The History Blazer, February 1995

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February 1995 Blazer Contents Martha Hughes Cannon-America's First Woman State--Senator-

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The 24th Infantry Brought African Americans to Fort Douglas The Cigarette Ban of the 1920s Caused an Uproar Hispanic Folk Practices in Utah Include the Healing Arts The Panic of 1893 Severely Jolted Utah's Economy Children in the 1930s Hoped to Become Nurses and Pilots Faculty Firings at the U. Sent Bernard DeVoto Packing Too Prohibition Failed to Stop the Liquor Flow in Utah Women Strived to Establish a Silk Industry in Utah Chief Pocatello Struggles to Survive on Utah's Northern Frontier Woman's Home Association Tried to Help the 'Fallen" Alma Richards Was Utah's First Olympic Gold Medalist - - - . . - . - - .._ Traveling Gypsies Brought an Exotic Lifestyle to Rural Utah "

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Utah Expatriates Formed a Club in New York Boxing Fans Take the Plunge at Saltair Judge Orlando W. Powers Was a Key Political Figure The Civilian Conservation Corps Was a Boon to Utah Senator Joseph McCarthy's 1950 Visit to Salt Lake City Hospitals and Health Crazes Engrossed Utahns in the Late 1800s Captain Richard W. Young and the Spanish-American War

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Martha Hughes Cannon-America's First Woman State Senator

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MAY BE THE MOST MEMORABLE YEAR IN Utah politics,

Not only was -1896the year of Utah's admission to the Union, but Utahns also voted the first woman state senator in the United States into office. Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon was one of five Democrats running for the five seats in the Sixth Senatorial District in Salt Lake County. The fact that Angus M. Cannon, her husband, was one of five Republicans vying for the same positions added to the publicity surrounding the campaign. Only the top five vote-getters would win. Martha, who received over 4,000 more votes than her husband, and the other Democrats all won.

Martha was born July 1, 1857, in northern Wales to Peter and Elizabeth Evans Hughes.

After converting to the Mormon faith the family immigrated to Utah and settled in Salt Lake City.

From a young age Martha set high goals for herself and even dreamed of becoming a physician.

After a period of fiugal living she had saved enough money to enter the University of Michigan medical school in 1878. She graduated two years later at age twenty-three and then entered the University of Pennsylvania's department of medicine for additional training. At the Pennsylvania school she was the only woman in a class of seventy-five when she graduated in 1882. She also studied at the National School of Elocution and Oratory to improve her speaking skills.

Upon returning to Utah she opened a private practice but was shortly called to be resident physician of the Deseret Hospital in Salt Lake City. In this position she met Angus Cannon, who was serving on the hospital board, .and.mechisfoud--wifean.-October6, 1884. Martha put her medical career on hold for extended periods of exile in Europe and California to help prevent her husband's arrest under federal anti-polygamy laws. After government prosecution of polygamy largely ended, she felt free to begin her public life and soon became an active voice in the woman suffrage movement. With woman suffrage achieved in Utah,she traveled in 1898 to Washington, D. C., to deliver a rousing speech to a congressional committee in favor of granting women the vote nationally.

In her career as a state senator Martha directed most of her efforts toward promoting public health. She introduced legislation providing for the education of deaf, mute, and blind children and for the creation of a State Board of Health. Naturally, Governor Heber M. Wells appointed her as an initial member of the newly created health board where she helped shape its purpose and direction.

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Dr. Cannon spent the remainder of her life near her children in Los Angeles where she worked at the Graves Clinic and in the orthopedic department of the General Hospital. Her eventful life as mother, state senator, physician, suffragist, and public health advocate ended on July 10, 1932, at the age of seventy-five.

Sowces: Jean Bickmore White, "Martha H. cannon," in Sister Saints, ed. Vicky Burgess-Olson (Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 1978), pp. 385-97; Annie Laurie Black, "h Woman Senator," Salt Lake Herald, November 11, 1896; Constance L. Lieber, "'The Goose Hangs High': Excerpts fbm the Letters of Martha Hughes Cannon," Utah Historical Quarterly 48 (winter 1980): 37-48.

