Beehive History 017

Edward Wilbur Clyde

rlverDanK engineering s~ i11sIr om mem, naullng heavy equlpnient up and down the river in various ~ mprov~ semdo tor and current- powered boats. While st111 a young man he was hired as a watchman at the abandoned dredge built In the 1890s In Glen Canyon by Robert Brewster Stanton. Chaftin opened a tradlng post there and dealt with Navajo Indlans. He not only survlved In this lonely and dangerous spot but prospered Chaffin's home at Hite, which he built In tne ear-ly 1930s. was a famous oaslr of fruit trees and melons that hot, weary travelers welcomed Its ~ solatlon, though, kept most vlsitors away, and Chaffin sought ways to open up that scenic corner g- e; z11717 of San Juan County to tourism. ,*,$ &%& H~ tew as named for Cass Hite, an earlier miner , s +,,$<* who had learned ot a convenient crossing of the Colorado R~ vera t that pomt from Navajo Indlans. & F*$* k:? zL2Tz, T he Dandy Cross~ nga, s H~ teca lled it, served the clenecd > reel, arrin rerry DC ," g&@ pack trams of explorers and cattlemen well I Scptc~ nbcr 17. ,146 It saw hee ., - ,- --. ... 0 :+$: enough, but even with a boat it was an inconvenient e UI anluln boom of the 1950s. ,*. 4 1, * Ty< ; &,;&? crosslng for tourlsts and impossible for automo- In 1948 Challin, nho had been marrled before ,>,+"'; , . 9 blles and had a clciughter. marlled Della Taylor L> ; a%',+? , Automotive access to Glen Canyon began in Hlclundn, a w~ do\ v cwth fi\ c daughter\ 5$. f. 2*?% 1932 when Chatfin borrowed a bulldozer from the A c l o ~ ~ of dd oom hung ovcr the f llte ferry durlng $: g2.- f ,- , * Utah Hlghway Department and carved out a road 11105t of 11s histor), for the Ru~ eau ot Rccl~ ima- ~ nfamous for 11s curves down North Wash to link tlon's dec151on to bu~ ld the Glen Canyon L) am Hanhsville and Hlte. Then ~ n 1945 state funds meant thd the c~ inyon would he tloodcd ktr above ~ ~ y bccamc avallablc to cxtcnd thc road from Hite to H~ teC hdllin loug'nt ~ nt he 1960s lo1 colnpensatlon & PA?-. ++ Blanding. For the first time, Wayne, Garfield, and ison1 ~ h ctc dcral go~ ern~ nertrotr 111s Glen Can~ on San Juan count~ esw ere llnked by an automob~ le p~ opert~ ehaut had to wttle for what he 1- cg'irded as &+ road- U- 95. Thls was not Chaffin's first road ven- far les4 th'tn the11 true worth ; 2R# ture Dur~ ng1 922- 26, whlle serving on the Waync On June 5, 1964, Chaffin's fell) made 11s l,~ st County Commission, he was instrumental ~ n secur- , run As the nates5 of Lake Powell slowly closed Ing a number of road Improvements In the area. " \ ,- OLCI h15 dr~! cn< h, onle. '~ ndf e r ~ at H~ ted colol- Chaftin's engineering sk~ llsc ame into play as he , ful 35- je, 11 cr, l In the h~ itorlo l Glen Canyon and mmered together a ferry capable of tloat~ ng ' soutlica\ terrt Utah cndcd Chaffind~ ecl In 1979 * \ d 11 I, Edward Wilbur Clyde He was a " guiding forcebehind the $ 2 billion Central Utah Proiect." Edward Wilbur " Ed" Clyde was born November 23, 19 17, in Heber City to L. Dean and ~ Ardell Buhler Clyde. He was raised with a com-prehension of the importance of land and water in semiarid Utah that a son of a farmer ( and later a cattle rancher himself) fully understands. He graduated from Brigham Young University in 1939 with a degree in speech and economics and from the University of Utah where in 1942 he earned his law degree and was honored as the top student in his class. Within a few years Clyde, a distant relative of a distinguished water engineer and gov- . rowerea e ferry and nufactured ernor, George D. Clyde, was recognized in Utah and the Intermountain West as a legal authority on natural resources. In 1941 Clyde married Betha ( Betty) Jensen, and they became the parents of four children: Steven E., Thomas E., Carolyn, and Susan. In 1949 Clyde was appointed to the National Rivers and Harbors Advisory Group to aid Con-gress and the president in developing laws to govern the nation's waterways and harbors. Short-ly after this the Utah attorney general appointed him as a special assistant attorney general to help with the colnplex legal negotiations for the Upper Colorado River Compact. His quick legal mind assured Utah of its fair share of Colorado Rivcr water. As these negotiations progressed Clyde also became involved in the legal planning for the Cen- tral Utah Project ( CUP). He later served as at-torney for the Salt Lake County Water Conservan-cy District and the Central Utah Water Conservan-cy District, two key organizations in the de-velopment and eventual operation and manage-ment of this important water reclamation project. His legal expertise was not limited to water reclamation. In 1962 Clyde was appointed to the National Advisory Council for Public Lands to review existing federal land laws. Then, with the beginning of rapid growth at the Salt Lake Interna-tional Airport, Salt Lake City hired him to settle a complex land problem to allow expansion. Committed to the values of higher education, Clyde served in various capacities at the University of Utah, including lecturer in the College of h w from 1945 to 1960. He was appointed to the uni-versity's Board of Regents in 1964 and in 1969 was elected president of the new Institutional Council which oversaw the school's growth. Later he served on the University of Utah Hospital board. Because of his years of service to the university Phi Delta Kappa honored him in 1973 as Man of the Year in Educafion, and in 1981 he received an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from the U. The Utah State Bar gave him its Lawyer of the Year Award in 1985, and in 1988 the U. S. Department of the Interior gave him its Citizen's Award. In the 1970s Clyde accepted appointment to the state's Constitutional Revision Commission and later succeeded Neal A. Maxwell as chair. The commission's objectives were to review the state constitution and make specific recommendations to streamline it and improve state government. Clyde did not aspire to political office, although he once served as chair of the State Democratic Convention. Rather, he worked behind the scenes to help revise state government, to provide direc-tion for an expanding state university and hospital, and to render legal counsel and direction for Utah's biggest reclamation project in its history. Ed Clyde died of cancer July 17, 199 1.