And we go to bed and by 4 o'clock there would be 8 or 10 feet of water all over town.

Senator DOWNEY. That is disconcerting, to say the least, Congress

man.

Mr. GOLDEN. That certainly is.

The map here illustrates the situation-the small map in the lefthand corner. As you go downstream when that river crosses the bank of the river, the main current of the Cumberland River goes_right through the little city of Barbourville. The current is tremendously swift and the water comes in at a very rapid rate.

Besides this known damage that has been very accurately estimated by the Corps of Engineers, as was stated by Colonel Gee, it brings a lot of debris and mud with it. Any of these ordinary floods that come to Barbourville leave about a foot of mud all over town. It gets in all the homes and nearly all of the business institutions. And every congressional district in Kentucky helps us to dig out of the mud when one of those floods hit us.

For instance, the city of Louisville sends its street-working machinery down there. We have a great Army post down at Fort Knox where our gold deposit for the United States is secured, and they have hundreds of Army trucks which come to Barbourville to help us shovel the mud out of our homes and business institutions and off the streets.

Those floods stay in town about 2 or 3 days, and it takes us 6 weeks to get the mud out of our homes and business places and off the streets. The damage as shown by these engineers does not take into consideration possibly 100 Army trucks and fire-fighting apparatus and street-cleaning apparatus from a dozen different towns that come there and work for a month or 6 weeks to help us get rid of the mud that is left by each of these floods.

Senator DOWNEY. Is Barbourville your home?

Mr. GOLDEN. It is my home town where I was born and reared.

In addition to that, the National Red Cross comes there to afford relief to our people. Of course, the furniture is ruined, the beds are all ruined, and they pitch tents, they put up soup kitchens to keep our people alive, and it presents a very serious health situation.

After one of these floods there are 2,500 people that have to be inoculated for typhoid fever.

In 1946 the Red Cross spent approximately a quarter of a million dollars in helping people to get bedclothing and clothing to wear, and to feed the people, and to help them clean up the terrible wreckage that comes to that community.

Senator DowNEY. Congressman, in view of this lamentable condition you have portrayed here, I am rather surprised the Government has not acted heretofore.

Mr. GOLDEN. I am, too. It has been a deplorable condition and one that the local citizens cannot handle themselves.

Senator CHAPMAN. Mr. Chairman, may I ask Mr. Golden a question? Senator DoWNEY. Yes.

Senator CHAPMAN. Mr. Golden, this is one of the richest coal fields. in the United States, is it not?

Mr. GOLDEN. Yes, sir.

Senator CHAPMAN. And Barbourville, the county seat of Knox County, is in the heart of the rich coal fields?

Mr. GOLDEN. Yes.

Senator CHAPMAN. Can you tell the committee what effect these floods have on the production of coal in the vicinity of Barbourville! Mr. GOLDEN. The Cumberland River division of the Louisville & Nashville Railroad starts in the edge of Knox County-the county we are talking about-at Corbin, Ky., and goes through Knox, Bell, and Harlan. Those are three of the greatest coal-producing counties in America.

The engineers in their report here show that in the year 1945-and it is about that normally-those three counties produced 18,000,000 tons of coal. Compared with the national output, that is about onetwenty-fifth of the entire production of coal in America.

In addition to that, as mentioned by Colonel Gee, we have some hardwood plants, and during the war one of the most productive walnut-hardwood plants in America was located there at Barbourville where we manufactured millions of gunstocks for the Army, and we produced oak beams for the Navy by the thousands.

When these floods come, those are things that cannot be estimated in damage as portrayed by the engineers' report.

When floods come all of those mines are closed. We have a great loss of pay roll. The railroad men are laid off-5,000 of them. Sixteen thousand coal miners are laid off. Our little wood factories are closed and flooded. Some of the machinery is damaged and ruined, and it is a matter of some national importance to give us protection.

Now the plan which the engineers have worked out will give us that protection. They can build a flood wall an average of 15 feet high that will prevent this river there at the bend at the edge of town from flowing through the center of this little city. It will not only protect us from the floods that we have had of record, the 1946 flood being the most devastating, but it will give us an additional 3 feet of protection which will take care not only of the floods we have had of record, but any prospective flood.