THE HISTORYBLAZERis produced by theUtah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For mote information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500. "'

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The 24th Infantry Brought African Americans to Fort Douglas h OCTOBER1896 SALTLAKEC m EXPERIENCED-a small butimportant change-inthe racial makeup of its population. The arrival of the U.S.Army's 24th Infantry Regiment at Fort Douglas brought approximately 600 African-American men, women, and children to the city. Only four African-American units existed in the U.S. Army; they were composed of white officers and black enlisted men. Fort Duchesne in eastern Utah was gamsoned by the black 9th Cavalry from 1886 to 1900, but those troops were seldom seen in Salt Lake while the 24th would be highly visible. The soldiers, their families, and others associated with the regiment roughly quadrupled Salt Lake City' s existing black population.

American society was highly polarized by race in the 1890s, and Utah was no exception.

Most African Americans still lived in the former slave states of the South where they experienced severe restrictions on their social and legal rights, including frequent violence. Salt Lake City's small African-American community did not experience much outright violence, but Utah's white population generally considered blacks second-class citizens. Minstrel shows, jokes, advertisements, and police behavior toward blacks demonstrated this attitude and reinforced negative racial stereotypes.

Black Army units usually served in remote areas @IceFort Duchesne, which Ninth Cavalrymen called the "American Siberia"). The 24th'~assignment to pleasant, urban Fort Douglas was meant as a reward.for--itsyears-on-thefrontierAe -movewas opposed by some of the city's white citizens. The Salt Lake Tribune suggested that drunken black soldiers might accost "the best people of the city" while traveling on streetcars. U.S. Senator Frank Cannon even met with the Secretary of War about the regiment's assignment but was unable to convince him to transfer the unit elsewhere.

Others, though, defended the 24th. A Captain Hoffman, a retired infantryman, claimed that the black soldiers were as good as any in the service and as well behaved. Julius Taylor, the African-American publisher and editor of the Broad Ax, a weekly Salt Lake newspaper, supported the move. The soldiers themselves were aware of the opposition; and one of them, Private Thomas A. Ernest, wrote a letter of rebuttal to the Tribune's editorial. In it he noted that the men had "enlisted to uphold the honor and dignity of their country as their fathers enlisted to found and preserve it. " Moreover, he asserted, the troops "object to being classed as lawless barbarians. We were men before we were soldiers.. .We ask the people of Salt Lake to treat us as such. " The 24th'~soldiers quickly proved their supporters correct. They joined existing fraternal organizations or formed their own. Their chaplain, Allen Allensworth, one of only two African(more)

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American chaplains in the Army, became a favorite speaker at local churches and social events.

The unit' s regimental band and baseball teams drew enthusiastic crowds.

The 24th'~deployment was not free from those problems-such as alcohol and gambling-commonly associated with military camps. One year after the soldiers' arrival, however, the Tribune acknowledged the men's general good behavior and professionalism. By their actions these African-American soldiers gained a measure of respect and admiration from the larger white society that was generally denied to black civilian.

When the regiment was ordered to Cuba and the Philippines during the Spanish-American War, local residents, both black and white, saw them off at the railroad station and welcomed them back to the city at the end of their tour of duty abroad. Several members of the 24th liked Salt Lake City well enough to make it their permanent home. &-

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See Rmdd G. Coleman, '~l&in Utah History: An ~nlcnbwn~ e ~ a c i ,in ' ' Helen 2.Papanikolas; ed: ;Pcopb of Urcrh (Sdt M e City: Utah State Historical Society, 1976), for more i n f o d o n on African-American life in Utah.

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The Cigarette Ban of the 1920s Caused an Uproar

ONFEBRUARY 24;

1923; A DETERMINED CROWD-of Utah citizens packed the Orpheurn Theater in Salt Lake City to voice their 'emphatic condemnation" of Utah's 'freak" anti-cigarette law. The meeting was organized by a committee of businessmen spurred into action by the arrest of several well-known citizens on charges of smoking in public dining rooms.

