''Cocopah'', was a

stern-wheel A paddle steamer is a steamship or steamboat powered by a steam engine that drives paddle wheels to propel the craft through the water. In antiquity, paddle wheelers followed the development of poles, oars and sails, where the first uses were w ...

paddle-steamer A paddle steamer is a steamship or steamboat powered by a steam engine that drives paddle wheels to propel the craft through the water. In antiquity, paddle wheelers followed the development of poles, oars and sails, where the first uses were w ...

, the fifth steamboat on the

Colorado River The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid drainage basin, watershed that encompasses parts of ...

, first put on the river in August 1859. The ''Cocopah'' was built in 1859 for the George A. Johnson & Company in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

for $35,000. It was the largest steamboat yet used on river being 140 feet long and 29 feet wide, with a powerful engine that could carry up to 100 tons of cargo upriver against strong currents in the river. Additionally it had a draft of a mere 19 inches, with a full cargo, making it ideal for dealing with the snags and sandbars of the river especially in the low water time of the year. ''Cocopah'' was built to replace

Johnson Johnson is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin meaning "Son of John". It is the second most common in the United States and 154th most common in the world. As a common family name in Scotland, Johnson is occasionally a variation of ''Johnston'', a ...

's first steamboat, the side-wheeler ''General Jesup''. Richard E. Lingenfelter, Steamboats on the Colorado River, 1852–1916, University of Arizona Press, Tucson, 1978
The ''Cocopah'' was disassembled and brought down from San Francisco to the mouth of the Colorado River then unloaded onto a steamboat and taken up river to be reassembled at Gridiron Landing in

Sonora Sonora (), officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Sonora ( en, Free and Sovereign State of Sonora), is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the Administrative divisions of Mexico, Federal Entities of Mexico. The state is d ...

. It was launched there in August 1859. It was subsequently captained by David C. Robinson, a long time employee of Johnson's, who had recently captained the ''Explorer'' in an exploration of the Colorado River over 500 miles up river above Fort Yuma to the mouth of

Las Vegas Wash Las Vegas Wash is a 12-mile-long channel (an Arroyo (creek), "arroyo" or "wash") which feeds most of the Las Vegas Valley's excess water into Lake Mead. The wash is sometimes called an ''urban river'', and it exists in its present capacity because ...

(now under

Las Vegas Bay Las Vegas Bay is a bay at the western edge of Lake Mead in the U.S. state of Nevada. The bay is located within the Lake Mead National Recreation Area to the northeast of the city of Henderson, Nevada, near the junction of Lake Mead Drive and Lak ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

). The ''Cocopah'' remained in use on the Colorado until 1867, when it had its boiler and engine removed and was hauled out onto the bank to serve as housing for workmen at the port and ship building settlement at

Port Isabel, Sonora Port Isabel was a seaport established on Port Isabel Slough in 1865 during the American Civil War in Sonora, Mexico in the mouth of the Colorado River on the Gulf of California. It was founded to support the increased river traffic caused by the ...

References

{{Steamboats of the Colorado River Merchant ships of the United States Steamboats of the Colorado River Stern-wheel steamboats of California Ships built in San Francisco 1859 ships