July 9, 2021 • 39 mins
We're Ba-aack! Season 2 of The Stories We Forgot kicks off with a good old fashioned tragedy. Listen you guys; it's history, and history shapes the future. If you want to understand more about the world we live in, it helps to know how we got here. Join husband and wife team, AJ and Pearl Hurst as they cover the story of the St. Francis Dam disaster in 1928, and learn why we've all but forgotten this story today.
Sources:
- https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/occasions-i-envy-dead-st-francis-dam-disaster-180954543/
- https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-stfrancis-dam-retrospective-20160319-story.html
- https://www.britannica.com/event/St-Francis-Dam-disaster
- https://myfavoritemurder.com/228-the-season-of-the-abyss/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pearl (00:00):
All right, well we're back
AJ (00:04):
two, baby.
Pearl (00:05):
Oh man.
You know, when we startedrecording season one, it was
January and now it is July.
AJ (00:13):
I almost, I almost said now it's June.
Wait.
Pearl (00:16):
it's July.
So when we record the podcast,we have to turn off the central
air for the house.
You can't have any fans comingon, or,
AJ (00:25):
background noise,
Pearl (00:26):
And we've turned off all fans, obviously.
So yeah, it's, it's gonna gethot in here real quick.
AJ (00:32):
So the only sound you may hear is the sweat dripping off
of our face.
Pearl (00:36):
It's summertime in Virginia.
AJ (00:38):
How's that for a visual
Pearl (00:41):
yeah, for a segue.
So, I'm speaking of
AJ (00:44):
segues,
Pearl (00:45):
warm and uncomfortable.
We were actually going to startthe podcast last week.
That was our official launch forseason two.
And we didn't do anythingbecause I ran into some poison
Ivy.
I don't know, I just ran into,ran into it.
Yeah.
AJ (01:01):
I mean, did you run into it or did it kind of run into you?
Pearl (01:04):
Well, You know, the thing is I've had poison Ivy
experiences before, and I didlearn my lesson, but I needed to
learn it again.
Apparently I think that happenssometimes
AJ (01:14):
it a rough in life when you, you have to learn a lesson
twice?
Pearl (01:18):
Oh man.
Yeah.
And I'm just, I'm just a littlebit impulsive when I have a
task.
In front of me that I want toget done.
I just want to like, get itdone.
AJ (01:29):
You're focused.
Pearl (01:30):
Yeah.
I'm sure.
But also I just really don'tlike stopping and doing all the
prep work like painting.
I do not prep.
And I actually pride myself inthat because I can paint a room
with zero taping.
Like no problem, no dripping notaping, nothing, but that is
only because.
(01:50):
I hate prep for painting so muchthat I'll go the extra mile to
do it, you know, without theprep.
So same way with poison Ivy inorder to deal with poison Ivy
effectively, you know, cause I,I do all the yard work out here
and
AJ (02:05):
I have seasonal allergies,
Pearl (02:06):
yeah yeah sure Yeah He's got
AJ (02:08):
not just lazy seasonal allergies.
Pearl (02:10):
So I do the yard work cause I don't have crazy grass
allergies like AIG does.
And.
In order to to effectively dealwith poison Ivy, you have to
like, you have to put yourselfinside of a giant bubble of
plastic and then use a laser andpointed at the base of the
poison Ivy, which is the networktwo 50 billion, other poison Ivy
(02:35):
plants in your garden.
You just haven't found yet.
I'm kidding.
It's terrible.
Poison Ivy is really difficultto Find and get out and yeah
AJ (02:43):
yeah, you basically need to wrap yourself in garbage bags,
head to toe.
Pearl (02:47):
It was 80 degrees out then you're sweating and yeah,
it's miserable, but so
AJ (02:52):
little opening, the poison Ivy will take
Pearl (02:54):
it, it.
Sure does.
And I I had a little opening andwhen I get poison Ivy on one
spot, they just kinda likespreads like wildfire.
So, last week we were going torecord and I just could not sit
still.
Long enough to research.
AJ (03:09):
Yeah, you've
Pearl (03:09):
record I was just So itchy and squirmy.
And I was, I was in a bad moodtoo.
So that didn't
AJ (03:14):
no, no, you weren't
Pearl (03:16):
a little, a little cranky, A little
AJ (03:19):
pleasant as always.
Pearl (03:21):
So here we are starting up season two of the pod and
AJ (03:25):
welcome to the stories.
We forgot
Pearl (03:27):
the stories we forgot.
AJ (03:29):
This is my lovely wife, Pearl Hearst.
Pearl (03:31):
This is my amazing husband AIG Hearst, And that was
a lot of an intro.
AJ (03:39):
They know us by now.
They know
Pearl (03:47):
the season of the podcast we've got a bunch of great
stories lined up for you and acouple of amazing historians as
well.
And looking forward to sharingthese stories with you and
hearing what you think aboutthem.
So AGA do you have a, this dayin history?
for
AJ (04:02):
Well, Pearl, as a matter of fact, I do it's time, right?
For this day in history,history, history,
Pearl (04:09):
still got
AJ (04:11):
fairly short.
And to the point for today onJuly 9th, 1947, the first female
army officer.
In a ceremony at the Pentagongeneral, Dwight D Eisenhower
appoints Florence Blanchfield tobe a Lieutenant Colonel in the U
S army, making her the firstwoman in us,
Pearl (04:33):
year
AJ (04:34):
1947,
Pearl (04:35):
47.
AJ (04:37):
making her the first woman in us history to hold permanent
military rank.
She was a member of the armynurse Corps since 1917.
So she'd been doing it.
For 30 years.
She secured her commission as anofficer following the passage of
the army Navy nurse act of 1947.
(04:57):
She had served as superintendentof the army nurse Corps during
world war two and wasinstrumental in the passage of
the army Navy nurse act.
In 1951, she was later she waslater given the Florence
Nightingale award from the redcar.
And in 1978 and army hospital inFort Campbell, Kentucky was
named in her honor.
Pearl (05:17):
And What's her name again?
AJ (05:19):
Florence Blanchfield,
Pearl (05:20):
Lawrence
AJ (05:23):
female, permanent army.
I'm not sure what you mean bypermanent.
We might have to look into that,but first woman in us history to
hold permanent military rank
Pearl (05:33):
is private military rank a thing.
AJ (05:35):
Well, I'm wondering if maybe during world war II, maybe there
were like, Temporary things thatwere done or something that's my
best guess.
I don't know.
Pearl (05:47):
Yeah.
I have no idea.
AJ (05:49):
has a, it's a fairly short article today on that one.
So I don't have a whole lot moreinfo
Pearl (05:55):
clearly we know, a lot about the military you're coming
to the experts.
Remember, remember, okay.
Speaking of experts I actuallyhave a story.
When the first time that I heardthis story, I thought to myself,
man, somebody needs to do apodcast with stories like this
one.
AJ (06:12):
Really?
Pearl (06:13):
This is the story.
AJ (06:14):
This is the story that started at all.
Pearl (06:16):
that started at all.
And I thought to myself, Oh whatshould they call the podcast?
It's driving down the road,listening to,
AJ (06:25):
this is the birth of the pod right here, folks.
Pearl (06:28):
Yeah.
Driving in a car, Listening to,hits from the seventies and
eighties as one Does,
AJ (06:37):
Is that when you first heard this story?
Pearl (06:38):
No, Listening to a podcast, but I was trying to
think of the name for the pod.
And then I just decided that Iwould name it, the stories.
We forgot if I had a podcast,which I did not, and I had no
interest, but then, you know,the longer I thought about it, I
was like, man, somebody needs tojust do this dang podcast.
So here we are
AJ (06:57):
on the dang podcast.
Pearl (07:00):
So this story is a disaster story.
AJ (07:05):
I was going to do some kind of bump bum, but I wasn't sure,
but a buck bump up.
Pearl (07:10):
sad
AJ (07:12):
The theme song that popped into my head was not disaster
story appropriate.
Pearl (07:18):
not a happy story.
It's a sad story, but ithappened really long time ago.
So it's a teensy bit lasts lesssad now.
AJ (07:24):
True, true time.
Heals all wounds,
Pearl (07:26):
I don't know.
but yeah, so here it goes.
AJ (07:30):
oh man notes and everything.
This is getting intense.
Right, right, right, right.
Pearl (07:38):
So, you've never heard this story.
You
AJ (07:40):
I don't know, because you haven't told me what the story
Pearl (07:42):
heard this story.
And I would imagine that anyone,living outside of most people
living outside of California,wouldn't have heard this story
either because this story tookplace in 1928, in the spring of
1928.
And Everyone knows that 1929 wasthe stock market crash.
(08:03):
And that really eclipsed all haall previous headlines.
