So Yeah, I am Peter Wrench, and I'm head of special collections in
archives today, I'm going to talk about one of the collections that's
housed in special collections and archives and how it relates to mapping
and, uh, the Grand Canyon. Um, admittedly, I am an archivist. That was in
my introduction, and I'd just admitted it before you, Um, so I am really
going to focus on the collecting part of or the archival part of this
particular collection. And I don't know if you've ever had this experience
where you've submitted presentation, title, um, for a conference and then
changed your mind about what you're going to talk about. So this title
I'll try to connect it to my, uh, my comments, but it's it's going to be a
little bit of stretch, I think. Anyway, so I want to start with a little
bit of context because I am an archivist and I want to talk about some of
the early explorers in the grand cane. So up there were, uh, you were seen
as John Wesley Powell. Everybody knows pal is, um, leaping. Apparently,
across the Grand Kane is Emery Kolb and his brother else. Worthies were
two gentlemen that came to the Grand Kane the early twentieth century.
Emery took some of the most amazing photographs early on in the early
nineteenth century of the green came next to every there is William Walls
Bass with this foot someplace.
Um, and William malls. Bass was there in the late nineteenth century and
early twentieth century. Have heard a little bit about William and his
wife eight already. And then, uh, next William Wallace passed. There is,
uh, uh, George Morton James, who was an author, uhm journalists. And he
wrote one of the early, uh, hiking guides for the Grand Canyon.
There are many more explorers, those air just for that, I thought I'd
choose. But prior to Western exploration, it needs to be acknowledged that
there was indigenous activity in the Grand Canyon. And anyone who's ever
hiked in the Grand Cain sees the evidence of that activity all over the
place on the trails. And many of the trails that we consider corridor
trails or even routes were definitely established by Native Americans and
indigenous communities. Um, and one of the things that want to kind of
point out is that not only were these early explorers and there's a lot of
Native American activity in the Grand Canyon, but I think, um, and I don't
think I'm stretching here. But the petro glitz and the rock art that we
see down in the Grand Cain is definitely a form of communication and
probably guide and similar to mapping is just not the type of mapping that
we consider traditional mapping here today.
Um, so some of the early maps again, this isn't going to be a history of
mapping of the Grand Canyon from my perspective or my thing, but it just
want to show a few slides of early maps of the grand cane. So here we have
Ah, eighteen fifty eight IVs expedition and we can see the Grand Canyon up
there. It's just a huge feature on this map, but there's a very little
detail associated with it again. This is before Palin's up going down
through the drinking in Colorado River. So not a ton of details. Um, this
I found this in our department are holdings. This's a guidebook of the
Grand Canyon of Arizona, and it's authored by these two gentleman named
young and big now, and I'm gonna have to read one of the quotes. But ah,
hang on. Let me just find it right here. I can't quite read it without my
the glasses on, but this this is a slightly better map, but not very much
better. And so the title of the book, again is grand Can't Guide Book of
the Grand Canyon of Arizona, and then it's so I don't know if I can see
that it's subtitled a volume of interesting fax and gossip. Um, and on the
page in the right hand side, uh, Bicknell says, the map of the Grand
Canyon here offered is an attempt to meet the constant demand of tourists
who naturally wish to knew something about the lay of the land. The first
desire of a traveller on arriving in a new region to him is to find out
where he's at, and there's no more satisfactory mess headed for arriving
at that desire knowledge than by consulting a correct map. In the next
paragraph, he offers the Cav, yet it is not claimed that this map is
absolutely correct.
So I'm not sure what the value of that map is. Um, anyway, this is early
mapping. This was published in nineteen o one. Is Dr Upchurch mentioned in
his presentation? These two guys, Francoise Mathis and Evans show up to
the Grand Kane and they survey and map the Grand Kane and I have found a
great quote in our holdings. Um uh, we see Oops.
