Well known to my readers is H. P. Lovecraft’s story, The
Mountains of Madness (pub 1931) which features an expedition and a huge
ancient city in an inaccessible mountain range at the bottom of the world, but
lesser known is the story about another expedition and a gigantic city, but
this time underground, beneath the Grand Canyon dating from 1909.
Years ago, I had read a reference to a “lost city” in the
Grand Canyon in a magazine, but in those pre-internet days some 40 years ago,
doing follow-up research was difficult.
Recently, I ran across references to the Grand Canyon Hoax online and
could finally follow it up.
The
information was so interesting, I had to share it with those of you who hadn’t
already found this interesting hoax previously.
Of course, I did a bit of digging and a ended up with a little
bit of interesting digression in this post.
The main body of the hoax was published in a local
newspaper, the Arizona Gazette, on 5 April 1909. A preceding hoax article was published on 12 March 1909 as a
setup for The Big One. Fortunately, I
have managed to glean scans of the original articles as well as have clearer
text of the articles as the scans are not very clear. I’ll take these two articles out of order
and run straight into the body of the hoax itself and then return back to the
shorter and earlier article at the end of the post along with some
observations.
Much like H. P. Lovecraft’s fictional work of horror,
The
Mountains of Madness, this hoax featured an entirely fictional
protagonists, G. E. Kincaid and Prof S. A. Jordan, but linked to a very real
and well known organization, the Smithsonian Institute of Washington DC.
I did a lot of searching and couldn’t find
any reference to these fictional characters, even though there are some
interesting biographical tips present in the article (see the 5 April article
text, but alas, these worthies doesn’t exist outside of the body of the
hoax.
Of course, the best way to create believability is to embed
the fantastic into verifiable facts and then give the hoax “facts” as having a
plausible explanation as to why they can’t be verified.
See also H. P. Lovecraft’s essay,
Notes on Writing Weird Fiction. [1] This newspaper hoax is excellent fodder for
writing scenarios and background for role playing games.
Now without further ado, here is a scan of the actual
article.
As it’s hard to read, the text
copy is available below from page one and the second half.
From the Arizona Gazette, April 5, 1909
- Mysteries of Immense Rich Cavern Being Brought to Light
- Jordan is enthused
- Remarkable Finds Indicate Ancient People Migrated From Orient
The latest news of the progress
of the explorations of what is now regarded by scientists as not only the
oldest archeological discovery in the United States, but one of the most
valuable in the world, which was mentioned some time ago in the Gazette, was
brought to the city yesterday by G.E. Kinkaid, the explorer who found the great
underground citadel of the Grand Canyon during a trip from Green River,
Wyoming, down the Colorado, in a wooden boat, to Yuma, several months ago.
According to the story related to the Gazette by Mr. Kinkaid, the archeologists
of the Smithsonian Institute, which is financing the expeditions, have made
discoveries which almost conclusively prove that the race which inhabited this
mysterious cavern, hewn in solid rock by human hands, was of oriental origin,
possibly from Egypt, tracing back to Ramses. If their theories are borne out by
the translation of the tablets engraved with hieroglyphics, the mystery of the
prehistoric peoples of North America, their ancient arts, who they were and
whence they came, will be solved. Egypt and the Nile, and Arizona and the
Colorado will be linked by a historical chain running back to ages which
staggers the wildest fancy of the fictionist.
A Thorough Examination
Under the direction of Prof. S. A. Jordan, the Smithsonian Institute is now
prosecuting the most thorough explorations, which will be continued until the
last link in the chain is forged. Nearly a mile underground, about 1480 feet
below the surface, the long main passage has been delved into, to find another
mammoth chamber from which radiates scores of passageways, like the spokes of a
wheel.
Several hundred rooms have been discovered, reached by passageways running from
the main passage, one of them having been explored for 854 feet and another 634
feet. The recent finds include articles which have never been known as native
to this country, and doubtless they had their origin in the orient. War
weapons, copper instruments, sharp-edged and hard as steel, indicate the high
state of civilization reached by these strange people. So interested have the
scientists become that preparations are being made to equip the camp for
extensive studies, and the force will be increased to thirty or forty persons.
Mr. Kinkaid's Report
Mr. Kinkaid was the first white child born in Idaho and has been an explorer
and hunter all his life, thirty years having been in the service of the
Smithsonian Institute. Even briefly recounted, his history sounds fabulous,
almost grotesque.