Everything that had beenhappening in the world was
basically sidelined for thegrid.
AJ (08:14):
That's how we forget a lot of stories.
Something more intriguing ormore tragic happens.
Pearl (08:21):
So true.
It's not a conspiracy theory,but a lot of conspiracy theories
have this premise, which isgoing to say, it,
AJ (08:28):
this is true.
This is true.
Pearl (08:30):
But this story is not a conspiracy theory.
Man, I don't I don't even knowhow to start the story.
It's so it's so big and sodaunting.
The story starts with Well, itstarts with the city of Los
Angeles, really.
Los Angeles was And still isheavily reliant on outside
sources of water.
(08:50):
Right.
California is a desert and
AJ (08:54):
not all of
Pearl (08:54):
mean Well, yeah.
Lots of California is a desertin that it has to rely on
irrigation.
And not natural rainfall.
So Um, Los Angeles back in theearly part of the 19.
Early 19 hundreds was growingrapidly or there's potential for
(09:15):
rapid growth, but they neededwater and the rivers that they
had access to just weren'tquite, weren't quite bringing in
the water that they potentiallywould need in order to actually
grow into a city of any sort offormidable size.
So.
What happened is there was a manby the name of William
(09:37):
Mulholland.
So William Mulholland, he's kindof the chief character for this
story because he is the chiefengineer So as Los Angeles is
growing, they hire a man whoworks in the water department
and he gets stuff done.
He Has he's he's brilliant inhis own.
(09:57):
Right.
He studies tons of stuff all thetime.
He's always learning and heessentially becomes a
self-taught engineer, which, youknow, technically shouldn't be a
thing.
and be like a self.
brain surgeon or you, You knowwhat I mean?
Like when, when you're doinglittle stuff, it's kind of okay
to say you're a self-taughtengineer, but when you're doing
(10:18):
big stuff, It kind of startsmattering more
AJ (10:21):
true there's some theory
Pearl (10:23):
can be a Google doctor with mosquito bites, but you
probably shouldn't be you know,looking at YouTube videos of how
to do brain surgery, you know,probably not a good idea.
AJ (10:33):
That's fair.
Pearl (10:34):
So, William Mulholland, he's working for the city of Los
Angeles and he rapidly rises inranks.
He's got friends in high places.
And he's kind of known forgetting projects done quickly
and coming in So that's kind ofhis thing.
He also has a fairlyphotographic memory so he
(10:56):
doesn't take, he doesn't havetons and tons of, paper trail
with him.
And that's one of thesignificant things about this
story is that because WilliamMulholland was in charge of
everything.
Eventually he, He didn't have toanswer to a lot of people and he
didn't have a lot of oversightin his career.
AJ (11:17):
Okay.
I am, I am getting extremelyintrigued
Pearl (11:20):
Okay.
So, so The first major thingthat he does is on the other
side of the Sierra Nevadamountain range, there is On the
other side of this, year, NevadaSU this year a Nevada, mountain
range from Los Angeles is theOwens valley.
And at that point, the Owensvalley had a large lake and that
(11:44):
was known as Owens lake.
And there was a lot ofdevelopment happening to start
irrigating the lake so that theOwens valley could kind of
blossom into a.
you know, A beautiful greenthriving However, because of and
this is, we're not going to gointo all the water rights, all
(12:04):
the water rights wars that havethat California has gone through
Cause it's a long sorted storyand kind of outside of the scope
one episode.
But so because of theconnections that Los Angeles
city leaders have.
They eventually win the rightsto build an aqueduct from the
(12:24):
Owens lake all the way to LosAngeles and an aqueduct is
essentially a manmade river.
So,
AJ (12:33):
so like through the Sierra Nevada's
Pearl (12:36):
yeah, so they build this aqueduct it's it's, It is a
really big.
project.
And will you Mulholland is incharge of the project and it
goes really, really well.
And of course, a lot of peopleare super upset about the land
and water rights that have beenstolen from the people, and the
farmers on the other side of theSierra Nevada's.
But the project gets finishedand he's a Hero.
(12:59):
He's a hero of of LA.
Yeah.
So at this point, he has risenthrough William Mulholland has
kind of risen through the ranksin city leadership.
So now he's in charge of thedepartment of power and water,
as far as being the chiefengineer and making decisions.
(13:21):
there just wasn't because of, Idon't know if it's because of
just the time celebrity statusor the I'm not, I don't really
understand how there was.
as much oversight as thereshould have been, but
AJ (13:38):
yeah, well,
Pearl (13:38):
Basically what happens is he decides that he is going to
build a reservoir because theOwens lake is so far away from
LA.
And they want to move the water.
So they have water much closerto LA because they're having so
many issues with farm withfarmers using dynamite on the,
(13:59):
on the Aqua.
To try and divert water back totheir farms.
So they kind of just, wanted,
AJ (14:05):
oh, like farmers from the Owens valley are trying to
destroy the aqueduct andessentially
Pearl (14:10):
they want to bring the water closer to them.
So they settle on a spot about30 miles Northeast of Los
Angeles.
So, and that is in the, 30 milesNortheast of Los Angeles.
That's in the Santa Clara rivervalley.
So I'm not super familiar withCalifornia geography, but so I'm
not going to really worry abouttrying to make this a
(14:31):
hyper-specific.
If you're interested in gettingmore details, we'll have links
to all of our sources in theshow notes.
So you can kind of figure out alittle bit better if you want to
see some topographical maps, butso what happens is he selects a
site?
They have some brief studiesdone.
of the
AJ (14:50):
That sounds
Pearl (14:51):
Just geology of the place.
And just trying to figure out,you know, what, what the best
possible location might be.
Basically, that you're trying tofind I a deep, a nice deep
valley with walls.
Where you can dam up one part ofit, the water can flow in.
You can only dam up a smallportion, and then you got a
(15:14):
massive manmade
AJ (15:15):
minimize the amount of
Pearl (15:17):
Right.
So remember, this man is not Anengineer who has ever gone to
school.
He is a self-taught engineer.
And I think at this, at thispoint, he is in his early
seventies.
So this is something he's builthis career on.
AJ (15:31):
Okay.
Pearl (15:31):
And the, the problem is.
that Because well, the problemis that he does not like to have
outside interference in hisprojects and so he rejects
oversight from, you know, havingactual engineers and geologists
come in and kind of double checksome stuff for him.
(15:51):
One of the, one of the thingsand one of the things that is
pretty notable.
Is that in the original designsfor this dam that they want to
build, they have at one height,but then the actual dam height
is significantly higher.
And if you want to increase damheight, you have to increase dam
(16:16):
base width as well.
Right.
AJ (16:19):
Or you have a damn problem.
Pearl (16:20):
Right.
Well, that's exactly whathappened.
So, So we're still, we're stillin backstory.
Sorry, I'm trying to speed thisup a little bit.
So, so they start to, they buildthe dam and they start that in.
AJ (16:34):
I mean, I feel like you're foreshadowing is on point here,
so I'm feeling some trepidation,
Pearl (16:40):
When it's completed, the dam has the capacity.
of, I think 12 and a halfbillion gallons of water
AJ (16:48):
billion with a B
Pearl (16:50):
with a B.
So it's, it's massive.
AJ (16:52):
It's a lot of water.
Pearl (16:53):
So they begin construction for the dam in
1924.
And the construction iscompleted by 1926.
So it takes about two years toto do it, and then they began
filling up the dam.
And I think that I thinknormally it sounds like most dam
(17:14):
failures happen.
The first time the dam is filledto capacity for the first, you
know?
AJ (17:20):
Yeah.
I guess probably makes sense.
Pearl (17:22):
Surprisingly dam disasters are not common.
AJ (17:25):
Why they pay us what they have engineers for.
Pearl (17:27):
Yeah exactly.
I guess, I guess that's why theypay engineers the big bucks for
those.
But, so it had been two yearsand the dam at this point was
full to capacity.
And I think like within threefeet of the very top of the dam,
massive, there's a couple ofpictures that I'm gonna post on
Instagram of The before andafter of the dam.
(17:48):
So you can kind of see, oh, Iguess I just said after, so I
guess that kind of lets it out,but, yeah, I mean,
AJ (17:53):
we know what's
Pearl (17:54):
is a disaster story.
I've been telling you all abouta self-taught engineer, building
a dam 12 and a half.
billion gallons of
AJ (18:01):
If this dam does not collapse, we are all going to be
very, very let down.
Pearl (18:07):
down So what happens is they start noticing it's been an
incredibly wet winter over, youknow, 1927 into January,
February, March of 1928.
And they start noticing somecracking in the dam.
And of course it is normal tohave cracking in dams.
