Spring 2018 LaThe Journal of the SanPeninsula Mateo County Historical Association, Volume xlvi, No. 1 Water for San Francisco Our Vision Table of Contents To discover the past and imagine the future. San Mateo County and San Francisco’s Search for Water ............................... 3 by Mitchell P. Postel Our Mission William Bowers Bourn II: To inspire wonder and President of Spring Valley Water Company and Builder of Filoli ....................... 10 by Joanne Garrison discovery of the cultural and natural history of San Images of Building Crystal Springs Dam........................................................... 13 Mateo County. Accredited By the American Alliance of Museums. The San Mateo County Historical Association Board of Directors Barbara Pierce, Chairwoman; Mark Jamison, Vice Chairman; John Blake, Secretary; Christine Williams, Treasurer; Jennifer Acheson; Thomas Ames; Alpio Barbara; Keith Bautista; Sandra McLellan Behling; Elaine Breeze; Chonita E. Cleary; Tracy De Leuw; The San Mateo County Shawn DeLuna; Dee Eva; Ted Everett; Greg Galli; Tania Gaspar; John LaTorra; Emmet Historical Association W. MacCorkle; Olivia Garcia Martinez; Rick Mayerson; Karen S. McCown; Gene Mullin; Mike Paioni; John Shroyer; Bill Stronck; Ellen Ulrich; Joseph Welch III; Darlynne Wood operates the San Mateo and Mitchell P. Postel, President. County History Museum and Archives at the old San President’s Advisory Board Mateo County Courthouse Albert A. Acena; Arthur H. Bredenbeck; David Canepa; John Clinton; T. Jack Foster, Jr.; located in Redwood City, Umang Gupta; Douglas Keyston; Greg Munks; Patrick Ryan; Cynthia L. Schreurs and California, and administers John Schrup. two county historical sites, Leadership Council the Sanchez Adobe in Arjun Gupta, Arjun Gupta Community Foundation; Paul Barulich, Barulich Dugoni Law Pacifica and the Woodside Group Inc; Tracey De Leuw, DPR Construction; Jenny Johnson, Franklin Templeton Store in Woodside. Investments; and John C. Adams, Wells Fargo. La Peninsula Carmen J. Blair, Managing Editor Publications Committee: Thomas Ames, Publications Chairman; Albert A. Acena, Ph.D.; Carmen J. Blair; Ted Everett; Joan Levy; Mitchell P. Postel; Mark S. Still, Ph.D. and Darlynne Wood. Address correspondence to: Editor, La Peninsula, San Mateo County Historical Association, 2200 Broadway, Redwood City, CA 94063 or [email protected]. Copyright © 2018 San Mateo County Historical Association. Cover: Building Crystal Springs Dam, c. 1888. La Peninsula, volume xlvi, no. 1 San Mateo County and San Francisco’s Search for Water by Mitchell P. Postel Pilarcitos Lake in 1926. Photo by George Fanning for the San Mateo County Chamber of Commerce, SMCHA Collection. San Mateo County has made substantial of agriculture the padres wanted to pursue. There was contributions to the development of California and the a lack of wood. Most of the natives of the Peninsula West. Its role as a provider of resources for the City (who would be targets for Christianization) lived south of of San Francisco after the Gold Rush was of particular present-day San Francisco, where the weather was dry significance. Lumber, farm products, shell fish, and and warm. Last, but certainly not least, there existed 1 much more came from the City’s neighbor. While they little fresh water. were important, San Francisco could have survived Early on, the missionaries understood the without these commodities, but it could not have shortcomings of the place. In 1785, they felt it survived without San Mateo County water. necessary to establish a far-removed agricultural 2 That San Francisco is a poor site for a city comes as outpost in the San Pedro Valley (today’s Pacifica). no historical surprise. When the Spanish placed the Within a year and a half this successful farm had as Mission and Presidio at the tip of the Peninsula, they many people living and working at it as were at the did so for military and strategic purposes, but for most Mission in San Francisco. Within another few years the every other reason, this was a terrible location. The soil outpost was largely abandoned. Traditionally, scholars was too sandy and the climate too damp for the type blamed disease among the neophytes, but there is 3 the possibility that the outpost was scaled back for source of supply was a single spring near Portsmouth political reasons. The size and scope of this San Pedro Square, with a capacity of no more than 5,000 gallons a settlement made it comparable to the initiation of a day. proper mission. The Franciscan fathers in Spain did not The Bensley Company was clearly the most important approve this enterprise, and the San Pedro experiment water provider for San Francisco during the first decade may have mostly closed as part of a power struggle. following the Gold Rush, but in 1860 von Schmidt had a With its closure the fathers, out of necessity, established falling-out with