The Utah State Legislature had passed the cigarette ban in 1921, but it was never significantly enforced until the early part of 1923 when police officers began arresting Utahns for smoking in public places. Four prominent Utah businessmen, including Ernest Bamberger, National Republican committeeman and former senatorial candidate, were netted for smoking afterdinner cigars in the Vienna Cafe in Salt Lake City.

Such drastic measures soon caught national attention, and one speaker at the mass meeting for the law's repeal claimed that "Utah . . is being ridiculed from ocean to ocean and from Canada to the gulf . . because of its fieak legislation." Another critic claimed the cigarette law was uobnoxious" to a large number of Utahns and was 'a check on personal liberty." Other opponents of the law claimed that the ban on the sale of cigarettes had failed to deter smoking and instead had given rise to bootlegging. In fact, one speaker, H. R. Macmillan, asserted that more cigarettes were being sold in Utah in 1923 than had been sold before the ban.

It was not long before the State Legislature responded to the uproar over the unpopular law. and.enacted-legisJation that permitted the licensed On March 9, 1923, lawmakersnullifiededth-egbm sale of cigarettes and the advertising of tobacco. Many provisions of the bill were hotly debated.

Some wanted to maintain the prohibition on advertising to prevent the state's young people from being tempted. One lawmaker proposed an amendment that would have divided restaurants into smoking and nonsmoking sections. The proposal, however, was voted down after another legislator cited one Salt Lake City establishment that had attempted such a division. It seemed that to date there had been no meals served in the nonsmoking dining area. The final bill, which limited advertising to newspapers and permitted the sale of cigarettes only by licensed businesses, passed the House on a vote of 33 to 20. The Senate concurred without discussion.

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Ironically, the State Legislature would pass another ban against smoking in public places 71 years later. It went into effect January 1, 1995. Concerned about the possible danger of breathing second-hand smoke, mahy Utahns embraced the measure, and hardly anyone dared to call it "ak"legislation.

For additional information see John S. H. Smith, "Cigarette Prohibition in Utah, 1921-23," Utah Historical Q w I y 41 (fall 1973): 358-72.

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Hispanic Folk Practices in Utah Include the Healing Arts

ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE IS WIDELY RECOGNEED and taIked about in Utah and throughout the United States. Discussed in popular magazines and on television, it is more than a late twentieth-century fad, however. Its roots run deep, and its practice encompasses many aspects neglected by the mass media.

Curanderism, for example, is a folk curing practice that is widespread in Hispanic communities in the United States and in Central and South America, the Caribbean, and parts of Europe.

Scholars disagree on the precise origin of curanderismo-whether it is based on ancient European practices, pre-Columbian American healing arts, or a some combination of the two.

They do agree that the skills of the folk healer are usually passed down from generation to generation, often from mother to daughter in Mexican-American communities.

E. Ferol Benavides, who studied curanderismo in the 1970s, identified some prominent Utah curanderas (female folk healers) who offered to help those in need. Mrs. Blanco, a Salt Lake City woman reportedly from a Spanish-Rumanian background, was so well known that people came from surrounding states to seek her services. Those wanting a cure for themselves or a loved one were cautioned to follow her instructions exactly and were often required to pray for many hours each day.

Another Salt Lake City..woman,-Incarnacioe-FJofez,was esteemed throughout the Inter-.. mountain Area as a curandera. She was born near the turn of the century in Fresnillo, Zacatecas, Mexico, and came to Utah with her husband, a railroad worker, in 1920. Mrs. Florez exemplified the traditional Mexican-American curandera in her use of prayer, herbal medicines, and ritual acts to help the ailing. She emphasized that the cure came from God and that she was only a instrument of the divine will. Mrs. Florez, like all "real" curanderas, Ms. Benavides emphasized, did not advertise and did not take money for her services, only an occasional gift to help defray expenses.

