provement had called for a 12-foot channel, which was sufficient in the pre-railroad days for the light-draft coasting vessels; but, since 1886, conditions had changed, for in that year the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railroad had been completed, this line being the shortest to the coast for a large portion of western Texas. This road extended both to Corpus Christi and to Rockport and was preparing to locate a terminal on Harbor Island, which lies just opposite the Pass. The natural harbor for ships entering the Pass lies between Harbor Island and St. Joseph Island. In 1887 it had a depth of 18 feet and width of 400 feet for a length of 2 miles, and for half the length the depth was over 20 feet. With a railroad headed for this harbor, it was natural to expect that it would be used by ocean-going vessels and that the depth of the channel across the bar should be increased to 20 feet.

The first work done by the company was the construction of a jetty, called the South or Nelson Jetty (from the name of the engineer), in 1892. It started from Mustang Island and extended on a curve concave to the channel for a distance of 1,800 feet. It was about 700 feet to the westward of the old Government jetty, lying approximately parallel to it. (Fig. 2.) It consisted of a row of cylindrical wooden caissons, 7 feet in diameter, filled with sand and stone and riprapped, especially on the western side, as a protection against the scour caused by the water falling over the jetty at flood tide.

The construction of this jetty exhausted the funds on hand and when the work was next resumed it was upon an entirely new plan. Two civil engineers had been retained as consulting engineers, Prof. Lewis M. Haupt and Mr. H. C. Ripley. The plan adopted on the advice of these engineers was the construction of a single jetty, which is thus described by the designers:

This structure consists of a line of works detached from the shore, every portion of which has its special function to perform, and which is intended to utilize and cooperate with the work which has already been done. The outer concavity is constructed on a curve whose radius is that which now produces and maintains depths of from 30 to 40 feet when protected from wave action and littoral drift, as in the concavity inside of the Pass; the middle or convex curve is designed to concentrate the ebb currents and increase their surface slope over the bar, while its opposite concave face will collect sand and reinforce that portion of the work; the salient is intended to divide the flood currents during the first quarter and aid the discharge of the later ebb currents, while the funnel formed by the breakwater and the shore of St. Joseph Island will aid the influx

of flood tide and increase the efflux passing out over the lower portion of the bar, thus changing the condition of equilibrium in favor of ebb scour.

However, the form of jetty was modified before work began, and the actual structure built is described as follows:

In plan it will differ from the usual form of jetty or breakwater, being detached from the shore and located on the bar to the “windward" of the channel. Its axis will be curved (compound and reverse), to produce reactions similar to those found in the concavities of streams, and having radii sufficient to maintain channels of the requisite depths, as revealed by existing curves and their resulting depths of over 30 feet, now found inside the bar. It is designed to fulfill the fundamental conditions of (a) arresting the littoral drift; (b) admitting the full tidal prism to the interior lagoons; (c) controlling the ebb currents and producing a reaction. across the bar; (d) changing the conditions of equilibrium of flood and ebb currents in favor of the latter, and (e) of affording aids to navigation by a structure of only half the length of the usual convergent or parallel jetties in pairs.

The work will be executed in two parts. The first will consist of 1,250 feet of completed breakwater and 2,500 feet of foundation extension. The second of 5,950 feet of completed breakwater and 250 feet of foundation extension. It is to be covered with a substantial apron of heavy blocks, weighing from 2 to 5 tons, carefully placed so as to produce a permanent and substantial structure.

The construction of the proposed breakwater as designed will unquestionably result in securing navigable depths over the bar of 15 feet for the first part of the work and 20 feet for the second.

The development of these depths will commence immediately upon the construction of the foundation course, which will be greatly hastened by the strong currents resulting from the "northers," and which occur between September and March. If a more rapid development of depths is desired than will result from natural causes, deepening may be facilitated by dredging or other auxiliary appliances.

Since the forces necessary to maintain a channel are much less than those required to create it, a channel once developed and protected from silt, as this will be, may be maintained by the natural tidal currents from the bays; hence the cost of maintenance under the plan proposed would be a minimum.

This jetty, called the North or Haupt jetty, was built between August, 1895, and September, 1896. It was to start about 1,500 feet out from St. Joseph Island, and follow seaward the general direction of the Pass, on a curve 2,000 feet in length and with a radius of 3,000 feet, convex toward the channel side; then a reverse curve 2,200 feet long with a radius of 6,000 feet, compounded

with a curve 2,000 feet long, with a radius of 4,000 feet. This compounded curve is concave toward the channel. The depths on the line of the jetty were, at the beginning of the work, generally from 9 to 11 feet, with an extreme depth of 1712 feet at the outer end and shoaling at the inner end to 5 or 6 feet. The estimate of the contractor to build this jetty was $285,000.