(18:29):
And there isn't Any such thingthere isn't, there's no such
thing as a dry dam.
that's just the way it goes withdams, I guess which
AJ (18:39):
they all
Pearl (18:39):
they they all illegal a little bit.
That's just part of the factthat you're dealing with a very
large expanse and material thatdoes not, have a lot of
plasticity.
and the earth does have a decentmiddle plasticity.
So, you know,
AJ (18:54):
Okay.
Pearl (18:55):
so Yeah.
So there's, there's enoughchecks and balances in modern
dam design.
That, that that's not a problem.
with with dams, apparently thething is, as long as the water
coming through and is obviouslya small amount, a that makes
sense.
But as long as the water isclear, you're fine.
But if it's muddy, than thatshows that the base of the dam
(19:17):
is being eroded away.
So what happens is farmers andranchers in the area noticing
some cracks in the dam.
And they're a little concernedabout it.
And then there is The damkeeper, which lives in a little
house at the base of the dam,with his girlfriend and his son,
(19:38):
he is, he's noticing he noticesa new leak.
And this is the morning of March12th.
AJ (19:47):
Is there, sorry, is there a name for this dam or the
reservoir?
Pearl (19:51):
Oh my goodness.
This is a story of the SaintFrancis dam disaster.
AJ (19:56):
The St.
Francis dam disaster yeah.
I have never heard of thatstory,
Pearl (20:00):
right?
Same.
Yeah.
So, the dam keeper notices thedam tapers name is Tony Harnish
Fager.
I'm going to take that I have noidea what his name is.
his name is Tony.
So Tony goes down to the dam andhe notices some news.
cracking.
(20:21):
And he's concerned about whetheror not the water might be muddy.
He calls Mulholland, Mulhollandcomes right down takes a look at
He's not really sure.
So he tells me, Tony, call methree times a day and keep me
updated and we'll keep an eye onit.
So, they're, you know, they wantto keep an eye on it, but
here's, here's the problem.
The problem is that when theybuilt this dam the city of Los
(20:45):
Angeles tried to keep this damnsituation as quiet as possible
because of all the water warsbeen dealing with with the
aqueduct and stealing land fromfarmers and bribes and all this
ridiculous stuff.
So, that's, the dealings areshady.
And the problem is if you say topeople within the flood path of
(21:08):
this dam, Hey.
guys, Probably not a big deal.
Might just want to keep your carrunning
AJ (21:14):
right.
Pearl (21:14):
Once you open that Pandora's box, that there's a,
that there's a dam and B itmight not be safe.
You can't ever close thatPandora's box.
People are going to flip theirlids.
AJ (21:28):
So anyone who knew about this is just trying to keep it
Pearl (21:32):
Well, it's the kind of thing.
Like You have to.
know That you know.
AJ (21:39):
Right,
Pearl (21:39):
You got to know that the dam is bad.
But Mulholland, you know, lookedat it and said it was among the
drier dams that I've ever seen.
He thought the dam looked great.
Yes, there might be muddy waterit's not that big of a deal
right now.
Why don't you just keep an eyeon it though, and call me three
times a day and we'll just seehow the situation progressed.
(22:00):
We've got, we've got.
time,
AJ (22:02):
Mean, seems fairly reasonable, but then I'm no damn
engineer.
Pearl (22:07):
You are no damage in there.
And you know, if I if someonewas going to build a, a dam
today, or in fact in 1930, youwould have had tons and tons of
oversight in third-partyinspections and engineers
looking at your work.
But a lot of those laws hadn'tbeen passed yet.
Cause sometimes you need tragedyto force laws through.
AJ (22:30):
Very true.
Pearl (22:31):
So yeah So, he totally takes a look at the leak, with
William Mulholland, they decidethat Tony is going to check on
it three times a day.
And then at 11:57 PM on March.
12th, The damn catastrophic
AJ (22:49):
the same day.
So they did not have much
Pearl (22:55):
They did not have much warning.
And the reason that they knowwhat time it happened is a man
on a motorcycle was driving pastthe dam.
And at 11:57 PM, he heard a loudcrashing and rumbling sound and
he, you know, check the time.
And he didn't know what hadhappened at the time.
(23:15):
He wondered if maybe it was anearthquake or something, but,
so, yeah.
And also when he went past, heknow he had noticed that the
keeper, that the damn keeper'shouse was house lights were on.
And so it's probably why hechecked his watch.
He knows that the house lightswere on.
It's really late.
He checks his watch and then aminute later he hears a
(23:38):
crashing.
And So they assume that Tony wasout there at midnight checking
the dam.
When it happened.
So at this point well you haveto, you have to have a little
perspective here.
The dam the water is nearly tonearly full on the dam and the
dam is over 200 feet tall.
AJ (23:58):
Okay.
That was, that was my nextquestion is how tall it
Pearl (24:00):
feet tall, I believe.
So this is a massive, massivestructure.
AJ (24:06):
Any idea how wide it was?
Pearl (24:09):
Yes.
So the, the.
dam Is 700 feet across and 205feet tall,
AJ (24:17):
700 feet across.
Pearl (24:19):
This is massive.
This is a massive dam.
AJ (24:24):
That's a really big dam.
Pearl (24:25):
Yeah, it's huge.
So, so the, the entire damcollapses and we're talking
about chunks of concrete, thesize of skyscrapers Are now
hurdling in 120, S 120 foot, awall of water down the Santa
Clara river valley towards theocean.
AJ (24:46):
So it just like fully let
Pearl (24:49):
didn't, it didn't leak.
It just like exploded.
It went from zero to everythingall at once.
The 12 and a half billiongallons of water were drained in
45 minutes.
AJ (25:04):
45 minutes.
It emptied.
Pearl (25:06):
It was empty in 45 minutes.
AJ (25:09):
Wow.
Pearl (25:10):
mind?
I mean, I can't even comprehendhow much water that is, but I
know that that is an insaneamount of force.
AJ (25:16):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm just wondering, hasthere ever been any other kind
of damn
Pearl (25:22):
Well, this is?
the deadliest, I don't think so.
This is the deadliest manmadedisaster in.
history.
Well, I think in the 20thcentury, 20 and 21st, I don't
know if there's there.
the closest, I think that in the20th century was the triangle
Shirtwaist fire factory fire.
But yeah, so, so this story, Sothe closest to the entire Santa
(25:46):
Clara, river valley is coveredin little towns.
Not like shanties, but actuallike Houses and post offices and
roads and, you know, actualtowns and orchards and farms and
cattle and people.
So the closest neighborhood tothe dam is Okay.
(26:08):
As a community of 74 people atpowerhouse.
Number two, and The 10 storywall of water hits this
community at 1203 in themorning.
So there's a couple, there's acouple stories that I heard
from, from this community.
There's a man.
AJ (26:28):
can't have been any survivors,
Pearl (26:29):
There was Actually there was a man named Ray and he heard
a roaring, like a cyclone.
He and his family wake up.
And all of a sudden the housejust literally disintegrates
around them.
And of course it's dark and hejust gets caught in a tangle of
wood and wire and telephonepoles.
(26:51):
And he manages to grab onto theroof of a house floating by.
And that roof brings him to asmall that was above the Muslim
on that small, but you know, anearby hill.
And he sits there.
And the only other survivor ofthat town is a woman named
Lillian and Lillian, and herhusband woke up to a strange
(27:14):
mist in the air and Lillian'shusband handed the baby to her
and he said, get out the windowand get to higher ground.
I'm going to grab the girls.
and.
She got higher ground and hedied.
You know, completely swept away.
So that, that town isobliterated.
Those people manage to get outjust like miraculously that the
(27:38):
force of the water is so greatthat the concrete powerhouse
there is completely obliteratedand swept away.
AJ (27:44):
Yeah.
I bet.
Pearl (27:45):
This Wall of water continues all the way to the
Pacific ocean.
It's a path about 54 miles long,and by the time it reaches the
ocean, I believe it's two mileswide.
And At this point, it is full.
of All of the debris, that itencountered, including bodies
(28:08):
were found as far away asMexico.
many of them were There are acouple of stories of heroes from
that event.
One of the stories is thePacific long distance.
Well actually one of the storiesis a nightwatchman in a small
community named ed Locke.
Heard The thundering sound andwoke up and he was the art.
(28:31):
He woke up a lot of people andhe was able to get them able to
get them to safety.
These people were living in a Idon't think there are migrant
farm.
I think they were, they wereworking on a project nearby some
sort of construction project Andmost of the ones.
that were saved.
were saved because they zippedtheir tent shut and they floated
away.
Because the water was soforceful that it just picked
(28:52):
them up in this room.
AJ (28:53):
Just picked them up and throw him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And hopefully by then, it's nota sky high
Pearl (28:59):
no it's still it's still a straight up tsunami.