"First, I would impress that the cavern is nearly inaccessible. The
entrance is 1,486 feet down the sheer canyon wall. It is located on government
land and no visitor will be allowed there under penalty of trespass. The
scientists wish to work unmolested, without fear of archeological discoveries
being disturbed by curio or relic hunters. A trip there would be
fruitless, and the visitor would be sent on his way. The story of how I found
the cavern has been related, but in a paragraph: I was journeying down the
Colorado river in a boat, alone, looking for mineral. Some forty-two miles up
the river from the El Tovar Crystal canyon, I saw on the east wall, stains in
the sedimentary formation about 2,000 feet above the river bed. There was no
trail to this point, but I finally reached it with great difficulty. Above
a shelf which hid it from view from the river, was the mouth of the cave. There
are steps leading from this entrance some thirty yards to what was, at the time
the cavern was inhabited, the level of the river. When I saw the chisel marks
on the wall inside the entrance, I became interested, securing my gun and went
in. During that trip I went back several hundred feet along the main passage
till I came to the crypt in which I discovered the mummies. One of these I
stood up and photographed by flashlight. I gathered a number of relics, which I
carried down the Colorado to Yuma, from whence I shipped them to Washington
with details of the discovery. Following this, the explorations were undertaken.
The Passages
"The main passageway is about 12 feet wide, narrowing to nine feet toward
the farther end. About 57 feet from the entrance, the first side-passages
branch off to the right and left, along which, on both sides, are a number of
rooms about the size of ordinary living rooms of today, though some are 30 by
40 feet square. These are entered by oval-shaped doors and are ventilated by
round air spaces through the walls into the passages. The walls are about three
feet six inches in thickness. The passages are chiseled or hewn as
straight as could be laid out by an engineer. The ceilings of many of the rooms
converge to a center. The side-passages near the entrance run at a sharp angle
from the main hall, but toward the rear they gradually reach a right angle in
direction.
The Shrine
"Over a hundred feet from the entrance is the cross-hall, several hundred
feet long, in which are found the idol, or image, of the people's god, sitting
cross-legged, with a lotus flower or lily in each hand. The cast of the
Explorations in Grand Canyon
(from page one, following text)
face is
oriental, and the carving this cavern. The idol almost resembles Buddha, though
the scientists are not certain as to what religious worship it represents.
Taking into consideration everything found thus far, it is possible that this
worship most resembles the ancient people of Tibet. Surrounding this idol
are smaller images, some very beautiful in form; others crooked-necked and
distorted shapes, symbolical, probably, of good and evil. There are two large
cactus with protruding arms, one on each side of the dais on which the god
squats. All this is carved out of hard rock resembling marble. In the opposite
corner of this cross-hall were found tools of all descriptions, made of copper.
These people undoubtedly knew the lost art of hardening this metal, which has
been sought by chemicals for centuries without result. On a bench running
around the workroom was some charcoal and other material probably used in the
process. There is also slag and stuff similar to matte, showing that these
ancients smelted ores, but so far no trace of where or how this was done has
been discovered, nor the origin of the ore.
"Among the other finds are vases or urns and cups of copper and gold, made
very artistic in design. The pottery work includes enameled ware and glazed
vessels. Another passageway leads to granaries such as are found in the
oriental temples. They contain seeds of various kinds. One very large
storehouse has not yet been entered, as it is twelve feet high and can be
reached only from above. Two copper hooks extend on the edge, which indicates
that some sort of ladder was attached. These granaries are rounded, as the
materials of which they are constructed, I think, is a very hard cement. A gray
metal is also found in this cavern, which puzzles the scientists, for its
identity has not been established. It resembles platinum. Strewn promiscuously
over the floor everywhere are what people call 'cats eyes,' a yellow stone of
no great value. Each one is engraved with the head of the Malay type.
The Hieroglyphics
"On all the urns, or walls over doorways , and tablets of stone which were
found by the image are the mysterious hieroglyphics, the key to which the
Smithsonian Institute hopes yet to discover. The engraving on the tables
probably has something to do with the religion of the people. Similar
hieroglyphics have been found in southern Arizona. Among the pictorial
writings, only two animals are found. One is of prehistoric type.
The Crypt
"The tomb or crypt in which the mummies were found is one of the largest
of the chambers, the walls slanting back at an angle of about 35 degrees. On
these are tiers of mummies, each one occupying a separate hewn shelf. At the
head of each is a small bench, on which is found copper cups and pieces of
broken swords. Some of the mummies are covered with clay, and all are wrapped
in a bark fabric. The urns or cups on the lower tiers are crude, while as
the higher shelves are reached, the urns are finer in design, showing a later
stage of civilization. It is worthy of note that all the mummies examined so
far have proved to be male, no children or females being buried here. This
leads to the belief that this exterior section was the warriors' barracks.