Like other reputable curanderas, Mrs. Florez recommended that the sick also seek help from a regular medical doctor. For more than 40 years she quietly offered her assistance to those in need, and until her death in 1968 the sick came from as far-away as Houston, Texas, to see La Medica in Salt Lake City.

Te Marie Cisneros Valdez, born in La Madera, New Mexico, in 1928, was another Utah curandera that Ms. Benavides discovered during her research. As a girl of twelve, Te Valdez apparently cured a sick cousin with an herbal tea. After witnessing this display of aptitude and initiative, her grandmother Agustinita Cisneros, a well-known curandera, began to train her as an (more) -

herbalist. When Te Valdez and her husband Eddie moved to Ogden in 1948 she continued her work as curondera. Although she based her practice on herbal remedies, she also used massage and other traditional folk treatments.

These curandefar provided a uniquely Hispanic perspective to healing, but they are also part of a larger group of folk practitioners in Utah that includes women and men from virtually every ethnic community.

For more information see E. Ferol Benavides, "The Saints among the Saints: A Study of Curanderismo in Utah, " Utah Historical Quarterly 41 (fall 1973): 373-92.

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The Panic of 1893 Severely Jolted Utah's Economy

Tm NATIONWIDE DEPRESSION-OF-THE 1890s -was one of the most severe in United States history. More than one-sixth of America's railroads went into bankruptcy in 1893, and farm prices and income dropped to their lowest levels in three decades. Utah's economy, reliant upon agriculture, mining, and transportation, was hit particularly hard. Silver production declined 33 percent, copper 48 percent, and salt production suffered an incredible 92 percent fall. Needless to say, unemployment and economic despair ran high.

In contrast to the barrage of New Deal legislation in response to the Great Depression of the 1930s, the federal government under Grover Cleveland adopted a laissez-faire attitude toward the Panic of 1893 and its aftermath. Cleveland left it up to municipalities and private charities to alleviate the distress. Even these local efforts proved minimal owing to the prevalent opinion that the dole destroyed character by giving something for nothing. Some cities did open soup kitchens, and others required that the destitute work in public parks or on the streets to earn relief. In Utah many citizens apparently turned to the Mormon church for assistance.

Mormon leaders responded with what historian Leonard J. Amngton called "perhaps the most important regional effort in the nation to stimulate economic activity and raise incomes."

Efforts to alleviate suffering included moral admonition, stop-gap relief, resettlement, and new industries. Church officials encouraged people to leave Salt Lake City for rural areas where the cost of living was lower and opprtunities ....for --- self-help were - .. - more .. . readily available. Leaders also instructed missionaries to discourage the migration of converts to Utah and urged Latter-day Saints to give their exclusive patronage to Utah industries. Salt Lake City congregations arranged for unused land to be loaned to the poor for vegetable gardens, and members were asked to fast one day a month and give the amount thus saved to local bishops for distribution to the needy.

In March 1894, 1,637 persons in Salt Lake City were receiving church aid. The high number in need of assistance prompted the church to organize the Industrial Employment Bureau which helped to match those looking for jobs with potential employers. Finally, in its most extensive efforts to combat employment problems, the church singled out several industries for special assistance and development. For example, it financially supported the construction of a $400,000 sugar factory in Lehi that by 1899 employed more than 100 workers and provided income to over 600 farmers. The church also became involved in the salt industry, constructing not only a salt refinery and railroad but also the Saltair bathing palace by the Great Salt Lake.

The overall success of the church's relief efforts are hard to determine, but there was at least one downside to the church's extensive business activities. It led to renewed accusations by . . %

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businessmen that Mormons sought to monopolize Utah's resources. Nevertheless, it seems that church leaders did help stem the tide of distress and, in the absence of outside aid, provided a measure of relief for suffering Utahns.

