Hotter & Drier: The Arboretum in the '40s

photo of Charles Rowe
Name
Charles Rowe
Affiliation
Arboretum Enthusiast
Memory

I remember a University employee cultivating around the young redwood trees with a black Percheron draft horse in the early 1940’s. The arboretum certainly looked a lot hotter and drier that it does now!  

During the end of March or early April 1941, I saw the arboretum area brim-to-brim with brown flood water.

I also remember the original wooden bridge (where the bridge is now west of the Mondavi Center, leading to the old Swine Barn and Police Station). When it was out of service at one point, there was a dry crossing angled across the creek-bed (probably in the late 1940s or early 1950s).

Date
1941