"Among the discoveries no bones of animals have been found, no skins, no
clothing, no bedding. Many of the rooms are bare but for water vessels. One
room, about 40 by 700 feet, was probably the main dining hall, for cooking
utensils are found here. What these people lived on is a problem, though it is
presumed that they came south in the winter and farmed in the valleys, going
back north in the summer. Upwards of 50,000 people could have lived in the
caverns comfortably. One theory is that the present Indian tribes found in
Arizona are descendants of the serfs or slaves of the people which inhabited
the cave. Undoubtedly a good many thousands of years before the Christian era,
a people lived here which reached a high stage of civilization. The chronology
of human history is full of gaps. Professor Jordan is much enthused over the
discoveries and believes that the find will prove of incalculable value in
archeological work.
"One thing I have not spoken of, may be of interest. There is one chamber
of the passageway to which is not ventilated, and when we approached it a
deadly, snaky smell struck us. Our light would not penetrate the gloom, and
until stronger ones are available we will not know what the chamber contains.
Some say snakes, but others boo-hoo this idea and think it may contain a deadly
gas or chemicals used by the ancients. No sounds are heard, but it smells snaky
just the same. The whole underground installation gives one of shaky nerves the
creeps. The gloom is like a weight on one's shoulders, and our flashlights and
candles only make the darkness blacker. Imagination can revel in conjectures
and ungodly daydreams back through the ages that have elapsed till the mind
reels dizzily in space."
An Indian Legend
In connection with this story, it is notable that among the Hopi Indians the
tradition is told that their ancestors once lived in an underworld in the Grand
Canyon till dissension arose between the good and the bad, the people of one
heart and the people of two hearts. Machetto, who was their chief, counseled
them to leave the underworld, but there was no way out. The chief then caused a
tree to grow up and pierce the roof of the underworld, and then the people of
one heart climbed out. They tarried by Paisisvai, which is the Colorado, and
grew grain and corn.
They sent out a message to the Temple of the Sun, asking the blessing of peace,
good will and rain for people of one heart. That messenger never returned, but
today at the Hopi villages at sundown can be seen the old men of the tribe out
on the housetops gazing toward the sun, looking for the messenger. When he
returns, their lands and ancient dwelling place will be restored to them. That
is the tradition.
Among the engravings of animals in the cave is seen the image of a heart over
the spot where it is located. The legend was learned by W.E. Rollins, the artist,
during a year spent with the Hopi Indians.
There are two theories of the origin of the Egyptians. One is that they came
from Asia; another that the racial cradle was in the upper Nile region. Heeren,
an Egyptologist, believed in the Indian origin of the Egyptians. The
discoveries in the Grand Canyon may throw further light on human evolution and
prehistoric ages.
Who is this Egyptologist, Heeren? The closest I can find is an
Arnold Heeren, a German historian who died in 1842 in obscurity and who could have had no connection with the 1909 article or even the Powell Expedition. In any case, he doesn't appear to have been an Egyptologist.
Who is W. E. Rollins, the southwestern artist of Hopi fame?
I did find
Warren Eliphalet. Rollins born in
Carson City, Nevada in 1861, raised in Northern California and studied at the
San Francisco School of Design.
Rollins
indeed traveled throughout the southwest, living with a number of native
tribes. He lived and painted in Pasadena, California and moved to Arizona
around 1917, making Arizona his home. Later, was also central to the Santa Fe
and Taos Art colonies and died in 1962. So he is actually contemporary and
lived in the region.
I wonder how he
felt about being named in the hoax article.
Interestingly, this particular lost city hoax sits broadly
upon the back of an earlier famous hoax, the
Mobertly Montana Lost City Hoax of 1885.
That earlier lost city hoax
appears in the pages of the
Evening Chronicle of St Louis Mo, on 8 April
1885.
On April 9, the
Evening
Chronicle had a follow up article.
Let’s also keep in mind that the whole Lost Civilization/Lost City
modern literary genre was pretty much made up whole cloth by
H. Ryder Haggard
starting with his classic,
King Solomon’s Mines [2], published in
September 1885 with a huge publicity campaign prior to release.
The Hoaxter found?
Soon after the Grand Canyon story hit, the Coconino Sun
published a headline on 16 April 1909, Vol 20, No 2, “Looks like a Mulhattan
Story” which is pretty much the only acknowledgement of the story in the press. It basically indicates that the Grand Canyon
story was viewed as an hoax, because Joseph Mulhattan’s name [3] was well associated with southwestern hoaxes
in the late 19th century, whether he authored the story or not..
