CHAPTER VIII 

 FIVE YEARS ON POWELL'S SURVEY 



ACQUAINTANCE WITH POWELL 



Gilbert's association with Powell was the greatest determining factor in his mature life. 

 It lead him to broad opportunities which he greatly enjoyed and it imposed upon him heavy 

 sacrifices which he loyally made. The two men first met in Washington in the late winter or 

 spring of 1872, probably at a meeting of the Philosophical Society, and acquaintance was already 

 well entered upon before they went west for the summer field work of that year. At the close 

 of the season, when Gilbert on returning from the Plateau province was in Salt Lake City, 

 he invited one of his nongeological associates on the Wheeler survey to call with him on the 

 "Major," then in charge of the "Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain 

 region," and on the way spoke of him in terms of high praise as a man whom it was a privilege 

 to know. The visitors were cordially received and the conversation naturally turned to geo- 

 logical problems, especially those of the region north of the Colorado Canyon, where both 

 Powell and Gilbert had spent several previous months in field work. The third member of 

 the party afterwards remarked to his companion upon Powell's extraordinary frankness in 

 telling of his new results, which he imparted quite regardless of the fact that his visitors were 

 members of what might be considered a rival survey; but it may be well believed that the 

 frankness on Powell's part was in no small measure a response to his recognition of a fine sense 

 of scientific honor in Gilbert. 



The cordial relation early established between the two men is well illustrated by a letter 

 that Gilbert wrote to Powell from Fort Wingate, N. Mex., under date of July. 17, 1873, soon 

 after arrival there at the opening of his third western campaign on the Wheeler survey: 



I reached here by buckboard four days ago and have been skirmishing in the neighborhood for a geological 

 start. The lithological series is well exposed but I cannot find a fossil — except the Shinavav wood — between 

 the Permo-carboniferous and the Cretaceous. . . . One day I spent on the dislocation that Newberry described. 

 I think he and you, too, must have crossed it at Stinking spring on the Puerco of the Colorado Chiquito. A 

 few miles further north the structure is perfectly exhibited — a regular flexed fault without the slightest fracture, 

 and with a throw of 2500 feet to the west. From a high point I could see it for twenty-five miles at least. 



In closing he expressed the wish that Powell rather than himself should see the Indian 

 village of Zuni. "You would make the visit profitable while I shall merely gratify idle curios- 

 ity." Clearly the two geologists were on familiar terms with each other at this time, and the 

 acquaintance so well begun rapidly grew into a close intellectual comradeship; witness the 

 interchange of ideas about the Colorado Canyon and its problems, as noted above. In a few 

 years the relation of the two men became like that of older and younger brothers who had 

 complete trust in each other. 



The contrast between Powell and Wheeler must have had, on Gilbert's side, much to do 

 with the intimate association that sprang up between the director of one survey and a subordi- 

 nate on another; for while Gilbert's relations with his own chief were, so far as known, always 

 friendly and pleasant, they could not, in view of Wheeler's ignorance of geology, have been a 

 source of scientific inspiration, such as intercourse with Powell must have been from the first. 

 Moreover, Gilbert was not only hampered in his geological work under Wheeler by its subordina- 

 tion to the topographical objects of the survey, as has already been told; he chafed under its 

 military cast and was annoyed by the many restrictions imposed upon its conduct by reason 

 of rulings from military officials "higher up." Indeed, its chief himself was not free from 

 embarrassment caused by these strict requirements. A quotation made above from one of 

 Gilbert's letters explains how his wish for the early publication of his results was negatived by 

 the Chief of Engineers — doubtless with entire propriety from the standpoint of an engineer in 

 chief — and how little ambition he felt to write reports the publication of which would be post- 

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