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Genevieve de Colmont at the head of Rapid 22, Mile 202.45. Late in October, 1938. Photo courtesy The Huntington Library |
October Colorado River History Dates
October 1, 1871 - The second Powell expedition caches the boat Canonita near
the mouth of the Dirty Devil River. Some 70 years later, Harry Aleson
discovers the location and finds an oak board possibly belonging to the
boat. He cuts it into small pieces and sends them to his various river
friends.
October
2, 1921 – The USGS level and dam survey of Cataract Canyon ties into a
known level at the mouth of the Dirty Devil and proceeds on to Bert
Loper’s cabin, the last boat arriving after dark.
October
3, 1938 – Buzz Holmstrom and Amos Burg hike from the Green River up to
the rim to overlook the Confluence of the Green and the Colorado rivers.
October
4, 1937 - Buzz Holmstrom climbs into his boat and floats away from
Green River, Wyoming, solo, headed for Lake Mead, Arizona.
October
5, 1952 –After William Culp Darrah’s biography of John Wesley Powell
hits the bookstands in the summer, Wallace Stegner writes Dock Marston
about the errors in Darrah’s book. Stegner notes if they were put end to
end, they “would reach quite a distance.”
October
6, 1903 – Wolley, Sanger, and King, having navigated the Grand Canyon
in one boat, departed Needles, California, and rowed on toward Yuma,
Arizona Territory.
October
7, 1923 - While on the USGS survey line below Diamond Creek, Roland
Burchard slides ten feet on the slickrock, hits the corner of his plane
table, and fractures a rib. The next morning, his pain is intense.
Bandaged with fifteen feet of tape, he felt no more pain and insists on
continuing his survey.
October
8, 1915 – The Salt Lake Tribune announces the creation of Dinosaur
National Monument. The protected area was small, only 80 acres, or about
thirteen city blocks.
October
9, 1947 – Grand Canyon National Park Superintendent Harold Bryant
writes Norm Nevills “Then, too, comes up the matter of whether some of
the wild expeditions through the Canyon could be partially stopped by
strict regulations demanding a permit and requirements as to the
equipment and as to experienced personnel.”
October
10, 1937 – Haldane Buzz Holstrom rows alone through Brown’s Hole,
noting the high mountains protecting the valley and feels kind of guilty
at his intrusion. He takes pictures of the scenes and recognizes he
can’t do the place justice.
October
11, 1937 – Geologists of the California Institute of Technology launch
at Lees Ferry in three wooden boats. Head boatman Frank Dodge writes the
boats “were a disgrace. Anyone that knew anything about boats would
laugh his head off.”
October
12, 1896 – Ramon Montez and George Flavell arrive at Lee’s Ferry on
their one boat trip from Green River, Wyoming, to Yuma, Arizona
Territory. Bill Rust is so impressed with their boat Panthon and its design superiority over anything previously seen on the river that he builds a copy at Hanksville, Utah.
October
13, 1923 – The USGS team reaches their tie point about 257 miles
downstream of Lees Ferry. As all hands gather around, the compilation
shows the elevations check within four feet at the end of their 251-mile
survey. General relief and rejoicing engulfs the crew.
October
14, 1871 – The Wheeler Expedition portages their boats up Separation
Rapid on their way to Diamond Creek. Seven days later, they downrun the
same rapid without lining or portaging.
October
15, 1956 - President Eisenhower taps a gold telegraph key in the West
Wing of the White House. 1,800 miles to the west, his signal arrives and
500 pounds of dynamite rips into the soft sandstone on the east wall of
Glen Canyon while three dynamite blasts bite into the rock at the
Flaming Gorge damsite 300 miles to the north.
October
16, 1957 – Dock Marston writes Harry Aleson that Frank Wright has sold
his river company, Mexican Hat Expeditions, to Joan Nevills Staveley and
her husband Gaylord.
October
17, 1937 – The Cal-Tech river trip boatmen run Kwagunt Rapid while the
geologists walk the shoreline collecting fossils. After passing the
Little Colorado River confluence, the group camps on the left just below
Lava Canyon Rapid.
October 18, 1896 – George Flavell and Ramon Montez row their boat past the mid-river boulder at Boulder Narrows in Grand Canyon.
October
19, 1923 – The USGS surveyors trip reaches Needles, California, after
completing the measuring of twenty-one dam sites in Marble and Grand
canyons.
October 20, 1928 – Glen and Bessie Hyde launch their sweep scow from Green River, Utah, headed for the Grand Canyon.
October
21, 1907 – Charles Russel and Edwin Monett boat past the confluence of
the Little Colorado and main Colorado rivers. The sun is warm and they
prospect leisurely, aloof from the crowded world.
October
22, 1937 – Buzz Holmstrom rows into Green River, Utah. On this same
date in 1896, Montez and Flavell run Horn Creek deep in Grand Canyon
while the next trip upstream of them, Nathaniel Galloway and William
Richmond in two boats, row past the agency at Ouray, Utah.
October
23, 1947 – Harry Aleson and Georgie White depart Green River, Utah,
heading to Lees Ferry in one boat. Harry is rowing his 7-man rubber raft
named MAY-OUI. Aleson and White line the raft around the larger rapids
in Cataract Canyon with the river flowing at about 10,000 cfs.
October
24, 1958 – Robert Stanton’s daughter sends Dock a batch of photos of
the 1889-1890 Stanton Expedition. Using his photo archive of Badger
Rapid at various water levels, he writes Pat Reilly the flow on the
Stanton trip at Badger was between 3,000 and 5,000 cfs.
October
25, 1954 – Dock Marston writes Don Harris “I’ll get more on the Disney
story soon. I am afraid that the opening of the proposed DISNEY LAND
will delay further the Powell story.” Dock was correct and the Powell
filming finally happened in 1959.
October
26, 1911 – Deep in Cataract Canyon, the Kolb brothers come upon a
trapper and his boat, Charles “one-eyed” Smith. The cleanshaven
well-dressed Smith had run Cat and Glen in 1897. Smith will finish his
1911 Cat run and successfully run Cat again in 1912.
October
27, 1937 – As he rowed through Stillwater Canyon, Buzz Holmstrom is
upset at the loss of Kolb’s book, but his spirits revive when he finds
it in his sleeping bag. Noises in camp during the night get him out of
his sleeping bag to be sure that beavers are not eating his boat.
October 28, 1896 – George Flavell runs his wooden boat through Lava Falls, the first record of a boat running that rapid.
October
29, 1896 – George Flavell writes in his journal “We were getting
reckless, so much so, we draw no line. We run thirteen heavy and four
dangerous ones. After running everything so far in G. C., we will take
very desperate chances now, for if our calculations are right, this is
our last night in the canyon.”
October
30, 1938 - The bad reputation of cantankerous Dubendorff Rapid causes
Amos Burg and Willis Johnson to lug the loads and the rubber raft to the
rapid’s foot. Buzz Holmstrom rows his boat through. They salvage
considerable booty abandoned by the Eddy party when it lost a boat at
this rapid in 1927.
October
31, 1911 - The Kolb brothers, still deep in Cataract Canyon, note the
name of A. G. Turner with the date ’07 on a rock. Running from Green
River, Utah, to Hite in an open boat, Turner had closely followed the
three steel skiffs of Russell, Monett, and Loper. Turner claimed to have
run all the rapids.
