My wife Sarah and I have been married for almost a quarter century now, and for a major portion of our time together she’s been obsessed with the catastrophic 1928 failure of LA’s St. Francis Dam. Classic girl stuff, amirite?!?

Anyway, a few months back, I saw that our town’s historical society was doing a guided tour of the ruins, but I was foiled by it immediately selling out. So I did my husbandly duty and…added myself to a DAM WAITLIST.

Cut to last Friday, when I got an early morning email saying that five more slots had opened. I swooped in, and am happy to report that I was able to make marital dreams come true, and we just got back from our little odyssey, at which we had a DAM good time (zero apologies).

If you’re unfamiliar with the tragedy, here’s the opening paragraph from Wikipedia:

“The St. Francis Dam, or the San Francisquito Dam, was a concrete gravity dam located in San Francisquito Canyon in northern Los Angeles County, California, United States, that was built between 1924 and 1926. The dam failed catastrophically in 1928, killing at least 431 people in the subsequent flood, in what is considered to have been one of the worst American civil engineering disasters of the 20th century and the third-greatest loss of life in California history.”

The tragedy ended the career of the legendary William Mulholland (of Mulholland Drive fame), at the time the general manager and chief engineer of the Bureau of Water Works and Supply.

If you want to learn more, there’s a PBS American Experience episode about it:

The tour was fascinating, and led by Frank “Dam Man” Rock, a nice guy and a vision in head to toe denim. Some pics from our day: