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J. W. Powell - Canyons of the Colorado
original exploration. Mr. Garfield was chairman of the committee, and after listening to my account of
the progress of the geographic and geologic work, he asked me why no history of the original exploration
of the canyons had been published. I informed him that I had no interest in that work as an adventure, but
was interested only in the scientific results, and that these results had in part been published and in part
were in course of publication. Thereupon Mr. Garfield, in a pleasant manner, insisted that the history of
the exploration should be published by the government, and that I must understand that my scientific
work would be continued by additional appropriations only upon my promise that I would publish an
account of the exploration. I made the promise, and the task was immediately undertaken.
My daily journal had been kept on long and narrow strips of brown paper, which were gathered into little
volumes that were bound in sole leather in camp as they were completed. After some deliberation I
decided to publish this journal, with only such emendations and corrections as its hasty writing in camp
necessitated. It chanced that the journal was written in the present tense, so that the first account of my
trip appeared in that tense. The journal thus published was not a lengthy paper, constituting but a part of
a report entitled "Exploration of the Colorado River of the West and its Tributaries. Explored in 1869,
1870, 1871, and 1872, under the direction of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution." The other
papers published with it relate to the geography, geology, and natural history of the country. And here
again I supposed all account of the exploration ended. But from that time until the present I have
received many letters urging that a popular account of the exploration and a description of that wonderful
land should be published by me. This call has been voiced occasionally in the daily press and sometimes
in the magazines, until at last I have concluded to publish a fuller account in popular form. In doing this I
have revised and enlarged the original journal of exploration, and have added several new chapters
descriptive of the region and of the people who inhabit it. Realizing the difficulty of painting in word
colors a land so strange, so wonderful, and so vast in its features, in the weakness of my descriptive
powers I have sought refuge in graphic illustration, and for this purpose have gathered from the
magazines and from various scientific reports an abundance of material. All of this illustrative material
originated in my work, but it has already been used elsewhere.
Many years have passed since the exploration, and those who were boys with me in the enterprise are -
ah, most of them are dead, and the living are gray with age. Their bronzed, hardy, brave faces come
before me as they appeared in the vigor of life; their lithe but powerful forms seem to move around me;
and the memory of the men and their heroic deeds, the men and their generous acts, overwhelms me with
a joy that seems almost a grief, for it starts a fountain of tears. I was a maimed man; my right arm was
gone; and these brave men, these good men, never forgot it. In every danger my safety was their first
care, and in every waking hour some kind service was rendered me, and they transfigured my misfortune
into a boon.
To you - J. C. Sumner, William H. Dunn, W. H. Powell, G. Y. Bradley, O. G. Howland, Seneca
Howland, Prank Goodman, W. E. Hawkins, and Andrew Hall - my noble and generous companions,
dead and alive, I dedicate this book.
CHAPTER I. THE VALLEY OF THE COLORADO.
The Colorado River is formed by the junction of the Grand and Green.
The Grand River has its source in the Rocky Mountains, five or six miles west of Long's Peak. A group
of little alpine lakes, that receive their waters directly from perpetual snowbanks, discharge into a
common reservoir known as Grand Lake, a beautiful sheet of water. Its quiet surface reflects towering
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