Lees Ferry: The Abandoned Arizona River Crossing That Still Splits the Colorado in Two

In the far north of Arizona, 467 feet above the Colorado River, two steel bridges cross the same canyon side by side. Cars use the newer one. The older one has not carried a car since 1995, and people walk out onto it every day to look down at the water. When that older bridge was going up, in 1928, the men building it relied on a ferry. On the 7th of June that year, the ferry went over in the river with three men and a car on board. The county that owned it decided not to replace it. So for seven months, trucks carrying material for the far half of the bridge drove 800 miles around the canyon to get to the other side of a gap a few hundred feet wide. This is not really a story about a bridge. It is a story about a crossing everyone had already given up on, and about the one thing at that crossing that nobody has ever been allowed to give up. IF YOU ARE GOING UP THERE As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Arizona Atlas & Gazetteer (DeLorme): https://link.amazon/B083aL63d Ad. Pit Stop, the iPhone app that tells you what is at the next exits and warns you before a long stretch without gas: https://www.pit-stop-app.com/go/oldalignment WHERE IT IS Lees Ferry: 36.86750, -111.59528. A paved road of about five miles leaves US 89A at Marble Canyon, Arizona, and runs down to the river. The old Navajo Bridge is a few miles downstream on US 89A. Park at the Navajo Bridge Interpretive Center on the west end and walk out onto the historic bridge. PRONUNCIATIONS Paria: puh-REE-uh Coconino: koh-kuh-NEE-noh Navajo: NAV-uh-hoh A NOTE ON THE IMAGES The research and the script are mine, from primary records and archives, and the sources are listed below. Where no photograph of a place survives, and for this channel that is often, the images are period material from elsewhere rather than the place itself. SOURCES National Park Service, Navajo Bridge: https://www.nps.gov/glca/learn/historyculture/navajobridge.htm National Park Service, Navajo Bridge place page: https://www.nps.gov/places/navajo-bridge.htm National Park Service, Lees Ferry History: https://www.nps.gov/glca/learn/historyculture/leesferryhistory.htm National Park Service, Pioneer Cemetery: https://www.nps.gov/places/pioneer-cemetery.htm C. Gregory Crampton and W. L. Rusho, Lees Ferry historical report: https://npshistory.com/publications/glca/lees-ferry-hist-rpt.pdf American Society of Civil Engineers, Navajo Bridge landmark: https://www.asce.org/about-civil-engineering/history-and-heritage/historic-landmarks/navajo-bridge Historical Marker Database, 1872 Founding Family: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=289828 Grand Canyon History, Lees Ferry: https://grcahistory.org/sites/colorado-river-corridor/lees-ferry/ Cedar City News, Lee's Ferry Day: https://www.cedarcityutah.com/story-series/days-series/lee-s-ferry-day-all-about-the-important-pioneer-river-crossing-failed-mining-location-and/article_6498a1a1-8930-5a48-8e91-4aade8dc9a91.html Arizona Highways, Historic River Crossing: https://www.arizonahighways.com/archive/issues/chapter/Doc.1004.Chapter.4 Colorado River Compact of 1922, Articles II and III: https://waterplan.state.wy.us/BAG/green/briefbook/lor/lor-3.html IF YOU WERE THERE If you have walked out onto the old Navajo Bridge, or you have family who ran the ferry at Lees Ferry or worked on the bridge in 1928, I want to hear it. And if anybody has a newspaper from that week in June 1928 with the names of the two men in that Model T, I would very much like to know it still exists. Comment or write to [email protected]. Old Alignment. Abandoned American roads, railroads and infrastructure. New video every other day. #LeesFerry #NavajoBridge #ColoradoRiver