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Show 120 THE RIPARIAN DOCTRINE industrial uses of riparian water that have been involved in litigation in the high courts include use for drilling operations;622 for cooling turbine engines used in connection with a municipal light and water plant;623 for supplying railroad engines; and operating a railroad.624 A ttractive Surroundings and Recreation Esthetic considerations not recognized in early riparian cases.-The trend of the decisions over a long span of years was to recognize the use of water for material purposes only, as a part of the riparian landowner's right. Esthetic considerations were not approved of, at least where the result of according such a right to one or a few would be to prevent other landowners upstream from putting the water to strictly utilitarian purposes.625 Thus, in a series of California cases, riparian use did not include the flow of water for "mere sentiment," or a flow that merely "pleases the eye or gratifies a taste for the beautiful;"626 nor for "the mere pleasure of looking at it as a feature of the landscape;"627 or "for no purpose other than to afford him pleasure in its prospect."628 And a Texas court of civil appeals, in similar vein, discounted "a mere artistic desire" on the part of a riparian owner "to see unappropriated and waste water flow by" his riparian land "on its way to the sea."629 Uses having tangible value.-(1) Attractive surroundings. With respect to two California lakes-Mono Lake and Lake Elsinore-maintenance of the lake level in its natural condition, with all of its attractive surroundings, was held to be a reasonable beneficial use of water under the constitutional amendment of 1928 and a part of the littoral rights of the bordering lands. The community interest in each case was considerable. Even though the water of Mono Lake is so high in salt content as to render it unfit for human consumption or domestic ™Smith v. Stanolind Oil & Gas Co., 197 Okla. 499, 500, 172 Pac. (2d) 1002 (1946). 623Fairbury v. Fairbury Mill & Elevator Co., 123 Nebr. 588, 589-590, 243 N.W. 774 (1932). ™ Martin v. Burr, 111 Tex. 57, 62, 65, 228 S.W. 543 (1921). See King v.Schaff, 204 S.W. 1039, 1040 (Tex. Civ. App. 1918). See also Grogan v. Brownwood, 214 S.W. 532, 538 (Tex. Civ. App. 1919), involving rights under contracts with riparians. The right acknowledged in Atchison, T. & S.F. Ry. v. Shriver, 101 Kans. 257, 258, 166 Pac. 519 (1917), is not a part of the court's holding, but indicates the court's view on a salient matter which, because of a change in physical conditions, was no longer an issue in the case. 625Modoc Land & Stock Co. v. Booth, 102 Cal. 151, 156-157, 36 Pac. 431 (1894); Crum v. Mt. Shasta Power Corp., 117 Cal. App. 586, 601, 4 Pac. (2d) 564 (1931), hearing denied by supreme court. 626Lux v. Haggin, 69 Cal. 255, 396,4 Pac. 919 (1884), 10 Pac. 674 (1886). '"Rose \.Mesmer, 142 Cal. 322, 330, 75 Pac. 905 (1904). 6MSan Joaquin & Kings River Canal & In. Co. v. Fresno Flume & Irr. Co., 158 Cal. 626, 629,112 Pac. 182(1910). 629Biggs v. Leffingwell, 62 Tex. Civ. App. 665, 668,132 S.W. 902 (1910). |