The following story first appeared in the Fall issue 1997 of 'Canyon Views', the member newsletter of Grand Canyon Association and is used with the GCA's permission.

A recent issue of Backpacker Magazine featured five Grand Canyon enthusiasts in an article entitled 'Grand Masters'. I was eager to review the story ---curious to see if any of the dozen or so individuals I would have nominated for that distinction were included. The inclusion of one inductee surprised me, the absence of several others surprised me even more. Finally I leafed to the only character that could anchor such a piece, and found myself fondly reliving my own first encounter with a living legend.

I first met Harvey Butchart less than a year ago, joining the ever-growing fraternity of hikers, reporters, well-wishers, and just plain curious who have been graced by his candor and hospitality. Mutual friend and GGFI (Grand Canyon Field Institute) Ken Walters encouraged me to pay a visit to his former hiking partner. I'd read Harvey's trilogy of Grand Canyon hiking guides cover-to-cover and was quite excited when he granted my request for an interview.

I've been introduced to many celebrities, dignitaries, and sports icons in my life, but none provided the adrenaline rush I experienced bearing down on Harvey's current residence in a popular retirement community near Phoenix, Arizona.

Sharing the broad, manicured boulevards with an endless stream of golf carts, I wended through the planned senior community in pursuit of a man who had made a name for himself traversing the most forbidding terrain in North America.

Harvey Butchart at his 90th birthday. Photo by Gene Wendt.

Our 3:45 p.m. rendezvous was designed to accommodate his near-daily game of chess. I was warmly greeted at the door, and escorted to a chair in his comfortable living room. After taking care of a final bit of business, the slightly stooped, bespectacled man took a seat next to mine. As I reached for my notes, which contained a series of questions to get things rolling, Harvey wasted no time breaking the ice.

'I understand you're a friend of Ken Walters?' he offered

'When I'm not slowing him down on the trail.' I replied.

'I'll never forget one particularly interesting descent from Comanche Point with Ken . . ,' said Harvey as he looked at the ceiling, jump-starting his razor-sharp memory. What followed was a dizzying torrent of fond recollections, historical facts, witty anecdotes, and humble confessions, all of which poured from my host with the ease of a July sweat on the Tonto Platform.

Though intoxicated with the trail talk and name dropping, I knew I had to establish some background information to round out my story, and found these details no less intriguing.

Through the age of thirteen, Harvey lived in mainland China, the son of missionaries. The first image of Grand Canyon he was exposed to was a watercolor reproduction his father had hung on a wall. His first glimpse of the genuine article was from Yaki Point in 1945, after moving his wife and two children to nearby Flagstaff.

In his capacity of a professor of mathematics, Harvey spent thirty-one years at Northern Arizona University. His new home's proximity to the park lent itself well to frequent forays into the Canyon. The university setting supplied him with an ample supply of hiking partners and free time during summers to pursue his passion. Though his hiking career was not limited to Grand Canyon, his fondness for the largely unexplored wilderness soon took precedence over all else.

Canyoneering in the 1940's was not the popular endeavor it has become in recent years. Harvey recalls a man named Merrell Clubb who boasted that he had summited ten peaks within the Grand Canyon, and that no other man had, or would, ever surpass this feat. During his four decades of Grand Canyon exploration, Harvey summited eighty-three of the Canyon's named buttes and temples, and was the first man to scale no less than twenty-five in modern times. In typical fashion, Harvey gives credit where it is due by describing a few 'firsts' as re-discoveries, with a tip of the hat to his prehistoric predecessors who left their mark on such pinnacles as Cardenas and Escalante Buttes. Though he is uncertain about how many miles he has logged below the rim, Harvey estimates that he has spent more than a thousand days hiking within the Canyon.

Another source of pride for Harvey was negotiating, and in many cases pioneering, one hundred sixty-four breaks in the Canyon's ever-present and precipitous Redwall cliff, including a few 'that would make you smile.'

Many of his harrowing escapades would have ended most hiking careers; several nearly cost him his life. All are recounted with zeal, such as the well-documented bumble which left him dangling upside down, feet tangled in a climbing rope, during a solo hike into Saddle Canyon. Rather than curse his predicament, Harvey counted his blessings. 'If I'd been six inches higher I couldn't have reached the ground,. and if I'd been a foot lower I would have cracked my head on the rock. I was lucky in about five different ways, any one of which could have killed me,' said Harvey. Eventually he inched up a dirt ramp with his fingertips, locked an arm around a shrub, and released himself with a free hand. His troubles had just begun in this case, as the alternate route out of the Canyon which he was forced to take left him battling hypothermia, dehydration, and darkness on the precarious Nankoweep Trail.

Another time, during a hike down Royal Arch Creek, he was admittedly trying to show off and jump over a pool of water. The impact on the far bank tore several ligaments and necessitated a helicopter evacuation. 'The ranger, Nicholson was his name I think, piggybacked me about half way up to the helicopter. On the steepest part of the slope he lost his footing, so I had to crawl up on hands and knees keeping my broken heels up in the air. I was through with that {injury} in no time and hiking pretty well by Thanksgiving.' In all, Harvey estimates that he had 'broken bones or worse' on no fewer than six occasions, but viewed each as an acceptable downside risk to accessing such pristine back country.

