IMMIGRANTSFROM GERMANY, by Allan Kent Powell

by Allan Kent Powell

German-born immigrants have played significant roles in Utah’s history since the first AngloEuropeans entered the region because of the fur trade. Probably the first German-American to set foot in Utah was John H. Weber, who joined the William H. Ashley expedition in 1822. . . . During the next two decades other German-born travelers entered Utah [including] Charles Preuss . . . the official cartographer and artist for the John C. Frémont expedition [and] some members of the ill-fated Donner–Reed Party. . . .

Among the original 143 Mormon pioneers to enter the Salt Lake Valley [in 1847] was Konrad Kleinman, a native of Germany. . . .

One of the first (and perhaps the most famous) German convert to Mormonism, Karl G. Maeser, was baptized in the Elbe River near Dresden. Immigrating to Utah in 1860, Maeser—an educator by training—was asked by Brigham Young to move to Provo in 1876 to establish Brigham Young Academy, the forerunner of Brigham Young University.

While conversion to the Mormon faith was the primary impetus for most German immigrants to come to Utah, others came as miners or as merchants. The latter were almost exclusively German-born Jews who established businesses in Salt Lake, Ogden, and some of the mining communities [in the 1850s].

The most successful German-born miner in Utah was John Beck. Born in 1843 in Aichelberg, Wurttemberg, Beck joined the Mormon Church in 1862 and served as a missionary in Switzerland and Germany before leaving for

Immigrants from Germany