Related Research Articles
The Quechan are an aboriginal American tribe who live on the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation on the lower Colorado River in Arizona and California just north of the Mexican border. Despite their name, they are not related to the Quechua people of the Andes. Members are enrolled into the Quechan Tribe of the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation. The federally recognized Quechan tribe's main office is located in Winterhaven, California. Its operations and the majority of its reservation land are located in California, United States.
The Yuma Desert is a lower-elevation section of the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern United States and the northwest of Mexico. It lies in the Salton basin. The desert contains areas of sparse vegetation and has notable areas of sand dunes. With an average rainfall less than 8 inches (200 mm) each year, this is among the harshest deserts in North America. Human presence is sparse throughout, the largest city being Yuma, Arizona, on the Colorado River and the border of California.
Fort Yuma was a fort in California located in Imperial County, across the Colorado River from Yuma, Arizona. It was on the Butterfield Overland Mail route from 1858 until 1861 and was abandoned May 16, 1883, and transferred to the Department of the Interior. The Fort Yuma Indian School and the Saint Thomas Yuma Indian Mission now occupy the site. It is one of the "associated sites" listed as Yuma Crossing and Associated Sites on the National Register of Historic Places in the Yuma Crossing National Heritage Area. In addition, it is registered as California Historical Landmark #806.
The Mojave Road, also known as Old Government Road, is a historic route and present day dirt road across what is now the Mojave National Preserve in the Mojave Desert in the United States. This rough road stretched 147 miles (237 km) from Beale's Crossing, to Fork of the Road location along the north bank of the Mojave River where the old Mojave Road split off from the route of the Old Spanish Trail/Mormon Road.
La Paz was a short-lived early gold mining town along on the western border of current-day La Paz County, Arizona. The town grew quickly after gold was discovered nearby in 1862. La Paz, Spanish for peace, was chosen as the name in recognition of the feast day for Our Lady of Peace. Originally located in the New Mexico Territory, the town became part of the Arizona Territory when President Abraham Lincoln established the new territory in 1863. In 1983 the newly-formed County of La Paz adopted the name, long after the town had become a ghost town.
Potholes is a former gold camp and settlement in Imperial County, California. The settlement was located on the railroad line 4 miles (6.4 km) northeast of Bard along the Colorado River near the site of the Laguna Dam.
The Yuma Project is a U.S. Bureau of Reclamation project built to irrigate over 68,000 acres (280 km2) of land in Yuma County, Arizona and parts of Imperial County, California. The project is designed to exploit year-round farming conditions and water from the Colorado River. It consists of the Laguna Diversion Dam, pumping plants, a power plant, a 53-mile (85 km) system of canals, 218 miles (351 km) of lateral canals, levees and drains. The project began in 1903 and the majority of the work was completed by 1915. It was the first dam and reclamation project on the Colorado River and workers had to overcome many natural and logistical obstacles to build and maintain it. The Laguna Diversion Dam was replaced by the Imperial Dam as the Project's water source between 1941 and 1948. Today, it serves 275 farms and over 94,000 people.
Port Isabel was a seaport established on Port Isabel Slough in 1865 during the American Civil War in Sonora, Mexico in the mouth of the Colorado River on the Gulf of California. It was founded to support the increased river traffic caused by the gold rush that began in 1862 on the Colorado River and the Yuma Quartermaster Depot newly established in 1864 to support the Army posts in the Arizona Military District. The slough was discovered in 1865 by the Captain W. H. Pierson of the schooner Isabel, that first used the slough to transfer its cargo to steamboats safe from the tidal bore of the Colorado River. Shortly afterward Port Isabel was established 3 miles up the slough and replaced Robinson's Landing as the place where cargo was unloaded in the river from seagoing craft on to flat bottomed steamboats of the Colorado River and carried up to Fort Yuma and points further north on the river.
Alamo Mucho Station, the misspelled name of Alamo Mocho Station was one of the original Butterfield Overland Mail stations located south of the Mexican border, in Baja California. Its location is 0.5 miles south-southeast of the Mexicali International Airport Terminal building.
Cooke's Wells Station a stage station of the Butterfeild Overland Mail, located south of the Mexican border, in the old Alamos River bed, about 1 km west northwest of Mérida, Baja California. Its site was at Cooke's Wells, named for Philip St. George Cooke whose expedition found them in 1847. It was at first the only water source 22 miles (35 km) east of Alamo Mucho Station and 18 miles (30 km) west of the Pilot Knob Station on the Southern Emigrant Trail.
Pilot Knob Station, a former stage station of the Butterfeild Overland Mail, located near Andrade, California. It was placed 10 miles west of the Fort Yuma stage station on the road along the Colorado River, in California, and 18 miles east of the Cooke's Wells Station in Baja California. It was subsequently used by the Union Army as station for its troops and supply wagons during the American Civil War and was a stage station again after the Civil War until the Southern Pacific Railroad, arrived in Yuma, Arizona ending the need for the stage line from California.
New River Station was a later station added into the Colorado Desert route of the Butterfield Overland Mail it was located 15 miles southeast of Indian Wells Station and 14 miles west of Alamo Mocho Station beside the New River. It was in operation until March 1861 when the Butterfield route was abandoned for the Central Route by the beginning of the American Civil War.
Antelope Hill, formerly Antelope Peak, is a summit, at an elevation of 804 feet, near the Gila River in Yuma County, Arizona.
Steamboats on the Colorado River operated from the river mouth at the Colorado River Delta on the Gulf of California in Mexico, up to the Virgin River on the Lower Colorado River Valley in the Southwestern United States from 1852 until 1909, when the construction of the Laguna Dam was completed. The shallow draft paddle steamers were found to be the most economical way to ship goods between the Pacific Ocean ports and settlements and mines along the lower river, putting in at landings in Sonora state, Baja California Territory, California state, Arizona Territory, New Mexico Territory, and Nevada state. They remained the primary means of transportation of freight until the advent of the more economical railroads began cutting away at their business from 1878 when the first line entered Arizona Territory.
Colorado City is a ghost town in what is now Yuma County, Arizona. It was located on the south bank of the Colorado River at Jaeger's Ferry, 1 mile down river from Fort Yuma.
Arizona City or Arizona is the name of the original settlement at the Yuma Crossing, in what is now Yuma, Arizona.
Jaeger City, or Jaegerville, was a former settlement in what is now Imperial County, California, at Jaeger's Ferry on the Colorado River a mile downstream from Fort Yuma. It was named for L. J. F. Jaeger who ran the ferry there from 1851.
Hualapai Smith's or Smith's Ferry was a steamboat landing and a ferry crossing and farm on the Sonora bank of the Colorado River, the border between Sonora and Baja California, from the later 1860s to 1878. It was located on the Colorado River in Sonora 20 miles overland from Yuma, Arizona and 30 miles down river from Fort Yuma in 1861.
Port Isabel Slough was a deep slough in the Colorado River Delta near the mouth of the Colorado River during the 19th century, within the state of Sonora, Mexico.
Antelope Peak Station, a later Butterfield Overland Mail station located 15.14 miles east of Mission Camp, at the foot of Antelope Peak. It replaced Filibusters Camp Station, 6 miles to the west. The Overland Mail Company replaced Filibusters Camp, because Antelope Peak Station had a better water supply. Its location is thought to be 32°42′47″N114°00′54″W.