The harbor company decided not to build the jetty complete at once, but to build a certain definite portion. It was stated by the consulting engineers that the construction of this definite portion would unquestionably secure navigable depths over the bar of 15 feet. A contract was entered into with a firm in Galveston for $145,000 for the following work (Fig. 2): Starting from a point F on the 15-foot curve, about 450 feet inside the outer end of the jetty as designed, and building first 1,000 feet of foundation from F to B; then 1,250 feet completed breakwater B to C; then 1,500 feet of foundation C to D; total length, 3,750 feet, ending at a point where the reverse curve begins, 2,000 feet inside of inner end as designed. This work was begun July 24, 1895, and completed July 22, 1896. The jetty was constructed by laying fascine mattresses 100 feet long and from 40 to 50 feet wide, and spreading over this the rock foundation 3 feet thick and 50 feet wide for 1,750 feet from the inner end and 60 feet wide for the remaining 2,000 feet. The stone was a sand stone of good quality, average weight, 1421⁄2 pounds per cubic foot, and of sizes from 100 to 1,000 pounds, filled in with quarry refuse. On this foundation was placed, from B to C, 1,250 feet, a core, built up to low water, of similar stone covered with cap and face stone weighing from 2 to 10 tons, so as to give a top width of 10 feet and slopes of 12 and 2 horizontal to 1 vertical.

The 15-foot depth expected was not obtained by this jetty and the company decided to extend the work. Additional work was done in the early part of 1896 in accordance with which the jetty was brought to the state of completion, in which it was turned over to the Government. The foundation was laid from outer end F to inner end E, a distance of 5,750 feet, with widths varying from 60 to 25 feet. When the inner end was laid, there was but 3 or 4 feet depth of water at that point. On this foundation from B (a point 1,000 feet within F) to C, 1,250 feet, the jetty was built complete; thence to D, 1,500 feet, the core was put in and the capping partially placed; thence to E, 2,000 feet, a portion of the core

was laid. This jetty failed to give any considerable permanent increase in depth.

In 1896, a contract was made whereby the contractor was required to obtain within eighteen months and maintain for a year a channel not less than 150 feet wide on bottom and not less than 20 feet deep at mean low tide, for the full width of the channel. The contract stated that a dredged or blasted channel would not be in compliance with the terms, but that the contractor should complete the present uncompleted breakwater in such a manner as to make it effective to maintain a channel, and build such other spurs, jetties, and breakwaters as might be necessary to secure and maintain the channel. The original project of a single jetty was apparently thus given up. The harbor company agreed to pay the contractor the sum of $500,000. The contractor, by working to the extent of $15,000, blasted the channel with dynamite and placed sand bags near the Nelson Jetty to accumulate sand. A large portion of the dynamite was used to blow out about 500 feet in length of the old Government jetty which crossed the channel at an angle of 45 degrees with depths of from 8 to 14 feet, and was considered as presenting an obstruction to further deepening. The contract was subsequently annulled.

By direction of Congress, in 1897, a board of officers was appointed to ascertain the character and the value of the improvements made at Aransas Pass. The board reported that the total amount expended by the Government prior to 1890, when the work was turned over to the harbor company, was $550,416.58, and the value of the improvements as turned over was: old jetty from the shore to the wreck Mary, this portion being covered with sand and supposed to be in good condition, $68,400; the revetment on Mustang Island, $163,207; a total of $231,607; that the South, or Nelson, Jetty, constructed by the company, had been greatly damaged by storms and teredos and was in a very dilapidated condition; that the North Jetty had never been completed as designed; that the depth that could be carried over the bar had not been materially, if at all, increased by the works constructed by the harbor company. A chart of October, 1895, showed an irregular line over the bar of about 13 feet depth and one of February, 1896, 10 to 11 feet. At the time of the examination by the board, in 1897, the depth was 8.8 feet. The position of the channel had become more constant and the width across the bar had lessened; the distance between the 20-foot contours being, in 1875, 5,500 feet, and in 1897 4,200 feet.

This lessening in distance had been caused by the advance of the inner contours, the outside slope having changed but little.

On some of the charts a deep narrow trench running alongside of the jetty was shown, but this trench could not be used by vessels. The channel used by the pilots at that time passed directly over the North Jetty a few hundred feet within the outside end. The board reported that there did not seem to be any probability that the jetty would of itself secure and maintain any considerable increase of depth in a navigable channel of proper width, and stated that in its opinion the original plan of parallel jetties was the proper method of improving the Pass; that such jetties would run approximately at right angles to the bar and allow of future. extensions; that they protected the channel from sand drifting into it from either side, and vessels coming in between them were to a great extent protected from cross currents and waves while required to keep in a comparatively narrow channel; that it was comparatively easy to obtain and keep open a deep channel by occasional dredging; and that the entrance could be kept at a width sufficient to provide for a free admission of the flood tide, without diminishing the available space for light-draft sailing vessels.

The Aransas Pass Harbor Co. had adopted a plan in conflict with the Government's and prosecuted with vigor the portion of it which the engineers stated would produce 15 feet of water, completing it in six months. As expected, results were not obtained; they did some 50 per cent more work without getting the 15 feet. After having done about three-fourths of the work necessary, according to the engineers, to get 20 feet, and at least 50 per cent more than was required to obtain 15 feet, without securing any direct or permanent improvement, the company appeared to have lost faith in their own plans, as they then made a contract to secure a 20-foot channel at a price fully 60 per cent greater than the entire original cost of their reversed curved breakwater, as bid on by the contractor. This contract was soon abandoned. The board was of the opinion that in the future improvement of the Pass it would be impossible to include the existing constructions, since the North Jetty was so located as to prevent carrying out the Government project of improvement, except by removing the jetty as it diagonally crossed the space between the proposed jetties. This removal would be very costly and it would probably be advisable to take up only the outer portion and leave the remainder as a part of the northern jetty in connection with a southern one. The