How did the dam come to be built?
After the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco claimed that Hetch Hetchy was the only good site to store water for the city and the San Francisco peninsula. Other equally appropriate dam sites outside Yosemite National Park were rejected. Teddy Roosevelt twice vetoed legislation to dam the Tuolumne but President Wilson signed the Raker Act in 1913, allowing the dam to be built.
