The Aberdeen-Springfield and Peoples Canals Cross Points

The paths of two canals cross three times in a span of a few miles, in part perhaps due to engineering differences but also a result of the canal companies' legal battles that went as far as the US Interior Department in 1895=1897. Their dispute was in regard to eighty thousand acres of desert ground, one canal a Mormon Church backed enterprise and the other the work of "outsiders"—investors from Utah initially, but eventually from the Midwest, too, especially the Chicago area. The flumes, once wooden, are now cement. The third and last flume is west of Moreland a couple miles, the first is placed north of the Groveland Road 90 degree swerve, and the second is near Bond Road's intersection with the two canals. This is the second flume:

You can read an historical account of the dispute in We, The Peoples.

A fictionalized account of the canal dispute takes place in Big Southern.

If you are out sightseeing near the canals, you might find the railroad crossing downstream from the last flume, near a place once called "The First Terminus", The Peoples constructors' name for the initial section of the canal they intended to eventually cover the same territory the Aberdeen-Springfield Canal now irrigates. The Peoples, in the court decision, was given 10,000 to 20,000 acres centered near the First Terminus and to the southwest, while the latter canal earned the right to irrigate land beyond that area clear to American Falls.