DESERT CALENDARSeptember 27-October 6—New Mex-

ico State Fair, Albuquerque, NewMexico.

September 29-30—San Geronimo Fi-esta, Taos, New Mexico.

October 1-2 — Taos Village Fiesta,Taos, New Mexico.

October 1-31 — Special Exhibit ofAmerican Indian handicraft fromcollection of the late Kathryn W.Leighton, noted artist. SouthwestMuseum, Highland Park, Los An-geles, California.

October 3-4—Spanish Village Fiesta,Rancho de Taos, Taos, New Mex-

October 4—Feast Day of St. Francisof Assisi, patron saint of SantaFe. Santa Fe, New Mexico.

October 4 — Annual Fiesta andDances, Nambe Indian Pueblo,New Mexico.

October 4-6 — Navajo Indian Fair,Shiprock, New Mexico.

October 5—Fifth Annual ColoradoRiver Outboard Motor Boat Race,Needles, California.

October 7-11—Eastern New MexicoState Fair, Roswell, New Mexico.

October 9-11 — Las Cruces Lions'Cotton Carnival, Las Cruces, NewMexico.

October 9-12 — Tri-State Fair andRodeo, Deming, New Mexico.

October 10-12 — Greenlee CountyFair, Clifton, Arizona.

October 11-12—Annual Liars Con-test (formerly on New Year's Eve)and Pegleg Smith Gold Trek.Borrego Valley, California. I Seepage 16.)

October 17-19—15th Annual PioneerDays Celebration, TwentyninePalms, California.

October 18-19—Cochise County Fair,Douglas, Arizona.

October 19-25—Southwestern CattleFestival. Clovis, New Mexico.

October 31—Hallowe'en Mardi Gras,Barstow, California.

Volume 15 OCTOBER, 1952 Number 10

COVER

LETTERS

CALENDAR

POETRY

MEMORIAL

EXPLORATION

TRUE OR FALSE

INDIANS

FICTION

INVITATION

WILDLIFE

PLAYGROUND

MININGPHOTOGRAPHYLOST MINE

CONTESTHISTORYCLOSE-UPSNEWSHOBBYFIELD TRIP

LAPIDARYCOMMENTBOOKS

Storm over Taos Pueblo, New MexicoBy Willard Luce, Provo, Utah.

Comment from Desert's readers 2

October events on the desert . . . . . . . . 3

Land-Locked Sea Monster, and other poems . . 4

Nevills Plaque is Dedicated 5

Glen Canyon Voyage

By RANDALL HENDERSON 7

A test of your desert knowledge 12

Tribal Meeting of the NavajoBy DOROTHY PILLSBURY

13

16

16

17

Hard Rock Shorty of Death Valley

Pegleg Trek and Liars Contest

Death Valley Playmates, by PAT STURTEVANT

Cliff Home of the AncientsBy WELDON F. HEALD 18

Current news of desert mines 22Picture of the Month 23

Lost Pima Indian Gold

By JOHN D. MITCHELL 24

Prizes for camera pictures 25

The Salt in Salton Sea, by W. DEANE WILEY . 26

About those who write for Desert 28

From Here and There on the Desert 29

Gems and Minerals 35

Gems, Minerals and Mines Along Southwestern

Trails, by CLAUDE A. CONLIN, JR. . . . 38

Amateur Gem Cutter, by LELANDE QUICK . . 41

Just Between You and Me, by the Editor . . . 42

Reviews of Southwestern literature 43The Desert Magazine is published monthly by the Desert Press, Inc., Palm Desert,

California. Re-entered as second class matter July 17, 1948, at the post office at Palm Desert,California, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Title registered No. 358865 in U. S. Patent Office,and contents copyrighted 1952 by the Desert Press, Inc. Permission to reproduce contentsmust be secured from the editor in writing.

RANDALL HENDERSON, EditorBESS STACY, Business Manager

MARGARET GERKE, Associate EditorMARTIN MORAN, Circulation Manager

Unsolicited manuscripts and photographs submitted cannot be returned or acknowledgedunless full return postage is enclosed. Desert Magazine assumes no responsibility fordamage or loss of manuscripts or photographs although due care will be exercised. Sub-scribers should send notice of change of address by the first of the month preceding issue.

