The Cascades: Mulholland Opens the Los Angeles Aqueduct

On November fifth, nineteen thirteen, more than thirty thousand people gathered at this spot to watch water pour down the concrete spillway known as the Cascades. The occasion was the opening of the Los Angeles Owens River Aqueduct, a two-hundred-thirty-three-mile channel that had taken five years and thousands of workers to build, with mules, hand labor, and steam-powered equipment.

William Mulholland, the self-taught Irish immigrant who designed and oversaw the project, had almost nothing prepared to say. As the headgates opened and the first torrent crashed down the spillway, he turned to the crowd and said only, there it is, take it.

The aqueduct transformed Los Angeles from a growing city into one that would eventually hold millions. It also quietly drained the Owens Valley to the east, devastating farms and ranches whose owners had been misled about the city's intentions. The water wars that followed shaped California politics for decades.