EXHIBITS

Summary

“For many years this mountain world has been an elevating sight for me. More than ten years ago I rode out under their shadows with old Buffalo Jones and the Mormons, on my first wild trip. I did not dream then that it was turning my face to fame and fortune. It would be strange and inspiring to go down into the desert again, and visit those places I loved so well and felt so poignantly, and about which I have written my novels.”— Zane Grey, “Down into the Desert”

Zane Grey was the best-known author of Western novels in the early 20^th Century. His books shaped Americans’ views of the West as well as inspired other Western authors such as Louis Lamour. This digital exhibit focuses on the Zane Grey Rainbow Bridge photograph album from 1922, which contains over 400 images of Grey’s second trip to Rainbow Bridge, the world largest natural bridge located in Southern Utah. The photographs in this collection provide context for the settings Zane Grey used his novels as well serve as a window into how an American author in 1922 might view the American West with its diverse landscapes and peoples.