SUBSCRIPTION RATESOne Year $3.50 Two Years $6.00

Canadian Subscriptions 25c Extra, Foreign 50c ExtraSubscriptions to Army Personnel Outside U. S. A. Must Be Mailed in Conformity With

P. O. D. Order No. 19687Address Correspondence to Desert Magazine, Palm Desert, California

O C T O B E R , 1952

At the dedication of the Nevills plaque, left to right,Barry Goldwater, master of ceremonies, Frank E. Mas-land, Joan Nevills, Sandra Nevills, Mary Ogden Abbott,

sculptor, and Mrs. Mae Nevills.

The Nevills plaque will remain on the canyon wall justbeneath Navajo bridge over the Colorado River, as apermanent tribute to the memory of the famous river-

man and his wife, Doris.

Nevills Plaque is DedicatedFollowing is the inscription engraved in bronze on the

plaque shown above.

THEY RUN THE RIVERS OF ETERNITY

IN MEMORY OFNORMAN D. NEVILLS

APRIL 9, 1908—SEPTEMBER 19, 1949AND DORIS, HIS WIFE

MARCH 11, 1914—SEPTEMBER 19, 1949

WHO SOUGHT AND RAN AND MASTEREDTHE WILD AND SECRET WATERS

SAN JUAN RIVER • GREEN RIVERCOLORADO RIVER • GRAND CANYON

SALMON RIVER • SNAKE RIVER

BY THE RIVER THEY LOVED SO WELLIN THE DESERT THAT WAS THEIR HOME

THIS RECORD IS PLACED BY

THE CANYONEERS

TRAVELING from the SouthRim of Grand Canyon to the North Rim, andvice versa, cross the Colorado River on Nav-

ajo bridge in northern Arizona.Beneath the steel girders at the western abutment

of this bridge a little group of Grand Canyon voyagersand their friends gathered from across the nation lastJuly 11 to honor the memory of one of the West'sgreatest rivermen, Norman Nevills—and his wife, Doris.

Nevills' adventurous career as a pilot-boatman onthe wildest rivers in western United States came to anend September 19, 1949, when he and Doris plungedto their death in a rocky canyon just after taking offin their private plane at their home at Mexican Hat,Utah.

Immediately after their tragic death, friends of theNevills began making preparations for a memorial—and the gathering at Navajo bridge last July was forthe unveiling of a bronze plaque which had been inthe making for more than two years.

For 10 years, Norman and Doris Nevills had oper-ated as a team. Norman was the designer and builderof the rugged little cataract boats which had proved

O C T O B E R , 1 9 5 2

their stability on six expeditions through the treacher-ous rapids of Grand Canyon. While Norman was onthe river, Doris was the manager of shore operations.She planned the menus, bought the food, and attendedto the thousand and one details necessary to operate afast schedule of river trips during the summer seasoneach year.

Barry Goldwater, city councilman in Phoenix, andcompanion of Norman Nevills on more than one of hisriver excursions, flew in from the Arizona capital inhis private plane to officiate as master of ceremoniesat the unveiling of the plaque. Assisting him in thededication ritual were Mary Ogden Abbott of Concord.Massachusetts, artist who had carved the original modelfor the plaque, and Frank E. Masland of Carlisle, Pa.,whose interest and financial help had made the mem-orial possible.

The Nevills' daughters, Joan and Sandra, and MaeNevills, Norman's mother, were present at the cere-monies. In a brief program just before the unveilingof the plaque, Wayne McConkie of Moab, Utah, for-mer boatman for Nevills, offered an invocation. BenAvery, newspaperman of Phoenix, was present as thepersonal representative of Governor Pyle, and FrankStreater of Moab spoke in behalf of Governor Lee ofUtah.

To Comeron

DESERT M A G A Z I N E

Rainbow bridge, with two members of the party on top. Frank Wright, senior pilot of the Mexican Hat Expeditions.

Glen Canyon VoyageBy RANDALL HENDERSON

Map by Norton Allen

AST FEBRUARY Jim Riggwrote to me: "In connectionwith the dedication of the Nev-

ills plaque at Marble Canyon nextJuly, Frank Wright and I are plan-ning a trip down the Colorado Riverthrough Glen Canyon from Hite, Utah,and we would like to have you as oneof our guests. We plan to leave Hiteon July 4 and reach Lee's ferry July10, the day before the dedication."