the owners. He left Bensley to become other outposts down the Peninsula. Most prominent chief engineer, and leading stockholder, in the smaller among this group was the one at San Mateo.3 Spring Valley Water Company. It was von Schmidt’s At the time of the American takeover of California, in idea to look south, to newly constituted San Mateo 1846, brackish water (probably deemed undrinkable by County, for future sources of water. today’s standards) was adequate for the little village of He picked Pilarcitos Creek as the site for a dam Yerba Buena, which had about 450 residents. However, to create the first out-of-town watershed for San the situation changed rapidly in 1849 when the Gold Francisco. He made this choice for some good Rush began. By 1860 the now City of San Francisco reasons. Although the watershed here is only half a had become the most important urban center in the square mile, it has the greatest rainfall on the Peninsula West, with a population of 78,000. – forty-nine inches a year. It is also high, at an elevation Early residents universally agreed that lack of water of 1,875 feet, giving it rapid flow by gravity feed to the was the City’s greatest resource problem. Between just City. two years, 1850 and 1852, San Francisco experienced Von Schmidt finished construction of a preliminary six terribly destructive fires with staggering financial system in 1862 and began delivering San Mateo County losses. water that same year. Citizens found that even drinking water was difficult In 1864, von Schmidt left the Spring Valley Water to obtain. Enterprising entrepreneurs barged in water Company, and Calvin Brown became chief engineer. from Marin County and sold the precious liquid by the On October 8th of that year he made perhaps his most barrel.4 Water peddlers then distributed the water on memorable decision when he hired Hermann Schussler regularized routes throughout the City. Some peddlers as his assistant at fifty dollars a month.6 strapped barrels to the backs of donkeys and sold The twenty-one-year-old immigrant from Zurich water by the bucket. One source has noted that during spoke little English and arrived in San Francisco riding shortages, buckets of water sold for a gold dollar each.5 a horse, with little more than a carpetbag containing Recognizing the possibilities for profit, several personal belongings. However, Schussler was schooled entrepreneurs formed the Mountain Lake Water in Switzerland and had already gained engineering Company in 1851 to bring water into town from the experience. His first assignment was to assist in a Presidio. The competing Bensley Company was organized in 1856. Under the direction of Engineer Alexei Waldemar von Schmidt, John Bensley dammed the mouth of Lobos Creek in the San Francisco hills, bringing a supply of 2,000,000 gallons a day into the City by flume and tunnel. In 1858, George H. Ensign created yet another company – the Spring Valley Water Company. Its chief Springs Valley Water Works bill for $4 from July 1869. 4 La Peninsula, volume xlvi, no. 1 Camp at the Pilarcitos Dam and Reservoir, Winter 1867-68. SMCHA Collection, courtesy San Francisco Public Utilities Commission. second Pilarcitos dam project. the dam one more time, to ninety-five feet, giving the Meanwhile, Spring Valley’s great rival, the Bensley reservoir a capacity of one billion gallons. Company, was experiencing difficulties with its water He built nearby Stone Dam between 1870 and 1871 supply. Soil had eroded into its Lobos Creek reservoir, as part of the larger San Andreas project. The dam and customers began complaining about muddy water. is built of rubble masonry on granite blocks quarried Not long after that, Bensley was caught tapping into below the dam site. It is a thin arch dam, a pioneer a Spring Valley main. The Bensley Company failed example of this kind of construction. Its reservoir has a soon thereafter, leaving Spring Valley as the sole water capacity of about five million gallons. supplier for the City.7 Schussler’s objective in building the Pilarcitos In May of 1866 Schussler became chief engineer. and Stone Dams was singular: to divert water from A year later he completed the Pilarcitos main dam Pilarcitos Creek, which flowed to the coast at Half at a height of seventy feet. At that time it was one Moon Bay, and send it to San Francisco instead. As of the world’s tallest earthen dams, capturing 600 part of this effort he set pressure pipe through a tunnel million gallons of water. Beginning with this project, from Pilarcitos to the San Andreas Dam. The project Schussler made it a policy to purchase not just the was begun in 1868 and went 3,400 feet. Few projects reservoir site but the surrounding watershed as well. He like it had ever been accomplished before. This would thus guarantee two things for the Spring Valley established his reputation as an expert in that field as Water Company.