The story of LA as a major world city really starts in ernest with the arrival of the aqueduct. How the city acquired the water and what happened afterward is the stuff of legend. The story has been dramatized and mythologized through the years. A lot of information has been mixed up or made up. It’s important that we differentiate fact from fiction going forward and have an understanding of what really happened. California is in a major drought that has no end in sight. As a California resident, I had to take a look around and ask myself, why does this place even exist? What are we doing here? Who built this place? Why was it built at all? Well, I went looking for the answers and this is what I came back with.