In support of his possible authorship, an article from
The Ol’ Pioneer,Summer 2009, which is a publication of the Grand Canyon Historical Society,
sheds some light on Mulhattan and his possible association to the story.
This article (available as PDF at the link
above) links the Grand Canyon story to well-known late Victorian hoaxter Joe
Mulhattan.
The infamous Mulhattan also
appears in the pages of
Hoaxipedia as Joseph Mulhattan, as well as in the book
Hoaxes,
by Curis D. MacDougall, pub by Macmillan NY, 1940 (although I don’t have copy
of the latter).
Ultimately, though
there is no absolute proof that Mulhattan had anything to do with this whopper,
although it’s certainly in his league.
A bio of Mulhattan is here
http://www.experience-az.com/About/arizona/people/mulhattan.html
Now we come to the cream of the jest, which was actually
presented first in the press.
It gives
all the appropriate clues to the local, period readers that this was all a
farce. First the photocopy of the original article and then a text copy for clarity.
Arizona Gazette, March
12, 1909
G. E. Kincaid Reaches Yuma
G. E. Kincaid of Lewiston, Idaho, arrived in Yuma
after a trip from Green River, Wyoming, down the entire course of the Colorado
River. He is the second man to make this journey and came alone in a small
skiff, stopping at his pleasure to investigate the surrounding country. He left
Green River in October having a small covered boat with oars, and carrying a
fine camera, with which he secured over 700 views of the river and canyons
which were unsurpassed. Mr. Kincaid says one of the most interesting features
of the trip was passing through the sluiceways at Laguna dam. He made this
perilous passage with only the loss of an oar.
Some interesting archaeological discoveries were unearthed and altogether the
trip was of such interest that he will repeat it next winter in the company of
friends.
An amusing bio for the phantom explorer, Mr Kinkaid.is from the 5
April article and worth recounting:
“Mr. Kinkaid was the first white child born in Idaho and has
been an explorer and hunter all his life, thirty years having been in the
service of the Smithsonian Institute. Even briefly recounted, his history
sounds fabulous, almost grotesque.”
The
12 March article claims he was the second person to make a solo descent of the
Colorado river.
Who was the first?
Even
John Wesley Powell didn’t try it solo in
his 1869 or 1871 trips.
Notice the nod to the one-armed Grand Canyon explorer, John
Wesley Powell who had previously lost his right arm at the battle of Shiloh,
who noted some interesting things in his notebook, later printed in his books
about the Colorado.[4] If
you followed the footnote, you will see that Powell’s notes from his book are
the jumping off point for this little hoax.
 |
| The spillway today |
The other clue that this is just a big josh is the fact that
Kinkaid made a great deal out of the descent through the
Laguna Diversion Damspillway at the end of his solo adventure down the Colorado Rive.
That particular drop is an easily graded 10
foot slide, which would be well known to the reader of the newspaper especially
since the dam and the spillway was very recently completed.
Note that this picture was made after a
renovation much later.
Certainly
claiming the spillway drop was somehow more treacherous that the whole of the
Colorado River rapids, pretty much lets the knowledgeable in on the joke. I
leave it to modern white water rafters to chuckle over that one.
In summary:
Lately the Grand Canyon hoax has been seized upon once
again. The proof? That nobody at the Smithsonian ever heard of
G. E. Kincaid. Want more proof? It was published in print! I now have a most excellent bridge across
the Hudson for sale if you wish to purchase …
I've tried to keep a good sense of humor while working on this article and I learned a few things, I didn't know before. I hope that you have enjoyed the article and the links. Thanks for reading.
CoastConFan
Update: Nov
2017 This hoax may have had its inspiration from an 1871 book
that was very well known in the Victorian Era and continued to have influence
decades afterward it was published. It
was about an ancient underground race that lived in a city at the bottom of a deep
chasm and had very Egyptian architecture.
That book was Vril, the Power of the Coming Race, by Edward
Bulwer-Lytton. It’s a serious contender for being good source
material for the Grand Canyon Hoax https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vril
. The Wikipedia article pretty much testifies
to the long interest in the power of Vril and worth a read. It might have given
the hoaxers a good chuckle to use this found material to work their fun.
 |
| King Tut Saloon, far away from the Grand Canyon |
Footnotes
[1] From his HPLs essay: “Inconceivable events and conditions have a special handicap to
overcome, and this can be accomplished only through the maintenance of a
careful realism in every phase of the story except that touching on the one
given marvel. This marvel must be treated very impressively and
deliberately—with a careful emotional “build-up”—else it will seem flat and
unconvincing. Being the principal thing in the story, its mere existence should
overshadow the characters and events. But the characters and events must be
consistent and natural except where they touch the single marvel.”
