A view can be had of this canyon surpassed only by a similar view of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. At intervals along the west side of the canyon streams of various sizes rush over the edge of the chasm forming water falls from 800 to 2000 feet high. The stream in the bottom of the canyon appears as a silver ribbon winding its way among the undergrowth and occasionally disappearing from view. In my opinion this canyon should be set apart by the government as a national park. The report was dispatched to Washington, June 25, 1909. A little more than a month later, July 31, the Acting Secretary of the Interior recommended to the President the creation of the Mukuntuweap National Monument. President Taft signed the proclamation on the same day. This act was primarily a withdrawal from entry—a method of holding land for national purposes and preventing it from passing into private ownership. There was no active administration of the area at first. The farmers still cultivated the land, the stockmen continued to graze their cattle in the canyon and the sawmill owners to lower lumber over the cable. The canyon was still inaccessible to automobiles and the roadway for wagons or buggies was such that few people cared to drive over it for pleasure. Wesley King, of the Salt Lake Commercial Club, was an early exception. Poor roads could not thwart his desire to see the scenic beauties of which he had heard from E. D. Woolley, a prominent leader of Kane County. He and his wife traveled by train to Marysvale where they obtained a team and buggy and started south. A report of this trip appeared in _The Salt Lake Tribune_, November 12, 1911. King wrote: We crossed the divide ... and began our descent into and upon one of the most scenic portions of America.... I do not believe there is anything on the globe like the canyon of the Rio Virgin, or to compare with the Vermillion cliffs.... Our admiration for this people was aroused.... They can only market such products as can be driven across the mountains, while freighting of goods southward presents obstacles that would baffle the stoutest hearts. Here and over in the Dixie Land to the westward, the people live a simple, healthy life, unspoiled by the world and its vagaries. Children of the soil ... of one faith and with a singleness of purpose.... We lost our way and our tempers getting over the Sahara bordering Kanab. A lone sheep herder saved us on the second morning out and we floundered into Kanab over twenty-four hours late, just as Uncle “D” Woolley was starting a posse of Indian Scouts after us. The Kings took Dave Rust for guide and went over to Zion Canyon. On the brink above Rockville, they “hesitated for awhile in an effort to comprehend the grandeur of the ‘Great Temple’ and its score of lesser temples and towers, brilliant in the glow of the setting sun.” King’s story continued: