February Colorado River History Dates

 

Bypass tunnels under construction at the Boulder (Hoover) Dam construction site, February 1, 1932. Photo courtesy Bureau of Reclamation collection.

February Colorado River History Dates

February 1, 1932 – The two diversion tunnels are under construction at the Boulder (Hoover) Dam construction site.

February 2, 1935 – Frank Dodge writes Dr. Ian Campbell that Sturdevant and Johnson’s drownings in Horn Creek “was just another unnecessary calamity” and that “the Park Super tried to put through a ruling to prohibit any future boat voyages in “His” canyon.”

February 3, 1897 – Nathaniel Galloway and William Richmond reach the Virgin River confluence with the Colorado River after boating through the Grand Canyon.

February 4, 1890 – Robert Stanton called camp on a beach with lots of driftwood near 84 Mile on the Colorado River in Grand Canyon.

February 5, 1952 – Otis “Dock” Marston writes to river runner Jim Rigg that “David Rust wisely remarked “It is easier to tell a good story than it is to seek the truth.”

February 6, 1890 – The Stanton Expedition destroys one of their boats, the Marie, while lining the craft at Horn Creek Rapid.

February 7, 1959 – River runner Gaylord Staveley writes to Dock Marston about “the verbal whacks I have heard Georgie White take at everything regarding my equipment and technique.” He also writes of planning to uprun the Grand Canyon using a motorized canoe.

February 8,  1959 – The Colorado River begins to flow into the west diversion tunnel at Glen Canyon damsite. Throughout the night under the glare of huge lights, dirt and the occasional rock are moved into the river on either side of the upper diversion dam.

February 9, 1959 – After days of pushing mostly dirt into the Colorado River, the upstream cofferdam blocks the river entirely at Glen Canyon Damsite.

February 10, 1890 – Harry McDonald quits the Stanton Expedition in disgust and starts hiking up the Crystal drainage in Grand Canyon. The snow on the Kaibab is three feet deep and he reaches the cow camp in House Rock Valley crawling on his hands and knees.

February 11, 1929 – Jim Brooks, Glen Sturdevant, and Fred Johnson hike to Phantom Ranch at the start of a boating expedition to Trinity Creek and back.

February 12, 1945 – Will Richmond passes away in Yakima, Washington. He and Nat Galloway rowed two boats from above Lodore Canyon to Needles, California, in the winter of 1896-1897.

February 13, 1878 – Claude H. Birdseye, Chief Topographic Engineer for the United States Geological Survey, is born.

February 14, 1960 – Otis “Dock” Marston looks for a home for the Norm Nevills Papers, either at The Huntington Library or The Utah State Historical Society. They ended up at University of Utah’s Marriott Library Special Collections.

February 15, 1881 – Emery Clifford Kolb is born in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania.

February 16, 1914 – Cass Hite dies “about” this day in Ticaboo Canyon deep within upper Glen Canyon.

February 17, 1890 – The Stanton Expedition reaches Shinumo Creek though Stanton thought they had arrived at Tapeats Creek.

February 18, 1927 – The Arizona Daily Star reports that engineer Minor Tillotson has been named Superintendent of Grand Canyon National Park.

February 19, 1929 – Brooks, Sturdevant, and Johnson camp at 91 Mile and their campfire is seen from the South Rim. The men were working their way back upriver with their canvas canoe, having spent some days exploring Trinity Creek.

February 20, 1929 – Brooks, Sturdevant, and Johnson portage their 11-foot-long canoe past Horn Creek Rapid. The river is at 5,710 cfs and the rapid has a sharp drop. Putting the frail boat in the water above the rapid intending to continue upriver, Sturdevant pops an oar and the craft floats back into the rapid. Brooks is the only survivor.

February 21, 1953 – Dock Marston writes Grand Canyon Superintendent Harold Bryant that continued research on “the adequacy of preparation in parties anticipating a Canyon traverse by water” had led Marston to the conclusion that adequate planning and equipment were the key to a successful cruise, not prior experience.

February 22, 1948 – Harry Aleson writes Dock Marston that Harry now owns a fleet of three 10-man rubber boats named May I, May U, and May OUI.

February 23, 1922 – 76-year-old Robert Brewster Stanton dies of pneumonia in New Canaan, Connecticut.

February 24, 1958 – Walt Disney writes Dock Marston that he remained hopeful they could “get together sometime later on when the Grand Canyon plans become a little more complete.” The Disney film Ten Who Dared will be filmed in Grand Canyon the next year.

February 25, 1890 – The Robert Stanton Expedition hears a roar from downriver as they approach Sinyella Canyon. They walk along the shore and find waves twelve to fifteen feet in height rise at their feet and roll downstream, while breaking upstream with a terrible noise. The men had no choice but to walk back to their waiting crafts and carry on. The boats were like “little chips tossed from one side to the other, turned round and round and fearfully unmanageable.”

February 26, 1944 – In an uprun attempt of Grand Canyon, five men led by Harry Aleson make it to Granite Spring Rapid at 221 Mile. While attempting the uprun, Harry drives the boat onto a rock, removing the lower end of the boat’s outboard motor in the process.

February 27, 1953 – Dock Marston, Frank “Fisheyes” Masland, and George Babbitt Jr all lobby newly minted Senator Barry Goldwater to replace the wooden shack that served as Grand Canyon National Park’s Museum Collection with a real building. The result was a brand new Visitors Center and Headquarters that opened in June, 1957.

February 28, 1955 – 68-year-old Southwest Regional Director Minor R. Tillotson passes away in Santa Fe, New Mexico. From 1929 until his death, Tillotson refused to let Grand Canyon National Park staff boat on the Colorado River. Five months after Tillotson’s passing, Grand Canyon National Park Ranger Dan Davis joins a Georgie White river trip in Grand Canyon.

Ps... Yes, this post is a challenge to see if I can find a Colorado River Basin fact for every day of January... Done! If you like this sort of stuff you might enjoy reading Dock Marston: Grand Canyon’s Colorado River Running Historian Volume 1 available at Vishnu Temple Press. The four-part Kindle version of the same book is available here.