Jean McClish strikes again with this fabulous article on the "Mountain Lifeline," a system of flumes, ditches and pipelines that supplied water to Groveland, Big Oak Flat and surrounding areas for mining and farming. This was published in the May 30, 1975 issue of the PML News.

MOUNTAIN LIFELINE
GOLDEN ROCK SYSTEM FLOWED WITH NEW HOPE
By Jean McClish

Water cascades down the raceway, across the high flume, a sparkling tidal wave coursing along the ditch that leads into the mining areas surrounding Groveland and Big Oak Flat. It is the first water of the Golden Rock Water Company and with it comes a renewal of mining activity, a revival of lagging economy, hope for the future. The date is March 29, 1860.

The water, an indispensable commodity in mining for gold, came from the south fork of the Tuolumne River. These thirty-eight miles of flume and ditch assured a constant and reliable source of water and thereby confirmed the survival of these south of the river mining camps.

Such a source of water had been long awaited and sorely needed. An 1851 description of the early gold camps by a Big Oak Flat correspondent for the SAN JOAQUIN REPUBLICAN (Stockton) had told of the problem of water deficiency. Signing himself "Mountaineer," he had written:

 As we pass up Rattlesnake, the first creek of note we meet is "Slate Gulch" which has been worked but little since the spring of '50 when they made an average of two ounces per day to the hand. There is considerable dirt thrown up on this gulch, and a fine chance to run toms when we get plenty of water.

"We next reach Garrote creek� There have been many thousands of dollars taken out of this creek and there is more left which will be extracted if we get a little more water, that article being short at present.

"Big Creek runs through flat country until within a few miles of Tuolumne when it enters a canyon which it follows until it empties into the river. This creek has been worked to a considerable extent from the mouth of Garrote Creek to where it enters the canyon, a distance of about four miles. This work was done last spring, when the water suddenly dried up and labor was suspended.

"Besides these creeks and innumerable gulches known to contain gold, there is "Deer Flat," situated three-fourths of a mile to the north of this place. Upon this flat gold has been found in several places in great abundance, but it has been but little more than prospected, as there was not water to work there last winter."

In 1854 a claim to water privilege on the south fork of the Tuolumne and to Big Creek had been filed by John G. Spangler, Richard Holt and John Hardin. Their claim included land sufficient for a canal or ditch "through Deer Flat, Big Oak Flat and such other places as may be necessary for the carrying of water to mines, and for the opening of all such collateral branches and offsets as may be necessary for conveying water for the development of those mineral regions now without water."

At the time the claim was filed, these enterprising individuals indicated that the route of the ditch had already been surveyed and staked. A dam was built at Hardin's mill to supply water for the flumes and ditch.

When about 18 miles of the ditch was completed and considerable work done to the remainder, financial resources were exhausted, and work on the project halted.

The Golden Rock Water Company was subsequently organized, and in 1859 work was resumed by Murphy, Watts and company. Otis Perrin took a contract for building the first 13 miles of the raceway, completing the section in one year.

Suspension flume from its northern terminus. Between each set of towers, a distance of approximately 200 feet, the flume box was supported by cross timbers placed at three-foot intervals and attached at each end to the main suspension cable above it by a guy wire. (photo courtesy of the Bancroft Library)

What was known as the "Big Gap Flume" was erected in 1859. The flume was designed by G.W. Holt and built by him and Gus Conrad at a cost of $80,000 in stock, scrip, and cash. This 2200-foot long suspension flume carried the water over Big Gap at Hamilton's meadow (Buck Meadows). The flume box built of sugar pine, measured 30 inches on the outside, 26 inches inside. It was supported by eleven towers; the highest two were 265 feet, the flume box being suspended about 250 feet above ground level. At the base the towers were 50 feet square, tapering upward.

Helen Rocca Goss, writing about the Golden Rock water ditch for the Tuolumne County Historical Society quarterly* suggested that the flume must have been constructed on high ground near the first tower and placed on rollers so it would be shoved ahead until it reached the first tower. The whole 2200 feet must have been constructed 200 feet at a time and shoved ahead on rollers from one tower to the next.

Carlo De Ferrari, Tuolumne County historian, adds, "The flume box was supported by cross beams spaced at approximately three-foot intervals which were suspended by wire rope from the two main suspension cables. The main cables were apparently in the neighborhood of three inches in diameter. The secondary cables were not so massive, and a section recovered at the site reveals that it was composed of ten parallel strands of stiff iron wire having a diameter of .125."

The ditch itself, through which the water flowed, was two and a half feet deep. Its width was nine feet at the top and six feet at the bottom. The grade was eight feet per mile.

Flume of the Golden Rock Water Company southwest of Hardin's Mill around 1900. (photo courtesy of Margaret E. Schlichtman)

To augment the quantity of water available, a second ditch with accompanying flumes was built to bring water from the middle fork of the Tuolumne to the south fork, adding 100 inches to the 5000 supplied to the water system by the south fork.

The ditch divided on the height just west of Garrote, one branch passing around the south side of Big Oak Flat and proceeding by ditch down Spring Gulch. It crossed Cobb's' creek and Coulterville road by means of flumes and served mines along this route and into Mariposa County.

Another branch passed north of Big Oak Flat and served quartz mines on the divide between Big Oak Flat and Deer Flat. The excess flowed into Slate Gulch and from there went by flume across Rattlesnake Creek just above Priest's.

