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United States and Mexico sign Rio Grande Rectification Treaty
On this day in 1933, the United States and Mexico signed the Rio Grande
Rectification Treaty, which called for construction of a 590-foot-wide
floodway and 66-foot-wide normal flow channel along a stretch of the
river from Cordova Island to below Fort Quitman. The agreement became
necessary after the 1916 completion of Elephant Butte Dam near Truth or
Consequences, New Mexico. Assuring water for irrigation, Elephant Butte
also kept the stream from flooding and cleaning its own channel. The bed
filled with silt, and uncontrolled wanderings not only wasted water but
destroyed crops and shifted the international boundary. When little
water flowed through the river the channel still marked the border, but
that line became more and more difficult to find. The agreement made the
international boundary the middle of the deepest channel of the Rio
Grande within the rectified channel. The project was completed in 1938
at a cost of $5 million, 88 percent of which the United States paid. The
International Boundary Commission, later renamed the International
Boundary and Water Commission, was given responsibility for its
construction and maintenance.
- Links to Related Handbook of Texas Online Articles
- RIO GRANDE RECTIFICATION PROJECT
- CORDOVA ISLAND
- INTERNATIONAL BOUNDARY AND WATER COMMISSION
- RIO GRANDE BOUNDARY
- RIO GRANDE
- Other Texas Day by Day Articles for This Date
- Ground broken for new Capitol (1882)
- Composer of state song dies (1971)
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