Los Angeles

The Three Leads

Modern Los Angeles owes its existence to three men--Harrison Gray Otis, Harry Chandler, and William Mulholland-who arrived along with all the others who came to Los Angeles to make it big. After returning from a military post in the Aleutian Islands, Harrison Gray Otis became the editor of a Santa Barbara newspaper. He hated the privileged people of the city and the fact that the city wanted to remain small. He soon moved to Los Angeles, which, despite its small size, boasted a number of newspapers. He became the editor of the Times and Mirror. Gambling his family's entire savings, he bought a share of the newspaper with the intentions of eventually forcing the paper's eastern financer out.

While at Dartmouth College, Harry Chandler accepted a challenge and dove into a vat of starch. He almost destroyed his lungs in the process. Upon the recommendation of his doctors, he moved to Los Angeles to recuperate. He eventually moved in with a doctor who owned an irrigated farm in the area. He took a job picking fruit. The doctor was not interested in money and let Chandler sell most of what he picked. Chandler managed to make a small fortune selling the fruit-$3,000. With the money he began to purchase newspaper circulation routes, which, back then, were owned independently of the newspapers.

While Chandler was buying up circulation routes, Otis had bought the other owner out of the Times. Just as soon as he was bought out, though, the financer established a rival paper, the Tribune. By chance, Otis found Chandler. The two teamed up and soon, with the help of Chandler's outlaw tactics, the Tribune was dead. Chandler was as smart as villainous and bought the Tribune printing plant. Otis, embodying similar traits, soon came to a deal with Chandler: Chandler became the Times circulation manager and Otis's son-in-law.

William Mulholland, who was born in Dublin, Ireland, came to Los Angeles for no particular reason. He did various work in Pittsburgh and Michigan before he became a seaman and traveled to Panama. In order to save money, he walked the Isthmus. After miscellaneous jobs in the southwest, Mulholland joined a well-drilling crew. He became curious and soon decided to become an engineer. In 1878 he joined the city's private water company as a ditch-tender. He rose through the ranks. In the Los Angeles City Water Company, Mulholland met Fred Eaton. Eaton liked Mulholland so much that he chose him to be his successor. When Eaton left the company to become a politician-he became the mayor of Los Angeles-Mulholland became superintendent of the dilapidated system.

A City Consumes a River

On a Quest for Water

Between the efforts of the railroad and the industrious Chamber of Commerce, Los Angeles soon grew to over 100,000 people. By 1903 the city's sole source of water, the meager Los Angeles River, was almost gone. Mulholland tried to convince the city to conserve water, yet his attempts were to no avail. As he would say years later in a speech, the city was condemned to grow. As soon as the city would obtain a surplus of water, people would move in and the city would have to search for more water.

The former mayor of Los Angeles and long-time friend of Mulholland's, Fred Eaton told Mulholland of the Owens Valley. The Owens Valley, nestled in the Sierra Nevada, over 200 miles across the desert from the city, contained a small river. Despite the fact that a range of mountains is between the Owens Valley and the ocean, a small break in the range allowed storms to enter the valley. While the valley itself is a desert-it is in the rain shadow of the surrounding mountains-the Owens River runs through the middle of it. The river, which is fed from the snow in the mountains, drains into Owens Lake. Unfortunately, the river no longer drains into the lake. The lake is the remnant of a giant prehistoric lake. Because of the high evaporation rate and the fact that there is not much inflow, Owens Lake is-was-extremely salty. Brine shrimp, which lived in the salty waters, attracted thousands of birds on their migratory routes. Sometimes birds would cover the skies of the valley for hours or even days.