page_title: Hetch Hetchy
section_title: Exploration and early development
hierarchical_section_title: Hetch Hetchy / History / Exploration and early development
caption_attribution_description: English: "Little Arroyo" — by John Englehart, signed as C.N. Doughty; oil painting; 1908. Painting of a side canyon in the Hetch Hetchy Valley, within Yosemite National Park. About 83 x 56 inches, with a 100 inch—8.33 foot diagonal; in original frame. The Little Arroyo may be under water since the 1920s, as Hetch Hetchy Valley was submerged under Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, after completion of the O'Shaughnessy Dam dam at the foot of the valley in 1923. Credits Photo by David P Cole.
context_page_description: Hetch Hetchy is the name of a valley, a reservoir and a water system in California in the United States. The glacial Hetch Hetchy Valley lies in the northwestern part of Yosemite National Park and is drained by the Tuolumne River. For thousands of years before the arrival of settlers from the United States in the 1850s, the valley was inhabited by Native Americans who practiced subsistence hunting-gathering. During the late 19th century, the valley was renowned for its natural beauty – often compared to that of Yosemite Valley – but also targeted for the development of water supply for irrigation and municipal interests.
  In 1923, the O'Shaughnessy Dam was completed on the Tuolumne River, flooding the entire valley under the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. The dam and reservoir are the centerpiece of the Hetch Hetchy Project, which in 1934 began to deliver water 167 miles west to San Francisco and its client municipalities in the greater San Francisco Bay Area.
context_section_description: In the early 1850s, a mountain man Nathan Screech became the first non-Native American to enter the valley. Local legend attributes the modern name Hetch Hetchy to Screech's initial arrival in the valley, during which he observed the Native Americans "cooking a variety of grass covered with edible seeds", which they called "hatch hatchy" or "hatchhatchie". Screech reported that the valley was bitterly disputed between the "Pah Utah Indians" (Paiute) and "Big Creek Indians" (Miwok), and witnessed several fights in which the Paiute appeared to be the dominant tribe. About 1853, his brother Joseph Screech (credited in some accounts for the original discovery of the valley) blazed the first trail from Big Oak Flat, a mining camp near present-day Lake Don Pedro, for 38 mi (61 km) northeast to Hetch Hetchy Valley.
  During this time, the upper Tuolumne River, including Hetch Hetchy Valley, was visited by prospectors attracted by the California Gold Rush. Miners did not stay in the area for long, however, as richer deposits occurred further south along the Merced River and in the Big Oak Flat area. After the valley's native inhabitants were driven out by the newcomers, it was used by ranchers, many of whom were former miners, to graze livestock. Animals were principally driven along Joseph Screech's trail from Big Oak Flat to Hetch Hetchy. Its meadows provided abundant feed for "thousands of head of sheep and cattle that entered lean and lank in the spring, but left rolling fat and hardly able to negotiate the precipitous and difficult defiles out of the mountains in the fall."
  In 1867, Charles F. Hoffman of the California Geological Survey conducted the first survey of the valley. Hoffman observed a meadow "well timbered and affording good grazing", and noted the valley had a milder climate than Yosemite Valley, hence the abundance of ponderosa pine and gray pine. The valley was slowly becoming known for its natural beauty, but it was never a popular tourist destination because of extremely poor access and the location of the famous Yosemite Valley just twenty miles to the south. Those who did visit it were enchanted by its scenery, but encountered difficulties with the primitive conditions and, in summertime, swarms of mosquitoes. Albert Bierstadt, Charles Dorman Robinson and William Keith were known for their landscapes that drew tourists to the Hetch Hetchy Valley. Bierstadt described the valley as "smaller than the more famous valley ... but it presents many of the same features in his scenery and is quite as beautiful."
  When Yosemite Valley became part of a state park in 1864, Hetch Hetchy received no such designation. As the grazing of livestock damaged native plants in the Hetch Hetchy Valley, mountaineer and naturalist John Muir pressed for the protection of both valleys under a single national park. Muir, who himself had briefly worked as a shepherd in Hetch Hetchy, was known for calling sheep "hoofed locusts" because of their environmental impact. Muir's friend Robert Underwood Johnson of the politically influential Century Magazine and several other prominent figures were inspired by Muir's work and helped to get Yosemite National Park established by October 1, 1890. However, ranchers who had previously owned land in the new park continued their use of Hetch Hetchy Valley – a "sheep-grazing free-for-all [that] threatened to denude the High Sierra meadows" – before disputes over state and private properties in respect to national park boundaries were finally settled in the early 1900s.
  Interest in using the valley as a water source or reservoir dates back as far as the 1850s, when the Tuolumne Valley Water Company proposed developing water storage there for irrigation. By the 1880s, San Francisco was looking to Hetch Hetchy water as a fix for its outdated and unreliable water system. The city would try repeatedly to acquire water rights to Hetch Hetchy, including in 1901, 1903 and 1905, but was continually rebuffed because of conflicts with irrigation districts that had senior water rights on the Tuolumne River, and be
caption: "Little Arroyo" side canyon in the Hetch Hetchy Valley — by John Englehart, signed as C.N. Doughty; oil painting; 1908
exif: {}