I was glad to accept this invitation,for I have long wanted to become bet-ter acquainted with certain landmarksalong the upper Glen Canyon sectorof the Colorado. I had previouslynavigated lower Glen Canyon withboth Norman Nevills and Harry Ale-son, but the sector above the Esca-lante River junction was still strangeto me.

Major John Wesley Powell, whofirst explored the Colorado River in1869, and again in 1872, was respon-

O C T O B E R , 1 9 5 2

When Norman and DorisNevills met tragic death in anairplane accident in Septem-ber, 1949, the river boats whichNorman had designed andbuilt for his river excursionswere purchased from the es-tate by I. Frank Wright ofBlanding, Utah, and JamesRigg of Grand Junction, Colo-rado. Wright and Rigg hadserved as boatmen, and hadacquired skill in running therapids under the tutelage ofNevills. For three years theteam of Wright and Rigg, op-erating as Mexican Hat Expe-ditions, have been carrying onsuccessfully the river traditionsleft them by the Nevills.

sible for the sector names given to thevarious canyons through which hislittle river flotilla passed. Below Moab,Utah, Powell encountered a ruggedseries of rapids extending for a dis-

tance of 20 miles, and he called thissector Cataract Canyon.

Below Cataract Canyon the riverflows through Glen Canyon as far asthe mouth of the Paria River. At thatpoint Glen Canyon gives way toMarble Canyon, and below the junc-tion of the Little Colorado MarbleCanyon becomes Grand Canyon.

In Cataract, Marble and GrandCanyons the river plunges down steepdeclivities, forming rapids which havegiven the Colorado River its reputa-tion as a treacherous stream to navi-gate.

But sandwiched in between Cataractand Marble Canyons, from the tribu-tary Fremont River to Lee's ferry, isa 149-mile sector where the mightyColorado flows in a deep well-definedchannel with hardly a riffle to breakthe surface of the water.

On his original voyage of explora-tion Powell called this sector Moundand Monument Canyons, but on hissecond trip he renamed it Glen Can-

yon. The best description of this can-yon was written by Lewis R. Freemanwho accompanied U. S. Engineer E.C. La Rue on a surveying expeditionhere in 1922. Freeman wrote:

"Glen Canyon is the Grand Canyonon a slightly reduced scale; but whatit lacks in sheer magnitude it makesup in the added charms of its gentlernatural beauties. Although its wallsare neither less sheer nor less loftythan the average run of those of theInner Gorge of the greater chasm, theless torrential current of the river—due to slighter declivity — in GlenCanyon has permitted the formationof more frequent and more fertilestretches of wooded bank and bench.One is never out of sight of trees, noroften of flowers . . . But the crowningglory of Glen Canyon is in the bower-like amphitheaters of verdure that areresponsible for its name . . . they forman almost unbroken chain of hanginggardens through the 150 miles fromthe mouth of Fremont River to thehead of Marble Canyon."

This is the canyon through whichFrank Wright and Jim Rigg of theMexican Hat Expeditions proposed tomake a 7-day run preceding the dateof the Nevills dedication at the headof Marble Canyon.

Our starting point was to be at Hitewhere Art and Delia Chaffin operatea ferry across the Colorado River(Desert Magazine, February '52). Thecrossing at this point was named forCass Hite, a recluse who had settledthere in 1883. In 1898 when reportswere circulated through the West thatthe sands of the Colorado River wererich in gold, there was a stampede offortune-hunters to this area and in1900 a postoflice was established atHite.

The place soon became too crowdedfor Cass Hite and he moved down-stream and built a little hermit's cabinat the mouth of Ticaboo Creek wherehe died in 1912.

The postofiice at Hite was closedwhen the sands of the Colorado failedto yield enough gold to pay for themining. But since this was one of thefew points along the Colorado River

Above—Frank E. Masland andDr. Josiah Eisaman in the fold-boat with which they accompan-ied the expedition through Glen

Canyon.Middle—On the sandbar at For-bidden Canyon. Rubber boattrips through (lien Canyon have

become very popular.Below—Old log cabin built bythe late Bert Loper, veteran riverman, six miles below Hite ferry.

DESERT M A G A Z I N E

where it is accessible for approachroads on both sides, the place has re-mained on the maps as a river cross-ing. Many Utahans believe that event-ually a bridge will be erected here.

