Water works: Dam key to agricultural success
To look at Lake Berryessa, it’s not obvious. But a little research reveals that Yolo County actually has its own Atlantis.
Today, the Monticello Dam provides approximately tens of billions of gallons of water yearly, distributed by the Solano Irrigation District, to areas in and around Napa and Solano counties.
Lake Berryessa is a popular recreational destination, providing opportunities for hiking, water sports, weekend picnicking and more.
Sometimes, though, when the water levels in the lake drop, the foundations of an old city are visible.
Underneath the lake lies an old agricultural town flooded 60 years ago to provide a reservoir for the increasing water demands of a rapidly growing region.
In the autumn of 1953, construction began on the Monticello Dam that would flood Berryessa Valley, and along with it, the entire town of Monticello.
History of construction
The project was proposed in the 1940s by the Solano County Water Council to meet the growing demands for water in the county and surrounding areas. The water would provide a steady source of irrigation for farmland and become a measure of flood control for Putah Creek.
“The distribution of water was a problem as more people came into California,” said Newton Wallace, former publisher of The Winters Express, who moved to Winters in 1947 and witnessed the construction of the dam.
“There were demands for more water, and to store water for irrigation. In the bigger valleys below, there were demands for water for the expanding cities.”
In 1947, Congress approved the project, and plans for construction began. The winning bid for construction of the main dam was made jointly by Peter Kiewit and Sons Company of San Francisco and Parish Brothers of Benicia, for $7.63 million.
Construction began in August 1953. On Sept. 24, 1953, then-California Gov. Earl Warren and then-state Sen. Luther Gibson moved the first dirt to begin excavation of the dam site. The first bucket of concrete was poured in 1955.
“I would go by every Tuesday to see how the dam was coming along and to see how many yards of concrete they’d poured,” Wallace said. “Along with everything else during the ’50s, it was part of my life.”
Constructed halted, however, in 1956, due to unusually heavy rains that flooded and damaged the dam and the trestle that carried the concrete for construction. Work resumed in the spring, when the heavy rains subsided.
Construction was officially complete on Nov. 7, 1957.
In 1983, the Solano Irrigation District, which operates the dam, built a hydropower plant at the base of the dam.
“Originally, the project called for no power plants or anything like that,” Wallace said. “But the power plant came in a good many years after the dam was built, and there was no opposition when they finally put the power plant in.”
Controversy over flooding Monticello
In order to build the dam and create a reservoir in Berryessa Valley, an entire town had to be submerged.
“There was a lot of opposition, particularly from Napa County, which didn’t want to see the valley flooded,” Winters historian Joann Larkey said.
The city of Winters also opposed the project at the time.
“They were pretty much against it because of the close ties to Monticello,” Wallace said. “All the kids in Monticello came down to Winters for school, and all the families were interrelated. I remember the families and businessmen (in Monticello) losing their homes.”
Napa County wanted a series of low-water dams to save the city of Monticello, “but it wasn’t practical,” Wallace said.
When the project was finalized, the people of Monticello prepared to leave their homes.
“Some of them went and moved up to Cache Creek and bought land. Some went north. They evaluated what their property was worth before they tore it down,” Wallace said. “Some of the famers didn’t agree with the price; the courts had to settle the price of their land.”
The houses were bulldozed, the oak trees were cut down and the graves in the cemetery were disinterred and moved to Spanish Flat.
Photographers Dorothea Lange and Pirkle Jones documented the dismantling of the city, publishing their work in a book titled “Death of a Valley.”
In “Berryessa Valley — The Last Year,” another book Jones published about the flooding of the valley, a statement by the Monticello Community Club was printed on the first page:
“We object to the Monticello Dam because it is a project planned that will destroy our homes, our land, our business enterprises, and our ways of making a living. It not only completely destroys Berryessa Valley, it weakens the whole of Napa County.”
Said Wallace, “I don’t think you could build it today. There’d be too much opposition. Nobody likes to lose their land.”
Far-reaching impact
The impact of the dam on Solano County was enormous. The Solano Project, of which the Monticello Dam is a main part, continues to be a crucial source of water in the area.
The water released by the reservoir is treated for urban use and diverted to farmland.
The dam had a huge economic impact on agriculture in the region, thanks to the large increase in water supply.
According to district engineer Jim Daniels of the Solano Irrigation District, before the dam, Solano County farmers never had an adequate supply of water.
After the dam was built, “farmers were able to grow tomatoes and orchard crops,” Wallace remembered.