Lost my place. Okay, um
so, yeah, I found this great quote in a publication called Military
Engineer in nineteen twenty six. And it's the announcement of the math of
seventy Step West have maps and Mathis rights in this publication, The
United States Geological Survey has recently brought to completion one of
its most difficult projects in topographic mapping, which it is ever
undertaken. The mapping of the upper half of the Grand Canyon of the
Colorado River in Arizona. The work was begun in nineteen o too long
before the establishment of the national park had been contemplated at the
instance of Dr Charles the Walcott. And we know that Walcott spent some
time with the grand cane in nineteen o one, Um, then director the
Geological Survey, who first saw the demand that would arise for a
detailed map of the Grand Canyon region, both from the public, who even at
this time were flocking in numbers to see the chasm and from the
scientific world. I think that's a really important quote to keep in mind
, because up until this point, there are no detailed maps in Walcott is
before seeing not only the value but the, um uh, the need for detailed map
and then the ramifications of having a detailed map like that that people
are going to use this map and exploring the Grand Canyon, especially the
public. So, um, here we are. The maps there's actually should have
anticipated that somebody would have brought these maps. So, um, here they
are about the math of seven snaps you haven't had an opportunity to see.
These maps are actually just stunning maps in one of my favourite objects
that are, that's in our collections. I'm Along comes Harvey. And here's
where we get to meet of the presentation. So, Harvey, but chart, uh, for
those that don't know was born in nineteen o seven, Um, he comes to
Flagstaff, Arizona, Um, after he applied for a position at Arizona State
College, which was what we used to call Northern Arizona University a long
time ago. Harvey applies to become the department chair for the
mathematics department and its sole member. So he comes here. He comes
here in forty five with his family. They think there might There may have
been some professional, um, interest in the position. I'm sure there was
professional interest in the position. Um But I think Harvey's really
interested in a couple other things or some personal drivers that are
bringing Harvey this family out to the Grand Kane. First. His daughter has
asthma, and he thought that the dry climate, ah, dry and arid climate of
the Southwest would be beneficial for her. So there is that point. The
second point was that Harvey's beginning to hike in the Colorado fourteen
hours during his summer break. So he's starting to hike and explore
already. And this job is conveniently located very close to Colorado for
cheaters. But it's also close to the Grand Canyon, so there were many
different factors that were definitely influencing Harvey and accepting
this position at Arizona State College. So here's one of the first
photographs, if not the first photograph of Harvey in the Grand Cane. So
what is there everyone do when they moved to Flagstaff that go up to the
Grand Kane, the other hang out at the South Rim and take it all in, or
those who are more ambitious will hike it. So Harvey is one of the more
ambitious folks. He takes his family down, and this is a picture of Harvey
in the South Chi Pap suspension bridge. And I just love the way that
Harvey's dressed right there. And that's pretty much the way Harvey and
sub hiking the Grand Canyon. Um, for quite some time. I mean typically,
where his khaki pants work, boots a shirt and maybe jack it up. It's cool.
This is a a great photograph, but it's also important. Slide to, um, I
don't know if you can see. I think the resolution may be off a little bit
on this, but that's Harvey climbing Rutan's throne. He's tied in, Um, the
person at the other end of the rope is Emery Kolb, and at first I didn't
realize this, but I looked at this photograph on him like he's delaying
Harvey but chart and taking a photograph of the same time. And this is
long before we had little cameras, so I don't know what that says about
both of them. But Harvey seems to be happy.
So why does Harvey Matter? Harvey matters for a couple different reasons.
Harvey begins hiking in the Grand Canyon, and he creates this amazing
math, and we'LL see version of Harvey's map. Matha seven snap in just a
moment. But one of the things that Harvey's doing is he's documenting his
activities in the Grand Cane, and this is really important. Harvey's also
, um, one of the first kind of recreational or casual explorers of the
Grand Kane. He's taking advantage of the math of sevens map. Justus
Walcott was predicting and he's going to go out, and he's going to explore
beyond just those corridor trails and roots. And so Harvey matters because
, um, he's in this first generation of thes, um, relatively, uh, I don't
know, like casual recreational explorers, but they're not being directed
like Washburn was there not being funded by, like Washburn was or, um,
Powell or any of the other early explorers. Birdseye. These are people
that are going out there and exploring for their own personal enjoyment.
