In the summer of 1877, Ephriam K. Hanks was advised by President Brigham Young to buy the ferry, but this plan fell through on the death of the President. The ferry, later, was bought from Emma Lee by Warren M. Johnson, as Church agent, he paying 100 cows, which were contributed by the people of southern Utah and northern Arizona settlements, they receiving tithing credits therefor.
About ten years ago, Lee's Ferry was visited by Miss Sharlot M. Hall, Arizona Territorial Historian. She wrote entertainingly of her trip, by wagon, northwest into the Arizona Strip, much of her diary published in 1912 in the Arizona Magazine. The Lee log cabin showed that some of its logs originally had been used in some sort of raft or rude ferryboat. There also was found in the yard a boat, said to have been one of those of the Powell expedition. This may have been the "Nellie Powell."
Of the Lee occupancy, Miss Hall tells a little story that gives insight into the trials of the women of the frontier:
"When Lee's wife stayed here alone, as she did much of the time, the Navajo Indians often crossed here and they were not always friendly. A party of them came one night and built their campfire in the yard and Mrs. Lee understood enough of their talk to know she was in danger. Brave woman as she was, she knew she must overawe them, and she took her little children and went out and spread a bed near the fire in the midst of the hostile camp and stayed there till morning. When the Navajos rode away they called her a brave woman and said she should be safe in the future."
The first real ferryboat was that built by John L. Blythe, on October 15, 1873, a barge 20x40 feet, one that would hold two wagons, loads and teams. It was in this boat that the Jas. S. Brown party crossed in 1875, and a much larger migration to the Little Colorado in the spring of 1876.
In 1877, there was consideration of the use of the Paria road, as a means for hauling freight into Arizona, at least as far as Prescott, which was estimated by R.J. Hinton as 448 miles distant from the terminus, at that time, of the Utah Southern Railroad. Via St. George and Grand Wash, the haul was set at 391 miles, though the Paria route seemed to be preferred. It should be remembered that at that time the nearest railroad was west of Yuma, a desert journey from Prescott of about 350 miles.
Crossing the Colorado on the Ice
The Paria crossing had served as route of most of the Mormon migration south. The ferry has been passed occasionally by river explorers, particularly by the Stanton expedition, which reached that point on Christmas Day, 1889, in the course of a trip down the Colorado that extended as far as salt water. The ferryboat was not needed at one stage of the history of Lee's Ferry. The story comes in the journals of several members of a missionary party. Anthony W. Ivins (now a member of the Church First Presidency) and Erastus B. Snow reached the river January 16, 1878, about the same time as did John W. Young and a number of prospective settlers bound for the Little Colorado. The Snow narrative of the experience follows:
"The Colorado River, the Little Colorado and all the springs and watering places were frozen over. Many of the springs and tanks were entirely frozen up, so that we were compelled to melt snow and ice for our teams. We (that is J.W. Young and I), crossed our team and wagon on the ice over the Colorado. I assure you it was quite a novelty to me, to cross such a stream of water on ice; many other heavily loaded wagons did the same, some with 2500 pounds on. One party did a very foolish trick, which resulted in the loss of an ox; they attempted to cross three head of large cattle all yoked and chained together, and one of the wheelers stepped on a chain that was dragging behind, tripped and fell, pulling his mate with him, thereby bringing such a heft on the ice that it broke through, letting the whole into the water; but the ice being sufficiently strong they could stand on it and pull them out one at a time. One got under the ice and was drowned, the live one swimming some length of time holding the dead one up by the yoke."
Concerning the same trip, Mr. Ivins has written the Arizona Historian that, "the river was frozen from shore to shore, but, above and below for a short distance, the river was open and running rapidly." Great care was taken in crossing, the wagons with their loads usually pulled over by hand and the horses taken over singly. Thus the ice was cracked. Mr. Ivins recites the episode of the oxen and then tells that a herd of cattle was taken across by throwing each animal, tying its legs and dragging it across. One man could drag a grown cow over the smooth ice. Mr. Ivins tells that he remained at the river several days, crossing on the ice 32 times. On the 22d the missionaries and settlers all were at Navajo Springs, ready to continue the journey. It is believed that the Colorado has not been frozen over since that time.