.840,1:11:07.139
too big to fight. It was not anything that anybody can do.

1:11:07.139,1:11:11.529
>> Great alkali dust storms began boiling up off the exposed shores of Mono and

1:11:11.550,1:11:17.489
the dry bed of Owens Lake. By 1974, Owens Valley the Switzerland of America had

1:11:17.510,1:11:24.349
the worst particulate pollution in the country.>> The sense that somehow LA had

1:11:24.369,1:11:32.209
sinned against another people became a central imagery in this whole water

1:11:32.229,1:11:35.629
story. And one that I've always had a lot of trouble

1:11:35.649,1:11:41.509
with. Because I've always sympathized with the underdog but at the same time

1:11:41.529,1:11:45.889
I've been proud of my grandfather so it's given me a great deal of conflict to

1:11:45.889,1:11:51.589
have to come to terms with that.>> Why are you doing it? How much better can you

1:11:51.609,1:11:54.359
eat? What can you buy that you can't already afford?

1:11:54.369,1:12:00.379
>> The future, Mr. Gibbs. The future.>> And the crimes that they committed in

1:12:00.399,1:12:06.529
the name of the future, against the future is really the history of water in

1:12:06.550,1:12:15.445
California here in LA. I mean it's-- it's just the supreme irony.

1:12:15.465,1:12:19.409
>> See, Mr. Gibbs, most people never have to face the fact that at the right

1:12:19.429,1:12:24.269
time and the right place they are capable of anything.

1:12:24.289,1:12:29.499
>> Sometimes they are so monstrous that they can't figure out how to punish them

1:12:29.519,1:12:35.489
so they actually sort of reward them. And inaudible name is on the scenic route

1:12:35.510,1:12:42.379
of the city and inaudible of those names are on plaques as city founders. Rather

1:12:42.399,1:12:48.819
than in jail where they belonged.>> When I think of a movie like Chinatown as an

1:12:48.840,1:12:55.009
easy out it oversimplifies it's melodramatic. It's not true I may not literally

1:12:55.029,1:13:03.409
not true. But it provides a rather easy explanation of events and for people who

1:13:03.429,1:13:15.309
like to bash LA is perfect.New York Times loves to hold it up as a piece of

1:13:15.329,1:13:20.679
history.>> The movie Chinatown was bad at contorted history but it was powerful

1:13:20.699,1:13:26.179
myth.Rekindling violence against the Department of water and power. Now

1:13:26.199,1:13:31.579
headquartered in a building that cost as much as Mulholland's original aqueduct.

1:13:31.599,1:13:37.329
>> There was violence here before a long time ago back in 1924 angry farmers and

1:13:37.349,1:13:42.849
ranchers lined the wall armed with shotguns and rifles. They blew holes in the

1:13:42.869,1:13:48.559
aqueduct 17 times. This year it took this form a dynamite blast at the gates of

1:13:48.579,1:13:54.099
the first aqueduct the water for Los Angeles stopped briefly instead--

1:13:54.119,1:13:58.469
>> Resistance was futile. The Department of water and power by now had more

1:13:58.489,1:14:03.529
manpower than the population of Bishop more in fact than the entire population

1:14:03.550,1:14:10.149
of Owens Valley. But this time something had changed. David Gaines a young

1:14:10.170,1:14:14.929
biologist from LA and a dozen University of California students had begun a

1:14:14.949,1:14:20.429
careful study of Mono Lake's singular ecosystem. They found it on the brink of

1:14:20.449,1:14:27.609
collapse.>> We knew about Owens like of course. Now it's just a dry ditch you

1:14:27.630,1:14:31.389
know 100 miles to the south. We realized that Mono Lake could look like that

1:14:31.409,1:14:36.649
someday and once we realized both here, that all that would be lost we couldn't

1:14:36.670,1:14:42.549
let it just go down without making some effort to save it.