And one of the things that Harvey's doing that's really important for us.
All of us here, actually, is that he's documenting all of his activities
in the Grand Cane, so it's super super important.
But Harvey is a mathematician, remember? And he loves his numbers, and
Harvey has quite a few numbers. Many of you guys may already know
something. These numbers. Ah, so Harvey ends up spending forty two years
exploring the grand can, and it's important to know that Harvey comes here
in nineteen forty five nineteen forty six. He's taken a little bit the
first ten years he's doing two or three heights a year, but after he died
, he doesn't start really hiking vigorously and with great verve and gusto
until the late nineteen fifties. So Harvey's fifty years old. When he
starts all this stuff, he ends up spending forty two years exploring the
Grand Canyon. In those forty two years he hikes twelve a thousand miles
that's halfway around circumference of the earth. He spent over one
thousand days below the rim, discovered one hundred and sixty four routes
through the Red wall. Limestone also discovered one hundred sixteen rim to
river routes, climbed eighty three buttes and temples, twenty eight being
first the sense. And over the course of a seventeen year period, Harvey
becomes the first person documented to do it, UM, height from one end to
the Grand Canyon to the other end.
All right. So Harvey's early influences toward Jordan James There's the
cover of the book in and around the Grand Canyon. Uh, George Morton James
lists about fifteen heights in that Grand Canyon. When you look at
Harvey's logs and line up those early hikes against the index of the hikes
that George Warden James, um, identify CE in his book, the similarities
pretty uncanny. Um, he's definitely looking at this book. The second book
in the Middle of Slide. There is kind of a compilation of articles in
chapters written by, uh, various people, one of whom is Eddie McKee. So
Inverted Mountains was really important text for Harvey, and he was really
focused on Eddie's Eddie McKee's chapters because that he was strictly
talking about the Grand Canyon. And then I met third pieces of map
fragment, and that is the upper right hand corner of Harvey Butters Mathis.
Seven Seas Top West, half maps and I don't know if you guys can read it,
but it says I think the quote is red. Lines are roots in complete of
Merrill clubs. Merrill Club was another faculty member knotted Arizona
State College. But at the University of Kansas he taught medieval
literature there, and in summer times, Merrill Club would come out to the
Grand Canyon and encamp himself on the North Rim and do some of the most
obscure, rugged routes off the North ramp. Early early. Who's about ten
fifteen years? Harvey Senior. So he was out about exploring, I think the
similarities between Merrill Club and, um Harvey. But sure we're not lost.
Son Harvey and Harvey. We can see right here that Harvey is a competitive
soul as well as, ah, a mathematician. I think he's trying to, um, with
this little quote, I think he's trying to, um, achieve exactly what
Merrill clubbed it and then outdo Meryl Club that definitely Meryl's one
of his early influences.
Okay, so here's Harvey's map. I hope you guys can see this, but it's the
math of seven. Sea separates have map with twelve thousand miles worth of
lines on that map, and each line is a story. Each line has a history. This
is an amazing source of information for anyone interested in exploring the
Grand Canyon by foot
um, so I was in a little bit of research. Looking around, I wanted to see
where we could find so that map is digitized and available on the Colorado
Plateau digital archives. I wanted to see where else it was available, so
it's available on wicked media comments, and I'm not even sure what that
is. Um, but the cool thing is that they had a little copyright notice and
say, Hey, this object, maybe cooperated like That's awesome. Somebody's
going to cite us, Um, and so I click on it and it's not us who gets cited.
It's the National Park Service, and I was like, Oh, you have course. So
the person that took this photograph, this is a photograph of copies of
Harvey's maps. The reason there are copies of Harvey it's maps is is
because people come to special collections and archives or they go online
and they look at the logs and the maps and they figure, well, this guy
just taught Matt how hard can this possibly be? And so they go, and they
try to replicate some of Harvey's Sykes and inevitably, thes people get
lost or stuck wherever they are in the National Park Service has to go
rescue. So they worked with declined library to get copies of these maps
up there to help with the search and rescue.
