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1874 Water Wars: Was there really almost a pitchfork fight over water 150 years ago?

By Historic Stories, Stories

150 years ago, on July 15, 1874, the conflict over water availability in the Cache la Poudre River Valley erupted. But where did the conflict begin, and why was the river so contentious? Let’s step back in time and find out…

People have been using the water in the Poudre for far longer than 150 years. The Arapaho, Ute, and Cheyenne peoples, along with others, and their ancestors, lived beside and used the Poudre for thousands of years before Euro-American settlement. However, around 150 years ago the way humans used this river, and its water, drastically changed.

While Colorado was not among the first areas to see settlement, by the late 1850s-1860s, the region saw rapid transformation. Spurred in part by the discovery of gold in Colorado in 1859, many people from eastern states like Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee moved to Colorado. While some tried to strike it rich, the majority were farmers, feeding the steady market for hay, grains, and fresh produce. Moving from states with significant rainfall (on average 45 inches of precipitation) they initially struggled with Colorado’s dry climate (average precipitation of about 15 inches), before realizing irrigation was the key to success—beginning small scale irrigation ditch building efforts in the 1860s.*

In 1870, 144 families traveled westward on the railroad to create an agricultural community called Union Colony (now Greeley). In need of water, the settlers quickly constructed two working irrigation ditches.

View of Greeley Main Street and Number 3 Ditch in June 1870.
Photo Credit: [1971.20.0004] City of Greeley Museums

The Greeley Number 3 supplied water to kitchens, gardens, and backyards. The Greeley Number 2 to water farmers’ crops. (The Number 1 was never constructed). Union Colony flourished drawing more settlers to the Poudre region. Two years later, Agricultural Colony (now Fort Collins), was firmly established upriver.

Which brings us back to the year of conflict –

In an already dry and arid region, the drought in July 1874 brought a grave threat to the people of Union Colony. Reliant on the Poudre River for water to irrigate their crops and gardens, and to meet community needs, farmers woke up one morning to find the Poudre bone dry at the Greeley Number 3 irrigation ditch headgate.** But what had caused their water supply to completely disappear?

Photograph of the Larimer County Ditch ten miles northwest of Fort Collins. Left to right: Teele, R.Q. Tenney, and Riddle. c1911
Photo Credit: Archive at Fort Collins Museum of Discovery. [H07772]

It was discovered that their upstream neighbors at Agricultural Colony and other upstream locations were diverting what little water was available into their own irrigation canals. New upstream irrigation canals, such as the Lake Canal, had the capacity to divert the whole of the Poudre River, and that wasn’t even accounting for the low flow of 1874, a drought year. Capacity had become reality—the newer canals were diverting much of the river’s flow, leaving little for downstream users. Union Colony was outraged, marching to Agricultural Colony with their pitchforks (yes, this really happened) to demand their water back.

To avoid an all-out war, some forty irrigators met at the Eaton schoolhouse on July 15, 1874, to find a solution. “The evening was hot, the structure was small, and the Greeleyites (among them several Civil War veterans) arrived with their guns” (Hobbs & Welsh, 2020).

Fortunately, guns stayed in their holsters and no punches (or pitchforks) were thrown. The injection of Nathan Meeker, Union Colony founder, warned that failure to reach an agreement river water usage could open the floor to allow “a heavy capitalist or corporation” to build ” a huge canal from the Poudre above La Porte [upstream of both colonies] and run it [all the river’s waters] through the Box Elder country” (Hobbs & Welsh, 2020).

Afraid of this outcome, the group laid down their pitchforks and eventually, after many more hours of loud disagreement, came to a compromise. This compromise became the basis of what is known as Western Water Law and the notion of “First in Time, First in Right,” or prior appropriation, still used across Colorado today. Prior appropriation means each irrigation diversion has a priority number—based upon the date they were built and first began to divert (kind of like take a number and get in line). The senior priority users get first use of the water and down the line. However, they can only divert as much water as they hold shares to and must put it to “beneficial use.” The water provisions established 150 years ago, here in the Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area, were eventually written into Colorado’s Constitution and are still in effect today.

Back of photo reads “Young wheat just starting being irrigated for the first time–Jackburn Baxter.” c1895
Photo Credit: [AI-2526] City of Greeley Museums

This conflict over Western water law not only led to the development of Western water law, but it’s the reason the Cache la Poudre River was designated by Congress as a National Heritage Area.

