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World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2017 397

departed his home on Christmas Eve and remained engaged in supervising repairs for four days
before returning home (Mulholland, 2000). No municipal hook-ups outside of the business district
were disrupted during the holidays. Word of his good deed spread over the holidays, and a grateful
water company awarded to him a gold watch at a company dinner, which he carried the rest of his
life.
Two weeks after receiving his coveted gold watch, the 34-yr old Mulholland (Fig. 2)
married Lillie Ferguson on July 3, 1890. She bore him five children before dying of cancer at age
47, on April 28, 1915. At the time of her death Mulholland had reached the peak of his professional
career, having received an honorary doctorate from the University of California in Berkeley the
previous June. The inscription on the diploma read "Percussit saxa et duxit flumina ad terram
sitientum" (He broke the rocks and brought the river to the thirsty land). He never re-married.
The turn of the Century in 1900 brought about life-changing events for everyone connected
with Los Angeles. Years after Mulholland’s death his colleague J.B. Lippincott (1939) would
recall:
"When the franchise of the Los Angeles City Water Co expired in 1898, a valuation of the
property became necessary to determine the price to be paid for it by the City. The city
employed a Board of Engineers, which included the writer [Lippincott], to present its case to
the arbiters, and this Board called upon Mr. Mulholland, Manager and engineer of the
company, for information.

As is frequently the case with people of fine memory, Mr. Mulholland's records were not perfect.
After the Board of Engineers, as politely as it could, had expressed an opinion that these
records were not sufficient for a proper valuation of the property, Mr. Mulholland asked, "Well,
what isit that you want?"

Said one member of the Board: "The thing we want is a complete list showing the length of pipe,
its size, character, and its age. We also want to know the number of gate valves and all about
them, as well as fire hydrants and other structures connected with the water system".

Upon hearing this sweeping request, Mr. Mulholland spread out on a drafting table a map of
the city and gave from his memory the size, kind, and age of the pipe in every one of the city
streets in which it was laid. He also designated the gate valves and hydrants. The Board
expressed surprise in his memory, but stated that it did not feel that an inventory made in this
way was adequate. Consequently, we indicated, with red circles on the map, 200 places
throughout the city where we wished to have the [buried] pipe exposed to view.

Mr. Mulholland was not disturbed in the least over this request. In fact, he seemed rather
pleased. He had the pipe dug up in the 200 places indicated; the Board of Engineers actually
inspected and classified the condition of all the pipe exposed; and the inspection indicated that
Mr. Mulholland's memory was correct in every particular. We thereupon accepted the complete
inventory which he had prepared from memory.

When the city finally acquired the water company's properties in 1902, at a cost of $2,000,000,
Mr. Mulholland was retained as manager of the system."

World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2017