[8] Colter's family gave up their Arizona homestead due to hostilities with the Indians, after which they moved near Alma, New Mexico.

[6] As a young man, he worked as a cowboy and rancher, even becoming the champion steer roper in Apache County.

[9][13][10]: 17  A few months later, he purchased four lots of land on Central Avenue in Phoenix, on which he planned to build a winter home.

[26] Colter was the head of Arizona's contingent of six delegates, which included George Babbitt and James S. Douglas.

[34] In June, Judge Fred Sutter officially entered the race, although he had been discussed as a possible contender since March.

[37] In the midst of the race, Colter purchased a large home at the southwest corner of Central Avenue and McKinley Street in Phoenix, for the sum of $20,000.

[38][39] On July 20, 1918, the last day to do so, Colter officially entered the gubernatorial race when he filed his petition with the Arizona Secretary of State.

[40] On the final day, Lamar Cobb added his name to the list of Democratic primary candidates, bringing the total to five.

[43] In late August, on his way to a campaign stop, the car in which Colter was traveling struck a steer on the road between Bisbee and Tombstone.

[48] After his winning the nomination, his eligibility was questioned due to his involvement in the state legislature in raising the salary of the office of the governor during the prior year.

[52] A main point of the opposition to Colter's candidacy was lack of denouncing the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), which might have been due to Hunt's support for the organization.

[60] The final tally was Campbell 25,927 and Colter 25,588, with the third party socialist candidate, George D. Smith garnering 444 votes.

[61] In February 1919 Colter floated the idea of his running again for the governorship of Arizona in 1920, one of several prominent men to throw their hat into the ring.

[62] The controversy surrounding Colter's potential eligibility for assuming the role of governor led to a proposal to alter the existing verbiage in the law, so that it allowed existing lawmakers to vote on pay issues of offices they run for in the future, but not for offices which were created by their legislature.

Said statement appearing in documents which were released in relation to a bond issuance of $250,000 which Colter was preparing to pay off debts he had accumulated during the campaign.

[72] He would be re-elected in November 1924, for his fourth term, representing Apache County in Arizona's seventh state legislature.

He began an effort to put construct a series of dams from southern Utah all the way down to Yuma, Arizona.

[10]: 18 In 1923, Colter founded the Arizona Highline Reclamation Association, the goal of which was to create a system of dams and reservoirs in the state, utilizing the waters of the Colorado.

[81] Early in 1924, Colter announced that he would be challenging incumbent Carl Hayden for his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Hayden was a proponent of the Santa Fe Compact, and this was seen as an internal struggle within the Democratic party in Arizona.

[3] He was compared as Arizona's counterpart to California's William Mulholland, as well as comparisons to Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson for his stance on Arizonians' rights to the water.

[10][82] Colter dedicated most of his efforts of the last two decades of his life to establishing the highline canal, committing not only his time, but the large fortune he had accumulated during the 1900s and 1910s.

He brought an unknown number of his own cattle to the ranch, in addition to taking control of the 1100 head which were in Duge's herd, as well as over 800 he also managed for Elizabeth.

Two years later, he had developed four reservoirs in the area: Colter, Mexican Hay Lake, Pool Corral, and Hog Wallow.

[84] By the end of 1915 it was reported that several gold mining ventures to which he was a partner were beginning to bear fruit.

[90] Leaving his brother Bert to oversee his ranching concerns, Colter moved to Los Angeles in 1920, to bolster his weakening financial position, he founded the Northern Arizona Land Company, and increased the mortgage on his properties to $450,000 through a bond issuance.

[10]: 12 [91] With his return to Arizona politics in 1922, Colter once again began splitting his time between Phoenix and his ranch in Round Valley.