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Carrying the state’s name, the Colorado River starts in the Rocky Mountains and runs southwest, creating the Grand Canyon and providing Arizona and California with its border before feeding into Baja California in Mexico.
But have you heard of Rio Buenaventura, the river that flows from the Rocky Mountains directly into the Pacific Ocean?
It’s okay if you haven’t. For centuries, Westerners believed there was a river that went from the Rockies to the Pacific, even giving it a name and drawing maps with its hypothetical flow.
But in 1845, John Charles Fremont, the founder of California, proved what we know now, too: It isn’t real.
– Alex Simon, The 100 Companies