Into the wild river at last

Predictions of calamity, misfortune, and death were the order of the day on the morning of June 20, 1938.
Green River, Utah, population 500, was abuzz with activity due to a recent article in the Saturday Evening Post mentioning the sleepy whistle-stop town.
A mob of over 100 national, regional, and state news reporters, river runners, and a bunch of old men who only imagined themselves as river runners swelled the town’s population by at least 20 percent.
“You couldn’t pay me to join them,” declared one riverman. The river itself, and the risk of drowning, was only one of the hazards ahead.
The expedition members would also have to contend with heat, hunger, and fatigue; with mosquitoes the size of dinner plates and rattlesnakes the color of dried blood; with wet clothes, sickness, bruises, and blisters, not to mention one another’s fraying nerves and tempers.
With the paint barely dry on three new boats he had designed and built in the previous few months in Mexican Hat, a town with no modern conveniences like electricity and running water, Captain Norman Nevills and his crew, with all their gear and supplies, arrived in Green River the night before.
Included were two University of Michigan female botanists, Elzada Clover and Lois Jotter. In 1938, women weren’t supposed to participate in anything associated with danger; such things were considered “for men only.”
At least all the men thought so. And why wouldn’t they? None of them had ever given birth. How could they know the first thing about how tough a woman is?
The sole reason the two academics were going was to catalog the river’s flora for scientific purposes. Despite their numerous attempts to convince the press of this, flippant remarks were all they got, proclaiming such a pursuit to be useless at best and foolhardy at worst.
Three men made up the rest of the crew, each with varying degrees of whitewater experience.
None of the three was an expert, and none, including Nevills, had ever been over the entire planned route.
Leaving from Green River in mid-June meant the expedition would have to run Cataract Canyon, known as the graveyard of the Colorado.
The river was at its highest and most dangerous flow, adding significant risk to a trip already fraught with danger.
As adroit as the group of critics wished to be thought of, the truth was that since John Wesley Powell’s trip in 1869, only a dozen expeditions involving just over 50 men were known to have made the same trip--not all successfully.
Today, 27,000 people float the Grand Canyon, and 5,000 run Cataract Canyon each year.
No one in 1938 had much experience, not even the so-called river runners, a testament to the pure grit of those willing to try in the face of so many naysayers.
However, the mob was unsuccessful in dissuading the group. The expedition left that morning, on schedule.
After just a few uneventful days, they reached Spanish Bottom, a 100-acre wide spot in the canyon floor on the river’s west bank, marks the beginning of Cataract Canyon and the real point of no return.
A rock formation, called “The Doll House,” made of striking, red and white striated sandstone figures resembling a young girl’s collection of dolls, looks down like a guardian on the 100 acres of flat bottom ground.
This is where river crews usually pause for one last gut-check of their nerve before paddling into the graveyard of the Colorado. As they ponder their fate, the river flows placidly by as it has for millions of years.
Cataract Canyon runs from Spanish Bottom to the mouth of the Dirty Devil, 46 miles downriver, losing 400 feet of elevation on the way.
Most of the drop occurs in 30 separate rapids. Over the years, river runners have assigned names that portend disaster, such as “The Big Drops,” which include three separate rapids spread over only three-quarters of a mile.
It drops more than 30 feet in that distance —more than twice the drop per mile in the entire canyon.
In high water, the three features combine into one enormous rapid just under a mile long. A few of the other rapids with pernicious names are Little Niagara, Capsize, Satan’s Gut, and Ben Hurt.
Despite what some may have thought, Norman Nevills was not reckless. He, like the rest of the group, was traversing Cataract Canyon for the first time. He understood the dangers and knew that responsibility for the group’s safety was his, and his alone.
With the national publicity, a successful trip would place his name at the forefront of an industry in its infancy — commercial river running. A major accident or fatality would end a dream he had nourished for years. He did everything he could to make the trip safe.
The first few days on the calm Green River provided the crew with ample opportunity to acclimate, but also risked luring them into overconfidence.
Boatman Don Harris wrote in his journal after a couple of days on the Green, “Surroundings so peaceful and quiet it seems to penetrate right into one’s soul.”
Nevills, on the other hand, wrote in his diary, “I feel certain that none of them realize just what bad water is like.” They were all about to find out.
Next: Into the Belly of the Beast.