[2][3] At the end of his run through the Grand Canyon, the motorboats refused to give him a tow across Lake Mead, so he rowed the distance in four and a half days.
[4] Symbolically, he touched the newly built Boulder Dam with his boat at the end of his journey on November 20.
However, Colorado River historian Otis "Dock" Marston wrote that he actually went to the base of the dam at the end of his following trip.
[7] Despite the ground-breaking nature of Holmstrom's feat, his river-running was characterized not by bravado, but by humility and awe at his surroundings.
[2] When the United States entered World War II, Holmstrom enlisted in the Navy, where he served in the European Theater and Kiriwina Island in the South Pacific.