A voyage along treacherous waters is probably not most newlyweds’ idea of a honeymoon. Nearly a century ago, however, one couple took the plunge shortly after tying the knot.

Twenty-nine-year-old Glen Hyde was not one to hide from a challenge. The adventurer had set his sights high by going low, into the depths of the Grand Canyon. He was determined to traverse the Colorado River by boat, and he had convinced his reluctant twenty-two-year-old bride, Bessie, to accompany him on his ride along the rivers.

Forty-five men had already traveled the Grand Canyon, but no documented woman had done so. Glen Hyde sought to be the fastest man to traverse the waters, and he sought to put his new bride in the books as the first woman to conquer the canyon.

The year before, Charles Lindbergh had flown into history in making the first nonstop transatlantic flight between North America and the European mainland. Glen Hyde hoped for a Lindy-like hero’s welcome upon completion of his boat ride through the Grand Canyon. The trip resulted in Glen and Bessie Hyde’s achieving fame and notoriety, but not in the way they had hoped.

Instead of being compared to Charles Lindbergh, the Hydes are mentioned in the same vein as George Mallory and Sandy Irvine, the British mountaineers who sought to scale Mount Everest in 1924. Whereas they vanished in the heights of the Himalayas, the Hydes disappeared in the depths of the Grand Canyon.

Mallory and Irvine’s remains were found seventy-five years later; the fate of Glen and Bessie Hyde, on the other hand, may be hidden forever.

Bessie and Glen Hyde

Glen Hyde and Bessie Haley met in 1927 on a passenger ship traveling from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Glen was a farmer from Twin Falls, Idaho, while Bessie had recently moved to Nevada from her native Parkersburg, West Virginia.

The two travelers were instantly drawn to one another and began a relationship. They married in Twin Falls on April 12, 1928, one day after Bessie’s divorce from her first husband, Earl Helmick, was finalized.

Newlyweds

With the knot tied, Glen Hyde was ready to ride, but his new bride was not as eager. Whereas Glen was a veteran on the waters, Bessie was a virgin to aqua adventures. Though she was apprehensive about the treacherous trek, the thought of becoming the first woman to navigate the waters of the Grand Canyon proved too alluring.

Yes, I Do

Set Sail with You

Early in the venture, before entering the depths of the Grand Canyon, the Hyde’s visited Cap Guelke, a river rafter in Green River, Utah, with whom Glen had traveled Idaho’s Salmon and Snake Rivers in 1926.

The Hydes’ mode of transportation for their Grand Canyon adventure was Glen’s handmade flat-bottomed wooden sweep scow, the type commonly used by river runners of that time in Idaho. Cap cautioned Glen that the two-ton twenty-foot boat was not suitable for the more intense Grand Canyon waters.

In addition to fears about the boat, Cap was also concerned that the couple did not have life jackets. Glen Hyde, however, was as confident as he was daring. The couple, without life jackets, set sail from Green River on October 20, 1928.

The Hydes Aboard Their Ride

The journey went as scheduled for three weeks. On November 16, twenty-six days after departing Utah, the Hyde’s arrived at the Bright Angel Trail in the deep depths of the Grand Canyon.

The following day, they stopped for supplies at Emery Kolb’s photography studio and home on the canyon rim. Kolb was also an adventurer who had twice traversed the Colorado River. Having documented the canyon’s waters extensively, he, too, warned Glen of the treacherous path ahead.

Kolb urged the Hydes to stay with him through the winter and wait until the weather improved. He told acquaintances that Bessie was eager to take him up on the offer, but Glen adamantly refused.

Emery Kolb

As Cap Guelke had done, Emery Kolb tried to convince, and even begged, Glen to take life jackets, but he again refused.

In addition to be being confident and daring, Glen Hyde was also stubborn.

Glen Again Will Not Bend

Kolb took this photograph of Glen and Bessie Hyde shortly before their departure on November 18, twenty-two days after beginning their venture.

The Couple Depart

Adolph Sutro, a wealthy tourist from California, accompanied the Hydes as far as Hermit Rapids.

The trio arrived at Hermit Camp later that day where they encountered some of the Colorado River’s worst waters at Horn Creek Rapids and Granite Falls. Sutro was spooked and said Bessie appeared so too. He found it amazing that the couple had made it this far, noting Glen’s trouble in handing the scow and the couple’s doing little to secure the boat during the evening.

After arriving at Hermit Camp, the Hydes and Sutro hiked approximately one-and-a-half miles from the river to the camp.

(Adolph Sutro is not related to the Prussian-born man of the same name who served as San Francisco mayor from 1895-97.)

Adolph Sutro

After lunch on November 18, Sutro snapped a few photographs of the couple, including the one below, before parting ways with them.

This proved to be the last photograph of the Glen and Bessie Hyde; Adolph Sutro was likely that last person to have seen them.

The Final Photo of the Hydes

The navigating newlyweds were roughly three-hundred-seventy-five miles into their trek, but another difficult four-hundred-thirty miles was in front of them. They were scheduled to conclude their adventure in Needles Point, California, on December 6. When they did not arrive on that date, an air and ground search was launched. Emery Kolb and his brother Ellsworth took part in the search as did Reith Hyde, Glen’s father.

Five days later, a search plane spotted their scow adrift near river mile 237. The craft showed no signs of damage and was fully stocked with supplies, including the couple’s coats and hiking boots, Bessie’s camera and journal, and Glen’s gun.

Approximately one foot of water was in the boat, but it was likely only overflow from rapids.