It will enable our community to continue to grow and continue to produce the necessary fuel and hardwood for the entire country.

While Barbourville is quite a small community, I think we have some things we can be proud of. We have a college there of about 600 students, which educates mountain preachers that go all over the United States. It is a very beautiful college-Union College. In addition to that, it has quite a history that may appeal to your committee. The first house west of the Appalachian Mountainthe whole western progress of the civilization of America-was there near Barbourville. Dr. Walker built the first house in Kentucky and the first house west of the Allegheny Mountains here near this little town.

Senator DowNEY. You have some venerable historic conditions there.

Mr. GOLDEN. We really do.

I might say, Senator, we have furnished a Governor of Senator Kerr's great State, and in addition to this, we have furnished to our own State two Governors. And we are impartial concerning our politics.

Senator DOWNEY. Congressman, I think you had better stop because if you do not we are liable to make the appropriation right here, and Senator Hayden might resent that.

Senator CHAPMAN. Well, my friend, Congressman Golden, is reciting the record of some of the celebrated men and eminent Americans who come from there, and I would like to add that one of the most illustrious of all the Justices of the Supreme Court, Samuel F. Miller, appointed by President Lincoln from the State of Iowa, was first a country doctor at Barbourville, and then a country lawyer. He read Pope and Blackstone while he was practicing medicine. He had one of those little, old-fashioned one-story law offices. A doctor occupied one room and he occupied the other. And he became so enamored of the law in reading these books in his neighbor's office that he became. a lawyer, abandoned the practice of medicine, migrated to Iowa, and was elevated to the Supreme Court by President Lincoln. Some of his constitutional decisions rank second only to those of the great Chief Justice Marshall.

Senator DowNEY. Colonel Gee, it would seem from the statements that conditions are much more precarious here than in the average flood-control project we hear of here, is that correct?

Colonel GEE. Yes, sir. You have a condition where the only space available to build a community is in the very bottom of a steep valley, and immediately alongside this river which does have flash floods of quite frequent occurrence.

Senator DOWNEY. Speaking for myself only, it does seem to me this is a project that ought to be given some priority.

Colonel GEE. There are considerable difficulties involved in the matter of local cooperation as Senator Chapman pointed out, because the rights-of-way are very expensive. The communities have built up all of the space within the valley floor, and to put a levee through such a community means you must tear down a considerable number of dwellings to do it.

Senator DowNEY. I was suggesting that whatever is going to be done by the Government certainly should be expedited.

Mr. GOLDEN. If we have another flood, that great damage will be inflicted upon us again.

I might say to Colonel Gee that since his men have been down there they have had a great community meeting, and the city council has passed an ordinance unanimously to accept the figures and raise the oney, and they will have it ready any time we can get the authorization from this great committee.

One more observation, if you will indulge me. When these floods bit Barbourville the Internal Revenue Department sends an agent down there to assist the citizens in making out their income taxes. We have great losses. It is estimated in 1 year the loss of taxes was

$400,000.

Those are very hurtful things. It is a matter that can be remedied Fy the assistance of our great Government.

Senator DowNEY. Congressman Golden and Senator Chapman, I think there is ample evidence in the record now to justify this project. So I do not think we have to hear more.

Is there some other companion project with this?

94522-49-pt. 1-48

Senator CHAPMAN. The one at Cumberland which would cost be tween $60,000 and $70,000, would it not, Colonel?

Colonel GEE. Yes, sir, and both are included in this report.
Senator DowNEY. We have covered both of them?

Colonel GEE. Yes, sir.

Senator CHAPMAN. And that is also in the heart of the rich coal fields, and similar arguments would apply in favor of it. It would cost much less.

Senator DowNEY. I think this is ample testimony, then, and I will be very happy indeed to have Senator Kerr review your remarks about the famous Governor from his State that was born in Barbourville. Senator KERR. Who is that?

Mr. GOLDEN. Governor Silas Wilson, a Governor of your great State. Senator DOWNEY. Senator Kerr, I just made a statement wholly on my own responsibility and not binding on anybody that it certainly seems a precarious condition exists and a strong case has been presented.

Thank you very much, gentlemen.

