Boatman's Quarterly Review
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boatman’sboatman’s quarterlyquarterly review review summer 2010 • voulme 23 number 2 • Allen Wilson the journal of the Grand Canyon River Guide’s, Inc. the journal of Grand Canyon River Guide’s, Prez Blurb • Farewells • GTS 2010fiiter Land text and • Watertext • Introducing GCRHC • Waiting Back of the Boat • Marble Canyon Days • Mike Castelli boatman’s quarterly review Prez Blurb …is published more or less quarterly by and for GRAND CANYON RIVER GUIDES. REETINGS. River season has arrived and the GRAND CANYON RIVER GUIDES Canyon is in bloom! is a nonprofit organization dedicated to GThe GTS was a great time—as usual. The native foods event was a neat way to experience different Protecting Grand Canyon cultures through food. It was so exciting to see those Setting the highest standards for the river profession agave hearts coming out of the roasting pit. It was also Celebrating the unique spirit of the river community thrilling to see one of the original jet boats that made Providing the best possible river experience the up run in 1960. Thanks to everyone who had a hand in making General Meetings are held each Spring and Fall. Our it such a successful event. Thanks to Steve and Sarah Board of Directors Meetings are generally held the first Hatch for letting us take over their warehouse once wednesday of each month. All innocent bystanders are again. Thanks to Simone and her awesome crew for urged to attend. Call for details. the great food. Thanks to all our speakers for sharing STAFF their wealth of knowledge with us. And thanks to Lynn Executive Director LYNN HAMILTON for putting it all together! Board of Directors We are still waiting for more news about the over President EMILY PERRY flights eis. This and uranium mining are important is- Vice President ERIKA ANDERSSON sues that are still on the forefront. Stay tuned for more Treasurer FRED THEVENIN information. Directors NIKKI COOLEY You can help GCRG out this summer. There are still LAURA FALLON a number of beaches that need adopting—adopt a JED KOLLER beach if you haven’t already (or adopt another one DOC NICHOLSON if you have). You can also tell your passengers about LATIMER SMITH GCRG. Many of them will fall in love with the Canyon JARED WEAVER and their experience. Becoming a member of GCRG is a GCRG’S AMwg great way for them to stay connected. Representative SAM JANSEN Have a great season! GCRG’S Twg Representative JERRY COX Emily Perry BQR Editors KATHERINE SPILLMAN MARY WILLIAMS RAND CANYON RIVER GUIDES extends our sincer- Our editorial policy, such as it is: provide an open est condolences to the Hatch family for their forum. We need articles, poetry, stories, drawings, Gloss. When Sarah Hatch sent us Ted’s photo, I photos, opinions, suggestions, gripes, comics, etc. have to admit it brought a smile to my face, and misty Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of Grand tears to my eyes. This is a man who simply adored Canyon River Guides, Inc. Grand Canyon, reveled in its challenges, with a love Written submissions should be less thatn 15oo of weaving stories so others could share his sense of words and , if possible, be sent on a CD or emailed to wonderment and fun. GCRG. Microsoft word files are best but we can translate For those of you who would like to learn more most programs. Include postpaid return envelope if about Ted and hear some of his stories, the BQR issue you want your disk or submission returned. with the Ted Hatch oral history interview is available Deadlines for submissions are the 1st of February, on the gcrg website at: http://www.gcrg.org/bqr.php. May, Sugust and Novmeber. Thanks! Just look on the right hand side for Summer 03/ 16:02. Our office location: 515 West Birch, Flagstaff, AZ 86001 For another fun interview, check out the oral his- Office Hours: 10:30–5:00, Monday through Friday tory spreadsheet on the gcrg website, scroll down to Ted Hatch and click on the url. Interviewer Lew PHONE 928/773-1075 Steiger has a fine time jawing with Ted Hatch and Fred FAX 928/773-8523 Burke about their experiences “back in the day.” E-MAIL [email protected] WEBSITE www.gcrg.org Lynn Hamilton page 2 grand canyon river guides Farewells TED HATCH—DECEMBER 29, 1933–APRIL 18, 2010 that run. So when Bus died in 1967, Ted and Don left teach- ED HATCH RAN HIS LAST RAPID on Sunday, April ing so they could manage Hatch River Expeditions. 