All right, so this is kind of cool. I'm sure a lot of you guys were at the
Grand Kane history symposium last weekend. I was supposed to be up there,
wasn't able to make it. Um, Tom Myers shared at this imposing me share to
film clips. He also shared them with me so I could share them with you
down here. This first film clip is a film clip taken by a guy named Ron
Mitchell. And Ron Mitchell was a hiker in the Grand Kane seventies in the
eighties, and he brought down one of those Super eight cameras and he has
taken film footage. And this is the on ly known film footage of Harvey
hiking in the Grand Cane. So let's see if I can get this thing to go.
So there he is, khaki pants. He's got his little doo rag on. It's work
boots. There's her on Mitchell, next home, and there he goes.
And that's cool. That's Harvey in his element, and it doesn't look like
he's moving fast. But if you ever look at his logs, he also notes that
time that it takes to do certain hikes her to go for one feature to
another. Harvey's moving pretty fast. I mean, I think he probably averaged
twelve to fifteen minute mile pace in the Grand Canyon.
There he goes.
There we go. All right. So the maps are amazing documents in themselves or
artifacts. But complimenting these maps are true, really important pieces
of documentation. The first, his Harvey's logs, as I mentioned a moment
ago like Harvey, was just kind of dabbling in Grand Kane hiking for the
first ten years. Well, is in Flagstaff area. It's not until a little bit
later that he starts to really get into it. And so he starts keeping
pretty serious logs. Or, I should say, starts keeping fairly detailed logs
in the late nineteen fifties. And this is, I think, Page six of the
earliest logs and of highlighted two passages here on this page one to
show that he's, uh, this first highlighted passage on the top is actually
Harvey trying to do a hike out of the George Morton James in and around
the Grand Canyon book. It's the Hope Salt Trail. He's going down there.
He'd gotten some information from another guy named Dr Marston. He doesn't
trust stocks information, and so Harvey decides to go out on his own and
inevitably does not find the cave that he was looking for. It's not until
two months later, on the next page, we learned that he goes down again
with Alan. Cure it in, and they find it once they pay attention to Doc's
information. The second piece that's highlighted down there and this is
great that both of these things are kind of on the same page, and the
hiking logs is Harvey's like one of them there to, like huge natural
barriers in the Grand K and the Red Wall and then the river. Those were
the things that are going to stop most average hikers from doing just
about anything they want to do in the canyon. And so Harvey, like,
pioneered all these routes to the Red Wall. But he wants to get across the
river because this is going to save him tons of time. He doesn't have to
drive all the way around. So Harvey devises this idea to blow up an air
mattress, which was probably bringing already. And then he's going to
paddle himself across the river. It sounds awesome. It sounds like a
really good idea. So Harvey would like, stripped down, throws his stuff in
his backpack, wraps it up in plastic, puts the backpack back on I think
it's sent on to his air mattress inserts paddling across the river. And
this works for Harvey. I mean, this becomes Harvey's one of his signature
or hallmark methods of crossing the river.
I don't advise it for a couple different reasons to see it. The river
doesn't look like it's moving fast when you're down there, but it kind of
is. And so here's another clip, um, from Ron Mitchell. Be a Tom Myers and
I just want to show you. So here's Ron Mitchell, definitely being
influenced by Harvey, but putting his own twist on this.
And so bronze, a bit of a ham.
Okay, so he's got his gear on an air mattress, but he's doing something a
little different than a piece of foam.
If I miss hiking companion, I tell him you go first if you make it.
This just like super curious.
All right, so here he goes.
That water's cold. This is even though this is I don't think this is
pretty, eh, Mrs Post?
He's going, he's going. He hits the current watch this.
Pan out. There's where it is. There it goes there.
Anyway. I'm running out of time. I want to keep going. He makes it across.
