permaculture

[Marimike6@cs.com]

In a message dated 11/1/2003 10:30:21 AM Eastern Standard Time, lfl@intrex.net writes:

>The Owens Valley in Eastern California was a beautiful green area with
>farms and orchards before the water rights were bought and the water was
>sent east to turn the LA desert into a city.  I believe that was done by
>Mulholland (sp?), one of the early developers of Los Angeles. Very
>interesting story.

The definitive book on the Owens Valley water theft is Cadillac Desert, by Marc Reisner. Your library very well may have it. It's a story of how the smartest bastards of the bunch snookered everyone else by playing on their own greed. There are no heros in this story-- the farmers of the Owens Valley just couldn't see what was happening in time to stop it.

That's how Los Angeles was born. Without the water it would have stayed a little desert town of about 50,000.

M. Elvin