Risk Takers - History Makers

In 1869, a one-armed explorer named John Wesley Powell became the first man to travel by river to the last unknown territory in the Continental U.S.: the Grand Canyon. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Grand Canyon was a giant unexplored gash in the American landscape, a mysterious void that inspired Powell a self-taught scientist and Civil War veteran to assemble a ragtag group of nine mountain men and head west to conquer the terrain. Over the course of their three-month, one thousand mile epic journey into the great unknown, the band of explorers would face starvation, back-biting, dizzying cliffs, terrifying rapids, and even death. But the driven Powell was determined the mission succeed, and by summer s end that year, he and the remainder of his crew floated out of the Grand Canyon and into the history books. Now, a modern-day team of adventurers tackles one of America s most unforgiving landscapes to trace, experience, and recount Powell s fantastic story. From swimming deadly rock-infested rapids to scaling cliffs as tall as skyscrapers, the team must rely on each other to survive. Will they succeed? And what insights will they gain into what it takes to be a risk taker/history maker? Only the canyon holds the answers and it s not going to relinquish them without a fight.