That's coming down the, theriver valley.
So it's not just like soakingand lifting slowly.
AJ (29:07):
Right.
But I mean, it would still startto dissipate a little bit.
It wouldn't be 10 stories, high,at
Pearl (29:11):
was definitely dissipating, but
AJ (29:13):
incredibly
Pearl (29:14):
you know I think 16, I want to say like 16 miles away.
It was still like 20 feet tall.
or 40 feet.
I don't know.
I've just heard some crazystories A couple of the heroes
from that night, there wereThese two telephone operators in
the river valley, their nameswere, a little guys.
(29:35):
I think I want to say Louis Guy.
and she lived in Santa Paula andthen resell Jones lived in Santa
coy.
Re Louis and resell were giventhe warning.
And then they were calling theway that they were calling
people to warn them asphysically dialing their numbers
and calling them because theydidn't have like widespread
(29:56):
alert system with an automatedvoice.
I would say, get out of yourhomes, you know, Louise or
resell had to say run get tohigher ground.
So they stayed in their postseven in the face of danger and
they call people Warning many intime to get them out of their
homes and onto higher ground.
And Two of the people that theywarned were, a man named
(30:19):
Thornton Edwards, He was ahighway patrol officer and
Thornton became known as thePaul Revere of the St.
AJ (30:27):
St Francis
Pearl (30:28):
the St.
Francis flood because he turnedon his motorcycle siren and he
just rode up and down the valleywarning people and getting them
out of their houses.
One of the people that he, orone of the other people that
Lewis and resell woke up was aman, A man named Eddie Hearn.
Eddie actually rode toward theflood To warn people until he
(30:51):
was eventually swept away.
So, and there's a monument tothese officers in Santa Paula
called the Watchers.
Yeah.
So over 1200 homes weredestroyed.
It's a really, really difficultto estimate the loss of life
from something like this.
I think the most accurate.
(31:11):
If we're counting actualnumbers, the most accurate
numbers are somewhere like 425people.
But of course, migrant farmworkers, wouldn't have been
counted anyways.
Just because of laws at thattime,
AJ (31:25):
there's been a lot in March.
Pearl (31:27):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And.
Obviously anyone who wasn't, youknow, so there was, there was
the bodies that they found inthe identified the bodies.
They couldn't identify.
And then the missing personsreports.
AJ (31:38):
never found.
Pearl (31:39):
And then of course there's the bodies they never
found.
So, and, and I think as late as1990 a body was found or you
know, a remains were found thatwere identified as a St.
Francis flood disaster victim,just based on flood sediment
and, you know,
AJ (31:56):
I mean, they'd have been, many of them have been buried
under
Pearl (32:00):
Yeah.
I mean, I think in some placesthere was, yeah, I think at some
places there were 20 feet of aflood to get through you know,
just to try and find, so there'sjust a massive, crazy story.
Mulholland they had, you know,they had so many different
investigations now, of course,we're having all the
investigators come in and thethird-party analysts And stuff.
(32:23):
They decided that it was aresult of a, the ground should
not have been built on becauseit was actually I think it was
maybe two tectonic plates weremeeting there.
There's two different types ofrock on either side of the dam.
There, there was some, someissues that, could have been.
avoided.
And the bottom line was thatthey needed, he, he should have
(32:43):
had third party engineerschecking on his work and saying,
Hey, we can't have the dam thistall without doing all these
extra things, you know, toreinforce it because the dam had
been fine for two years.
And then eventually got filledall the way up and just
completely let loose.
Yeah.
So, Of course, there was a tonof relief efforts and this was
(33:08):
front page news across the U Sand probably most of Europe,
most of the world.
But then the stock marketcrashed and
AJ (33:17):
loses their money.
Pearl (33:18):
The stock market crashed and the story went away.
So that is the story of the St.
Francis dam disaster.
AJ (33:24):
Well, you're right.
I've never heard of that story,
Pearl (33:26):
right?
Not crazy.
You feel like, it should be astory story.
AJ (33:31):
That's incredible that the destructive force, I mean, not
only the loss of a life, butalso just anyone who survived
now having to completely leavethe area.
I mean, I'm sure it wasbasically unlivable for a long
time,
Pearl (33:46):
right?
Yeah.
And if you look up, likesurvivor,
AJ (33:49):
lost all their water source,
Pearl (33:52):
Yeah The entire reservoir.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not really sure.
what they Did after that torebuild Ellie's water situation.
But a lot of the stories thatyou can find from survivors of
course are, well, I was sixmonths old and my parents told
me this cause it was so longago.
And those survivors are very oldnow, but
AJ (34:13):
almost
Pearl (34:14):
Yeah, there's, There's a couple of videos you can find on
YouTube about it.
there was actually a silent filmthat was made.
That was a reenactment wherethey did like miniature scale
reenactments of it.
It's not super great quality,but the interesting thing is
then they do have some realfootage of the dam before and
then have the cleanup resultsand stuff, or clean up efforts.
(34:36):
So,
AJ (34:37):
wow.
So I take it then a lot of laws.
We're strictly
Pearl (34:42):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So that changed that changed alot of civil engineering at that
point, you know, it was kind oflike Mulholland said, he knew
how to do this, and he's got alittle bit of a track record.
He's got a long track record buthe hasn't actually done a ton of
massive dam projects like this.
And he was allowed to do aproject and I think the,
(35:05):
eventually he was ruled, It wasruled that he was not guilty for
the dam collapse because, and Ithink the main reason they
decided this was because no oneperson should have had so much
power and the city of LosAngeles should have stepped in
and said, no, you don't get tomake these decisions all by
yourself.
You have to have hoursoversight.
(35:25):
And he just did not haveoversight.
AJ (35:27):
Right.
I mean,
Pearl (35:29):
and that's, and that's kind of the thing is like, it's
really easy to get upset aboutred tape and bureaucracy.
But every single time youencounter a rule like that, a
law like that it's because itwas probably forced through
because of some, either crisisaverted or actual disaster.
AJ (35:45):
Yeah.
It, it, yeah.
Yeah.
It is true.
I mean, that could have been,should have been.
Pearl (35:54):
Yeah.
And, you know, too
AJ (35:55):
there was obviously some corruption in there as well of,
you know, people were turning ablind eye.
People were letting egos get inthe way of this people.
You know, he was probably hadhis, his legacy Mulholland
probably had his legacy kind ofriding was probably his last
big, last big hurrah before herides off into the sunset.
(36:19):
And you know, for two years,Riding high.
He was feeling pretty good aboutit.
Pearl (36:24):
Yeah.
So, to his credit Mulhollanddoes, Take full responsibility
for the disaster.
He says, if there isessentially, if there's any
human error, it's my error.
No one else should be blamed forthis.
This is 100% And He just kindof, I mean, it's, it's a, just a
wretchedly, awful story.
(36:45):
And he kind of just went, spentthe rest of his life, obviously
his career's over and he spentthe rest life rest of his life
in seclusion and, died, I thinkin 1935.
And he just had to live withthat.
AJ (36:56):
Yeah.
Hmm.
That would haunt I mean, thatwould truly
Pearl (37:02):
absolutely.
So,
AJ (37:04):
Well, I don't know.
I don't know where we go fromhere.
Pearl (37:07):
Aren't you glad you listened to this?
Aren't you glad you listened tothis incredibly depressing pod?
I mean,
AJ (37:12):
on the upside, a worst damn disaster has never happened in
the
Pearl (37:16):
Well that's
AJ (37:17):
so,
Pearl (37:18):
And a lot of that is because of The li the lessons
learned from this one.
But you know, the reason that Iwanted to tell this story, is
just because.
It's so important to know ourhistory and
AJ (37:32):
the good and the
Pearl (37:33):
this is a crazy story that happened in American
history and kind of like thegreat Pachinko fire.
I'd never heard of it.
Because you know, there's just alot of events like that, that
just kind of get eclipsed byother events and then they just
kind of disappear.
So yeah, there you go.
There's the story.
AJ (37:52):
Yeah, well, and I think sometimes events like this,
hearing these disasters thathappened, it gives you a little
more appreciation for, you know,the way things work.
These days, we live with apretty low risk of a massive dam
failure like that.
You know, we also probably livewith.
(38:14):
Lower risk of a pitch digo firehappening
Pearl (38:17):
Right.
Well, we're not going to putsawdust on our roads and build
all wooden houses.
Yeah.
AJ (38:22):
I mean, we've seen some pretty horrific fires in recent
years, but without the same kindof loss of life and people just
being kind of
Pearl (38:31):
Yeah absolutely
AJ (38:33):
So,
Pearl (38:34):
yeah.
So, that's it, that's theepisode.
If you are still listening, thenyou are truly committed.