After the eventful March day in 1860, mining in the areas serviced by the Golden Rock ditch flourished. Placer mining in the whole Mother Lode was waning by the 1860's, but quartz mines, their shafts thrusting deeper and deeper into the ground, depended on water. Individual owners of small claims and the companies formed to develop the larger ones, as well as water-hungry ranchers of the area, all received their supply of water from the ditch, interrupted only occasionally by slides in the ditch or damage to the flumes. Water was sold by the inch, and at one time cost $2.00 a day for a stream of 20 inches.

By the summer of 1868 the main and subsidiary ditches totaled about 100 miles.

Constant attention to the condition of the ditch and flumes was necessary, and a crew was kept busily at work removing debris, fallen trees or limbs, replacing timbers along the flumes, raising and lowering sluice gates.

The suspension flume with its wooden towers had been built with a life expectancy of seven or eight years. That estimate proved to be quite accurate, for on July 8, 1868 the towers fell with a tremendous crash. "It crushed right down on its foundation, leaving scarcely a beam erect - a vast heap of broken and rotting timbers," announced THE UNION DEMOCRAT on July 25. A later issue remarked, "It is a sad loss to the Garrotes, Big Oak Flat, Moccasin Creek and Pino Blanco, all of which depended on the Golden Rock ditch for a supply of water. We think the company will put pipes across the gap, as the diggings in that section are by no means exhausted."

Andrew Rocca acquired the Golden Rock Water ditch in 1869, buying out some of the owners including John Watts, Irwin Davis and Otis Perrin who had been superintendent until the flume fell, suspending operations of the water system.

Rocca immediately set about bridging "Big Gap" with a pipeline, forming an inverted siphon.

The pipe was 22 inches in diameter, 2,262 feet in length. The required 28 tons of sheet iron were hauled to the gap by horse teams and the pipe constructed on the ground.

Although constructing and installing the pipe was a monumental task, the cost was surprisingly low, probably around $12,000. This was partly due to the fact that the undertaking was a cooperative effort. Rocca had bought out some of the owners, but others agreed to transfer their title of ownership to him in return for his supplying the pipe and putting the ditch in good repair. The miners contributed their labor without pay in order to secure the needed water as quickly as possible. Within two months water was flowing through the pipe and along the ditch.

Rocca continued as superintendent of the Golden Rock Water Company, with headquarters at one time on Main Street in Big Oak Flat, until 1875 when he sold out and left Tuolumne County.

After that time the water system was owned by a succession of large mining companies, the first being Merced Gold Mining Company. By 1905 it was owned by the Big Creek Gold Mining Company, a Maine corporation, later becoming the Tuolumne River Power Company when the generation of electric power became part of the system's capabilities.

Early in the 1900's, after a period of being out of use, the ditch was given a thorough cleaning and new flumes were built. When the work was completed a big celebration was held in Groveland.

The water from the ditch at that time was used not only for a revival of some of the big gold mines, but for the farmlands as well.

In 1915 improvements were again being made on the ditch. The TUOLUMNE PROSPECTOR of September 19, 1915 says, "Partington and Scofield are making good progress on their contract of running a tunnel through the divide back of the Elwell place for the Yosemite Power Company, the object of the work being the elimination of an expensive piece of flume across a slide. The rock tunnel is said to be harder than a mistress' heart and a power drill is a necessity."

The Tuolumne River Power Company owned the system until 1917 when the lack of use caused suspension of operations.

From 1917 to 1923 the City and County of San Francisco owned the property. This was the time that headquarters were established in Groveland for the transportation of cement and supplies for building of O'Shaughnessy Dam and the mountain tunnels. The City operated the water system for the purpose of supplying water for the railroad and for fire protection in Groveland.

When there was no longer a need for the water, the ditches and remaining flumes and pipeline were untended and allowed to disintegrate.

In 1942 the property was bought by Tuolumne County for $750 of accumulated delinquent taxes.

Only remnants remain: portions of the pipeline of the inverted siphon seen along the Tuolumne Rim Road; the ditch glimpsed here and there, appearing to be a dry stream bed covered with pine needles and punctuated by small trees.

While it lived, the main artery and its tributaries pumped life-giving water into the mining communities and was responsible, more than any other one factor, for the survival and growth of Groveland, Big Oak Flat and other areas it served.

*Tuolumne County's Golden Rock Water Ditch," by Helen Rocca Goss published in the Jan-Mar 1964 issue of the Tuolumne County Historical Society's CHISPA was especially helpful in supplying information and identifying issues of THE UNION DEMOCRAT that described the story.

May 30, 1975
PINE MOUNTAIN LAKE NEWS

PLAQUE TO MARK HISTORIC DITCH
Special recognition of the role of Golden Rock Water Ditch played in the life of the gold mining areas of Groveland and Big Oak Flat will be given on Saturday, June 14, 1975 at 1pm.

A plaque will be placed at the Buck Meadows site of the old suspension flume, and the inverted siphon pipeline that replaced it, by members of the Tuolumne County Historical Society.

Present at the dedication of the plaque will be Helen Rocca Goss and Bernard T. Rocca. Their father - Andrew Rocca operated the Golden Rock Water Company from 1869 to 1875, its most productive years. It was Rocca who built the pipeline when the suspension flume collapsed in 1868.

A family picnic will precede the ceremonies. The public is invited to bring a picnic lunch and participate in the dedication.

Drive east from Groveland on Highway 120 to Buck Meadows. The picnic area is on the left side of the highway just past Yosemite Meadows Lodge (Mountain Lodge).