Book Reviews

“Hijacking A River: A Political History of the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon” by Jeff Ingram, 2003, Vishnu Temple Press, Flagstaff, 479 pages, paperback, $17.95
I’ll confess at the outset that when I agreed to read and review this book, I didn’t think that I would enjoy it or have much good to say about it. It was, as I expected, limited in a number of ways, but in spite of it’s flaws I think Hijacking A River deserves a larger audience than it is likely to find.
During the period from 1966 to 1969, as interest in Grand Canyon boating was taking off (no doubt in part due to the post-Glen Canyon dam river environment), author Jeff Ingram was intimately involved in the controversies over the management of the river. As he states in his introduction, “As the author of this book, I have a definite point of view, shaped over almost twenty years in the 1960s and ’70s fighting to protect the Grand Canyon and to enhance peoples ability to enjoy it in ways that do not damage the place and allow us to enjoy it on its terms. The fighting was necessary, is still necessary, will continue to be necessary, because others see the Canyon very differently.”
Ingram is an unapologetic opponent of motorized boating in Grand Canyon, an advocate of designating the river as a non-motorized “Wilderness,” as well as a severe critic of the National Park Service and the companies that run commercial trips on the Colorado River. And in the mid to late 1960s, he was on the staff of the Sierra Club, their Southwestern Representative, opposing the construction of more dams and fighting for his vision of good management for the Colorado River, in opposition to the rapidly expanding interest in commercial boating.
Consequently, this “history” is told from a very personal point of view. Ingram does not like commercial operators, and makes no bones about it. They are deliberately trivialized as “comm ops”, just as some folks have dismissed Sierra Club conservationists with the term “tree huggers.” Nor does he have anything good to say about motorized boating in the Grand Canyon—he doesn’t like motors, and thinks they have no place in the “wilderness”—which is what he believes the Grand Canyon would, and should, be, if it were not for the pernicious influence of commercial outfitters and their cronies in the National Park Service.
Like most true believers, Ingram never bothers to consider the possibility that people holding different points of view might have as much reason for their opinions as he has for his own. Consequently, rather than engaging anyone with different views on managing the river, he dismisses them—and their opinions—as obviously wrong, if not downright evil. This “holier than thou” attitude was, no doubt, at least part of the reason that the Sierra Club’s—and Ingram’s—plan for managing the river went nowhere. He’s definitely preaching to the choir here.
Most of Hijacking a River details events and controversies of the late 1960s and 1970s. The interesting decade of the 1980s—when Ingram was no longer an active player—is quickly skipped over. There’s nothing about the floods of ’83 and ’84, while Glen Canyon Environmental Studies is mentioned twice, both times in a single paragraph. Grand Canyon River Guides, and the successful three year campaign that led to the passage of the Grand Canyon Protection Act, isn’t mentioned at all. While Ingram obviously sympathizes with private (i.e. “non-commercial”) boaters—and does mention their lawsuit which restarted the Colorado River Manangement Plan (crmp) process—it’s easy to get the impression that his knowledge of private boaters is limited, at best.
In spite of these shortcomings and others—a jarring style of writing stands out—there’s a lot of interesting material here. The early history of commercial Grand Canyon boating, and its spectacular growth during the late ’60s and early ’70s, was before the time of most current guides.
The current controversies over allocation, wilderness, motors, and the relative importance of preservation versus recreation, to mention a few, have a long history that predates the involvement of most of the folks now embroiled in these issues. Arguments about the importance, accuracy, and relevance of research in managing the canyon go back a long time.
There’s an entertaining account of how human waste was ignored, until that became impossible, then containerized in privies made of 55 gallon drums buried in sandbars near popular camps (until they became un-approachable), then voluntarily carried out (by a few companies) before the nps finally recognized (a decade after the Sierra Club) the necessity of hauling all waste out of the canyon. This brought back fragrant memories of my early trips. A similar toe-dragging, head-in-the sand attitude was adopted in regard to epidemics of communicable disease on river trips, following the shigella incidents in ’72 and ’79. However, Ingram is clearly impatient with both outfitters and the National Park Service, who were—to be honest about this—struggling to invent and manage something entirely new (for themselves, their customers, and future visitors). Characterizing them as greedy (outfitters) and incompetent (nps) seems to me to greatly oversimplify the situation, and demonizes everyone who did not hold the Sierra Club party line.
Between the covers of Hijacking a River you’ll find the names of some familiar characters—perhaps a third of the outfitters from the early days are still active—but, like me, you may not recognize all of them from Ingram’s descriptions. Ingram has clearly bought into the idea that motorized boating dominates the Grand Canyon because, way back when commercial boating got started, the outfitters were obsessed with the economic efficiency of large groups, quick trips, and large passenger to crew ratios. I think he’s all to eager to ignore the obvious, that then—as now—it’s easier to sell a one week vacation trip than it is to sell one that is two or three times as long, and more expensive besides. Most people take their vacations a week at a time.
Ingram and his sympathizers obviously subscribe to the notion that a long, slow, non-motorized trip is the best way to see the canyon, but they go a bit further and argue that if you aren’t willing to do it their way, well, you should just stay home and make more room for people like them. I’m inclined to think—and the history of the past couple decades seems to demonstrate—that millions of other Americans simply don’t agree.
In summary: this book has some rough edges and a very one-sided point of view. But it’s still very interesting, and—considering the on-going controversy over the Colorado River Management Plan—it tells an old story, but one that is still relevant. Others really do “see the Canyon very differently.” Ingram has written from a front-row seat perspective, and documents his side of the story with hundreds of references to documents, papers, testimony, meetings, newspaper articles, etc. You probably won’t agree with much of what he has to say, or how he says it. But like it or not, it may be too important to ignore. In the controversy to come over the Draft crmp, some folks will be using Hijacking a River as their bible, history book, and call to arms: those who disagree should at least know where they are coming from.