To investigate area investing inyour own.
Uh I don't know what I was soyeah, we'll be here next week
and we got another story foryou.
AJ (38:51):
We've got more episodes for season two coming up.
Pearl (38:54):
sure do.
AJ (38:55):
So don't forget to like subscribe and review
Pearl (38:58):
and share with your mom.
Bye
AJ (39:01):
you next time.
Bye.
All right, well we're back
AJ (00:04):
two, baby.
Pearl (00:05):
Oh man.
You know, when we startedrecording season one, it was
January and now it is July.
AJ (00:13):
I almost, I almost said now it's June.
Wait.
Pearl (00:16):
it's July.
So when we record the podcast,we have to turn off the central
air for the house.
You can't have any fans comingon, or,
AJ (00:25):
background noise,
Pearl (00:26):
And we've turned off all fans, obviously.
So yeah, it's, it's gonna gethot in here real quick.
AJ (00:32):
So the only sound you may hear is the sweat dripping off
of our face.
Pearl (00:36):
It's summertime in Virginia.
AJ (00:38):
How's that for a visual
Pearl (00:41):
yeah, for a segue.
So, I'm speaking of
AJ (00:44):
segues,
Pearl (00:45):
warm and uncomfortable.
We were actually going to startthe podcast last week.
That was our official launch forseason two.
And we didn't do anythingbecause I ran into some poison
Ivy.
I don't know, I just ran into,ran into it.
Yeah.
AJ (01:01):
I mean, did you run into it or did it kind of run into you?
Pearl (01:04):
Well, You know, the thing is I've had poison Ivy
experiences before, and I didlearn my lesson, but I needed to
learn it again.
Apparently I think that happenssometimes
AJ (01:14):
it a rough in life when you, you have to learn a lesson
twice?
Pearl (01:18):
Oh man.
Yeah.
And I'm just, I'm just a littlebit impulsive when I have a
task.
In front of me that I want toget done.
I just want to like, get itdone.
AJ (01:29):
You're focused.
Pearl (01:30):
Yeah.
I'm sure.
But also I just really don'tlike stopping and doing all the
prep work like painting.
I do not prep.
And I actually pride myself inthat because I can paint a room
with zero taping.
Like no problem, no dripping notaping, nothing, but that is
only because.
(01:50):
I hate prep for painting so muchthat I'll go the extra mile to
do it, you know, without theprep.
So same way with poison Ivy inorder to deal with poison Ivy
effectively, you know, cause I,I do all the yard work out here
and
AJ (02:05):
I have seasonal allergies,
Pearl (02:06):
yeah yeah sure Yeah He's got
AJ (02:08):
not just lazy seasonal allergies.
Pearl (02:10):
So I do the yard work cause I don't have crazy grass
allergies like AIG does.
And.
In order to to effectively dealwith poison Ivy, you have to
like, you have to put yourselfinside of a giant bubble of
plastic and then use a laser andpointed at the base of the
poison Ivy, which is the networktwo 50 billion, other poison Ivy
(02:35):
plants in your garden.
You just haven't found yet.
I'm kidding.
It's terrible.
Poison Ivy is really difficultto Find and get out and yeah
AJ (02:43):
yeah, you basically need to wrap yourself in garbage bags,
head to toe.
Pearl (02:47):
It was 80 degrees out then you're sweating and yeah,
it's miserable, but so
AJ (02:52):
little opening, the poison Ivy will take
Pearl (02:54):
it, it.
Sure does.
And I I had a little opening andwhen I get poison Ivy on one
spot, they just kinda likespreads like wildfire.
So, last week we were going torecord and I just could not sit
still.
Long enough to research.
AJ (03:09):
Yeah, you've
Pearl (03:09):
record I was just So itchy and squirmy.
And I was, I was in a bad moodtoo.
So that didn't
AJ (03:14):
no, no, you weren't
Pearl (03:16):
a little, a little cranky, A little
AJ (03:19):
pleasant as always.
Pearl (03:21):
So here we are starting up season two of the pod and
AJ (03:25):
welcome to the stories.
We forgot
Pearl (03:27):
the stories we forgot.
AJ (03:29):
This is my lovely wife, Pearl Hearst.
Pearl (03:31):
This is my amazing husband AIG Hearst, And that was
a lot of an intro.
AJ (03:39):
They know us by now.
They know
Pearl (03:47):
the season of the podcast we've got a bunch of great
stories lined up for you and acouple of amazing historians as
well.
And looking forward to sharingthese stories with you and
hearing what you think aboutthem.
So AGA do you have a, this dayin history?
for
AJ (04:02):
Well, Pearl, as a matter of fact, I do it's time, right?
For this day in history,history, history,
Pearl (04:09):
still got
AJ (04:11):
fairly short.
And to the point for today onJuly 9th, 1947, the first female
army officer.
In a ceremony at the Pentagongeneral, Dwight D Eisenhower
appoints Florence Blanchfield tobe a Lieutenant Colonel in the U
S army, making her the firstwoman in us,
Pearl (04:33):
year
AJ (04:34):
1947,
Pearl (04:35):
47.
AJ (04:37):
making her the first woman in us history to hold permanent
military rank.
She was a member of the armynurse Corps since 1917.
So she'd been doing it.
For 30 years.
She secured her commission as anofficer following the passage of
the army Navy nurse act of 1947.
(04:57):
She had served as superintendentof the army nurse Corps during
world war two and wasinstrumental in the passage of
the army Navy nurse act.
In 1951, she was later she waslater given the Florence
Nightingale award from the redcar.
And in 1978 and army hospital inFort Campbell, Kentucky was
named in her honor.
Pearl (05:17):
And What's her name again?
AJ (05:19):
Florence Blanchfield,
Pearl (05:20):
Lawrence
AJ (05:23):
female, permanent army.
I'm not sure what you mean bypermanent.
We might have to look into that,but first woman in us history to
hold permanent military rank
Pearl (05:33):
is private military rank a thing.
AJ (05:35):
Well, I'm wondering if maybe during world war II, maybe there
were like, Temporary things thatwere done or something that's my
best guess.
I don't know.
Pearl (05:47):
Yeah.
I have no idea.
AJ (05:49):
has a, it's a fairly short article today on that one.
So I don't have a whole lot moreinfo
Pearl (05:55):
clearly we know, a lot about the military you're coming
to the experts.
Remember, remember, okay.
Speaking of experts I actuallyhave a story.
When the first time that I heardthis story, I thought to myself,
man, somebody needs to do apodcast with stories like this
one.
AJ (06:12):
Really?
Pearl (06:13):
This is the story.
AJ (06:14):
This is the story that started at all.
Pearl (06:16):
that started at all.
And I thought to myself, Oh whatshould they call the podcast?
It's driving down the road,listening to,
AJ (06:25):
this is the birth of the pod right here, folks.
Pearl (06:28):
Yeah.
Driving in a car, Listening to,hits from the seventies and
eighties as one Does,
AJ (06:37):
Is that when you first heard this story?
Pearl (06:38):
No, Listening to a podcast, but I was trying to
think of the name for the pod.
And then I just decided that Iwould name it, the stories.
We forgot if I had a podcast,which I did not, and I had no
interest, but then, you know,the longer I thought about it, I
was like, man, somebody needs tojust do this dang podcast.
So here we are
AJ (06:57):
on the dang podcast.
Pearl (07:00):
So this story is a disaster story.
AJ (07:05):
I was going to do some kind of bump bum, but I wasn't sure,
but a buck bump up.
Pearl (07:10):
sad
AJ (07:12):
The theme song that popped into my head was not disaster
story appropriate.
Pearl (07:18):
not a happy story.
It's a sad story, but ithappened really long time ago.
So it's a teensy bit lasts lesssad now.
AJ (07:24):
True, true time.
Heals all wounds,
Pearl (07:26):
I don't know.
but yeah, so here it goes.
AJ (07:30):
oh man notes and everything.
This is getting intense.
Right, right, right, right.
Pearl (07:38):
So, you've never heard this story.
You
AJ (07:40):
I don't know, because you haven't told me what the story
Pearl (07:42):
heard this story.
And I would imagine that anyone,living outside of most people
living outside of California,wouldn't have heard this story
either because this story tookplace in 1928, in the spring of
1928.
And Everyone knows that 1929 wasthe stock market crash.
(08:03):
And that really eclipsed all haall previous headlines.
Everything that had beenhappening in the world was
basically sidelined for thegrid.
AJ (08:14):
That's how we forget a lot of stories.
Something more intriguing ormore tragic happens.
Pearl (08:21):
So true.
It's not a conspiracy theory,but a lot of conspiracy theories
have this premise, which isgoing to say, it,
AJ (08:28):
this is true.
This is true.