A majority of the members of ourparty assembled for the expedition onthe morning of July 3 at the home ofFrank Wright in Blanding, Utah. Herefood for our 7-day trip was packed,and sleeping bags assigned to thosewho did not already have them. Earlyin the afternoon, in a station wagonand a truck carrying the three boatsfor our river trip, we headed up overElk Ridge on the road to Hite cross-ing, passing between the buttes knownas the "Bear's Ears" and continuingpast the Natural Bridges NationalMonument to the Chaffin ferry land-ing.

Intensive prospecting since WorldWar II has disclosed several uraniumdeposits in this area, and a mill forthe processing of the ore has beenerected along the Colorado River justabove the ferry.

The Chaffins were away when wereached the river, and the ferry wasbeing operated by Reuben and BethNielsen.

Three members of our river partyarrived at the crossing the morningof July 4, having come in from thewest by way of Hanksville. When theboats were launched and passengersassigned to their seats our roster wasas follows:

In the boat Music Hall: FrankWright, boatman, and Tad and MaryJane Nichols of Tucson, Arizona, pas-sengers.

In the Redbud Canyon: Bob Rigg,boatman, and Warner Seeley of Cleve-land, Ohio, and his daughter Susan,passengers.

In the Hidden Passage: John Har-per, boatman, and Mary Ogden Ab-bott of Concord, Massachusetts, andmyself, passengers.

The boats, named for tributary can-yons along the San Juan and Colo-rado Rivers, were built by Norman

Above—Members of the expedi-tion, left to right, Randall Hen-derson, Frank Masland, FrankWright, Tad Nichols, John Har-per, Mary Jane Nichols, MaryOgden Abbott, Dr. Josiah Eisa-man, Bob Rigg, Susan and War-

ner Seely.Middle — Night camps generallywere on sandbars where there

was driftwood.Below — Typical lunch menu:Lemonade, canned ham, cannedfish, cheese, pickles, relish and

bread.

O C T O B E R , 1 9 5 2

Nevills, and taken over by Wright andRigg following Nevills' death in 1949.

A fourth boat arrived on the scenejust before we shoved off early in theafternoon of July 4. This was a grace-ful two-passenger foldboat whichFrank E. Masland brought from hishome in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in apackage not much bigger than a suit-case, and assembled at Hite landing.Accompanying Masland was his friendDr. Josiah Eisaman of Pittsburgh.

Their little canvas craft, weighingless than 60 pounds and fashionedsomewhat after the lines of a kayak,proved to be a fast sea-worthy boatfor Glen Canyon navigation. The twopassengers occupied the limit of itsspace load, but with the Mexican Hatboats available for the transportationof food and gear, the foldboat servedits role as purely a pleasure craft verywell, and all the members of the ex-pedition had the opportunity to ridein it during the 7-day river schedule.

Six miles downstream from Hite wepulled in for a landing at the 10-acreranch developed by the veteran riverman Bert Loper before his death inJuly, 1949. Loper had found a fertilebench which could be irrigated bygravity from the little stream in RedCanyon a mile away, and had erecteda stone and mud cabin here. Theplace is accessible only by river, orby a very bad jeep road. It is one ofthose hide-aways which city folksdream about—where they could goand raise their own food and neverhave to worry about tax assessors andbill collectors.

This year the little ranch is beingfarmed by a Mormon boy, ElderTrone. He told us he had a very finecrop of corn and melons until somerange cattle discovered the garden,and ate much of it. Next season therewill be fences to keep the cattle out.

Since we had seven days in whichto cover a distance of 149 miles, anda 4-mile-an-hour current to carry usalong, we floated down-stream at aleisurely pace, seldom using the oars.

During that first afternoon wepassed a conspicuous landmark knownas Castle Butte — one of probablymore than a hundred buttes with thissame name in western United States.The hills and cliffs along much of ourafternoon route were beautifully tintedwith pink, gray, brown and a dozenshades of yellow. The coloring re-minded me of Artist's Drive in DeathValley National Monument.

At sundown we pulled in to a sand-bar opposite the mouth of TicabooCreek. Frank Wright, who was chiefcook as well as skipper of the expedi-tion, soon had a delicious steak din-ner on the fire. This first night out

we could enjoy the luxury of freshmeat. The rest of the week we gotour meat out of cans.

We had come 12 miles this firstafternoon—just drifting along. It washot in mid-day. The thermometerwent up to 97 degrees. But the waterwas cool and there was no discomfortwhen one could sit on the deck of theboat and drag his bare feet in thestream.