It's here. Who? All right, So? So I talked aboutthe logs. I talked about
the maps, the rial, and I think it was Michael Fry. That may have
mentioned this correspondence is one of the the juiciest parts of any
collection. Most archivists on historians and scholars wanna go right into
the correspondence because that's where it's Carter. I think it was
Nicholas that kind of mentioned. Be careful what you write in
correspondents Orin emails. Um, but Harvey's pretty candid he writes to
all these people looking for additional information on hikes, roots,
mysteries, anything that is interested in the Grand Kane. Here's a list of
just a few of the people he corresponded with, like going from left to
right. Um, upper to lower. We got PT Riley, Joseph All Emery Kolb. George
Billings leads in the audience stock. Marsten, Dan and Don Davis. Fred
Iceman, Jim Almond, These air Just some of the folks he corresponded with
, um, the person he corresponded the most with was PT Riley. He
corresponded with Petey Rally for over thirty years, averaging about two
letters this is before e mailed to letters a month, sometimes more. And
these guys, they're exchanging really important information about their
previous likes. For those of you don't know who PT Riley is, he was a
river runner in the forties, fifties and sixties. He ended up, um,
researching a book on Lee's Ferry, and it was published post humorously.
Um, but he's suggesting here in the correspondence for Harvey to start
maintaining logs, taking photos in to write some trail guides.
And that may have been the seed for three of harvest. The most well known
publications. Grand Canyon Treks, Drinking Treks to and Green Kane Trucks
three published between seventy and eighty four. So how does Harvey end up
in the archives? Harvey ends up in the archives through serendipity. Um,
Harvey and his wife, Roma, love to play bridge, and they played bridge
with other faculty members of one of the other faculty couples he played
with. Um, that didn't sound right. Um, one of the faculty couple city
played bridge with, um His wife was a special collections like brain at
the time. Her name was Jane, Julian and Jane.
Jane was, um, noticing that Harvey was really interesting. The Grand Cane.
We're building this collection of information on the Colorado Plateau. So
Jane definitely is asking Harbor and talking to Harvey early on about
donating this stuff. Tow the client library nineteen, sixty eighty starts
donating material. And so he donates material from sixty eight for about
another ten years. Um, so that's how we end up with the material again.
The rich. The richness of the collection is much deeper than just the map
six thousand slides that he took across over those forty two years. All of
those slides have been digitized and available online. The correspondence
files that I talked about, of course, the original trip logs that he
maintained. So one of the big things that Harvey was trying to do, like he
was looking for patterns on his map and one of the patterns that he he
started to look for, and this is why it took him seventeen years ago from
one into the Grand Cane to the other was to connect these hikes, and so he
wanted to start connecting the lines. I want to use that as a metaphor,
because Harvey's collection comes to us in nineteen sixty eight. But
shortly thereafter, we can start seeing the influence of Harvey on other
people that are depositing stuff in our questions. So we had any more. We
have a little bit of material from any Maquis. Michael Fry knows that we
have the Bradford Washburn material regarding of the mapping of the Bright
Angel Dan. And on Davis, George Billingsley and Peter Hunt Tune. Um,
George and Peter wrote an amazing or not road. They created an amazing
geological map of the Grand Canyon. Um, Bob Mueller was an archeologist
and re cold bread iceman there with the pipe ruin the boat. I'm just
appalled biologist PT Riley and then in the corner. And the lower right
hand side is Mary Kay Alan, and choose someone that she was a river under
interested in, um documenting rock art and Patrick lists in the Grand
Canyon. So what does this all mean? Like you spend forty two years in the
Grand Kane a thousand days hiking below the ram, you know, twelve thousand
miles, you get a butte named after you. That's all it takes. And so
Harvey's bute. But char bute is located on the eastern side of the Grand
Canyon. It's kind of in between, uh, Jessa point in sick free pyre. Harvey
never climb. Spewed. Um, he got really close. He did Siegfried pyre, but
yeah, he never actually climbed it. And so, um, I'm gonna wrap up because
I have less than a minute to go. I do want to thank some people, of course
, Harvey, but chart for donating all this material. Jane Julian for
helping Steward that material there. Tom Myers for sharing those film
clips. George Billingsley for going out to coffee with me and telling me
Harvey, but charge stories. And then, of course, Matt, for inviting me
down here in all of Matt's colleagues who put this on and really
appreciate being invited down here and having the opportunity to share a
little bit of our history with you. So thank you all.