In building hoax legitimacy, the use of very specific
measurements are used to legitimize but also to cordon off explorers so the
hoax can’t be easily exploded. Yeah, go
looking 1,500 feet down a sheer cliff on some random wall of the Grand Canyon. Consider this quote, “First, I would
impress that the cavern is nearly inaccessible. The entrance is 1,486
feet down the sheer canyon wall. It is located on government land and no
visitor will be allowed there under penalty of trespass.”
[3] Variant spellings of his name appear, including
Mulhatten, Mulhatton, and Mulholland. Curtis MacDougall, author of the 1940
book Hoaxes, referred to him as "Mulholland." However, sources
from the late nineteenth century most consistently wrote his last name as
"Mulhattan."
[4] Quotes from Powell’s book, Canyons of the Colorado
August 11 -- We remain at this point to-day for the
purpose of determining the latitude and longitude, measuring the height of the falls,
drying our rations, and repairing our boats.
Captain Powell early in the morning takes a barometer and
goes out to cimb a point between the two rivers. I walk down the gorge to the
left at the foot of the cliff, climb to a bench, and discover a trail, deeply worn
in the rock. Where it crosses the side gulches in some places steps have been
cut. I can see no evidence of its having been traveled for a long time. It was
doubtless a path used by the people who inhabited this country anterior to the
present Indian races--the people who built the communal houses of which mention
has been made.
I return to camp about three o'clock and find that some
of the men have discovered ruins and many fragments of pottery; also etchings
and hieroglyphics on the rocks.
It's easy to see how somebody who is either sloppy or ignorant might misread the above quotes.
The people previous to the present Indians were other Indians, going back some 10 to 30 thousand years, not Egyptians. Also, the term "
hieroglyphics" does not automatically mean Egyptian, it's just the most common known to the average person. Other cultures have used
logograms as well.
Some Additional Links of Interest
See book, Hoaxes, by Curis D. MacDougall, pub by
Macmillan NY, 1940
 |
| G. E. Kinkaid -- ruler of the Grand Canyon |
|
|
I recently ran across the image of an old paperback I had
back in the late ‘70s and it brought back a flood of memories. It was the same edition I had owned of The Glittering Plain from the Newcastle
Forgotten Fantasy Library series, which pretty much took over the field when the Ballentine
Adult Fantasy series petered out. The
crappy blue monocolor cover and the hippy-dippy “mod” font on the inset was
unmistakable. .This got me googling around the internet to unearth some
information about the long-gone Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library series of
books. I hadn’t thought about them for
decades. Those old style covers eventually were phased out for full color covers with original art with later issues. 
As a warning to some of the younger readers of this blog,
the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library series is a collection of antique books
that are primarily Anglophile or Eurocentric in scope. They were reprinted in the 1970s, much like the earlier
Ballentine Adult Fantasy series and should be treated as a snapshot of that
period. Many of the books of these
series were originally published a century or more ago, so they may not conform
to the present state of fantasy writing, which is just as well, as fantasy is
all about going out of the box and exploring “what ifs”. When we lose our ability to dream and to put those ideas out in public
we lose a large part of ourselves. When
we lose the possibility of publishing those dreams or being able to find them
at bookstores or on line, we are in a dystopia. 
I’m not here to create new or anoint exiting cannon, just to
give new readers some ideas outside of the (present) box and let some older readers go
down memory lane for a bit with these familiar works. There’s recently been a lot of fuss about Appendix N [2]
books and the like, as well as other “must read” or “must not read” lists. There are attempts to control the narrative
of Fantasy in the present as well as quelling books from the past. Let’s keep our intellectual freedom open and
away from self-appointed gatekeepers who think that they are the only ones who
know what should be in print or on the net.
The other side of this problem is that there are those who think that
the Fantasy genre is static, like a fly in amber and only their approved cannon
is of consequence. Both sides are
wrong. 
Many of these books are out of copyright and available for
free on line through such sites as Project
Gutenberg or its sister down under Project
Gutenberg Australia, or at the Internet
Archive.org as well as through other electronic means. I found nearly all
of them online in a variety of e-formats, including audio, and for free. Did I mention free? Additionally, some of these titles can be
found as physical books at on-line book sites and at some book shops, used and for fairly reasonable
prices. Call me old fashioned, but
nothing really takes the place of holding a real book in your hands. 