Learn more at Water War and Law | Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area (poudreheritage.org).

Index

*Irrigation Ditch: Ditches are man-made channels built to store and divert water to where it can be used by farmers to water crops and provide water to towns.

**Headgate: A headgate is an irrigation structure used to regulate the flow of water from a river into an irrigation ditch. Headgates can be opened or closed to control the amount of water allowed through.

References

Hobbs, G., & Welsh, M. E. (2020). Confluence: The Story of Greeley Water. Jordan Designs.

Image 1 Photo Credit: [1971.20.0004] City of Greeley Museums

Image 2 Photo Credit: Archive at Fort Collins Museum of Discovery. [H07772]

Image 3 Photo Credit: [AI-2526] City of Greeley Museums

The Mysterious Woman: Miss Stella M. Newell

By Stories

They say behind every good man is a woman, but in the case of the hundreds relying on the water of the North Poudre Irrigation Company it was just one woman—Miss Stella M. Newell.

Stella Newell, born in 1885, grew up near St. Louis, Missouri. After contracting tuberculosis, she moved to Fort Collins in 1914, a common move when clean air of the West was thought to cure ailing lungs. Less common, in 1914, was a young woman striking out on her own. For six years Stella worked a variety of jobs—even spending time as postmistress of Coalmont, a rural community near Walden, Colorado—but in 1920, she was offered a job that changed her life, secretary and treasurer of the North Poudre Irrigation Company.

1933 Audit, p.161. North Poudre Irrigation Company Records. Water Resources Archives, Fort Collins, Colorado.

The North Poudre Irrigation Company, made up of nineteen reservoirs, hundreds of miles of ditches, and hundreds of shareholders, was (and is) vital to farming in Northern Colorado. Shortly after farmers began settling here in the 1870s, they realized rainfall would not provide enough water to grow crops. As a solution, they began constructing a complex network of irrigation reservoirs and ditches, founding companies to build and maintain them, including North Poudre in 1901. Running such a company was no small task, so in 1920 they hired Stella.

Fort Collins Courier June 194, 1920. P.3. Accessed on newspapers.com

Stella managed day-to-day operations and finances, assisted with the purchase and sale of stock and shares, secured renters for farms and water rights, answered inquiries and legal questions, testified in water rights cases, and answered thousands of pages of correspondence. In an era before email, computers, or in some cases direct telephone lines, this was no small feat. In most cases, the correspondence is businesslike, Stella often signing simply as “secretary,” but upon occasion, especially when corresponding with fellow women, personal notes, political discussions, and friendly requests appear. Stella was the brains and heart behind the operation—in fact, a shareholder once wrote that when Stella was out sick none of her bosses knew enough to fill in!  In an era where a woman with a career was uncommon, Stella devoted her life to this work.

Stella was also very involved in the Fort Collins community. She organized the Delphian Society (think book club on steroids), was a member of the Order of the Eastern Star (women’s branch of the Masons), attended the First Presbyterian Church, and was an early and lifelong member of the Business and Professional Women’s Club. While Stella never married, she was loved by many, appearing frequently as an attendee in social gatherings, trips, and wedding parties! She rented a plethora of apartments around Fort Collins, even living in the Northern Hotel for years!

Sadly, the poor health that brought Stella west followed her all her life and in 1953, after thirty-three years in office she resigned from the irrigation company due to illness. She died in 1956 and is buried in Grandview Cemetery in Fort Collins.

You might be wondering, “Gee for such an important person, where’s her photo?” We’d like to know the answer to that too! Despite combing several archives and sources, Cache NHA staff and local archivists have been unable to find a photo of Stella! What we’ve discovered is that despite decades of critical work, her tenure is rarely mentioned or remembered and there is no known photograph of her. In a sad way, this is a bit poetic. A woman who was in many ways taken for granted remains in some ways invisible even to us. Stella offers us a small look at the often-hidden work women did to build industries and communities across the West.

 

This story was compiled from research conducted by Cache NHA staff including records at the Fort Collins Archives, Colorado State University Water Resource Archives–North Poudre Irrigation Company Records, on Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection/Newspapers.com, and U.S. Census Records.