Senator CHAPMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

PAINTED ROCK, ARIZ.

Senator DOWNEY. Our next project this morning is Painted Rock, Ariz.

Senator Hayden, do you wish to make a preliminary statement? Senator HAYDEN. As all southern Californians know, the Colorado River once broke into the Imperial Valley and did great damage. That is, the water ran out of the Colorado River into the Imperiai Valley but the cause of the break was a flood on the Gila River.

The Colorado River drains a vast area and rises gradually to a flood stage, and as it does, scours out the bottom of the stream. Normally you will find a difference between high and low water of 30 or 40 feet down at the bottom of the river. As the current goes down, the silt and gravel deposit again.

Now, the Gila flood came in this time and with no opportunity to scour out the Colorado below the mouth of the Gila, and so it had to break away somewhere, and it broke the levee and got into the old channel of the Alamo River and ran for a number of years, the river itself, into the Salton Sea, until finally it was stopped largely by the efforts of the Southern Pacific Railroad Co.

To avoid a repetition of that, the International Boundary Commission in connection with the equitable distribution of waters along the American border both on the Rio Grande and the Colorado have recommended that a dam be built on the Gila River near Sentinel. It is called Painted Rock site. That would impound the floodwaters of the Gila so that disaster could not occur again.

What I came for this morning was to ask that Colonel Gee place it the record the recommendation of the Board of Engineers with respect to this matter.

It is my understanding that all of the required reports are not quite ready, Colonel.

Colonel GEE. That is correct, sir.

Senator HAYDEN. And I would like to ask in that connection that the record be left open. It is my understanding that the Interior

Department is required to report upon it; the Agriculture Department is required to report upon it; and I assume the State Department through the International Boundary and Water Commission.

Colonel GEE. We have their report. We do not have the Federal Power Commission report.

Senator HAYDEN. There is no power involved in the matter, so I am sure the Federal Power Commission would have but little comment to make except to say so.

So, Colonel, if you will be kind enough to place in the record the statements we have in regard to this and leave the record open for others, I think the committee can have the whole picture?

Senator DOWNEY. Am I right in assuming there is no objection to this that you know of?

Senator HAYDEN. Not at all. It has been submitted to the Governor of Arizona, the Governor of California, and the directors of the Imperial irrigation district. Everyone concerned in the matter deems the development desirable so far as I know.

Hearings have been held on this at Phoenix.

Senator KERR. Pardon me, Senator, is this the item referred to as Redondo Beach?

Senator HAYDEN. This is Painted Rock Reservoir on the Gila River.

Senator DowNEY. Off the record.

(Discussion off the record.)

Senator HAYDEN. The benefit to Arizona, I might say, so far as the Painted Rock site is concerned, is this: You will notice on the lower Gila above Yuma there is an irrigated area around Welton. If the floodwaters are contained by this reservoir, the peak taken off, and the water gradually released, it will percolate into the underground and aid in maintaining the levels of the wells for irrigation purposes in the lower Gila. That is the principal benefits as far as Arizona is concerned.

The primary benefit is to protect the lower Colorado below Yuma and Mexico and the Imperial Valley from serious flood damage that has occurred in the past.

Senator DOWNEY. Senator Hayden, you consider it a thoroughly justified project?

Senator HAYDEN. I do.

Senator DOWNEY. Colonel Gee, is your report completed?

Colonel GEE. Yes; it is, and it is awaiting the comments of these three agencies previously mentioned.

Senator DoWNEY. I wonder if it might be advisable just to allow you when those reports are ready to place your written statement in the record without giving it here orally.

Colonel GEE. We will do so, sir.

(The statement above referred to, is as follows:)

STATEMENT OF CORPS OF ENGINEERS ON PAINTED ROCK RESERVOIR, ARIZ.

The Gila River, the largest tributary to the lower Colorado River, drains about 58,200 square miles, of which about 8,600 square miles are below Gillespie Dam at river-mile 164. The river is about 650 miles long from its source on the westerly slope of the Continental Divide in southwest New Mexico to its junction with the Colorado River about 3 miles upstream from Yuma, Ariz. The principal tributaries all joint the main stream above Gillespie Dam, below which the river flows