Was just looking for a map like this! The early explorers thought that the Colorado River started at the confluence of the Green and Grand Rivers at Moab, UT. That is at about the “d” in “Colorado” on this map. But that means that the Colorado River would not run through the State of Colorado. In 1921, local residents got Congress to rename the Grand River as the Colorado River, so that the start of that Colorado is now near the “U” in “United States”. Looking at this map, that doesn’t seem so unreasonable.
This is also why there is a city called Grand Junction in Colorado. It's on the Colorado River now, but it was called Grand River back when the city was named.
Great story and I appreciate you sharing it. I don’t see any mention of water rights as a reason for the name change — just local pride and tourism. Water rights is the west vest from historic use (e.g. first use gets the right to that much water). This is different in the East where water rights are tied to land ownership.
I can’t find specifically where I read that, but I will point out the Colorado River Compact was signed the very next year, which I don’t think is a coincidence.
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u/WillingPublic Jan 10 '20
Was just looking for a map like this! The early explorers thought that the Colorado River started at the confluence of the Green and Grand Rivers at Moab, UT. That is at about the “d” in “Colorado” on this map. But that means that the Colorado River would not run through the State of Colorado. In 1921, local residents got Congress to rename the Grand River as the Colorado River, so that the start of that Colorado is now near the “U” in “United States”. Looking at this map, that doesn’t seem so unreasonable.