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Children in the 1930s Hoped to Become Nurses and Pilots the-United Statesinto-theGreat Depression also affected Utah quickly and severely. By 1932 farm income had declined from $69 million to $29 million. More than a third of Utah's work force was unemployed at the depth of the depression, and in 1934 Utah ranked fourth nationally in the number of citizens on relief.

Certainly people's dreams and aspirations were also affected by such widespread economic despair. However, it seems that children along the Wasatch Front still maintained hope for a better life. In 1936 Salt Lake City schools conducted surveys concerning the future aspirations of their students. Some responses reflected the extracurricular activities of the children.

For example, many children at the Ensign Elementary School belonged to the Junior Red Cross program. They frequently visited the nearby Veterans Hospital where they sang on several occasions and also made menu cards and nut cups for the patients. Not surprisingly, almost half of the girls in Alice Page's kindergarten class aspired to be nurses, and one girl even planned on being a doctor. Mother and teacher were other top choices among the girls. The largest percentage of kindergarten boys hoped to be airplane pilots, but policeman and doctor also ranked high.

Results were similar among fifth graders at the Ensign School. Almost half of the ten- and elevenyear-old boys wanted to be pilots. One boy wanted to be an insurance agent, while another, Neil Holbrook, hoped to one day be a radio announcer. Nurse was still most popular among fifth-grade . girls, but others aspired to-be singers~e8eher.~.~~s)enographe~s ordress-designers.

The first-grade children at Columbus School had a wider range of goals. Eugene Crowton and Eugene Moray both wanted to be inventors. Jay Crawford wanted to be a judge, and Kenneth Martin hoped to coach football someday. Most of the girls chose nursing; teaching, or motherhood as their future plans. In contrast, Ruth Scarlet hoped to be an elevator operator and Marine Jensen specifically wanted to be a farmer's wife.

Aspirations became even more diverse among the high school students surveyed. At West High School most of the senior boys wanted to be either civil or electrical engineers, but others were more descriptive. For example, George R. Morgan wanted "to have a good job and travel"; Donald Nelson hoped to "join the Navy and go places"; and Dean L. Phillips dreamed of becoming an 'outstanding tennis star." As for Frank Gilmore's aspirations, he simply commented, "frankly I have none." Almost opposite to Gilmore in response was Bob Fugal who hoped to be a "Jack-of-darned-near-all-trades." Equally ambitious among the girls was Lael Woolsey who wanted to be an author, poet, and artist. Other senior and junior girls hoped to be telephone operators, actresses, secretaries, airline stewardesses, and beauticians. But perhaps it was Kathryn (more)

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Lee's aspiration that best echoed the hopes of many in the trying depression years of the 1930s.

She just wanted "a happy home and family. " In addition to compiling rosters listing the future goals of students, the Salt Lake School District conducted an Ideal Boy and Girl Contest to decide who would be the models for the children represented in the statue located on the west side of the Salt Lake City and County Building. Among the contestants for Ideal Boy was Russell M. Nelson, a future leader in the LDS church, who wanted in 1936 to be a world traveler. J. William Fehr, another candidate, hoped to be a pilot as a Nth grader at Jefferson School; later he became editor of the Salt Loke Tribune and a licensed pilot. Though the contest was close, Frank Wilkins was chosen as the Ideal Boy. He later achieved his goal of becoming an attorney and also served as a judge in the Third District Court and on the Utah Supreme Court.

Patricia Van Derck was chosen fIom the Ensign School as the Ideal Girl. Though her announced goal was to become a nurse, she later became a schoolteacher in Missouri.

Both Patricia and Frank took daily trips to the sculpting studio of Torlief S. Knaphus.-The statue he created represents the two youngsters gazing upward in aspiration. Though their faces grew older, the statue has continued to preserve their youth for almost 60 years. Their gaze gives viewers, symbolically, a snapshot of the hopes and dreams of some 33,000 students who made the statue possible.

The idea of creating a monument dedicated to the children of the city became a reality when school district officials agreed to take on the task. Because of the Great Depression few funds were available for the project and students were asked to donate pennies, nickels, and dimes to the project. For many families the request for fifteen cents from each student was all that could be spared under the difficult economic circumstances.

