HISTORY OF DISCOVERY
While leading an archeological expedition through southeastern Utah and northern Arizona during the summer of 1908, Dr. Byron Cummings, then Dean of Arts and Sciences, University of Utah, became interested in rumors of a great stone arch somewhere in the vicinity of Navajo Mountain. Mr. and Mrs. John Wetherill, of Oljato, Utah, related to him rumors of the arch which were prevalent among the Indians. Mrs. Wetherill later learned from Nasja, a Paiute Indian from Paiute Canyon, that his son, Nasja-begay, had actually seen the great stone arch and could return to it.
During July 1909, Dr. Cummings formulated plans to set out in search of the bridge. There were delays in obtaining the necessary guides. In the meantime, Dr. Cummings received word that W. B. Douglass, a Government surveyor, was en route to the area also to look for the arch. Subsequently, the Cummings-Douglass parties met and joined in the search for the Nonnozoshi, which was the Navajo word for the great stone arch.
The journey lasted several days. The party crossed canyons and “slick rock” surfaces where the horses slipped and skidded. Frequently, it was necessary to retrace portions of the course, because forward progress was blocked by “rimrock” ledges which the horses were unable to cross. There were more canyons, some with dry, boulder-choked beds, others with water and dense brush.
Across a scrub juniper (cedar) flat, and down into the last canyon they went. This was Nonnezoshi Biko, the Indian guide’s name for the canyon of the great stone arch, or Rainbow Bridge Canyon of the present.
The horses, as well as the men, were fagged because of the hard trail and shortage of forage and water. The footsore procession trudged forward; and in the late afternoon of August 14, 1909, the party rounded a bend in the canyon, and Dr. Cummings became the first white man to see the largest and most beautiful of all known stone arches, Rainbow Bridge.
How a natural bridge is formed
HOW WAS IT FORMED?
Geologists tell us that, at the time of the formation of the rocks from which Rainbow Bridge was later carved, the physical environment of that vicinity may not have differed greatly from much of the present Southwest. Broad valleys surrounded by highlands were present.