San Pedro River

And this is all a story from the state health department official.

He said, an earthquake happened in 1887 and the malarial pools were wiped out because the San Pedro River next to St. David surged and wiped out all the malarial pools.

So I'm sitting there in this meeting thinking, how had I never heard of this earthquake? Because I grew up here in Tucson.

And then I thought back to when I was in high school and I know that there were these metal plates across the hallway called earthquake bands and they were there.

They went into the The forest, the mountains nearby, they set up a lumber mill so they could supply lumber to the mines that needed lumber to shore up the mining shafts.

So St. David was economically very successful, but everyone was sick.

So as I mentioned, the earthquake happened, the San Pedro River surged, wiped out the malarial pools, and the town was saved.

But the river didn't continue to flow high for the rest of time.

Heading straight west.

Yeah, for the San Pedro River.

Let's move.

[instrumental music] The tracks lead right into the river.

But they didn't leave, and one year in 1887, on May 3rd, there was a massive earthquake in Sonora, Mexico.

That earthquake caused the San Pedro River to surge, and it wiped out all the malarial pools, so there were no more mosquitoes-

Wow

... and the town was saved.

... somehow that there were earthquakes in Arizona, in Tucson, but I had never heard of this particular earthquake.

But this was no small earthquake.

Like, as you're getting at there, I, I think we could infer based on the surge in the San Pedro River you mentioned, right? Like, this was really big.

Describe just the, the impact of this for us.

The colonel looked at the direction of the road, then to the southwest, then to the west, saying, I don't want to get under General Wool and lose my trip to California.

he arose in his saddle and ordered a halt then he said with firmness this is not my course i was ordered to california and he added with an oath i will go to there or die in the attempt then turning to the bugler he said blow the right Turning westward at this point, 32 degrees, 41 minutes north latitude, and but a short distance, some 30 miles, north of the present city of El Paso, the course of march was westward to San Bernardino Rancho, thence to Llanos, and so on to the San Pedro River, where the command arrived on the 9th of December.

The Fight with Wild Bulls Here occurred the only fighting a battalion engaged in on its expedition, a battle with wild bulls.

This section of the country seemed to abound with herds of wild cattle, and the males among them were much more bold and ferocious than among the buffaloes.