18, 2010, in Vernal, Utah. He was doing about In the next ten years they set the standard for river Twhat you’d expect Ted to be doing before river running outfitters, becoming a household name for season; out in the yard, a project in hand, a friend everyone from regular passengers to the Kennedy clan. nearby to joke with, and no doubt with a big smile on In 1977, they split the company, and Ted took over his face, when he was felled by a stroke. It was all over the Grand Canyon operations. Here he came into his in about the time it would take to scout an unfamiliar own, for Ted loved the Grand Canyon, how big it was, rapid, decide it was easy, how challenging; and he and walk back to your liked to show it to people. boat. At his funeral service Ted made sure that his in Vernal, complete with clients had a good time on his drift boat decked in the river: that they were garlands, equipped for well fed, that they had his last trip with cooler great rides, that they had and sunscreen and church a pillow in their sleep- key—and a big cooler full ing kit, that they enjoyed of margaritas at the back themselves. His dad used of the hall for those of us to say “the passengers are who weren’t going with your bread and butter, him--all agreed that no so treat them like friends matter how sad they were you haven’t met yet.” And at his passing, that it was that’s how Ted ran the the way to go for him. And company. He built a very besides, Sarah Hatch said, loyal clientele because he he never did like to say treated people well and goodbye. genuinely enjoyed being Ted was born in Ver- around them, and showing nal, Utah, on December them the Canyon. 29, 1933, the youngest son By the time he retired of Bus and Eva Caldwell and sold the company to Hatch. He grew up in Vernal, served in the army dur- his son Steve, Ted had built Hatch River Expeditions ing the Korean War, and attended the University of into the best known, if not the biggest, company in Utah, graduating with a biology degree and teaching the Grand Canyon. Until recently, the company didn’t certificate in 1959; Don and Ted both became teachers need an advertising budget, because their trips were so they would have their summers free to be on the completely booked by word of mouth. Ted was also a river. The next year, Ted married Pat, and took his first member of the Western River Guides Association and teaching job in Vernal. Within a few years, he became the Grand Canyon River Outfitters Association, and principal of the high school in Manila, Utah. But his worked actively with the National Park Service and first love was the river; Ted had been around boats and other organizations to ensure the quality of the Grand rivers practically since he could walk. The first time Canyon river experience. he ran a rapid on his own, he was 10 years old, on the Everyone who’s been around the Colorado for Yampa on a trip with his dad. They were in a wooden any length of time will have at least one Ted story. An boat with an outboard and inflated tubes along the oft-told favorite is the time he gave the test for Utah sides, a kind of hybrid. In Big Joe Rapid, Bus yelled boating licenses in the warehouse in Vernal, sitting to go right; Ted, thinking he meant push the motor “in hilarious mock sincerity at the front of the room,” handle to the right, went left into the waves. The mo- reading the answers and telling his guides “Miss a tor sputtering, the boat awash, they barely made it to couple so it looks good. And don’t all miss the same shore; it’s easy to imagine what Bus had to say about ones.” Or the time he asked a nervous rookie guide, boatman’s quarterly review page 3 gathering at the boatyard for a training trip, “Whose beer is this?,” in a firm disapproving voice. “Don’t you know this is a Hatch River Expeditions training trip?” Ode to Ted Hatch Then, with his usual laugh, he said “this is not going to be near enough beer.” Always smilin’, full of lore Earl Perry, a Hatch guide in the 1960s, remembered Ted was special, that’s for sure Ted, “sipping a bit of whiskey from a Sierra Club cup, delighted to have a delighted audience,” telling about All the boys he turned to men the time a whole tail dragger frame tore loose and Long to run with him again came off the back of the boat when he got stuck in the big hole in Crystal: “What the hell? The boat’ll do Hatch—the best job I have known just fine.