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Image / View of the Salton Sea at sunset, Riverside County, southern California, ca.1900-1930

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Title
View of the Salton Sea at sunset, Riverside County, southern California, ca.1900-1930
Creator
Pierce, C.C. (Charles C.), 1861-1946
Date Created and/or Issued
circa 1900/1930
Publication Information
University of Southern California. Libraries
Contributing Institution
California Historical Society
University of Southern California Digital Library
Collection
California Historical Society Collection, 1860-1960
Rights Information
Doheny Memorial Library, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0189
Public Domain. Release under the CC BY Attribution license--http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/--Credit both “University of Southern California. Libraries” and “California Historical Society” as the source. Digitally reproduced by the USC Digital Library; From the California Historical Society Collection at the University of Southern California
Send requests to address or e-mail given
USC Libraries Special Collections
specol@usc.edu
Description
Photograph of a view of the Salton Sea at sunset, Riverside County, southern California, ca.1900-1930. Clouds above the sea partially blocks the suns rays but allows enough to penetrate creating a spectacular view of broken sunrays. The sea is calm. Mountains are visible in the distance. Picture file card reads: "Salton Sea at sunset, when it was a sea. 265' below sea level."
"The Salton Sea was formed between 1905 and 1907 when the Colorado River burst through poorly built irrigation controls south of Yuma, Arizona. Almost the entire flow of the river filled the Salton Basin for more than a year, inundating communities, farms and the main line of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Continued filling of the Salton Sink was finally stopped in 1907, when a line of protective levees was built by boxcars dumping boulders into the breach from Southern Pacific tracks. By then, this inland lake was about 40 miles long and 13 miles wide, covering an area of about 400 square miles. The Salton Sea is currently 35 miles by 15 miles and can be as long as 40 miles by almost 20 miles in particularly wet years. It has an average depth of 29.9 feet and, at its deepest, is 51 feet. It contains 7.3 million acre feet of water and evaporates 1.3 million acre feet each year. There is a five-mile-long trench on the south end of the Sea that is 51 feet deep. The Sea is currently 228 feet below sea level. Interestingly, the bed of the Salton Sea is only five feet higher than the lowest spot in Death Valley." -- unknown author.
Type
image
Format
2 photographs : photoprint, b&w
21 x 26 cm.
photographic prints
photographs
Identifier
chs-m14069
USC-1-1-1-14228
USC-1-1-1-14232 [Legacy record ID]
CHS-5945
http://doi.org/10.25549/chs-m14069
http://thumbnails.digitallibrary.usc.edu/CHS-5945.jpg
Subject
Deserts
Lakes
Natural features--Lakes--Salton Sea
Natural features--Deserts--Mojave
Seas
Time Period
circa 1900/1930
Place
California
Riverside
USA
lakes: Salton Sea
Source
1-81-79 [Microfiche number]
5945 [Accession number]
CHS-5945 [Call number]
California Historical Society [Contributing entity]
Relation
California Historical Society Collection, 1860-1960
Title Insurance and Trust, and C.C. Pierce Photography Collection, 1860-1960
USC
chs-m265

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