Yuma Crossing History by Tina Clark

The water of the Colorado River has provided life and sustenance for many generations of people. They came to hunt, to camp, to mine, to farm and most came to cross the Mighty Colorado at it narrowest point and continue their journeys– first the Quechan, then the Spanish, the Mexicans and finally American and European explorers and settlers. This was the only natural river crossing on the desert. It was here that the old tribal trails converged. Here natives, conquistadors, padres, adventurers, armies, and immigrants met the river’s challenge. Near this place where the Gila and Colorado Rivers join, where the hot sun and rich soil make agriculture an ideal industry, the town of Yuma developed and prospered.

A singular great event occurred in the year 1848, which would make the Yuma Crossing a household word in countless American homes: the discovery of gold in California. When President Polk verified stories of the gold strike in California and declared that the wealth was so great "it could scarcely command belief," the nation was said "went into a state of delirium" in which it talked only of migrating west.

Yuma, situated at the Mighty Colorado’s narrowest point, was the crossroads for these Forty-Niners, a group willing to risk all for the "pot of gold" believed to be there for the taking in California. Many were fortune hunters, but there were also those who had lost health or home and were looking only for a new beginning.

It must be emphasized that the importance of the Yuma area to these people lay in the fact that it was the end of the perilous Gila Trail. It was the point where they began the last leg of their journey to the gold fields. The trail itself was a natural route west along the Gila river, popular because travelers could be reasonably certain of finding water and were free of at least one danger – freezing to death, as many did on the northern route through the Rockies.

Thousands of people crossed at Yuma into the emptiness of the desert, hailing from almost every nation in the world and every state in the Union. These travelers and settlers embodied the pioneer spirit of the American West and Yuma is a reflection of this important piece of American history.

Today, thousands of travelers cross the Colorado River at these same historic narrows. The view of the river from Interstate is that of a degraded river overgrown with giant reeds. No one would know that they are passing over one of the most important historical sites in the west. With the development of the Gateway Park project this important site will become once again the highly visible Gateway to Arizona and the Southwest. This project is a vision that flowered long ago and is ready to bloom once again.