The one tragedy that refused a silver lining was a drowning accident in the spring of 1955. Harvey soberly described the time when a companion was swept away, his body never to be recovered, while following Harvey's lead during one of his trademark air mattress crossings of the Colorado River. His sad story left both of us a bit choked up, and was a signal that we needed to stop and catch our breath for a bit.

I took the opportunity to survey my surroundings. A silent stillness pervaded the room, the kind one might savor on a remote hike in the Canyon's depths. I did find the well-kept dwelling to be suspiciously lacking of any Grand Canyon memorabilia.

'I notice you don't have any pictures of the Canyon lying around.' I observed.

'There's one reproduction over there,' he assured me. 'Well, if you don't mind seeing a room sort of in disarray, I'll show you my den.'

We relocated to a room stacked with books, magazines, and letters. The walls were adorned with satellite photos, maps, a few plaques, and numerous snapshots. The running theme was no surprise. This was a Grand Canyon archivist's dream.

Of greatest interest to me personally was a thousand-page journal which chronicles his many exploits and discoveries. I browsed the four-volume diary with delight. Within the well-worn pages one can find route descriptions, sketches of rock art, notations on water sources, hiking time, distances, and overall impressions of places I would likely never visit regardless of how many sojourns I take below the rim.

I asked Harvey if he ever played favorites with Grand Canyon destinations. 'Not really,' he said. 'Well, I think when I consider all the different hikes I've taken, maybe the area north of Cape Final and east of Natchi Point. There's a good Indian ruin for one thing. It's the ruin Pat Reilly called Juno.'

I went on to ask what image popped into his head when he closed his eyes and thought of Grand Canyon. No single image came to mind, he insisted, though occasionally when he hears certain church hymns he feels himself transported to the confluence of the Little Colorado and Colorado Rivers.

It's no wonder he still receives calls and letters from Canyon hikers the world over who are anxious to pick his brain. He snickers at some of the inquiries that assume he could predict the weather, or the three men in England that wanted to hike from Glen Canyon Dam to Hoover Dam. 'They had letterhead stationery and had it all printed up using the fancy name of their club, stating their ambition', Harvey chuckled. 'When I received all that I figured they should have used it for some other purpose than that club.' Harvey recommended a modest warm-up hike like a South Kaibab to Bright Angel loop, and never heard from them again.

Hiking the length of Grand Canyon (widely accepted as the 277 river miles extending from Lees Ferry to Pearce Ferry) is a rare feat that even Harvey himself never accomplished - - - though he covered all but the twenty-five miles from Kanab Creek to Toroweap in various stages.

Harvey's wry wit, ever-tinged with mischief, lingered just below the surface throughout our conversation. Whether declaring that cactus scared him more than rattlesnakes, or recalling a running joke between him and Doc Marston, who proposed DOMA (Diapers on Mules Association), Harvey had a gift of being able to lighten even the most serious of topics.

What most impressed me about Harvey was the clarity and precision of his memory. His gift is at once impressive and a little bit spooky. Mention any of Grand Canyon's innumerable side canyons, for example, and most Canyon buffs would do well to locate it on the map (or pronounce it correctly.) Dr. Butchart, on the other hand, would likely describe in detail the chock stone to be negotiated prior to reaching a narrow break in the Tapeats Sandstone that affords access to a seasonal spring located just short of the scree slope which switchbacks past a granary to the river.

One wouldn't expect this sort of detail from a hiker fresh off the trail, much less an elderly man with forty years between himself and the drainage in question. I couldn't help but surmise that the key to his longevity lay hidden within this talent as well.

His advanced age detracted nothing from our conversation besides lending an awkward sense of urgency, for Harvey is the first to admit he won't be around forever. We parted with my offer to treat him to lunch at El Tovar during his next trip to Grand Canyon for the Pioneer Society's outing in the park.

I later saw Harvey at his 90th birthday party held on the Northern Arizona University campus several months later. As the turnout evidenced, he was not short on friends and admirers, so I wasn't certain he would remember me without a little prodding.

'Happy birthday, Harvey, do you remember me? I paid you a visit back . . .'

'Yes, yes, Mike,' he smiled. ' I was hoping to see you today. About our lunch date at the El Tovar on the 14th of June. I was thinking it might be better to meet at the picnic rather than fight for a parking spot in the Village.'

I'm clearing my calendar for his 100th in 2007.

Used by permission of the Grand Canyon Pioneers Society.

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Copyright © Grand Canyon Pioneers Society, 1999, all rights reserved. This publication and its text and photos may not be copied for commercial use without the express written permission of the Grand Canyon Pioneers Society, PO Box 2372, Flagstaff, AZ 86003-2372.