Pearl (08:30):
But this story is not a conspiracy theory.
Man, I don't I don't even knowhow to start the story.
It's so it's so big and sodaunting.
The story starts with Well, itstarts with the city of Los
Angeles, really.
Los Angeles was And still isheavily reliant on outside
sources of water.
(08:50):
Right.
California is a desert and
AJ (08:54):
not all of
Pearl (08:54):
mean Well, yeah.
Lots of California is a desertin that it has to rely on
irrigation.
And not natural rainfall.
So Um, Los Angeles back in theearly part of the 19.
Early 19 hundreds was growingrapidly or there's potential for
(09:15):
rapid growth, but they neededwater and the rivers that they
had access to just weren'tquite, weren't quite bringing in
the water that they potentiallywould need in order to actually
grow into a city of any sort offormidable size.
So.
What happened is there was a manby the name of William
(09:37):
Mulholland.
So William Mulholland, he's kindof the chief character for this
story because he is the chiefengineer So as Los Angeles is
growing, they hire a man whoworks in the water department
and he gets stuff done.
He Has he's he's brilliant inhis own.
(09:57):
Right.
He studies tons of stuff all thetime.
He's always learning and heessentially becomes a
self-taught engineer, which, youknow, technically shouldn't be a
thing.
and be like a self.
brain surgeon or you, You knowwhat I mean?
Like when, when you're doinglittle stuff, it's kind of okay
to say you're a self-taughtengineer, but when you're doing
(10:18):
big stuff, It kind of startsmattering more
AJ (10:21):
true there's some theory
Pearl (10:23):
can be a Google doctor with mosquito bites, but you
probably shouldn't be you know,looking at YouTube videos of how
to do brain surgery, you know,probably not a good idea.
AJ (10:33):
That's fair.
Pearl (10:34):
So, William Mulholland, he's working for the city of Los
Angeles and he rapidly rises inranks.
He's got friends in high places.
And he's kind of known forgetting projects done quickly
and coming in So that's kind ofhis thing.
He also has a fairlyphotographic memory so he
(10:56):
doesn't take, he doesn't havetons and tons of, paper trail
with him.
And that's one of thesignificant things about this
story is that because WilliamMulholland was in charge of
everything.
Eventually he, He didn't have toanswer to a lot of people and he
didn't have a lot of oversightin his career.
AJ (11:17):
Okay.
I am, I am getting extremelyintrigued
Pearl (11:20):
Okay.
So, so The first major thingthat he does is on the other
side of the Sierra Nevadamountain range, there is On the
other side of this, year, NevadaSU this year a Nevada, mountain
range from Los Angeles is theOwens valley.
And at that point, the Owensvalley had a large lake and that
(11:44):
was known as Owens lake.
And there was a lot ofdevelopment happening to start
irrigating the lake so that theOwens valley could kind of
blossom into a.
you know, A beautiful greenthriving However, because of and
this is, we're not going to gointo all the water rights, all
(12:04):
the water rights wars that havethat California has gone through
Cause it's a long sorted storyand kind of outside of the scope
one episode.
But so because of theconnections that Los Angeles
city leaders have.
They eventually win the rightsto build an aqueduct from the
(12:24):
Owens lake all the way to LosAngeles and an aqueduct is
essentially a manmade river.
So,
AJ (12:33):
so like through the Sierra Nevada's
Pearl (12:36):
yeah, so they build this aqueduct it's it's, It is a
really big.
project.
And will you Mulholland is incharge of the project and it
goes really, really well.
And of course, a lot of peopleare super upset about the land
and water rights that have beenstolen from the people, and the
farmers on the other side of theSierra Nevada's.
But the project gets finishedand he's a Hero.
(12:59):
He's a hero of of LA.
Yeah.
So at this point, he has risenthrough William Mulholland has
kind of risen through the ranksin city leadership.
So now he's in charge of thedepartment of power and water,
as far as being the chiefengineer and making decisions.
(13:21):
there just wasn't because of, Idon't know if it's because of
just the time celebrity statusor the I'm not, I don't really
understand how there was.
as much oversight as thereshould have been, but
AJ (13:38):
yeah, well,
Pearl (13:38):
Basically what happens is he decides that he is going to
build a reservoir because theOwens lake is so far away from
LA.
And they want to move the water.
So they have water much closerto LA because they're having so
many issues with farm withfarmers using dynamite on the,
(13:59):
on the Aqua.
To try and divert water back totheir farms.
So they kind of just, wanted,
AJ (14:05):
oh, like farmers from the Owens valley are trying to
destroy the aqueduct andessentially
Pearl (14:10):
they want to bring the water closer to them.
So they settle on a spot about30 miles Northeast of Los
Angeles.
So, and that is in the, 30 milesNortheast of Los Angeles.
That's in the Santa Clara rivervalley.
So I'm not super familiar withCalifornia geography, but so I'm
not going to really worry abouttrying to make this a
(14:31):
hyper-specific.
If you're interested in gettingmore details, we'll have links
to all of our sources in theshow notes.
So you can kind of figure out alittle bit better if you want to
see some topographical maps, butso what happens is he selects a
site?
They have some brief studiesdone.
of the
AJ (14:50):
That sounds
Pearl (14:51):
Just geology of the place.
And just trying to figure out,you know, what, what the best
possible location might be.
Basically, that you're trying tofind I a deep, a nice deep
valley with walls.
Where you can dam up one part ofit, the water can flow in.
You can only dam up a smallportion, and then you got a
(15:14):
massive manmade
AJ (15:15):
minimize the amount of
Pearl (15:17):
Right.
So remember, this man is not Anengineer who has ever gone to
school.
He is a self-taught engineer.
And I think at this, at thispoint, he is in his early
seventies.
So this is something he's builthis career on.
AJ (15:31):
Okay.
Pearl (15:31):
And the, the problem is.
that Because well, the problemis that he does not like to have
outside interference in hisprojects and so he rejects
oversight from, you know, havingactual engineers and geologists
come in and kind of double checksome stuff for him.
(15:51):
One of the, one of the thingsand one of the things that is
pretty notable.
Is that in the original designsfor this dam that they want to
build, they have at one height,but then the actual dam height
is significantly higher.
And if you want to increase damheight, you have to increase dam
(16:16):
base width as well.
Right.
AJ (16:19):
Or you have a damn problem.
Pearl (16:20):
Right.
Well, that's exactly whathappened.
So, So we're still, we're stillin backstory.
Sorry, I'm trying to speed thisup a little bit.
So, so they start to, they buildthe dam and they start that in.
AJ (16:34):
I mean, I feel like you're foreshadowing is on point here,
so I'm feeling some trepidation,
Pearl (16:40):
When it's completed, the dam has the capacity.
of, I think 12 and a halfbillion gallons of water
AJ (16:48):
billion with a B
Pearl (16:50):
with a B.
So it's, it's massive.
AJ (16:52):
It's a lot of water.
Pearl (16:53):
So they begin construction for the dam in
1924.
And the construction iscompleted by 1926.
So it takes about two years toto do it, and then they began
filling up the dam.
And I think that I thinknormally it sounds like most dam
(17:14):
failures happen.
The first time the dam is filledto capacity for the first, you
know?
AJ (17:20):
Yeah.
I guess probably makes sense.
Pearl (17:22):
Surprisingly dam disasters are not common.
AJ (17:25):
Why they pay us what they have engineers for.
Pearl (17:27):
Yeah exactly.
I guess, I guess that's why theypay engineers the big bucks for
those.
But, so it had been two yearsand the dam at this point was
full to capacity.
And I think like within threefeet of the very top of the dam,
massive, there's a couple ofpictures that I'm gonna post on
Instagram of The before andafter of the dam.
(17:48):
So you can kind of see, oh, Iguess I just said after, so I
guess that kind of lets it out,but, yeah, I mean,
AJ (17:53):
we know what's
Pearl (17:54):
is a disaster story.
I've been telling you all abouta self-taught engineer, building
a dam 12 and a half.
billion gallons of
AJ (18:01):
If this dam does not collapse, we are all going to be
very, very let down.
Pearl (18:07):
down So what happens is they start noticing it's been an
incredibly wet winter over, youknow, 1927 into January,
February, March of 1928.
And they start noticing somecracking in the dam.
And of course it is normal tohave cracking in dams.
(18:29):
And there isn't Any such thingthere isn't, there's no such
thing as a dry dam.
that's just the way it goes withdams, I guess which
AJ (18:39):
they all
Pearl (18:39):
they they all illegal a little bit.
That's just part of the factthat you're dealing with a very
large expanse and material thatdoes not, have a lot of
plasticity.
and the earth does have a decentmiddle plasticity.
So, you know,
AJ (18:54):
Okay.