Resources

Image 1

1933 Audit, p.161. North Poudre Irrigation Company Records. Water Resources Archives, Fort Collins, Colorado.

Image 2

Annual Reports, 1941-1965, image 110. North Poudre Irrigation Company Records. Water Resources Archives, Fort Collins, Colorado.
https://hdl.handle.net/10217/192915

Image 3

Annual Reports, 1909-1920, image 193. North Poudre Irrigation Company Records. Water Resources Archives, Fort Collins, Colorado. https://hdl.handle.net/10217/186350

Image 4

Correspondence. February 1935. WNPR Box 39, Cor. 1935 Jan-Mar. North Poudre Irrigation Company Records. Water Resource Archives, Fort Collins, CO. https://hdl.handle.net/10217/187557

Image 5

Fort Collins Courier June 194, 1920. P.3. Accessed on newspapers.com

Alpe at Lake Grandby spillway.

Women in Water: Alyssa Alpe

By Stories

Alyssa Alpe has been a student of history her whole life. It started in her early years where she grew up driving by Windy Gap reservoir, listening to her mother, a former Colorado State University Extension Agent on the North Platte Basin Round table in Jackson County, say that water was THE issue in Colorado.

When she started college, everyone questioned Alpe’s decision to pursue a history degree, unsure of the careers available for historians. But Alpe knew she, “loved researching in the archives to piece together a narrative that interpreted the story of the past,” and that passion would lend itself to her career somehow.

After graduate school, Alpe landed a job at a law firm where she discovered the world of records management, a profession focused on understanding records and making them accessible to others to tell a story or research an issue.

“It’s about being a ‘knowledge keeper’ and finding a way to communicate that knowledge to others,” Alpe said.

In 2015, Alpe was hired as a Records Data Analyst for Northern Water. Alpe has been with Northern Water for eight and a half years now and she has advanced in her career to the Records & Administrative Services Manager.

In the day-to-day, Alpe balances the managerial and Board of Director support roles along with the records and information management program. She can be found figuring out the best way to collect and store records, researching any number of topics like the origins of the Colorado-Big Thompson Project, or making plans for archival projects like digitizing collections to make them accessible. In the future, she hopes to add another job to her plate to work with the communications team to develop the public history components of their website.

“You have to have a bit of background on many issues,” Alpe said. “You don’t have to know everything, but you have to know a little bit about a lot.”

Q&A with Alyssa Alpe

Alpe at Lake Grandby spillway.

Q: What do you enjoy most about working with/studying water?

“The fact that it’s a constant state of learning. I don’t feel that you ever get to a point where you know everything about water because there is so much to learn. You’re constantly learning and that’s my favorite part.”

Q: What is the most challenging aspect of your job?

“It’s a challenge to keep up with the complexities of managing water in the United States and in our region. There’s been a real transition in terms of the institutional knowledge of folks that have retired during COVID-19 and moved onto different spaces of life. Transmitting that knowledge down the line to the next generation is a constant evolution. My hope is that through records and information management, that knowledge is accessible to our future selves 25 years down the line.”

Q: What has your experience so far been like being a woman in this line of work?

“Northern Water has modernized a lot since I started in terms of more diversity and women into this space. That’s been really encouraging to see. And I think further down the road we will have more and more of that. We have women in leadership roles across the organization which has been a shift from when I started 8 years ago. So, there is a legacy being built by women in these spaces that have historically been male dominated, and their voices will be preserved in our records for the future.”

Q: What’s a project you have worked on in this field that you are most proud of?

“When I first started with Northern Water, our former public information officer was working with a historian over at UNC, Michael Welsh, and he was writing a book along with the recently passed, former Colorado Supreme Court Justice, Greg Hobbs, who wrote prolifically about water in the west. They were working on the book Confluence: The Story of Greeley Water. We were able to dig into our records and give Michael these old newspaper clippings. He really appreciated that because we were able to give him pieces of information that contributed to this big project about the story of water in Greeley. I really loved that project because I got to work with Justice Hobbs before he passed and Michael Welsh as a historian.” 

Q: What or who has been an inspiration to you throughout your work experience?

“My number one mentor in all my life has been a former professor of mine, Heather Thiessen-Reily. She is a professor of history at Western Colorado University in Gunnison. She has done a lot of work with the National Park Service, working on public history projects. She has always been my inspiration because she is so driven. I am still connected with her, and she’s been a valuable person that I still go to if I have questions about something.”

Q: What is something you have learned about the water industry that you didn’t know before you started your role?

“It’s been hard for me to fully comprehend the prior appropriation system and how water is allocated because it is very complex. But it is also fundamental because it’s how we get water to our taps. I did not come into my role with Northern Water with a background in water. It’s been an evolution of learning and that’s the system that has been the most complex for me to learn, especially in terms of keeping the records and indexing with the appropriate terminology to be able to track back the history.”

