Settling the Land

In 1866, Colorado's first bid for statehood passed Congress, but was vetoed by President Andrew Johnson who cited concerns with Colorado’s population:

The population [of Colorado] is small; some estimate it as low as twenty-five thousand, while the advocates of the bill reckon the number at from thirty-five thousand to forty thousand. The people are principally recent settlers, many of whom are understood to be ready for removal to other mining districts beyond the limit of the Territory, if circumstances shall render them more inviting

President Jackson's fears were apparently realized. Despite the surge of gold miners into Colorado in the mid-1860s, the population of the Colorado Territory remained relatively stable from 1860 (34,277) to 1870 (39,864). However, by 1880, the population of Colorado would raise drastically to nearly 200,000. Settlers came, but this time, they came to settle the land and it would be this new wave of settlers who would soon build Fort Morgan.

    

The first irrigation ditch in the area was said to have been dug by none other than Holon Godfrey in 1872 which was soon incorporated into the South Platte Ditch. Over the next two decades nearly two dozen irrigation ditches were dug in the Fort Morgan area including the Fort Morgan Canal begun by Abner S. Baker in 1882 and stretched approximately 25 miles.

Included in the August 30, 1889 anniversary issue of The Fort Morgan Times was a description of the canals in the Fort Morgan area noting at the time of writing that there were 200 miles of canal lines representing an investment of $750,000:

Commencing at the western boundary of Morgan county, the first system is the Bijou Reservoir and Canal Company’s property, which heads on the South Platte River…thirty miles west of Fort Morgan, near the station of Hardin, on the Julesburg branch of the Union Pacific Railway. This canal was incorporated in August of 1888, by Walter T. Brown, Walter B. Howard and W. H. Clatworthy, and its capital stock is $150,000…. 

Work was commenced on the line in September [1888].... The capacity of the canal is 450 cubic feet per second. It is the largest canal in the county, has a length of fifty miles, and under 45,000 acres of land…. With this line in operation, a continuous strip of country ten miles wide by forty in length will have been recovered from the parched plains of Colorado, and in the center stands the future metropolis of Eastern Colorado....

Weldon Valley Ditch Co. This canal is the main north-side one, and was built in 1882. The incorporators were P. W. Putnam, Dr. S. K. Thompson, G. A. W. Cage, Solon Martin and Albert and Jerome Igo. It is sixteen miles in length, and waters 8,000 acres of land. The stock of the company, amounting to $65,000, is owned exclusively by the farmers under it....

Fort Morgan Canal. The next large irrigating canal we come to is that of the Fort Morgan Land and Canal Company. This large canal was incorporated in 1882, by A. S. Baker, J. S. Courtney, G. W. Warner and E. E. and F. E. Baker, and built by the former gentleman during the following year, the first crops were watered from it in 1884, when about 5,000 acres were cultivated. The canal has a capacity of 378 cubic feet per second, and under it are 23,000 acres of the finest lands in the world…. 

Platte and Beaver Canal. The Platte and Beaver Company has two lines of ditches, and are known as the Upper Platte and Beaver, and the Supply Ditch. The original franchise of this system was granted to A. S. Baker, Lyulph Ogilvy and E. E. Baker…. The upper line has a capacity of 265 cubic feet, and the supply of 415 cubic feet per second, and water 45,000 acres of land unexcelled for irrigation….

Deuel and Snyder Canal. This canal, which is known as the More & Tracy ditch, is a private one, having been built, and the stock is now entirely owned by L. F. More and H. S. Tracy. The head of this line is on the north side of the river, just below the dam at the head of the upper Platte and Beaver ditch. The length of the canal is eight miles, width eight feet, depth three feet, a grade of two and eleven-tenths per mile. Under the line are in the neighborhood of 3,000 acres....

Other Canals. There are several small irrigation ditches supplied from the Big Beaver creek in the vicinity of Brush, several of which have large and sufficient reservoirs to catch and retain the spring and summer flood waters. Among these enterprises are the Beaver Creek Ditch incorporated by Dr. Emerson; the Sled Ranch Ditch, partially built by C. I. Lawton; the Obrecht Reservoir and Canal Company; the Big Beaver Land and Canal Company, and the Beaver Ditch Company, all taken from Big Beaver creek. This stream at no season of the year runs dry, and during the greater part of the year furnishes a liberal supply of water for the irrigation of crops… Further down the Platte is the private canal owned by Sheriff A. A. Smith, which covers about 5,000 acres of most valuable land….

Photo of three men in a boat on the Morgan Irrigation Canal. Fort Morgan, Colorado 

Colorado attained statehood not because of gold found in the mountains, but because of the settlers on the plains who had found a way to harness the rivers.

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Sources:

1. New York Times May 17, 1866
2. Resident Population and Apportionment of the U.S. House of Representatives www.census.gov/dmd/www/resapport/states/colorado.pdf
3. Eberhart, Perry, Ghosts of the Colorado Plains (Athens, OH: Swallow Press, 1986), pp. 11-12.
4. Baker, L. C. 1895. What Ten Years of Irrigation has Done for a Part of the Colorado Desert.
5. Cameron. 1908. National Magazine, 28(2).