Both the statue and the rosters listing what students wanted to be when the grew up provide keen insight into Utah society in the 1930s.

Soutce: Rosters compiled by the schools in 1936 are archived in the Utah State Historical Society Library.

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Faculty Firings at the U. Sent Bernard DeVoto Packing Too

THEYOUNG

BERNARD DEVOTO; LATER TO BECOME a famed-literary-critic;.historian,.-

novelist, and conservationist, could not have chosen a more significant year to leave his home town of Ogden to attend the University of Utah. During spring quarter of his freshman year, in 1915, a controversy erupted that sent the campus into an uproar of political and religious &bate.

For DeVoto, the event provided the final push that sent him far away from Utah and to the beginning of his literary career.

Born to a Catholic father and a Mormon mother in the mostly Mormon town of Ogden, DeVoto never seemed to agree with Latter-day Saint perspectives, or indeed with most organized religion. The university had represented a place where he could finally voice his opinions and find friends sympathetic to his viewpoint. One such friendship developed with his professor and mentor Charles Wilbert Snow.

As a faculty member in the English Department, Snow was considered one of the more radical teachers on campus. He, along with several others, tended to disregard advice from the university administration to avoid any discussions that were politically or religiously offensive.

What were the 'issues" in 1915 that represented such a threat to the university administration? As an influential man in the Salt Lake community, Joseph T. Kingsbury, president of the university, wished to eliminate radical viewpoints from the campus as a means of maintaining suehas Snowrwho-seemed out-of the mainstream, public support for the institution;--Professo~s~ threatened that objective in Kingsbury's mind. Those with a reputation for liberal thought were advised not to speak publicly on political matters, such as the currency system debate, or encourage religious discussion in the classroom. Under Kingsbury U. professors were constantly being watched.

During the 1915 school year the U. president's paranoia seems to have included the belief that an underground radical movement was developing on campus. On February 28 Kingsbury dismissed four professors from the faculty, including Snow. Nearly a week later, Professor George W. Marshall, head of the English Department, was excused from office. Kingsbury's only explanation of the firings was the vague statement that they were 'for the good of the University."

Despite the student protests and media coverage that followed throughout the month of March, he refused to provide further justification for his actions.

But small groups of students and faculty had their suspicions about the president's motivations. For them "repression, suspicion, and opportunism" became the catchwords describing the

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policies of the university administration. Despite demands from the university faculty, the Ladies' Literary Club, and the Alumni Association to investigate the case, both the Utah State Senate and Board of Regents declined. Kingsbury had too many personal ties with both bodies for strong opposition to form.

Dismayed and angered by Kingsbury's firings, fourteen faculty members resigned from the university on March 19. They were not the only ones who left. Freshman Bernard DeVoto, for one, was shocked by the events that had occurred. Not only had the president stifled free speech at the academic institution, but he had also fired the professor who had been the most influential in shaping this young scholar's early ideas. To DeVoto the event represented the culmination of intellectual repression and backwardness that had typified the society of his youth and young adulthood. Determined to find a setting where he could think and express himself freely, DeVoto applied to and was accepted by Harvard University.

By the summer of 1915 the controversy at the U. had faded. At the request of the Board of Regents, Kingsbury was on an extendedvacation 'back East,"-new -faeulty members were moving into offices once occupied by more "radical" professors, and students were happily preparing for another school year. By the fall, life seemed back to normal at the University of Utah.

For Bernard DeVoto, however, the episode had changed his life. By the summer of 1915 the young man was on a train heading for Massachusetts. With each mile Utah was fading farther and farther into the distance.

