History of the Big Ditch in the Bitterroot Valley
Sue Justus
Building the Big Ditch
Construction of a section of flume for the Big Ditch across McKinney Gulch. The flume was 18 ft. wide and 7 ft. high and was later replaced with conventional ditching. The view is circa 1908, and is looking northwest towards Downing and Blodgett mountains.
A Bitter Root District Irrigation Company steam shovel digging a portion of the Big Ditch along the east side of the valley, with Ward Mountain in the background, circa 1908.
After a group photo at the trestle at McKinney Gulch, the men working at the sight all went to eat lunch, the trestle gave out and the steam shovel went over the side. The men hung a flag on the wreckage and congratulated each other on their fortunate timing. The trestle at McKinney Gulch was later replaced with conventional ditching.
Around the turn of the last century a group of highly motivated individuals organized a ditch company. Their vision was to acquire tens of thousands of acres of dry land, irrigate it with water from Lake Como via a canal 24 feet wide, six feet deep and 75 miles long. They wanted to plant apple orchards producing the famous Bitterroot McIntosh apples. Inspired by the success of Marcus Daly’s Republican Ditch in delivering water to his Bitter Root Stock Farm, they set about their ambitious project.
A Bitter Root District Irrigation Company steam shovel digging a portion of the Big Ditch along the east side of the valley, with Ward Mountain in the background, circa 1908.
Emboldened by the promise of financial backing, they set to work and raised the earth dam at Lake Como 50 feet high. Once that was accomplished, the job of building the Big Ditch started in full earnest. The ditch was laid out by surveyors to cross the Bitter Root via a siphon over the river, emptying the flow into the head of the canal proper. Taking advantage of the valley’s shallow gradient, the canal cruised along the eastside foothills, where flumes and siphons kept it from intercepting all the streams draining the Sapphire range.
A Bitter Root District Irrigation Company steam shovel digging a portion of the Big Ditch along the east side of the valley, with Ward Mountain in the background, circa 1908. After the group of people shown in this photo all went to eat lunch, the trestle gave out and the steam shovel went over the side.
In order to carve this 75 mile ditch out of the Valley’s hillsides, builders brought in a team of massive steam shovels. The shovels were mounted on railroad running gear, and as they progressed a short length of track was laid down ahead of them and pulled up behind as they moved on. Construction crews erected wooden trestles to span the many creeks and draws along the route.
A coal-fired Little Giant steam shovel and crew cutting the supply ditch northeast of Lake Como as part of the Big Ditch project. This section of ditch is on the west side of the Bitter Root River near Lick Creek. Bertie Lord Photograph taken from a glass plate negative, circa 1908.
Work on Lake Como dam peaked in 1909 and the first water turned into the Big Ditch that same year. The dam was completed in 1910, but the project was not without its setbacks. A serious one occurred when a trestle bearing a steam shovel collapsed, dumping the machine in the bottom of the gulch. Cash flow problems caused the Big Ditch Company to flounder in 1918. In fact, the ditch company changed hands several times in a course of twenty years due to bankruptcies.
A team of four horses pulling a section of steel pipe to be used on one of the siphons of the Big Ditch, circa 1908. The pipes were brought up the valley to the Como Station by rail and off-loaded at the siding below Tabor Mountain near the mouth of Rock Creek.
Despite several setbacks, the effort to bring water from Lake Como to the lower benches of the eastern slopes was highly successful. Today, the Big Ditch still operates, covering tracts of land passing through the valley from Lake Como on to Grantsdale, Hamilton, Corvallis, Stevensville and points further north.
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