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1955 Map of Salton Sea

Name: 1955 Topographic Map of Salton Sea
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1955
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1955

About this map

The Salton Sea dominates the southwestern portion of this map, its surface marked at 241 feet below sea level. This mid-century survey illustrates the intensive resource extraction and military/government presence in the arid basins of Southern California and western Arizona. Settlement is concentrated along the irrigation-fed Palo Verde Valley near Blythe and the southern reaches of the Salton Sink, where the Alamo River and New River flow through the agriculture-heavy Calipatria.

Industrial and wartime legacies are visible in the numerous mining operations, such as the Eagle Mountain Mine and Red Cloud Mine, and the presence of the Parker Alien Reception Center Unit No 1 near the Colorado River. Transportation is anchored by the Southern Pacific and Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe railroads, which served remote sidings like Tortuga and Amos before the expansion of the modern interstate system.