A short history of the general subject of government irrigation and the inception of the various projects in western Nebraska, and near the Wyoming border which laid the foundation for the later enterprises that have been or are being projected in Morrill county.

The first irrigation in America, except by pre-historic peoples, was by the Spanish in Xew Mexico. The Mormons, after 1847. practiced it extensively in Utah. In the early fifties Germans from San Francisco established the colony of Anaheim, building a canal and cutting the farms into 20-acre

tracts. The colony was successful. In 1870 the Flurierism colony, promoted by Horace Greeley, began the first irrigation in Colorado. From these efforts Greeley, Colorado, has come to be looked upon as an example of what irrigation will do. In the early seventies, the government post at Sidney built a small irrigation system.

In 1871 the Riverside, California, colony and canal were established. Today this is one of the most beautiful spots in the world, and land has an enormous value. These were the earliest irrigation projects, and from them the irrigation idea spread over a

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HISTORY OF WESTERN NEBRASKA

wide area. Many canals were built by cooperative efforts of people under them and outside capital, but most of the land subject to irrigation remained unclaimed government land.

Major John Wesley Powell, United States Geological Survey, William E. Smythe, of California ; John Hall, of Texas ; John Henry Smith, of Utah; C. E. Brainard, of Idaho; L. Bradford Prince, of New Mexico, can be looked upon as the prime movers in government irrigation. During 1891 while employed on the Omaha Bee as editor, Mr. Smythe wrote articles resulting in a state irrigation convention at Lincoln, which laid the first steps toward a National Irrigation Congress, the first one held, which convened a few months later at Salt Lake City.