Access to this collection is generously supported by Arcadia funds. 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. William Mulholland, Superintendent of the Bureau of Water Works and Supply of Los Angeles, pointing towards something in the distance. Mulholland is with 4 other men on the east bank of the St. Francis Reservoir with the top of the St. Francis Dam visible behind them at some time between the completion of the dam, in 1926, and its failure and collapse on March 12 1928. Text from negative sleeve: Saint Francis Dam
Type
Image
Format
b&w nitrate negative
Identifier
uclamss_1429_1919 ark:/21198/zz002dct4n
Language
No linguistic content
Subject
Saint Francis Dam Failure, Calif., 1928 Saint Francis Dam (Calif.) Saint Francis Reservoir (San Francisquito Canyon, Calif.) Mulholland, William, 1855-1935
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