Franklin Canal

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker says about the Franklin Canal, right there in El Paso County. Settle in, because this one goes back a long way. Further than you might think.

For centuries, the Rio Grande has been molded and shaped by the people living along its banks. Informal irrigation systems existed along that life-sustaining river all the way back to the Spanish Colonial period. Now that river didn't wait around for anybody, and neither did the folks who depended on it.

As early as the 1840s, area farmers began making more modern improvements on those old systems. Progress, slow and steady, working its way up the valley. By 1889, El Paso developers had a more urgent problem on their hands.

They needed a means to efficiently deliver water to farmers in the El Paso Valley, and they needed it soon. So the El Paso Irrigation Company got to work, and construction on the Franklin Canal began the following year. Then things got complicated, the way they tend to when two nations share one river.

A dispute between the United States and Mexico over water rights led all the way to an international treaty, signed in 1906. In that agreement, it was settled that the U.S. would deliver sixty thousand acre feet of water to Mexico, and the Franklin Canal would be the means of doing it. Sixty thousand acre feet.

Let that number sit with you a moment. The canal was completed in 1912, beginning at the international dam and extending five miles, running along the north bank of the Rio Grande and continuing right through downtown El Paso, intended to carry water thirty miles into the El Paso Valley. Then the population grew, as populations do, and the demands on the canal grew right along with it.

Upgrades began in 1914 and continued on into the 1930s. And in 1938, the American Dam was created, specifically to hinder the efforts of Mexican citizens to siphon water from the Rio Grande. Modifications kept coming throughout the twentieth century.

Essential to irrigation on both sides of the Rio Grande, the Franklin Canal continues to affect development in both countries to this day. Some things you build to last. Some things, it turns out, just refuse to stop mattering.

What the marker says

For centuries, the Rio Grande has been molded and shaped by the humans living along its banks. Informal irrigation systems have existed along the life-sustaining river from the Spanish Colonial period. As early as the 1840s, area farmers began more modern improvements on these systems. By 1889 El Paso developers needed a means to efficiently provide water to farmers in the El Paso Valley. The El Paso Irrigation Company began construction on the Franklin Canal the following year. A dispute between the U. S. and Mexico over water rights led to the international treaty of 1906, in which it was agreed that the U. S. would deliver 60,000 acre feet of water to Mexico via the Franklin Canal. Completed in 1912, the canal began at the international dam and extended five miles, paralleling the Rio Grande on its north bank and continuing through downtown El Paso. It was intended to deliver water thirty miles into the El Paso Valley. Demands on the canal increased as the area's population grew. Upgrades began in 1914 and continued into the 1930s. The American Dam was created in 1938 to hinder the efforts of Mexican citizens to siphon water from the Rio Grande. Modifications have been made to Franklin Canal throughout the 20th century. It is an important element in the history of water control along the U.S.-Mexico border. Essential to irrigation on both sides of the Rio Grande, the canal continues to affect development in both countries. (1998)