(12)-6083-Down the Granite Gorge of the Colorado (1200 ft. deep) from Pyrites Point, Grand Cañon of Ariz.[sic]

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(12)-6083-Down the Granite Gorge of the Colorado (1200 ft. deep) from Pyrites Point, Grand Cañon of Ariz.[sic]
(12)-6083-Down the Granite Gorge of the Colorado (1200 ft. deep) from Pyrites Point, Grand Cañon of Ariz.[sic]
Publisher (American (active Ottawa, KS and New York, NY), 1882 – 1941)
Date1908
MediumGelatin silver prints mounted on cardstock
DimensionsMount: 3 1/2 × 7 in. (8.9 × 17.8 cm)
Credit LineGift of Simón de Swaan
Object numberS2023.1.14
Not on view
DescriptionPart of an unnamed series; has substantial information printed vertically on the back of the cardstock about the geologic and human history of the location.
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Additional Details

Markings Recto, center of left margin: [SUN SCULPTURE TRADE MARK]
Inscribed Recto, bottom right margin: “(12)-6083-Down the Granite Gorge of the Colorado (1200 ft. deep) from Pyrites Point, Grand Cañon of Ariz. / Copyright 1908 [3?] by Underwood & Underwood.”

Recto, left margin (vertical): "Underwood & Underwood. Publishers. / New York. London. Toronto - Canada. Ottawa - Kansas.
Recto, right margin (vertical): "Works and Studios~ / Arlington N.J. Littleton N.H. Washington. D.C."

Verso, starting on the top: "We are twelve hundred feet above that deep, swift, swirling flood of the river, and yet the rim of this incredible chasm – the edge of the surrounding level – is almost a mile higher still above our heads. We are looking nearly N.W., following the downward rush of the Colorado as it comes from our right, and around that bend in the granite-walled channel, on its devious way to the Gulf of California, 400 miles at the S.W. (left).
This stupendous rock-coulpture all around us is the [stain]cord of a prehistoric stream, the hard-worked outlet of a great inland sea farther north. Even now, ages after that old inland lake-bed was drained dry, the Colorado has enough to do, for at this instant it is carrying swiftly by, down there below our feet, waters that were once drifting snow on Rocky mountain summits in Wyoming and Colorado, 600 miles farther north (right). / Distances are deceptive in this clear Arizona at-mosphere. Those terraced cliffs standing up on the horizon ahead are about twelve miles away in a straight line. Their terraces are chiefly the work of ancient river currents, aided by weathering. You can see clearly how those rocks are stratified, betraying their slow creation, little by little, one layer after another, when all this region was part of the ocean bed. The granite walls of the lower gorge close at hand are wholly different in forma-tion. They are part of the core of the earth, fused by inward fires. / The first white man who ever looked into this canyon was a Spanish explorer in 1540. It was not until 1869 that the first white men (Powell's expedition) actually explored the canyon by boat.
See J. W. Powell: Canyons of the Colorado; F. S. Dellenbaugh: Romance of the Colorado River; Charles Dudley Warner: Our Italy, etc. / From Descriptive Bulletin No. 1, copyrighted, 1904, by Underwood & Underwood."

Verso, bottom quarter of the page: "Down the Granite Gorge of the Grand Canyon, Arizona. (following by the same inscription in French, German, Spanish, Swedish, and Russian.)"
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Medium: Gelatin silver prints mounted on cardstock
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Medium: Albumen prints mounted on cardstock
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Medium: Albumen prints mounted on cardstock
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Underwood & Underwood Publishers
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Medium: Albumen print mounted on cardstock
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