The Dams that Weren’t: Tascosa and Amarillo

     The letters and telegram on U.S. Representative George Mahon’s desk in May 1949 were vehement: the new dam should be built at the site of Old Tascosa. A lake there would cost less, would improve the groundwater as far as Plainview, would permit completion of a highway that would boost tourism and transportation as far as the Big Bend and would have better water than if the reservoir were downstream. Tascosa Dam proponents wielded another, less scientific argument: Borger and Amarillo already had their share of public works projects and now it was Hereford’s and Littlefield’s turn. That the Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation had yet to finish their investigations did not discourage or temper the emotions of the people supporting a Tascosa Dam.

     The first serious proposal for a dam on the Canadian River to supply thirsty Texans dated to 1924. A group of Panhandle businessmen and promoters led by Albert Sidney (A.S.) Stinnett hired civil engineers to study the possibility of an irrigation dam and canal system on the Canadian. The final report envisioned a dam in New Mexico very close to the Texas border. Canals from that reservoir would bring irrigation water along the southern side of the Canadian and make it available to farmers in Oldham, Potter, Randall and possibly Carson Counties. Nothing came of the idea, in part because the farmers were not yet interested in the water: it would cost too much and they did not really need it.

     Following the Great Depression and Second World War, plans for a dam accelerated. A number of small dams on creeks around the Panhandle came about through the Soil Conservation Service and Works Progress Administration, while the WPA assisted in the construction of Conchas Dam in New Mexico. Panhandle dam proponents looked at these accomplishments, and at the growing tension between city water consumers and area farmers over groundwater, and decided that the time had come. In 1948 and 1949 engineers from the Army Corps of Engineers returned to the Canadian River watershed and began studying the geology and topography of the Breaks and Caprock within Texas. They wanted to determine if 1) there were any places where the inner valley’s rocks could support a dam and 2) how a pipeline from a reservoir would have to run in order to supply Canadian River water as far as Lubbock and beyond. Their investigations soon narrowed to three locations: Borger, Amarillo and Tascosa.

     Each site possessed both advantages and disadvantages. Borger and Amarillo were close to cities that would use Canadian River water and the relatively narrow inner valley made a dam easier to build. Tascosa was upstream of Amarillo’s water treatment system discharge and there were no pipelines that would have to be relocated, unlike Borger and Amarillo. A pipeline from Tascosa would be longer, but fewer pumps might be necessary to get the water to Amarillo, Borger and beyond. Disadvantages at Amarillo and Borger included pre-existing infrastructure that would have to be relocated, plus the cost of relocating Amarillo’s sewage discharge. In all three locations, the landowners supported a dam but not one on their property.

     As the engineers studied the terrain, letters arrived at newspaper offices, politicians’ desks and Chamber of Commerce offices arguing for a dam at Tascosa. Most Tascosa backers also wanted a bridge at Tascosa. People still had to ford the river or go to Amarillo and then cut west to Vega or Channing. The state of Texas already planned a highway connecting Dalhart, Channing and the northern towns with Vega, Hereford and on to the south. The Highway Department purchased land for a bridge across the Canadian in 1948 but it lacked the funds to build the bridge in 1949. Residents of towns along the highway south of the Canadian dearly wanted a permanent dry river crossing and if it happened that their crossing ran along the crest of a dam then all the better. Also present were the hard feelings remained from the previous decade: some Hereford residents felt that Amarillo and Borger had gotten more than their fair share of federal projects and economic booms during the previous decades. A permanent river crossing at Tascosa and a recreational lake would help solve that.

     The supporting arguments sounded reasonable. In addition to the benefits of being upstream of all oil and gas pipelines, sewage outfalls and highway bridges, a dam at Tascosa would recharge the groundwater. Because if water seeped into the river from springs, then it should also seep out of a reservoir back into the groundwater, recharging the aquifer and providing benefits as far away as Plainview (in theory). Traffic over the Tascosa crossing meant less congestion on the already overloaded US-287/87 bridge and highway between Amarillo and Dumas. Increasing tourism in the western Panhandle would provide benefits to towns as far away as the Big Bend. And the final water system would cost less because gravity rather than pumps moved the water to Amarillo and Borger (once the water had been pumped up out of the Breaks).

     As rumors grew stronger that the engineers favored Borger, or rather a site upstream of Borger near the town of Sanford, the lobbying increased. “Don’t let Borger steal our dam!” Tascosa proponents pled. Tom Cowent of Hereford declared that, “[w]e’re sure as hell not going to quit,” even as the engineers prepared their final decision. Tascosa proponents were going to get their dam (and bridge).

     Alas, it was not to be. The engineers found that dam at Tascosa would have to be larger than at either downstream site in order to compensate for the fewer streams flowing in and the greater evaporation from the shallower reservoir site. Material needed for the structure of the dam could be found very close to the location of a Sanford Dam, but had to be trucked over fifty miles from New Mexico to supply Tascosa. The most expensive part of the project would be the pipeline and the cost of the longer pipeline from Tascosa drove the project towards the point of financial impossibility for the cities involved. Even considering the costs of moving pipelines and re-drilling gas and oil wells at Sanford, the upstream location did not compare favorably. Hereford, Deaf Smith County and Littlefield would just have to wait for their all-weather river crossing.

     They did not wait long. The state built a bridge over the Canadian near Boys’ Ranch and Tascosa in 1954. The first dirt did not move at Sanford until 1962.

Sources:

W.V. McCoy, “Hereford Mobilizes for a Fight” Amarillo Times May 10, 1949

“Tascosa Dam –Site is Urged,” Amarillo Globe News May 11, 1949

Elster M. Haile to George Mahon, July 5, 1949; Levelland Chamber of Commerce to George Mahon, May 27, 1949; and H.B. Crawford to George Mahon, April 27, 1949; all in Folder 7, Box 486, George Mahon Papers, Southwest Collection of the Special Collections Library, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas.

Cal Farley and E. L. Howe, Ten Thousand Sons: The Story of Cal Farley’s Boys Ranch (Canaan, NH: Phoenix Publishing, 1987).