Frank was kindling a driftwood firefor breakfast when I awakened thenext morning at 5:30. By eight o'clockwe had eaten our breakfast of coffee,cereal, bacon and eggs, and cannedfruit and were ready to shove off.

Much of the second day's journeywas through an area which had beenthe center of a gold rush in the late1890s. Some one had discovered finegold dust in the sand along the river—and several fortunes were spent in-stalling machinery to recover the goldbefore it was proven that there wasn'tenough of the yellow metal for profit-able operation.

Some of the wreckage of the goldboom is still to be seen along thebanks of the river. Late in the morn-ing we passed a huge steel frameperched on a protruding rock abovethe river—the remains of what hadbeen known as the Bennett wheel. Abig water wheel had been installed todevelop power for pumping water toa sluicing plant on the bench higherup. Many thousands of dollars hadbeen spent on this installation a halfcentury ago, but it was evident thatvery little gravel had ever gone overthe sluiceway.

But while there was not sufficientgold to make this a paying operation,I found a rich field of cutting materialhere for the rockhounds. There weregreat chunks of agate and jasper inmany shades, and fine specimens ofblack and white fossilized wood whichhad been worn by ages of streambedtravel. Presumably this wood hadcome down from the Henry Moun-tains, and from the White Canyondeposits described by Harold Weightin the Desert Magazine of March,1950.

I also found similar material onseveral of the sand and gravel barsalong this sector of Glen Canyon.Since these specimens cannot be re-moved except by boat, it hardly islikely this mineral field ever will be-come entirely exhausted.

During the afternoon of this secondday we stopped at the entrance toMoki Canyon. At high water it ispossible for small boats to run somedistance up in the tributary, to a lovelycanyon vista where there is clear coolwater. However, we found the en-

trance to Moki closed by a bar ofquicksand—and that discouraged anyfurther travel in that direction.

Our camp that night was on a barat the mouth of Bullfrog tributary,and as on all the other nights we foundit necessary to crawl inside our sleep-ing bags for warmth, despite mid-daytemperatures of nearly 100 degrees.

On Sunday, our third day on theriver, we reached Lake Canyon tribu-tary at nine in the morning, and hikeda mile up along the little creek to somewell-preserved Moki cliff dwellings ina great arched recess in the sandstonewall. The Indians abandoned theircliff homes here many hundreds ofyears ago, but one of the rooms re-mained in almost perfect state of pres-ervation. It had been built with nativestone laid in mud mortar, and thefinger-prints of the Indian masonscould still be seen in the dry mud.

After leaving Lake Canyon we rodefor many hours between vertical wallsof red sandstone, stopping on a sand-bar for lunch. Occasionally, high upon a bench or ledge above the riverwe could see a cairn, probably putthere during the gold rush days as acorner monument for a mining claim.

There are also a few of the oldBrown-Stanton survey stakes still tobe seen above the high water level.F. M. Brown in 1889 had undertakento run a survey down through the can-yons of the Colorado River to deter-mine the feasibility of building a rail-road to the west coast by this route.Brown's chief engineer was RobertBrewster Stanton, and when Brownwas drowned after his boat capsizedin upper Marble Canyon Stanton re-organized the expedition and com-pleted the survey. In the end, it wasagreed that the railroad in the canyonwas not feasible.

Late in the afternoon of our thirdday we passed the mouth of EscalanteRiver, one of the principal tributariesof the Glen Canyon sector of theColorado. Passing this point I re-called a rugged experience two yearsago when my wife and I undertook torun the Escalante River in rubberboats with Harry Aleson. The waterwas at such a low stage we spent mostof the eight days hiking along theshallow channel and dragging theboats. {Desert Magazine, Sept. '50.)

Below the Escalante we stopped toreplenish our water supply at Hole-in-the-Rock spring. This place was givenits name when a wagon train of Mor-mon settlers in 1879-80 crossed theColorado River here enroute to Bluff,Utah, to establish a colony. Severalweeks' time were required to chisel apassageway through the rocks in orderto get the wagons down to the river.

10 DESERT M A G A Z I N E

Members of the expedition hiked up Lake Canyon amile to this well preserved cliff house relic of the days

when Moki Indians lived here.

