Paths of Discovery: The Sitgreaves and Ives Expeditions in the Colorado River Valley

The Sitgreaves and Ives Expeditions in the Colorado River Valley were more than paths of discovery. They are milestones in the American story.

Before the advent of automobiles rivers often served as roads, especially in the southwest desert. Long before Route 66, in the 19^th century the mighty Colorado River served as a pathway into one of the least understood regions in North America. Today, travelers celebrating America’s 250^th anniversary in the communities of Bullhead City and Laughlin stand in a landscape once explored by determined soldiers, scientists, artists, and adventurers who ventured into what maps of the era simply labeled “unknown.”

Among the most significant of these early explorations were the 1851 Sitgreaves Expedition and the famed Joseph Christmas Ives Expedition of 1857–1858. Their journeys through western Arizona and in the Colorado River Valley helped transform the region from a land of mystery into mapped frontier. That laid groundwork for transportation, settlement, commerce, and ultimately tourism in Arizona as well as the sotuhwest.

In many ways, these expeditions were the opening chapters in the modern story of the Colorado River corridor. Those stories are being told in the River 250 projects.

The Great Southwestern Mystery

Following the Mexican American War and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, the United States suddenly found itself in possession of vast new western territories. The problem was that nobody really knew what was in those lands north of the presidio at Tucson.

Military planners wanted routes for troops and supplies. Politicians wanted wagon roads and railroad corridors that would open the land to settlement. Entrepreneurs dreamed of river commerce linking the interior with California and the Gulf of California. Scientists saw exploration as an unmatched opportunity to study geology, plants, animals, and Native cultures in lands barely documented by Americans.

The Colorado River Valley became the focus of intense interest because many believed the river might serve as a practical transportation corridor into the Southwest. Before railroads conquered the West, navigable rivers were viewed as economic lifelines and the key to development. That belief set the stage for Captain Lorenzo Sitgreaves.

Captain Lorenzo Sitgreaves and the 1851 Expedition

Lorenzo Sitgreaves led one of the earliest major government surveys across northern Arizona in 1851. Ordered by the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers, Sitgreaves and his party departed from Zuni Pueblo in present-day New Mexico near Gallup with a mission to map a route westward. The goal was to determine whether waterways connected to the Colorado River might provide a navigable transportation route.

The expedition included soldiers, artists, naturalists, guides, and scientists. In true frontier fashion, they traveled by mule and pack train across rugged country few Americans had ever seen. Much of their travel was over a centuries-old trade route that had been documented in an expedition chronicled by Father Garces in 1776.

Their route carried them through regions now associated with the Petrified Forest, the Little Colorado River, the San Francisco Peaks near Flagstaff, and eventually western Arizona near present-day Bullhead City. Along the way, expedition members documented villages, wildlife, geology, and archaeological sites including the Wupatki ruins.

For modern travelers, there is irony in the route they followed. Portions of their journey paralleled corridors later used by the Beale Wagon Road, railroads, National Old Trails Road, Interstate 40, and of course historic Route 66.

Into the Colorado River Valley

When Sitgreaves’ expedition finally reached the Colorado River near today’s Bullhead City area, they encountered the lush agricultural settlements of the Mohave people. Early reports described fields rich with melons, beans, squash, and corn. Native communities had mastered survival and prosperity in the desert along the river centuries before the arrival of European and American explorers.

Initially, relations between the expedition and the Mohave communities were peaceful and gifts were exchanged. But tensions rose as misunderstandings mounted. A violent confrontation erupted along the river south of present-day Bullhead City before the expedition continued down the river toward Fort Yuma.

Despite hardships, hunger, and equipment losses, Sitgreaves succeeded in mapping large portions of the region. His findings demonstrated that the Zuni and Little Colorado Rivers were unsuitable for navigation. They also indicated that the Colorado River itself showed significant promise as a transportation corridor. That conclusion would shape future exploration of the Colorado River Valley.

The Expeditions of Joseph Christmas Ives

Building on the work of Sitgreaves, Joseph Christmas Ives sparked a wave of increased interest in the region with his expeditions.

In 1857, the War Department commissioned Ives to determine whether the Colorado River could support steamboat transportation deep into the Southwest. The assignment carried increased urgency because of growing tensions during the Utah War, sometimes called the Mormon War. Military officials wanted to know whether troops and supplies could move upriver toward Utah Territory. So, unlike Sitgreaves, Ives approached the Colorado River with military precision. He designed and assembled a shallow-draft sternwheel steamboat called the Explorer that was shipped in pieces from California to the Colorado River Delta and reassembled for the expedition.

The Explorer Pushes North

Ives and his crew navigated hundreds of miles upstream from the Gulf of California, passing through the lower Colorado River Valley and to a point near present day Hoover Dam.

The expedition included geologists, artists, botanists, and cartographers whose observations would become some of the earliest detailed records of the region. Among the most important contributors was artist and topographer Baron Frederick von Egloffstein. His dramatic shaded-relief maps and illustrations provided he details need for later expeditions as well as settlement

The expedition encountered enormous challenges. Rapids, shifting channels, sandbars, and rocky narrows constantly threatened the Explorer. Eventually, the steamboat struck submerged rocks near Black Canyon and suffered serious damage.

Still, Ives pressed onward using smaller boats and overland travel. The expedition eventually became one of the first expeditions to enter portions of the Grand Canyon region.

“Altogether Valueless”

History is filled with spectacularly incorrect predictions. After enduring the brutal terrain and isolation of the Colorado River canyon country, Ives famously declared the region “altogether valueless.” He predicted it would remain forever unvisited and undisturbed.

Today, millions visit the Grand Canyon annually, while the Colorado River corridor anchors recreation, tourism, gaming, boating, fishing, and economic development throughout western Arizona and southern Nevada. So, we can respectfully disagree with Lieutenant Ives’ assessment.

The Legacy Along the River

The importance of the Sitgreaves and Ives expeditions extends far beyond old military reports and faded maps. Their surveys helped establish transportation corridors that are still used today. Their documentation of the Colorado River Valley also contributed to the rise of steamboat commerce on the river in the late nineteenth century.

Equally important, these expeditions produced artwork, scientific observations, and geographic records that introduced Americans to the astonishing landscapes of western Arizona.

Today, communities like Bullhead City and Laughlin continue that tradition of discovery in a very different form. Modern visitors arrive not by mule train or steamboat but by automobile, motorcycle, RV, and boat. Yet the attraction remains remarkably similar. The Colorado River still inspires adventure, wonder, and the promise of exploration. It is the thread connecting Indigenous history, frontier exploration, transportation, commerce, recreation, and river community development.

The maps may be complete now. The highways are paved. The river front hotels in Laughlin glow with bright lights after sunset. But the spirit of adventure that fueled Sitgreaves and Ives on their journey into the unknown still flows through the Colorado River Valley.

Written by Jim Hinckley’s America