INTRODUCTIONIn the latter half of the nineteenth century, after the cannon of the Civil War had quieted, the young nation of the United States turned its face westward to the little known reaches of the Great Plains, RockyMountains, and beyond. The Transcontinental Railroad, a 3,000-mile link between the east and the pacific coast was nearing completion as surveys of the federal government were exploring, mapping and bringing back to an eager public audience the wonders of geysers, fogged peaks, and miles and miles of treeless plains. The last and perhaps most wondrous area of the frontier to be explored lay south in the arid canyonlands of thePlateau Region — The Colorado River and its Grand Canyon.
Unlike many of the inhabited regions in
Unlike many of the inhabited regions in