Boat Found . . .

Another boater remembered seeing a brown leather jacket floating in the water, but he could not remember the date.  Bessie was last seen wearing such a jacket, but whether the garment was hers is only speculation.

No trace of the rafters was found.

. . . But No Glen and Bessie

The last photo in Bessie’s camera was taken near river mile 165, probably on or around November 27. The search indicated the couple made it to Diamond Creek at river mile 226, where it is believed they made camp. Bessie’s journal stated they had cleared the Mile 231 rapids.

Some researchers believe the couple were likely swept out of the boat when it hit submerged rocks in the heavy rapids near river mile maker 232, where the majority of capsized boats in the canyon were found.

The Couples’ Documented Travels

At the end of their commercial rafting trip through the Grand Canyon in 1971, a group of campers set up at Diamond Head, where the Glena and Bessie Hyde’s boat was found in 1928. During the course of the campfire conversation, the couple’s disappearance from forty-three years earlier was discussed. After a short break in the conversation, a woman rafter calmly uttered, “I’m Bessie Hyde.” After repeating her claim, another rafter jokingly asked, “So, how did you kill him?” The woman, in the same calm and monotonous tone, stated she had stabbed “him” to death and thrown his body into the river. She said she had done so because he had beaten her in the course of an argument; he wanted to continue their trek, while she wanted to terminate it.

When later questioned, however, the woman recanted without offering an explanation for claiming to be Bessie Hyde. She was four inches taller than Bessie and birth records confirmed she was Elizabeth Arnold Cutler, born in Ohio in 1908. Bessie Hyde was born in West Virginia three years earlier.

Elizabeth Cutler died in 1998. The only photo I could find of her was as a younger woman than when she claimed to be Bessie Hyde.

Elizabeth Cutler

Skeletal remains were discovered on Emery Kolb’s property after his death in December 1976. He had photographed the skeleton and a gun, apparently found in the Grand Canyon terrain, and had removed both from the scene.

A bullet from a .32 caliber revolver manufactured around 1902 was lodged in the man’s skull. The production date of the gun and clothing fragments found with the skeleton suggested the man’s death occurred in the 1920s.

After the skull of the skeleton was determined to be that of a young male, speculation mounted that it was Glen Hyde’s and that Kolb had killed him because he wanted to be with Bessie.

Forensic examination conducted by University of Arizona Forensic Anthropologist Dr. Walter Birkby, however, concluded that the skeleton was of a man no older than twenty-two, seven years younger than Glen Hyde, and that the skeleton’s physical features did not match Hyde’s.

The Skeleton and Gun

Kolb was previously involved in coroner’s juries, assisting in identifying the remains and causes of death of people found in the Grand Canyon. Some of the remains were set aside at his property; it is believed that the skeleton was left there and forgotten.

Old Emery

In 2008, an investigation by the Coconino County Sheriff’s Office determined the remains were those of a man who had been found on a cliff near Shoshone Point in the Grand Canyon on June 4, 1933, over three years after Glen Hyde’s disappearance. Advanced forensic testing determined he had committed suicide.

The Kolb skeleton is conclusively proven not to be that of Glen Hyde, but the man’s identity is still unknown.

 

Composite of the Unknown Man

In 1992, following the death of Georgie White Clark, a noted rafter who had been a river-running guide in the Grand Canyon, rumors swirled that she was Bessie Hyde. Friends found a marriage certificate for Glen and Bessie Hyde among her belongings.

Georgie White Clark’s birth name was confirmed to be Bessie De Ross, not Bessie Haley, the maiden name of Bessie Hyde. The document was determined to be a copy of the long-missing couple’s marriage certificate. Historians believe White acquired the certificate as a souvenir; anything relating to the Hyde’s had become popular collectibles following their disappearances.

Like Elizabeth Cutler, Georgie White Clark was much taller than Bessie Hyde and her early life is well documented. She, too, was not the long-missing female rafter.

Georgie White Clark

Bessie had left her first husband, Earl Helmick, in August 1926, after only a couple of months of marriage. After Earl refused to grant her a divorce, she moved to Elko, Nevada, to meet residency requirements to obtain a divorce decree there. Rumors that she was pregnant have not been confirmed.

Bessie’s family said that Helmick had a violent temper and was angry at Bessie’s leaving him, leading to speculation that he had a role in her disappearance, but nothing has been found suggesting his involvement.

Earl Helmick remarried in 1930, two years after the disappearances of his former wife and her new husband. He died in 1995 at age ninety, having never discussed Bessie’s vanishing.

Bessie and Earl

Ninety-five years after their arduous excursion through the Grand Canyon, the story of Glen and Bessie Hyde does not have an ending. America’s natural wonder seems determined to keep us wondering what happened to the adventurous newlyweds.

The fate of Glen and Bessie Hyde seems destined to remain hidden . . . perhaps forever.

Hydden Fate

Had Glen and Bessie Hyde succeeded in running the rapids of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon, Bessie would be etched in history as the first woman to achieve the feat.

That accomplishment, instead, belongs to two botanists. In 1938, a decade after Bessie Hyde’s attempt, Elzada Clover and Lois Jotter became the first women to conquer the canyon, accumulating scientific collections of plants along their journey.

Lois Jotter and Elzada Clover

SOURCES:

• Arizona Republic
• Charley Project
• Doe Network
• The Idaho Statesman
• Los Angeles Times
• Newspaper Archive
• Sunk Without a Sound: The Tragic Colorado River Honeymoon of Glen and Bessie Hyde