Drifter Smith

“The Books of the Colorado River & the Grand Canyon A Selective Bibliography” by Francis P. Farquhar, Edited and Endnotes by Daniel F. Cassidy, Expanded Index by Richard D. Quartaroli, 2003, Fretwater Press, Flagstaff.
“The Books of the Grand Canyon, the Colorado River, the Green River & the Colorado Plateau 1953–2003 A Selective Bibliography” by Mike S. Ford, 2003, Fretwater Press, Flagstaff
Grand Canyon bibliomaniacs need no introduction to “Farquhar”—as this rare and long out of print classic is known. Farquhar’s little book is the standard reference to the most collectable, and readable, literature of the Colorado River. In it he lists, and briefly describes, his favorite 125 works on the Canyon and the River, from the earliest accounts up until 1953, when it was first published. In it you’ll find your old favorites by Powell, Dutton, Dellenbaugh, and Kolb, and dozens of other classics, with a brief description of each, and notes on various versions and editions (updated by Dan Cassidy), with an expanded index (courtesy of Richard Quartaroli).
Brad Dimmock has performed a great service for folks interested in the Grand Canyon and Colorado River, by making these volumes available in attractive matching editions. Farquhar has been long out of print, and is itself on the order of a rare collectable. In honor of the 50th anniversary re-issuing of Farquhar’s classic, Mike Ford has prepared a companion volume listing his picks for the best of the last fifty years, an additional 225 titles. It would be a very empty ammo box that doesn’t have at least a couple of Mike’s favorites, and a very good library that had them all.
The literature of the Grand Canyon continues to grow at an exponential rate, and just trying to keep up with new books as they are published would probably be more than a full-time occupation, if not an impossibility. If you want to include the classics of the past as well as new releases in your reading, you’ll appreciate the value of these two little gems, which will give you lots of ideas about how to round out your acquaintance with the best of Grand Canyon literature.
This is not to say that either Farquhar or Ford has absolutely the last word on what’s worth reading: any well-read person interested in the Grand Canyon and the Colorado River would come up with a slightly different list. However, there would certainly be a very large amount of overlap. Even the best libraries, which might have many of these titles, won’t have them all shelved in the same place for your convenience. Browsing Farquhar’s and Ford’s selective bibliographies can save you some time while looking for a good book to read next, and is interesting in its own right.

Drifter Smith

Super Guide Map

The Grand Canyon Super Guide Map is more than just a map. It is like having a park ranger in your back pocket. It is double-sided, water resistant, and tear resistant. The front side covers the 280 mile span between Lake Powell and Lake Mead and is packed full of geologic diagrams and essays. The back side zooms in on the Canyon’s central corridor, and is full of facts, figures, and historical anecdotes. The Grand Canyon Super Guide Map labels every major temple, butte, side canyon, point of interest, rapid and trail within Grand Canyon’s limits.
For those who have wanted more information in a map, Bronze Black—designer, photographer, geologist, and Grand Canyon river guide—has created this comprehensive, user-friendly, guide-map to the Grand Canyon.
The maps are available March 2004 for $9.95 (isbn: 0-9740027-1-2), If you are interested, please contact Bronze Black, Dragon Creek Publishing, llc, p.o. Box 546, Flagstaff, az 86002-0546, gc@superguidemaps .com, (928) 525-0359.

Book Announcement

A new book regarding the Colorado Plateau has reached the shelves: Cataract Canyon: A Human and Environmental History by Robert H. Webb, Jayne Belnap, John H. Weisheit.
This ambitious book will enthrall armchair naturalists and river runners alike, offering a stunning tour through the natural, environmental, and human history of Cataract Canyon. Setting the stage with preliminary chapters on geology and hydrology, prehistory and geography, biology, and river-running history the authors take the reader on a “downriver journey,” narrating an exploration of the river that is breathtaking in scope.
Robert H. Webb is a research advisor with the us Geological Survey in Tucson, Arizona. Jayne Belnap is a biologist with the us Geological Survey in Moab, Utah. John Weishiet is a senior river guide and cofounder of Colorado Plateau River Guides which publishes the journal The Confluence.
The book (480 pp., 7 x 10; 125 illustrations, two maps) will be available in April 2004. A cloth bound version is $60 (isbn 0-87480-781-60) and a paper back version is $26.95 (isbn 0-87480-782-4).