Archives West Finding Aid

The collection consists of digital scans of 35mm slides taken by Greg Dimmitt and David Thompson. These photographs document various river trips on the Colorado and San Juan Rivers in which Mr. Dimmitt and Mr. Thompson participated. The original 35mm slides from which these digital scans were made were returned to the donors after the scanning was completed in April 2002. It should be noted that the slides are not in strict chronological or geographical order, although every effort has been made to see that they are in order. Descriptions and other information about individual images was provided by Mr. Dimmitt and Mr. Thompson in a series of meetings with Special Collections staff in 2002. When names are given for individuals, they are listed left-to-right. If a name was not known in a group photograph, the unknown individual will be listed as __?__. If the location of the photograph is known, that will also be given after the names of people. It should be noted that some of the location names are unique to these groups and may not reflect names used on USGS maps or those used by other groups.

Mr. Dimmitt and Mr. Thompson were members of a loosely-organized group of river runners known as SOCOTWA, which stood for South Cottonwood Ward. SOCOTWA provided equipment and sometimes leadership for river trips through Glen Canyon on the Colorado River, the San Juan River, and other rivers in Utah. These trips were in the period 1954 through circa 1961; the earlier date was supplied by Mr. Dimmitt, while the latter date was ascertained from dates found on some of the original slides and from images of the half-built Glen Canyon dam, which was completed in 1963.