Little Colorado River - History

History

The presence of humans in the Little Colorado River watershed dates back to the early Holocene epoch, in the last glacial period. Nomadic hunter-gatherers inhabited the relatively water-rich and diverse upper basin of the Little Colorado for almost 8,000 years before the premodern Navajo, Apache and Hopi tribes came into being. Many of these people practiced small-scale irrigated agriculture in desert riverside villages, especially in sheltered canyons and cliffs. Early Spanish explorers exploring the Grand Canyon area were most likely the first Europeans to see the Little Colorado River. They called it Colorado Chiquito, the Little Colorado. Other than fur trappers and mountain men, one of the first organized expeditions into the area of the Little Colorado River was one led by Amiel Weeks Whipple in 1853-1854 during one of the expeditions to map out a route for a cross continental railroad. Called The Great Railroad Expeditions, or Pacific Railroad Surveys, Whipple's consisted of several teams going roughly along the 35th parallel from Albuquerque to the pacific. It pretty much followed the Santa Fe Trail route. The Little Colorado River also known as the Flax River, and the first Rio Chiquito, is depicted and labelled as such on a map compiled by Lt. Joseph C.(Christmas)Ives and published in the Official volumes of those expeditions. Ives, would in 1858 again return to the area after navigating a steamboat named the 'Explorer' up the Colorado from south of Yuma northwards to Blacks Canyon at which point his party went ashore and attempted to go up into the Grand Canyon until the sheer cliffs prevented him from doing so, at which point he left the canyon and proceeded overland and someplace in the vicinity of the Grand Falls also known as the Chocolate falls on the Little Colorado, he picked up the Whipple trail from four years previously.

The Powell Geographic Expedition, on August 10, 1869, was one of the first American parties to sight the Little Colorado River. Powell and some of his crew explored a segment of the Little Colorado River canyon, although they mainly found it impassable. In diary entries, they recorded its name as "Flax River", for the flax that makes up much of the river's riparian zone—and "Colorado Chiquito"—so, presumably they already knew about the river before they had come on the expedition.

This was, in fact, an inaccurate description in comparison to the Little Colorado's normal flow. While the muddy quality they saw in the river was caused by flash flooding, the river normally is a light blue color caused by dissolved travertine and limestone in the water, similar to Havasu Creek, another southern tributary of the Colorado within the Grand Canyon.

In the 1870s, Mormon colonists migrated southwards from Salt Lake City and settled in the lower part of the Little Colorado River valley. Expeditions had been sent into the basin about five years before to determine the qualities of the area. The Mormons founded Joseph City near the confluence with the Puerco River, and four others nearby, although Joseph City is the only one that still exists. Settlers continued traveling into the area through 1876, although many of them had great difficulty in crossing the Little Colorado. Although shallow and slow-flowing, the river flows through soft sand and in some places, even quicksand, creating non-ideal conditions for their wagons.

There were two primary crossings of the Little Colorado—one at the Grand Falls, and one at Black Falls, a smaller waterfall some 10 miles (16 km) downstream. It was easier to ford the river at the two waterfalls because at that point, it flows over hard bedrock, making the crossing much easier. The Mormons also made many attempts to construct dams on the river to provide irrigation water—as far upstream as the confluence of the river's forks and as far downstream as below Grand Falls—but most of them failed because of the Little Colorado's fickle variations in discharge. Finally, they managed to construct one at Joseph City that lasted for 29 years. Despite the continued hardships, the Mormons persisted, successfully established their colonies, and survived in the region for many decades. Later, Hispanics began to move into the Little Colorado River watershed from the Rio Grande area, establishing St. Johns and Concho. American ranchers from New Mexico also began to colonize the region, creating Eagar and Springerville. For many years, Mormons were the primary group living in the watershed until the 1960s, when their independent towns and farms were absorbed into the growing Arizonan economy.