Ghost Towns: Dewey

Ghost Towns: Dewey

There are only three roads in Utah that bridge the Colorado River, and only a handful of crossings. The ghost town of Dewey is one of those places and early settlers of the region made good use of this crossing.

Getting across the Colorado River is hard! Just downstream from where the Dolores River enters the Colorado is one of the rare spots suitable for crossing. Thanks to the formidable, steep cliffs of canyon country, this spot -- now known as Dewey -- is one of the few places in southern Utah where a bridge spans the river. 

In the 1880s, Samuel King first set up a ferry crossing at Dewey. The ferry was a crucial transportation link, allowing cargo, passengers, and livestock to move to and from the remote communities across eastern Grand County. A settlement sprang up around the ferry, providing services for travelers. Farmers, prospectors, and families made the small riverside settlement into a home.

Grand County commissioned a new ferry in 1903, and paid Richard Westwood to operate the boat for many years. Westwood served as the County’s first elected Sheriff, his children attended school in Dewey, and his wife Martha ran a boarding house and served hot meals to travelers crossing on the ferry. While it was a small, remote community, Dewey’s residents were busy.

“I got 25 cents a meal for the steady boarders and 35 cents for the transients,” remembered Martha Westwood. “The mail from Cisco to Castleton and other outlying districts came with the stage, arriving there at eleven o’clock. I had to have dinner for the stage driver and all those who came in with the stage by 11:30 so that while they ate, I [handled] all the mail that came through.”

Maintenance on the ferry was expensive and sometimes left the boat out of commission. The vessel became obsolete overnight with the 1916 construction of the Dewey Bridge. Residents moved away, and many resettled in nearby communities.

The bones of the original Dewey Bridge still stand. It was restored in the early 2000s, only to tragically go up in flames in an accidental 2008 fire. Traces of the town remain, including old foundations and an icehouse carved into the sandstone cliffs. Today, the Bureau of Land Management maintains a campground and boat ramp at Dewey, and a newer bridge allows cars to cross the river.

By Moab Museum © 2024

Image: Ferry crossing the Colorado River at Dewey, 1910. This ferry was commissioned by Grand County in 1903 and operated by Richard Westwood to keep transportation lines open between Moab and Cisco. Image courtesy Moab Museum.
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See Daughters of the Utah Pioneers,Grand Memories, Utah Printing Company, 1972; Richard Firmage, A History of Grand County, Utah State Historical Society, 1996; Robert Mitchell, “Dewey,” Canyon Legacy (no. 51), Summer 2004; “The Wave of Progress,” Grand Valley Times, March 22, 1912.

The Beehive Archive is a production of Utah Humanities. This episode of The Beehive Archive was contributed by the Moab Museum. Find sources and the whole collection of past episodes at www.utahhumanities.org/stories.

2024-07-15