1:14:42.569,1:14:48.579
>> By 1976, Mono Lake had fallen 40 feet. Exposing mineral towers which had

1:14:48.599,1:14:56.129
formed underwater over the ages. It had become three times saltier than the

1:14:56.149,1:14:59.849
ocean.>> What we are asking what Mono Lake is asking all of us is where we going

1:14:59.849,1:15:04.509
to draw the line? If we don't share some water with Mono Lake will be next? Will

1:15:04.529,1:15:09.709
it be like Tahoe, will be the Eagle River? The Yukon? Will it be on and on until

1:15:09.729,1:15:13.569
the last of our singing rivers and beautiful lakes are gone because we've taken

1:15:13.590,1:15:19.399
every last drop we watched the last waterfall and the last salmon follow the

1:15:19.420,1:15:24.469
California State emblem the California grizzly into oblivion? It is a

1:15:24.489,1:15:28.519
battleground in that sense. It's asking us how much are we going to share with

1:15:28.539,1:15:36.249
the Earth?>> Well it was very primitive. I mean there was 12 people only one or

1:15:36.269,1:15:40.769
two cars everybody else did their research via bicycle. They did take their

1:15:40.789,1:15:44.309
binoculars and their backpack and their lunch and then hop on their bikes and

1:15:44.329,1:15:48.329
they'd ride down the dirt roads and dump their bikes and hike out for a couple

1:15:48.329,1:15:55.689
miles and then walk through mud and you know they were really the quintessential

1:15:55.710,1:16:00.459
researchers out there braving the elements.>> All those college boys come over

1:16:00.479,1:16:04.729
they all want to look like professors you know they got big beers you know and

1:16:04.750,1:16:11.029
so Mr. Gaines he was one of them. You know?And he looked just like the rest of

1:16:11.050,1:16:15.619
them. You know? Kind of like a hippie I'd say but I don't want to say you know

1:16:15.619,1:16:22.059
he wasn't a hippie but he looked that way.But he was pretty smart that guy. He

1:16:22.079,1:16:27.769
would start a thing going-->> When I grew up in Los Angeles I never learned

1:16:27.789,1:16:33.009
where water came from. And it was only after doing some complex calculations

1:16:33.029,1:16:38.279
that we learned that if diversions continued this Lake will fall another 40 to

1:16:38.300,1:16:44.869
60 vertical feet. What we will be left with is an alkaline waste land a sterile

1:16:44.889,1:16:49.269
chemical sump where there is now one of the most beautiful and life productive

1:16:49.289,1:17:02.449
places on earth.>> Far more than natural beauty was threatened at Mono Lake.

1:17:02.469,1:17:07.839
>> What was at stake was a big aquatic ecosystem that was very simple but very

1:17:07.859,1:17:12.729
productive. I mean the numbers are astronomical. You got algae and then the

1:17:12.750,1:17:15.679
brine shrimp eat the algae and then you've got millions of birds coming every

1:17:15.679,1:17:23.349
summer to eat the brine flies and the brine shrimp. A far off dream was out

1:17:23.369,1:17:28.049
there but I don't think we gazed up at it too much. It might be too

1:17:28.069,1:17:33.339
discouraging. I mean to have a handful of biologists fighting the Department of

1:17:33.359,1:17:38.239
water and power of the city of Los Angeles with a multimillion dollar budget was

1:17:38.260,1:17:43.749
too big of a contrast.>> When William Mulholland took water from Owens Valley

1:17:43.769,1:17:49.539
and Mono Lake years before, no one questioned the damage to nature. But an

1:17:49.559,1:17:54.909
environmental movement had come of age in America. Along with powerful new laws

1:17:54.929,1:18:00.789
and a great shift in public opinion. Committees at Mono Lake and Owens Valley

1:18:00.809,1:18:05.909
together with the Audubon Society, went to court to stop the water conquest

1:18:05.929,1:18:10.529
Mulholland had set in motion in 1905.>> If you're angry and have nothing else--

1:18:10.550,1:18:16.319
no other recourse I think dynamite comes to mind. And they were ranchers. They

1:18:16.340,1:18:22.379
understood dynamite. We were college biologists. No experience with dynamite. We

1:18:22.399,1:18:26.659
knew facts and figures and we knew that we could you know we were educated

1:18:26.679,1:18:32.169
people and we could probably figure out how to find lobbyists to go to help us

1:18:32.189,1:18:36.469
in Sacramento and how to find lawyers.People were saying well, ask for a lot. Go

1:18:36.489,1:18:40.669
way high and then you compromise down with the politicians and the agencies and

1:18:40.689,1:18:45.769
we were all biologists and we kind of said that doesn't sound right. Why can't

1:18:45.789,1:18:50.589
we just start with what we know is the truth and it just stay there forever? And

1:18:50.609,1:18:56.149
that's what we did.>> The courts ruled that drying out the Owens River or

1:18:56.170,1:19:02.739
streams feeding Mono Lake was not in the public interest. In 1988, the state

1:19:02.760,1:19:06.130
forced the city to return water to Mono for the first time in half a century.