Pearl (18:55):
so Yeah.
So there's, there's enoughchecks and balances in modern
dam design.
That, that that's not a problem.
with with dams, apparently thething is, as long as the water
coming through and is obviouslya small amount, a that makes
sense.
But as long as the water isclear, you're fine.
But if it's muddy, than thatshows that the base of the dam
(19:17):
is being eroded away.
So what happens is farmers andranchers in the area noticing
some cracks in the dam.
And they're a little concernedabout it.
And then there is The damkeeper, which lives in a little
house at the base of the dam,with his girlfriend and his son,
(19:38):
he is, he's noticing he noticesa new leak.
And this is the morning of March12th.
AJ (19:47):
Is there, sorry, is there a name for this dam or the
reservoir?
Pearl (19:51):
Oh my goodness.
This is a story of the SaintFrancis dam disaster.
AJ (19:56):
The St.
Francis dam disaster yeah.
I have never heard of thatstory,
Pearl (20:00):
right?
Same.
Yeah.
So, the dam keeper notices thedam tapers name is Tony Harnish
Fager.
I'm going to take that I have noidea what his name is.
his name is Tony.
So Tony goes down to the dam andhe notices some news.
cracking.
(20:21):
And he's concerned about whetheror not the water might be muddy.
He calls Mulholland, Mulhollandcomes right down takes a look at
He's not really sure.
So he tells me, Tony, call methree times a day and keep me
updated and we'll keep an eye onit.
So, they're, you know, they wantto keep an eye on it, but
here's, here's the problem.
The problem is that when theybuilt this dam the city of Los
(20:45):
Angeles tried to keep this damnsituation as quiet as possible
because of all the water warsbeen dealing with with the
aqueduct and stealing land fromfarmers and bribes and all this
ridiculous stuff.
So, that's, the dealings areshady.
And the problem is if you say topeople within the flood path of
(21:08):
this dam, Hey.
guys, Probably not a big deal.
Might just want to keep your carrunning
AJ (21:14):
right.
Pearl (21:14):
Once you open that Pandora's box, that there's a,
that there's a dam and B itmight not be safe.
You can't ever close thatPandora's box.
People are going to flip theirlids.
AJ (21:28):
So anyone who knew about this is just trying to keep it
Pearl (21:32):
Well, it's the kind of thing.
Like You have to.
know That you know.
AJ (21:39):
Right,
Pearl (21:39):
You got to know that the dam is bad.
But Mulholland, you know, lookedat it and said it was among the
drier dams that I've ever seen.
He thought the dam looked great.
Yes, there might be muddy waterit's not that big of a deal
right now.
Why don't you just keep an eyeon it though, and call me three
times a day and we'll just seehow the situation progressed.
(22:00):
We've got, we've got.
time,
AJ (22:02):
Mean, seems fairly reasonable, but then I'm no damn
engineer.
Pearl (22:07):
You are no damage in there.
And you know, if I if someonewas going to build a, a dam
today, or in fact in 1930, youwould have had tons and tons of
oversight in third-partyinspections and engineers
looking at your work.
But a lot of those laws hadn'tbeen passed yet.
Cause sometimes you need tragedyto force laws through.
AJ (22:30):
Very true.
Pearl (22:31):
So yeah So, he totally takes a look at the leak, with
William Mulholland, they decidethat Tony is going to check on
it three times a day.
And then at 11:57 PM on March.
12th, The damn catastrophic
AJ (22:49):
the same day.
So they did not have much
Pearl (22:55):
They did not have much warning.
And the reason that they knowwhat time it happened is a man
on a motorcycle was driving pastthe dam.
And at 11:57 PM, he heard a loudcrashing and rumbling sound and
he, you know, check the time.
And he didn't know what hadhappened at the time.
(23:15):
He wondered if maybe it was anearthquake or something, but,
so, yeah.
And also when he went past, heknow he had noticed that the
keeper, that the damn keeper'shouse was house lights were on.
And so it's probably why hechecked his watch.
He knows that the house lightswere on.
It's really late.
He checks his watch and then aminute later he hears a
(23:38):
crashing.
And So they assume that Tony wasout there at midnight checking
the dam.
When it happened.
So at this point well you haveto, you have to have a little
perspective here.
The dam the water is nearly tonearly full on the dam and the
dam is over 200 feet tall.
AJ (23:58):
Okay.
That was, that was my nextquestion is how tall it
Pearl (24:00):
feet tall, I believe.
So this is a massive, massivestructure.
AJ (24:06):
Any idea how wide it was?
Pearl (24:09):
Yes.
So the, the.
dam Is 700 feet across and 205feet tall,
AJ (24:17):
700 feet across.
Pearl (24:19):
This is massive.
This is a massive dam.
AJ (24:24):
That's a really big dam.
Pearl (24:25):
Yeah, it's huge.
So, so the, the entire damcollapses and we're talking
about chunks of concrete, thesize of skyscrapers Are now
hurdling in 120, S 120 foot, awall of water down the Santa
Clara river valley towards theocean.
AJ (24:46):
So it just like fully let
Pearl (24:49):
didn't, it didn't leak.
It just like exploded.
It went from zero to everythingall at once.
The 12 and a half billiongallons of water were drained in
45 minutes.
AJ (25:04):
45 minutes.
It emptied.
Pearl (25:06):
It was empty in 45 minutes.
AJ (25:09):
Wow.
Pearl (25:10):
mind?
I mean, I can't even comprehendhow much water that is, but I
know that that is an insaneamount of force.
AJ (25:16):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm just wondering, hasthere ever been any other kind
of damn
Pearl (25:22):
Well, this is?
the deadliest, I don't think so.
This is the deadliest manmadedisaster in.
history.
Well, I think in the 20thcentury, 20 and 21st, I don't
know if there's there.
the closest, I think that in the20th century was the triangle
Shirtwaist fire factory fire.
But yeah, so, so this story, Sothe closest to the entire Santa
(25:46):
Clara, river valley is coveredin little towns.
Not like shanties, but actuallike Houses and post offices and
roads and, you know, actualtowns and orchards and farms and
cattle and people.
So the closest neighborhood tothe dam is Okay.
(26:08):
As a community of 74 people atpowerhouse.
Number two, and The 10 storywall of water hits this
community at 1203 in themorning.
So there's a couple, there's acouple stories that I heard
from, from this community.
There's a man.
AJ (26:28):
can't have been any survivors,
Pearl (26:29):
There was Actually there was a man named Ray and he heard
a roaring, like a cyclone.
He and his family wake up.
And all of a sudden the housejust literally disintegrates
around them.
And of course it's dark and hejust gets caught in a tangle of
wood and wire and telephonepoles.
(26:51):
And he manages to grab onto theroof of a house floating by.
And that roof brings him to asmall that was above the Muslim
on that small, but you know, anearby hill.
And he sits there.
And the only other survivor ofthat town is a woman named
Lillian and Lillian, and herhusband woke up to a strange
(27:14):
mist in the air and Lillian'shusband handed the baby to her
and he said, get out the windowand get to higher ground.
I'm going to grab the girls.
and.
She got higher ground and hedied.
You know, completely swept away.
So that, that town isobliterated.
Those people manage to get outjust like miraculously that the
(27:38):
force of the water is so greatthat the concrete powerhouse
there is completely obliteratedand swept away.
AJ (27:44):
Yeah.
I bet.
Pearl (27:45):
This Wall of water continues all the way to the
Pacific ocean.
It's a path about 54 miles long,and by the time it reaches the
ocean, I believe it's two mileswide.
And At this point, it is full.
of All of the debris, that itencountered, including bodies
(28:08):
were found as far away asMexico.
many of them were There are acouple of stories of heroes from
that event.
One of the stories is thePacific long distance.
Well actually one of the storiesis a nightwatchman in a small
community named ed Locke.
Heard The thundering sound andwoke up and he was the art.
(28:31):
He woke up a lot of people andhe was able to get them able to
get them to safety.
These people were living in a Idon't think there are migrant
farm.
I think they were, they wereworking on a project nearby some
sort of construction project Andmost of the ones.
that were saved.
were saved because they zippedtheir tent shut and they floated
away.
Because the water was soforceful that it just picked
(28:52):
them up in this room.
AJ (28:53):
Just picked them up and throw him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And hopefully by then, it's nota sky high
Pearl (28:59):
no it's still it's still a straight up tsunami.
That's coming down the, theriver valley.
So it's not just like soakingand lifting slowly.
AJ (29:07):
Right.
But I mean, it would still startto dissipate a little bit.
It wouldn't be 10 stories, high,at
Pearl (29:11):
was definitely dissipating, but
AJ (29:13):
incredibly
Pearl (29:14):
you know I think 16, I want to say like 16 miles away.
