Historical Marker
The Canadian River
Amarillo, Potter County · Texas
Erected 1967
Below this point the Canadian runs in the gorge that long made it a barrier. Across the Panhandle it flows 500 to 800 feet below the plateau, and quicksand in its bed made it hard to bridge; about 190 miles of its course lie in Texas. Juan de Oñate probably knew it in 1601 as the Magdalena. The valley was Comanche country into the late 1800s and familiar to Comancheros trading out of New Mexico, and after the buffalo were gone cattlemen took it over; except for oil, it was still mainly ranch country in 1949.
What the plaque says
The Canadian River A travel route and dwelling site for over 12,000 years, the Canadian River supported stone and adobe Indian villages from the 12th to the 14th centuries. This waterway was also one of the first interior rivers of the U.S. known to early explorers. Coronado, coming from Mexico, crossed the Canadian in 1541 in his search for the famed city of Quivira. Juan de Onate, also seeking Quivira, saw the river in 1601. The Canadian traders Pierre and Paul Mallet followed it in 1741. Josiah Gregg, famous Missouri trader, took $25,000 worth of goods to Santa Fe along the river trails in 1839. Gold seekers bound for California were escorted along the trails in 1849 by Army Captain R.B. Marcy. During its history, the river has borne many names. The origin of the word "Canadian" is disputed. A possible source is the Caddo word "Kanohatino", which means "Red River". Some think it was named by the French-Canadians who traveled it in the 1700s, while others believe the river is called "Canadian" because it rises in a "canyon" (from the Spanish word meaning "boxed-in"). Beginning near the Colorado-New Mexico line in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the Canadian flows 900 miles. Its course runs southeast, then east until it finally joins the Arkansas 36 miles from Fort Smith. (1967)
Where it stands
35.47592, -101.88308 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument — 12 miHand-dug pits on a mesa above the Canadian River where people quarried banded flint for thousands of years and traded it across the Plains, seen on a ranger-led climb.
- Route 66 Sixth Street Historic District — 18 miThirteen blocks of Amarillo's streetcar suburb that Route 66 turned into a roadside strip, from the 1922 Nat to Texaco, Phillips and Dutch Mill stations, now shops and bars.
- Helium Centennial Time Columns Monument — 19 miFour sealed time capsules raised in Amarillo in 1968 for helium's centennial, in the city that for years produced almost all the world's commercial helium from the Cliffside field.
- Lake Meredith National Recreation Area — 20 miA Canadian River reservoir in 200-foot breaks, built to water the Panhandle's cities, that fell to a record 26 feet deep in 2013 and still rises and falls with the drought.