1:19:06.130,1:19:11.999
Los Angeles began water conservation on a scale never before seen in America.

1:19:12.019,1:19:18.959
And now shares the water in a fragile peace with Owens Valley and Mono Lake.

1:19:18.979,1:19:25.229
>> One local person said, if you guys say the lake I'll eat my hat. It turns out

1:19:25.250,1:19:30.049
that we saved the lake and we have the regulations and people seem much happier.

1:19:30.069,1:19:35.479
We see water running down the creek fish in the creek. Maybe some of them

1:19:35.500,1:19:38.319
remember the great numbers of ducks and geese that were down at the lake and

1:19:38.319,1:19:45.789
they look forward to that being in the future again.

1:19:45.809,1:19:49.599
>> I didn't think that they would succeed in persuading the inaudible to let the

1:19:49.619,1:19:57.759
water in again.>> What you think they would not succeed?

1:19:57.779,1:20:04.719
>> Well, how can you fight the city of Los Angeles? So really this is a victory.

1:20:04.739,1:20:13.879
A great victory.>> David Gaines did not live to see the victory. He had died a

1:20:13.899,1:20:28.459
year before in an automobile accident not far from Mono Lake.

1:20:28.479,1:20:34.939
>> And so finally, the machine that Mulholland had set in motion just kind of

1:20:34.960,1:20:42.179
began to fall apart. The whole posture of the Los Angeles Department of water

1:20:42.199,1:20:48.029
and power and the city changed. The city negotiated with Mono Lake folks and

1:20:48.050,1:20:53.549
decided to give more water back to the lake. It gave up on the idea of importing

1:20:53.569,1:21:00.389
Klamath River water or Columbia River water.>> I think ultimately, it was

1:21:00.409,1:21:07.249
people's feeling why bring more water in if it just encourages more growth that

1:21:07.269,1:21:12.189
forces us to bring more water in. You know?It's sort of a death vortex. It's the

1:21:12.210,1:21:17.429
red Queen in Alice in Wonderland running faster and faster just to stay in

1:21:17.449,1:21:25.579
place. And that mentality has sort of died a respectful death. And you know if

1:21:25.599,1:21:30.979
there's an occasional shortage well that's too bad. We are in a desert here. We

1:21:31.000,1:21:38.049
are not supposed to be like Miami all the time every day of the year to

1:21:38.069,1:21:50.449
infinity.>> After the dam failure, my grandfather underwent the most profound

1:21:50.469,1:21:59.449
change that you can imagine and-- but he had been a vigorous functioning

1:21:59.469,1:22:05.559
70-year-old man or 72-year-old man at the time the dam failed. And he simply

1:22:05.579,1:22:11.629
shriveled. He'd come out to the ranch and he sits in the living room with his

1:22:11.649,1:22:18.399
cigar and the conversation would go around and he would just shut his eyes. He

1:22:18.420,1:22:30.849
would sit there like some kind of a sleeping giant. I was so struck as a child

1:22:30.869,1:22:37.829
when I attended the funeral and his body lay in state and city hall and the

1:22:37.849,1:22:44.179
working men who came to pay their last respects to him. Some of them cried and

1:22:44.199,1:22:47.880
when I was 12 years old and that made a big impression on me because I'd never

1:22:47.880,1:22:55.199
seen grown men cry.And so, I derived from that that this was a man who had

1:22:55.219,1:23:01.019
commanded a lot of love and respect in his day. And I've spent a lifetime trying

1:23:01.039,1:23:06.329
to drive that with all the attacks that had been made on him by people who

1:23:06.349,1:23:15.799
didn't know him.>> Freeways are settling down, believe it or not. We check on

1:23:15.819,1:23:19.969
the 405 and the 101 leaving the Hollywood Hills. Not bad at all. No need to take

1:23:19.969,1:23:24.439
alternate routes such as Laurel Canyon, Coldwater Canyon, or even Mulholland

1:23:24.460,1:23:35.756
Drive. I'm Dr. Roadmap flying for Capt. Jorge inaudible 'copter 790.

1:23:35.776,1:23:36.698
Music