US UCLA Library Special Collections, A1713 Charles E. Young Research Library, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575. Email: spec-coll@library.ucla.edu. Phone: (310) 825-4988
Description
The St. Francis Dam was a 200-foot high concrete gravity-arch dam built between 1924 and 1926 in St. Francisquito Canyon (near present-day Castaic and Santa Clarita). The dam collapsed on March 12, 1928 at two and a half minutes before midnight. The resulting flood killed more than 600 residents plus an unknown number of itinerant farm workers camped in San Francisquito Canyon, making it the 2nd greatest loss of life in California after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. It is considered the worst American civil engineering failure in the 20th century. Note in photo: This Rope found under bush at west end of St. Francis Dam, near trench about 10 feet long and about 10 inches deep by 10 wide. Present Clarence Hill. Ed Leahey. Mar. 17, 1928 12:45 p.m. Handwritten on negative: St. Francis Dam Rope Text from negative sleeve: Dam, Saint Francis.
Type
image
Format
b&w glass negative
Identifier
uclamss_1429_b3701_G1270 ark:/21198/z1fj88pr
Language
No linguistic content
Subject
Dam failures--California--San Francisquito Canyon Saint Francis Dam Failure, Calif., 1928
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