Archives West Finding Aid

BIOGRAPHY OF FREDERICK HOFFMAN WOOD / HISTORY OF THE HATCH EGGERT RIVER EXPEDITION

Frederick H. Wood (b. 1904) was the owner of the Open Book bookshops in Bridgeport and Fairfield, Connecticut. In 1952, he took his family on a one-month car trip to visit relatives in California. It was on this trip that Fred Wood began his love affair with the American west. He read everything he could regarding the history of western settlement. When he saw an ad in the SATURDAY REVIEW OF LITERATURE seeking participants in a river expedition to film the Colorado River, Mr. Wood replied, was accepted, and became a member of the crew during the two-month, 1,000 mile journey. The first leg was from Green River, Wyoming to Lees Ferry, Arizona, where the low stage of the water made the leaders decide to postpone the Grand Canyon segment of the voyage until the next year. In 1956, Fred Wood was back for the last part of the trip, through the Grand Canyon. After that, he never returned to the American West, but built a library of books about the region. He sold his bookshops in the 1970s, and died in 1986. In 2002, at the suggestion of Charles Eggert, the Library contacted Ann Wood Smith, daughter of Fred Wood, with the result that she donated her father's papers, photographs, and films to the Special Collections Department.

The Hatch-Eggert Expedition grew out of a conversation held between Don Hatch and Charles Eggert during the Echo Park Dam controversy. Eggert, a film-maker, and Hatch, son of Bus Hatch, founder of Hatch River Expeditions, agreed to put together a river trip for the purpose of filming the river canyons of the Green and Colorado--following the course of John Wesley Powell=s exploration in 1869Bbefore the great dams were built. Photography and other personnel consisted of Charles Eggert, the photographer; his assistant, a student named Anthony Tuttle; and Fred Wood, Cid Ricketts Sumner, and Dr. Bob Parsons, all of whom were chosen by Eggert based on their answers to an ad he placed in the Saturday Review of Literature. Boatmen, besides Don Hatch, included at various times Les Jones, Bruce Lium, Clark Lium, Al Galloway, and Sylvester "Smuss" Allen. They started from Green River, Wyoming, in June 1955, in two boats, a 10-man raft and a pontoon. They reached Lees Ferry, Arizona, later that summer without serious mishap. However, by then the water had reached a low stage and Don Hatch judged that it was too low for a safe passage through the Grand Canyon. They agreed to meet again the next summer, when the water would be higher, to complete the journey through the Grand Canyon. Accordingly, they met at Lees Ferry in June 1956, with mostly the same people, although there were some changes. Fred Wood and Charles Eggert were the only two of the original members who made the complete trip through the Grand Canyon, which was, again, done without problems. They were accompanied through the Grand Canyon by Jack Brennan, another pioneer river runner, who was testing a new boat and wanted to go along in case of trouble. Charles Eggert made two films, "A Canyon Voyage" and "Danger River" which he took on the lecture circuit and showed to audiences all over the country. These films, as well as his photographs of the expedition and all of his notes, files, correspondence, memorabilia, and other materials relating to the Hatch-Eggert Expedition, are found in P0766; ACCN 1659; and A0511.