It was still like 20 feet tall.
or 40 feet.
I don't know.
I've just heard some crazystories A couple of the heroes
from that night, there wereThese two telephone operators in
the river valley, their nameswere, a little guys.
(29:35):
I think I want to say Louis Guy.
and she lived in Santa Paula andthen resell Jones lived in Santa
coy.
Re Louis and resell were giventhe warning.
And then they were calling theway that they were calling
people to warn them asphysically dialing their numbers
and calling them because theydidn't have like widespread
(29:56):
alert system with an automatedvoice.
I would say, get out of yourhomes, you know, Louise or
resell had to say run get tohigher ground.
So they stayed in their postseven in the face of danger and
they call people Warning many intime to get them out of their
homes and onto higher ground.
And Two of the people that theywarned were, a man named
(30:19):
Thornton Edwards, He was ahighway patrol officer and
Thornton became known as thePaul Revere of the St.
AJ (30:27):
St Francis
Pearl (30:28):
the St.
Francis flood because he turnedon his motorcycle siren and he
just rode up and down the valleywarning people and getting them
out of their houses.
One of the people that he, orone of the other people that
Lewis and resell woke up was aman, A man named Eddie Hearn.
Eddie actually rode toward theflood To warn people until he
(30:51):
was eventually swept away.
So, and there's a monument tothese officers in Santa Paula
called the Watchers.
Yeah.
So over 1200 homes weredestroyed.
It's a really, really difficultto estimate the loss of life
from something like this.
I think the most accurate.
(31:11):
If we're counting actualnumbers, the most accurate
numbers are somewhere like 425people.
But of course, migrant farmworkers, wouldn't have been
counted anyways.
Just because of laws at thattime,
AJ (31:25):
there's been a lot in March.
Pearl (31:27):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And.
Obviously anyone who wasn't, youknow, so there was, there was
the bodies that they found inthe identified the bodies.
They couldn't identify.
And then the missing personsreports.
AJ (31:38):
never found.
Pearl (31:39):
And then of course there's the bodies they never
found.
So, and, and I think as late as1990 a body was found or you
know, a remains were found thatwere identified as a St.
Francis flood disaster victim,just based on flood sediment
and, you know,
AJ (31:56):
I mean, they'd have been, many of them have been buried
under
Pearl (32:00):
Yeah.
I mean, I think in some placesthere was, yeah, I think at some
places there were 20 feet of aflood to get through you know,
just to try and find, so there'sjust a massive, crazy story.
Mulholland they had, you know,they had so many different
investigations now, of course,we're having all the
investigators come in and thethird-party analysts And stuff.
(32:23):
They decided that it was aresult of a, the ground should
not have been built on becauseit was actually I think it was
maybe two tectonic plates weremeeting there.
There's two different types ofrock on either side of the dam.
There, there was some, someissues that, could have been.
avoided.
And the bottom line was thatthey needed, he, he should have
(32:43):
had third party engineerschecking on his work and saying,
Hey, we can't have the dam thistall without doing all these
extra things, you know, toreinforce it because the dam had
been fine for two years.
And then eventually got filledall the way up and just
completely let loose.
Yeah.
So, Of course, there was a tonof relief efforts and this was
(33:08):
front page news across the U Sand probably most of Europe,
most of the world.
But then the stock marketcrashed and
AJ (33:17):
loses their money.
Pearl (33:18):
The stock market crashed and the story went away.
So that is the story of the St.
Francis dam disaster.
AJ (33:24):
Well, you're right.
I've never heard of that story,
Pearl (33:26):
right?
Not crazy.
You feel like, it should be astory story.
AJ (33:31):
That's incredible that the destructive force, I mean, not
only the loss of a life, butalso just anyone who survived
now having to completely leavethe area.
I mean, I'm sure it wasbasically unlivable for a long
time,
Pearl (33:46):
right?
Yeah.
And if you look up, likesurvivor,
AJ (33:49):
lost all their water source,
Pearl (33:52):
Yeah The entire reservoir.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not really sure.
what they Did after that torebuild Ellie's water situation.
But a lot of the stories thatyou can find from survivors of
course are, well, I was sixmonths old and my parents told
me this cause it was so longago.
And those survivors are very oldnow, but
AJ (34:13):
almost
Pearl (34:14):
Yeah, there's, There's a couple of videos you can find on
YouTube about it.
there was actually a silent filmthat was made.
That was a reenactment wherethey did like miniature scale
reenactments of it.
It's not super great quality,but the interesting thing is
then they do have some realfootage of the dam before and
then have the cleanup resultsand stuff, or clean up efforts.
(34:36):
So,
AJ (34:37):
wow.
So I take it then a lot of laws.
We're strictly
Pearl (34:42):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So that changed that changed alot of civil engineering at that
point, you know, it was kind oflike Mulholland said, he knew
how to do this, and he's got alittle bit of a track record.
He's got a long track record buthe hasn't actually done a ton of
massive dam projects like this.
And he was allowed to do aproject and I think the,
(35:05):
eventually he was ruled, It wasruled that he was not guilty for
the dam collapse because, and Ithink the main reason they
decided this was because no oneperson should have had so much
power and the city of LosAngeles should have stepped in
and said, no, you don't get tomake these decisions all by
yourself.
You have to have hoursoversight.
(35:25):
And he just did not haveoversight.
AJ (35:27):
Right.
I mean,
Pearl (35:29):
and that's, and that's kind of the thing is like, it's
really easy to get upset aboutred tape and bureaucracy.
But every single time youencounter a rule like that, a
law like that it's because itwas probably forced through
because of some, either crisisaverted or actual disaster.
AJ (35:45):
Yeah.
It, it, yeah.
Yeah.
It is true.
I mean, that could have been,should have been.
Pearl (35:54):
Yeah.
And, you know, too
AJ (35:55):
there was obviously some corruption in there as well of,
you know, people were turning ablind eye.
People were letting egos get inthe way of this people.
You know, he was probably hadhis, his legacy Mulholland
probably had his legacy kind ofriding was probably his last
big, last big hurrah before herides off into the sunset.
(36:19):
And you know, for two years,Riding high.
He was feeling pretty good aboutit.
Pearl (36:24):
Yeah.
So, to his credit Mulhollanddoes, Take full responsibility
for the disaster.
He says, if there isessentially, if there's any
human error, it's my error.
No one else should be blamed forthis.
This is 100% And He just kindof, I mean, it's, it's a, just a
wretchedly, awful story.
(36:45):
And he kind of just went, spentthe rest of his life, obviously
his career's over and he spentthe rest life rest of his life
in seclusion and, died, I thinkin 1935.
And he just had to live withthat.
AJ (36:56):
Yeah.
Hmm.
That would haunt I mean, thatwould truly
Pearl (37:02):
absolutely.
So,
AJ (37:04):
Well, I don't know.
I don't know where we go fromhere.
Pearl (37:07):
Aren't you glad you listened to this?
Aren't you glad you listened tothis incredibly depressing pod?
I mean,
AJ (37:12):
on the upside, a worst damn disaster has never happened in
the
Pearl (37:16):
Well that's
AJ (37:17):
so,
Pearl (37:18):
And a lot of that is because of The li the lessons
learned from this one.
But you know, the reason that Iwanted to tell this story, is
just because.
It's so important to know ourhistory and
AJ (37:32):
the good and the
Pearl (37:33):
this is a crazy story that happened in American
history and kind of like thegreat Pachinko fire.
I'd never heard of it.
Because you know, there's just alot of events like that, that
just kind of get eclipsed byother events and then they just
kind of disappear.
So yeah, there you go.
There's the story.
AJ (37:52):
Yeah, well, and I think sometimes events like this,
hearing these disasters thathappened, it gives you a little
more appreciation for, you know,the way things work.
These days, we live with apretty low risk of a massive dam
failure like that.
You know, we also probably livewith.
(38:14):
Lower risk of a pitch digo firehappening
Pearl (38:17):
Right.
Well, we're not going to putsawdust on our roads and build
all wooden houses.
Yeah.
AJ (38:22):
I mean, we've seen some pretty horrific fires in recent
years, but without the same kindof loss of life and people just
being kind of
Pearl (38:31):
Yeah absolutely
AJ (38:33):
So,
Pearl (38:34):
yeah.
So, that's it, that's theepisode.
If you are still listening, thenyou are truly committed.
To investigate area investing inyour own.
Uh I don't know what I was soyeah, we'll be here next week
and we got another story foryou.
AJ (38:51):
We've got more episodes for season two coming up.
Pearl (38:54):
sure do.
AJ (38:55):
So don't forget to like subscribe and review
Pearl (38:58):
and share with your mom.
Bye
AJ (39:01):
you next time.
Bye.
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