A bar of quicksand closed the mouth of Moki Canyon.Tad Nichols and Bob Rigg are shown floundering in

the treacherous sandbar.

A bronze plaque now marks the spotand many of the Glen Canyon riverparties make an overnight stop at thisplace because of the fine spring.

We decided to push on, and at 7:30passed the mouth of the San JuanRiver and made camp on a 40-acresandbar deposited by this year's floodwaters just below the junction of theSan Juan with the Colorado.

At this point we reached a sector ofGlen Canyon known to many hun-dreds of boat passengers who in recentyears have been on one of the Mexi-can Hat expeditions with NormanNevills, Harry Aleson, Wright andRigg, and other boatmen who conductexcursions on the San Juan and thencethrough lower Glen Canyon to Lee'sferry.

On Monday, the 4th day of ourjourney, we awakened to find the SanJuan pouring a stream of red fluidmud into the channel of the Colorado.The upper San Juan flows through thePainted Desert of northern Arizona,and storms in the upper basin bringdown flood waters of various hues, ac-cording to the sector in which the rain-fall occurs.

Immediately below the San Juanjunction are a series of side canyonsof rare scenic beauty, and since theyare easily accessible to river voyagerswe made brief stops at all of them: AtHidden Passage where a narrow slotin the vertical side-wall leads back intoa labyrinth of colorful passageways;at Music Hall, named by Powell in1869 because of the acoustical quali-ties of the great domed amphitheaterfound here; at Twilight Canyon wherethe petroglyphs of prehistoric Indiansare found on the side-wall of a rockygorge which derives its name fromthe lack of sunlight beneath its over-hanging walls; at Mystery Canyonwhere at high water a small boat maypenetrate far back into the canyonalong a narrow winding channel, witha delicious pool at the end.

This was a delightful day of side-trips. One is amazed at the beautyconcealed in the recesses of thosegreat walls which form Glen Canyon.Much of this area has not been fullyexplored, and it remains for futureColorado River adventurers who haveunlimited time at their disposal topenetrate further into the labyrinth of

side canyons along the Colorado, andperhaps discover scenic vistas and an-cient Indian ruins now unknown.

Our camp that night was on a sand-bar at the mouth of. Forbidden Can-yon—at the river end of the six-miletrail which leads to Rainbow NaturalBridge. Nearly every river party re-mains here for a day in order to visitAmerica's most spectacular naturalarch of stone.

The trail follows the floor of For-bidden Canyon to its junction withBridge Canyon, and thence to theBridge. It is not a difficult route. Ihave been over it four times, and myadvice to hikers is to ignore the horse-trail which climbs over the sandbanksat each bend in the canyon, and keepto the hard rock at the creek level.Hiking in fine sand is much more tir-ing than on rock—and the boatmenwho serve as guides on this route oftenfail to point out this difference to theirpassengers.

Along the floor of the canyon lead-ing to the Bridge are many pools ofclear cool water—an ever present in-vitation to the hiker to stop for arefreshing dip.

O C T O B E R , 1 9 5 2 11

It is possible to reach the top ofRainbow Bridge by following a ratherprecipitous route up the south wall ofBridge Canyon to a point above thearch, and then work down over a 50-foot vertical rock face where toe andfinger holds have been chiseled in thestone. When a rope is available foradded security, there is no hazard inthis climb.

Beneath the great rock span is abook for the registration of visitors,kept here by the National Park Serv-ice. The bridge first was seen by awhite party which included JohnWetherill and Byron Cummings inAugust, 1909, and the number of vis-itors on record from that date untilthe day of our arrival there has been7997. During the last seven years anaverage of 600 names have beenadded to the register annually.

On the sandbar at the mouth of For-bidden Canyon two other river partieswere camped while we were there,both of them having come down theriver in rubber boats of the WorldWar II salvage type. One of theparties, with four of these boats, hadfitted them with frames to carry out-board motors.

These river parties are typical ofincreasing numbers of persons whoare making the Glen Canyon voyageeach summer in all kinds of craft—rubber boats, foldboats, canoes, kay-aks, rowboats of every type, and oftenwith outboard motors.

With no rapids to run, the GlenCanyon trip offers a safe, pleasant,and inexpensive outing for people ofall ages. Many Boy Scout troops havemade the run in recent years.

