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Show The First Intruders: Explorers, Traders, and Slavers 31 In 1826 and 1827 Jedediah Smith, an American fur trapper, made two crossings to California through Nuwuvi lands. Smith linked portions of the routes traveled by Escalante and Garces, thus establishing a connection between Santa Fe and the Pacific Coast which ran directly through Nuwuvi territory. Traveling south from Utah Lake with his party of fifteen men, Smith made no mention of Nuwuvi until reaching the junction of the Virgin and Santa Clara Rivers in August of 1826. He named the river now called the Santa Clara, "Corn Creek," for on its banks he found that corn and pumpkins were being raised. Though Smith's account is sketchy, he did record that he obtained corn and pumpkins from the Nuwuvi. He also acquired one of their "interesting pipes [made] from green marble" 40 for a friend's museum of Indian artifacts. The Nuwuvi, Smith recorded, were getting rock salt from a cave farther down the Virgin River. Traveling on down the river, when only two days from its mouth, Smith found the salt cave. The Indians had mined for centuries in this cave, which is now covered by Lake Mead. Nuwuvi alive today still remember going to these caves and bringing back sacks of salt rock. This salt mine on the Virgin River was used by Nuwuvi for hundreds of years prior to being flooded by the rising waters of Lake Mead. It is probably the same mine Jedediah Smith visited in 1826. (courtesy Smithsonian Institution) |