Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 238, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 October 1920 — GRAND CANYON DEDICATED [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

GRAND CANYON DEDICATED

GRAND Canyon of the Colorado In Arizona Is a national park at last, after more than 30 years of endeavor by the nature lovers of the country. Congress has passed an act changing this natural wonder- of the world from a national monument to a national park, and has appropriated money for its ■development. The national park service has succeeded the forest service in ■control of It. Court decisions have pronounced worthless the fake mining claims with which Its rim Is plastered. And the other day the Grand ■Canyon was dedicated as a playground for the people of the United States forever. And an Interesting part of the exercises was the dedication of the memorial to Powell (thumbnail sketch ■with head).

The average well-Informed American thinks of Jamestown and Plymouth when America’s beginnings are mentioned. That Is to say, he goes back to 1607-20. But by this time the American Southwest was near a century old. Allen Chamberlin, writing of the Grand Canyon dedicatory exercises In the Boston Transcript, calls attention to this. For it was one of Coronado’s lieutenants, Don Gargia Lopez <le Cardenas, who was the first white man to behold that tremendous spectacle, about the year 1540. From that time until shortly before the Civil war the canyon seems to have attracted no particular attention, and small wonder, considering Its remoteness and the forbidding aridityof the region on every hand. The report of Lieutenant Ives In 1857 to the war department on the navigability of the Colorado river seems to have been the first official recognition of the cannon by the government, but It remained for the Powell expedition of 1869 to put It on the map, so to speak. The tale of that Adventure, undertaken In a purely scientific spirit, was more thrilling than a novel, and attracted considerable public notice. Nearly 20 years later President Harrison, then a* senator from Indiana, conceived the idea that the canyon was a worthy subject for a national park, and Introduced a bill in congress. That was in 1886. Yellowstone park had been created in J. 872, the Hot Springs reservation of Arkansas was set up as a national park in 1880, Yosemite valley had been turned over to California as early as 1864 as astate park, and Senator Harrison evidently saw that the Grand Canyon was at least equally worthy of protection from exploitation In the public interest. At that time Arizona was a wild Indian country, and the canyon was miles from anywhere that could he reached by rail. *

Where Roosevelt Stepped In. Finally, after more than 80 years, that Grand Canyon National park was created last year. It did not come easily into being, however, for the obstacles of selfish ambitions which beset the course of the final legislation required a decade of patient and persistent effort to overcome. President Roosevelt, in his characteristically timely fa'shion, interposed a powerful •check upon the hankerings of the would-be exploiters when he took matters into his own hands in 1908 and proclaimed the canyon a national monument and a game preserve. By that ■time the Santa Fe railroad had built a Une to the southern rhn, and every visitor thenceforward became a publicity agent for the park idea. When the ■writer first saw the canyon in 1902, shortly after the railroad was built, fewer than 1,000 persons made the trip Coring the course of a season. Nowadays more than 100 times that number are counted on, few this is one of the few all-the-year-around parks, and instead of the rude log houses and the adjacent one-story barracks of 20 jrears ago, there is now a modern hotel, and attractive boarding camps as well, where accommodations can be meet varying tastes and requirements, i The interest that was taken In the park dedication ceremony was indicated by the fact that a special train was run from tbs oast to accommodate those who had expressed a desire to

attend. Among these was a man, F. 3. Dellenbaugh of New York, who was a member of that daring crew under Powell, who bore the ensign carried by that expedition, and taken through safely In spite of the loss of two of their four boats, all their instruments and much of their general duffel in their exciting battle With the raging river. It was a wonderful experience to stand on the rim of the canyon and listen to this man’s story of that three months’ journey from the upper waters in Wyoming to and through the canyon. Powell was a school teacher who had been a major In the Civil war, In which he lost* his right forearm. Much had been heard in a desultory way of the wonderful Colorado river, but, except for the report by Lieutenant Ives, little was actually known about It Powell determined to find out what he could of scientific and economic interest In that hidden region, and, backed by certain Illinois state Institutions and the Chicago Academy of Science, he embarked, late In May, with ten men, In four open boats. ' Long before they made the Grand Canyon their mishaps had reduced the flotilla to three boats. Most of their Instruments had been lost, and of the ten months' supplies with’ which they set forth there was left an abundance of coffee, but hardly enough flour for ten days, and musty at that, plus a few dried apples. That was on August 17. Nothing daunted, they launched resolutely into the fohblddlng depths of the defile, and somehow, two weeks later, they came through alive, all except three men who, but a day or two before the canyon was finally passed through, became disheartened and abandoned the party, only to fall prey to the Indians. This-experience but whetted Powell’s appetite for more, and two years later he repeated the experience with greater success and less privation. Subsequently, not improbably in recognition of these achievements, he became director of the United States geological survey. Plans for Greater Usefulness. The human history of the Grand Canyon did not begin with that early sixteenth century visit of the Spanish adventurer. There are records all about on the canyon’s walls of a people who dwelt there day in and day out for many generations long before the Spaniard came. With the creation of the national park the Grand Canyon will be developed so that it will become a genuine vacation ground. Until now it has beeri regarded by the public generally as a one-day stop in the course of a transcontinental journey. Unless the visitor engaged a pack train for himself there was little that could be done beyond gazing from the rim near the hotel, or joining a mule procession down the Bright Angel trail, a trip too rough and nerve-trying for many persons. Plans are forming in the park service for a system of good motoring roads along the rim, and for the development of new trails, not only Into the canyon, but through It, with camping opportunities here and there along the way, .thus providing excursion possibilities that will exhibit the incomparable scenery from various aspects. Moreover there is the north rim, 1,000 feet higher than that on the south, and eight miles or more away, where there are interesting things to see and do. From that point a road is projected to connect with the new Zion National park In southwestern Utah, and boarding facilities are to be established on the northern side. But before travel from rim to rim can become popular that 1,000-foot gulf of the Granite gorge must be bridged so that saddle animals may cross in safety. That Is one of the problems of the near future. Tn a sense the country breathes easier ndw that the Grand Canyon has become a. national park. It is safer now than ever before from the yearnings of those who would capitalize the show on the basis of “four bits” a look, or set up a movie tent in competition with an outdoors, Bi the hands of .the park service it will be developed sanely and harmoniously, and In the Interest only of those who will use it property. • ’ • ’

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