Q: What advice would you give to other women that may want to get into this type of work?

“Be open to anything. You don’t know how that job will evolve. I didn’t think I would get into water when I left grad school and landed at a law firm working in records. I was just trying to navigate life after college. Be open to opportunities because it may not happen overnight, but eventually you do end up navigating your career towards what you want to do. It can get a little discouraging when you are trying to wedge your career into one path, and it’s not working out. But I believe all those experiences come together to make a package that will land you where you need to be, especially if you’re knowledgeable and passionate about things. Ask questions. And always be open to learning.”

“The other part of it is to be engaged with the public agencies, community organizations, your town, and other communities in the region that you may not know anything about. Learn about the region and its many histories, particularly if you are looking to work in the water industry in Northern Colorado.”

Just Add Water: Pre-settlement Water, Land, People Relationships in the Poudre River Valley

By Historic Stories

The Poudre River’s recorded history, prior to gold seekers and settlers arriving in the late 1850s and early 1860s, is scarce.  There were fur trappers’ and explorers’ writings of the area, but these were very limited regarding the Poudre River.  It was during this period that the river obtained its name, but the exact reasons and timing are uncertain.  It is generally agreed that fur traders/trappers needed to stash some of their supplies (including gun powder – in French it becomes ‘Cache la Poudre’), for a short time, during the 1820s or 1830s, for some reason, and the river was named for this action. 

As gold seekers and settlers encountered the Poudre River Valley in the mid-1800s, I often wonder what they saw.  We know that the river today is not like the natural stream before it was adapted to support permanent settlement of large numbers of people.   

Before permanent settlement in the Poudre River valley, the river meandered in a shallow, braided fashion through the bottomlands.  Each spring, runoff flooded (i.e. ‘irrigated’) the valley bottomlands in such a manner that there was an excellent stand of native grasses growing across the valley floor from the mouth of the canyon to the mouth of the river, east of Greeley.  One place, open to the public, to visualize this low, flat, bottomlands is the Arapaho Bends Natural Area.  As you stand near the remains of the Strauss Cabin, you can gaze across the valley floor (removing Rigden Reservoir from visualization) toward the west and see the bluff with Ziegler Road on top.  Look east to the bluff where I-25 is now located with the town of Timnath on the east side of the interstate.  Looking upstream the valley widens as the Box Elder Creek enters the Poudre River.  Imagine the entire bottomland area covered with native grasses and trees growing along the river meandering through the valley. 

The lushness of grasses drew buffalo into the valley.  It becomes rather obvious why the Native Americans used the area to camp – food, water, fuel – all in abundance.  Just north of the Strauss Cabin, across the railroad tracks, is where the Council Tree was located.  Large numbers of Native Americans could camp in the vicinity to ‘Council’, as the early setters called Native American gatherings, – i.e. transact business, socialize, and conduct ceremonies – while living comfortably on the resources provided by the river. 

This lushness did not escape the attention of earlier settlers to the area.  George Strauss (1858) and Benjamin Eaton (1859), traveling through the area on other missions, noted the lushness and both returned to settle in the valley when their missions were completed.  The Coy family decided to over-winter in the valley on their way to California in 1862, but did not continue their trip when spring arrived.  The Valley is a beautiful place where many people, over the years, have chosen to settle. 

The Northern Arapaho, under the leadership of ‘Chief’ Friday, were the last band of Native Americans to live/visit the Poudre River Valley, being forced out in the late 1860s.  Before leaving, they requested a reservation on the north bank of the Poudre River, on which to live, but were denied.  Friday’s band eventually was assigned to live on the Wind River Indian Reservation in central Wyoming. 


References:

Silkensen, G. 1993. South Platte River Observations: Historical Clues to the Evolution of a River’s Ecology. Published in the Proceedings of the 1992 South Platte Conference, Information Series Number 72, Colorado Water Institute, Colorado State University, pages 41-56. http://www.cwi.colostate.edu/publications/IS/72.pdf

Simmons, Marc. 2004. Friday: the Arapaho Boy – a Story from History. Children of the West Series, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque. 

Burris, Lucy. 2006. People of the Poudre: An Ethnohistory of the Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area, AD 1500-1880. (Published through a cooperative agreement between the National Park Service, Friends of the Poudre, and the Cache la Poudre River National Heritage Area)