Brazos
River 
The
Brazos River, originally called, the Rio Brazos de Dios which can
be translated as "The River of God's Arms". is the 11th longest river in the
United States at 2060 km (1280 miles) from its
source of Blackwater Draw,
Curry County, New Mexico
to its
mouth at the
Gulf of Mexico with a 116,000 km² (44,800 sq mi)
drainage basin.The Brazos is the longest length of river stretching through
Texas technically
the Rio
Grande is on the border between Texas and
Mexico.
The Brazos proper begins at the confluence of its Salt Fork
and Double Mountain Fork (which rises west of
Lubbock and passes through the city) flowing 840 miles through the middle of
Texas. Its main
tributaries are the Clear Fork of the Brazos, which passes by
Abilene and joins the main river near
Graham;
Bosque
River;
Little River; Yegua Creek; and
Navasota River. Initially running east towards
Dallas-Fort
Worth, the Brazos turns south, passing through
Waco,
then by
Bryan-College
Station, then through
Sugar Land, and into the
Gulf of Mexico in the
marshes just
south of
Freeport.
The Brazos is dammed in three places, all north of Waco,
forming
Possum Kingdom Lake,
Lake
Granbury and
Lake Whitney. Of these three, Granbury was the last to be completed, in
1969, and its proposed construction in the mid-1950s became the impetus for
John Graves' book,
Goodbye to a River. There is also a small municipal dam (Lake Brazos
Dam) near the downstream city limit of
Waco, which raises
the level of the river through the city to form a
town-lake. This impoundment of the
Brazos through
Waco is locally
called
Lake Brazos.There are 19 major reservoirs along the Brazos.
It is unclear as when it was first named by European
explorers, since it was often confused with the
Colorado River not far to the south, but it was certainly seen by
La Salle. Later
Spanish accounts call it Los Brazos de Dios (the arms of God), for
which name there were several different explanations, all involving it being the
first water to be found by desperately thirsty parties.While the river was important for navigation before the
American Civil War, it is primarily important today as a source of water for
power and irrigation. The water is administered by the
Brazos River Authority.
(Source by
Wikipedia)
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