A sandstorm of short duration gaveus a gritty hour on the sandbar afterwe returned from our hike to RainbowBridge that evening. This was theonly unpleasant bit of weather weencountered on the seven-day outing.The photographers in our party com-plained that they needed more cloudsfor good picture composition, and wedid have light sprinkles of rain ontwo occasions. But most of the timewe were floating down stream underclear skies.

We embarked at Forbidden Can-yon on the sixth day of our trip at7:30 in the morning. At eleven wereached Kane Creek where a landingwas made for lunch. A mile down-stream from here is Padre Creek whereFather Escalante and the members ofhis party cut steps in the canyon side-wall in order to ford their horses andequipment across the stream duringtheir historic trek in November, 1776.

Since Padre Creek often is closedto hiking due to quicksand at itsmouth, river parties desiring to visitthe old hand-hewn stone steps gener-ally land at Kane Creek and walk

overland a mile and a half to the site.A majority of our party already hadvisited the Escalante steps, and so wedid not make the overland journeyon this occasion. Later we stoppedat the mouth of Padre Creek andBoatman John Harper went into theside-canyon a short distance andbrought back the report that the sandwas too soft for hikers.

At 6:15 that evening our little flo-tilla pulled in at a great arched recessin the canyon wall known as OutlawCave. This is one of the favorite camp-ing places for river parties, and the lastovernight stop before reaching Lee'sferry. From here it is 17 Vz miles tothe ferry.

The following morning we got anearly start and before noon had Tandedat the sandbar below Lee's ferry whereour journey ended. We were on sched-

ule, and friends were on the river bankto greet us. The welcoming crowd waslarger than usually greets river expe-ditions at this point for the reason thatthe dedication of the Nevills plaquewas scheduled to take place the fol-lowing day, and old rivermen andfriends of the Nevills had gatheredfrom across the country to pay tributeto the memory of Norman and Doris.

No river journey to Lee's ferry isquite complete without a final reuniondinner served by the Art Greene familyat Cliff Dwellers' Lodge, 10 miles fromNavajo Bridge on the road to HouseRock Valley1;

After many years in the role of hostsat Marble Canyon Lodge and morerecently at Cliff Dwellers', the Greeneshave become as much an institution atthis place as have the Vermillion Cliffsin whose shadow they dwell.

TRUE OR FALSE Very few of us can travel thedesert country as much as wewould like, but that is no rea-

son why our knowledge of the desert should become rusty. These quizquestions which appear each month in Desert Magazine serve as a sortof "refresher course" for those who like to keep in touch with the geog-raphy, the mineralogy, botany, history and lore of the arid Southwest.Twelve to 14 correct answers is a fair score; 15 to 17 is excellent; 18 orover is very superior. The answers are on page 25.

1—The bite of a Chuckawalla lizard sometimes proves fatal. TrueFalse

2—The atlatl was a tool used by the Papago Indians to harvest fruit ofthe Saguaro cactus. True . False

3—Tuzigoot Ruins National Monument is in New Mexico. TrueFalse

4—Calcite is harder than rose quartz. True . False5—Visitors to the Petrified National Monument are permitted to pick

up and carry away specimens not exceeding one pound in weight.True . False

6—Pyramid Lake in Nevada derives its name from a pyramid-shapedrock near its shores. True . False

7—Cochise was an Apache Indian chieftain. True . False8—The Mojavc River of California is a tributary of the Colorado.

True . False9—A line drawn east and west through Salt Lake City would pass north

of Reno, Nevada. True . False-The Virgin River flows through Zion National Park.False

-Shivwits is the name of an Indian tribe in New Mexico.False

-Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormon Church, never saw Utah.True . False

-The Wasatch Mountains may be seen from the Great Salt Lake.True . False

-The blossom of the Joshua Tree is red. True . False15—Winnemucca, Nevada, derived its name from a Navajo Indian chief.

True . False16—Tinajas is a Spanish word commonly used in the Southwest meaning

pack mule. True . False17—The mineral specimens known as Apache Tears are nodules of ob-

sidian. True . False18—Death Valley Scotty was once a cowboy in Buffalo Bill's Wild West

Show. True . False19—The beans of the mesquite tree were a staple item of food for desert

Indians when white men first explored the Southwest. TrueFalse

20—Leader of the first expedition to seek the Seven Cities of Cibola wasMarcos de Niza. True . False

10-

1 1-

12-

14-

True

rue

12 DESERT M A G A Z I N E