Other major crops made possible by the water supply were corn, wheat, sugar beets, nuts and irrigated pasture, according to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
“That was a major development,” Daniels said. “Solano County has a thriving economy because the water is available.”
The Monticello Dam also changed the area’s population, Daniels said.
Wallace remembers big crews of construction workers, who brought their families.
“There was an inflow of new families with the dam, and they all stayed,” he said.
Another impact is on Putah Creek. Before the dam, “not much water was getting to the lower reaches,” Daniels said.
“Putah Creek dried up every summer when I came here,” Wallace recalled. Now, Lake Berryessa feeds the creek year-round.
The dam also provides a measure of flood control, Daniels said.
An estimated $5.015 million in flood damages were prevented due to the dam, according to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
Lake Berryessa also is a huge recreational area. Its clean, warm waters make it popular for water sports, and the surrounding natural habitat makes for good hiking and wildlife-watching.
The spillway, or “glory hole,” also is a popular attraction. Essentially a concrete funnel, the spillway forms a drain for when the level of water exceeds the capacity of the reservoir.
“The spillway is quite dramatic when it runs,” Daniels said. “It’s uncontrolled. Once the water goes over the spillway, we can’t stop it. Back in the 1980s, they had some really wet years, and the water was 7 feet over the lip of the glory hole. It actually washed away the road that goes to the base of the dam.”
That road was the old road that led to Monticello, now buried under several hundred feet of water.
Such reminders of Monticello happen once in a while.
“When we went through the last drought in 1992, we drained more water out of that lake than before, and that bridge was exposed. The arch feature of Monticello is the old stone bridge across Putah Creek,” Daniels said. “It’s a pretty thing.”
— Reach Chloe Kim at ckim@davisenterprise.net
Fast facts
* The Monticello Dam is a gravity-arch dam that retains water intake. Gravity-arch dams are held in place by their own weight bearing down on the side.
* The more water against the Monticello Dam, the stronger it is.
* The dam is 304 feet tall.
* The crest length is 1,023 feet.
* The reservoir holds 1.6 million acre-feet of water.
* Every year the dam provides about 200,000 acre-feet of water (one acre-foot of water equals 326,000 gallons).
* The lake was calculated to have seven full years of storage, which means theoretically, with a full reservoir, the Solano Irrigation District still would be able to make full delivery of water for seven years.
* The spillway’s diameter is 72 feet at its widest point.
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Posted by Chloe Kim
on Dec 30 2011.
Last Login: Mon 21 May 2012 02:48:00 PM PDT
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Great article.
DAM good story.
Very nice article. Growing up in Woodland and going to UCD, I remember bike rides from both towns up to the dam and down the long grade beyond–and then back home again. Just another factor that made Yolo County and the surrounding region a great place to grow up.
Pirkle Jones and Dorothea Lange collaborated on a photographic essay that chronicled the death of Monticello in 1956. Really great photos. They can be viewed here: http://lumieregallery.net/wp/1643/death-of-a-valley-pirkle-jones-dorothea-lange/
Dave, thanks for that link. Those Dorothea Lange photos are truly excellent. It would be nice if one of the galleries or museums in Davis would put prints of them on display.
“‘Putah Creek dried up every summer when I came here,’ Wallace recalled. Now, Lake Berryessa feeds the creek year-round.”
The year-round flow of Putah Creek greatly improved after a court decision in 1996. When I was a child in the 1970s–particularly in the drought years of the late ’70s–Putah Creek would often dry up between Davis and Winters in the summer. It used to end right around Stevenson Bridge (Road 95A). But over the last 15 years, the Creek is much healthier downstream.
Here is a summary of what changed after 1996:
“In March of 1996 Sacramento Superior Court ruled that additional instream flows were needed for Putah Creek downstream of the Solano Diversion Dam. The judgment was appealed by the Solano parties, but a settlement, the Putah Creek Accord, was negotiated in 2000 among the parties that resolved all disputes. The settlement still provides for increased flows to Putah Creek, but includes reduced flows when Lake Berryessa is low in storage and includes a process for addressing illegal surface water diverters in Putah Creek. A Lower Putah Creek Coordinating Committee was formed made up of Yolo and Solano representatives to address Putah Creek issues such as creek habitat enhancement projects. The Committee has hired a Streamkeeper.”
Source: http://www.waterplan.water.ca.gov/docs/cwpu2005/vol4/vol4-litigation-summaryofsignificantlitigation.pdf