Timeline

The timeline below spans almost 100 years: the first years of the plans to build New Melones Dam; early river running in the 1950s and 1960s; the campaigns of the 1970s and 1980s to save the river; and information about how the river conservation community responded to the loss of the Stanislaus with many more campaigns to save other rivers – the flooding of the Stanislaus River in the early 1980s was the last death of a major river in the U.S by a large dam, partly due to the momentum and lessons that came out of the Stanislaus campaigns.

(Not included in the timeline are the creation of the canyon 9 million years ago (!), its naming in 1844 by John C. Fremont for a Native American resister of Spanish occupation, the Gold Rush in 1848, or any other events before 1905.)

Tip: Drag your mouse over the timeline to zoom in to a section. Use the Reset zoom button to zoom back out.