Name/Title
Print, PhotographicEntry/Object ID
A1694.14Description
Fifty-two mule team shown hauling steel siphon to construction camp at Jawbone Siphon. The steel plate is 1 1/8 inches thick.
There are five men in the lower right, four of which are lifting a big wooden beam. There is a tent building on the right side behind the siphon pipe.
Stamped in black ink on reverse with Dept. of Water & Power stamp and photograph/negative number T202.
"In January 1912 the work was started in the canyon bottom, where the extra thickness of the steel made it necessary for most of the riveting to be done at the Eastern mill. Several pipes thirty-six feet long, weighing twenty-six tons apiece, were pulled the last four miles to the siphon by two specially rigged mule teams. Each outfit had a pair of great flat-decked wagons supported by steel wheels with tires two feet wide. They were drawn by no less than fifty-two mules, using three parallel jerk lines of sixteen mules each, with a lead pair at the head and two wheelers on the tongue. Such a job of mule skinning required highly skilled work from the most experienced drivers on the desert." --from Water Seekers, by Nadeau, pg 45.Collection
Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Collection