Treasure of Granite Gorge

The U.S. has few more desolate spots than the Grand Canyon's Granite Gorge, where the millracing Colorado River widens, flattens and becomes the tip of Lake Mead. The nearest town, Peach Springs (pop. 550), Ariz., is 50 miles away. Yet there last week was a marvel of modern engineering: one of the world's longest single-span freight tramways, stretching 9,010 ft. across and 2,800 ft. up to the south rim. Its purpose: to haul bat manure out of caverns where it has lain for ages and hopefully net the haulers $12.5 million profit on a $1,000,000 investment.

Since the '30s, prospectors have known that there were untold thousands of tons of one of the finest natural fertilizers packed in the caves, in some places 70 ft. deep. The problem was to get it out. Various companies tried to dragline the guano out of the caves, lower it to the canyon floor, then float it down the river on barges. The Colorado's raging moods queered that plan. Others tried to ferry it out by helicopter and by light planes; one company managed to fly out 400 tons, a ton at a time, before the canyon's turbulent air and logistics problems forced a halt.

No one made any money until two years ago, when Frank E. Ruben, 61, boss of the Toronto-based New Pacific Coal & Oils, Ltd. (mining, timber), got a whiff of the guano. He estimated the deposits held at least 100,000 tons and thought he knew how to go about getting it. Buying out the remaining leases, he went to U.S. Steel Corp.'s Consolidated Western Steel Division, asked it to stretch a huge cable-and-bucket rig from the caves to the canyon's south rim, where the guano could be trucked to market. Specifications: the cable must be strong enough to withstand 100-m.p.h. gales, the bucket big enough to cart 3,500 lbs. of guano in one scoop.

As it turned out the job was one of the toughest in Big Steel's history. The company had to plant huge towers at the cave and on the rim, sling light cables across the chasm by helicopter, then use them to haul across a 20-ton, 1 1/2-in-thick main cable. In summer, 130DEG heat down in the canyon made tools so hot they blistered workers' hands. All food and supplies had to be flown in from Los Angeles 435 miles away; some 200 tons of equipment (compressors, hoists, welding machines) was airlifted in pieces and assembled on the canyon floor. Finally, after nine months, the job was finished. Cost to U.S. Steel: $680,000, nearly $230,000 more than its firm bid. When and if all the guano is mined in ten years or so, says Ruben, "we'll simply offer tourists the only tram ride across the greatest hole on earth."

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