THE HISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

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Prohibition Failed to Stop the Liquor Flow in Utah

NATIONALLY IN 1893 A- GROW

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MORAL ~ ~ ~ o ~ ~ ~ ~ s - o the r g ~nti-saloon a n i z e d League. -

It joined forces with the Women's Christian Temperance Union to intensify the long-standing campaign against drunkenness and its harmful effects on society. These organizations advocated government intervention to regulate drinking. In response to such lobbying many state, county, town, and city officials began restricting the sale and consumption of liquor. In fact, by the turn of the century nearly one-fourth of America's population lived in 'dry" communities that prohibited the sale of liquor.

Even before Utah finally enacted statewide prohibition in 1917 many small towns had already adopted their own anti-liquor laws. On October 21, 1911, St. George passed an ordinance prohibiting the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors. Yet, as St. George and other communities found, regulating people's drinking habits was no easy task. Less than two months after the bill's enactment several young men secured a five-gallon keg of wine and sneaked west of the city to indulge. After enjoying much of the illegal liquid one young man, for no apparent reason, shot and wounded one of his drinking buddies. News of the incident traveled fast, and soon the whole group was arrested and tried for drunkenness. One pled guilty and was fined $7.

Four others were acquitted due to lack of evidence, and two more were found guilty and fined $10 each.

Not only was regulating-drinkingdiffic~lt~..b~~-asGmd-County - officers discovered; stopping its illegal sale was also challenging. In 1911 Sheriff Bliss of Moab, acting on information that John Tescher was selling liquor from his home, searched the residence and seized about three quarts of whiskey and numerous empty kegs. Tescher pled guilty to owning and keeping whiskey for sale and was fined $250. In another Grand County case Warren 3. Gardner was found guilty of selling a gallon of wine to five minors. His attorney tried to establish that the wine was actually unfermented pure grape juice, but two of the boys testified to the contrary. They told the court that they became intoxicated after drinking it. The jury believed the boys, and the judge sentenced Gardner to ninety days in the county jail.

These experiences were only precursors of what lay ahead. After the ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S.Constitution in 1919, which instituted nationwide prohibition, the illegal production and sale of liquor increased dramatically in Utah and across America. Largescale regulation proved even more challenging than enforcing state and local ordinances.

In 1923 Utah's attorney general claimed that drinking in the larger cities was just as bad as before prohibition. Huge profits from the manufacture and sale of liquor made it impossible to (more)

stop. In Milford, Beaver County, officials alleged that the chief bootlegger was the city marshal's sister. In Sanpete County one bootlegger loaded whiskey in the pack saddle of his trained horse and sent it home over twenty miles of mountainous road. He returned in his car, and when officers stopped him on suspicion of bootlegging they found no liquor in his vehicle. One Salt Lake City mother kept a still going in the basement of her house while her husband was serving an eighteenmonth sentence for bootlegging. More shocking, raids on speakeasies in Utah often netted off-duty policemen among the criminal drinkers. Overall, from 1925 to 1932 federal agents in Utah seized over 400 distilleries, 25,000 gallons of spirits, 8,000 gallons of malt liquors, 13,000 gallons of wine, and 332,000 gallons of mash.

Local authorities did their part to ensure that their respective towns remained dry. In Utah's Dixie, when one local drugstore began selling "tonic beverages," a question arose over the defmition of "intoxicating liquors." While the town clerk wrote to the state attorney general for clarification, town leaders instructed the marshal to request that the drugstore "promise to stop selling alcoholic tonic." If the store manager refused, the marshal was to threaten mnrenewal of his business license. The scare tactics proved unnecessary when the store owner agreed to remove the offensive liquid from the shelves.

Problems of enforcement and the unpopularity of prohibition led to agitation for its repeal.

Following his 1932 election, President Franklin D. Roosevelt kept his campaign pledge and each state soon began voting on the issue in special conventions. Despite the Mormon church's efforts, Utahns voted on November 7, 1933, for repeal of national prohibition and in the same election also repealed the state's liquor law. Utah was the thirty-sixth state to vote for repeal and thus, ironically, delivered prohibition its death blow.

Legal liquor began flowing again in Utah in 1935 when the first state liquor stores in Salt Lake City and Ogden opened their doors. Business was brisk at the new stores as Utahns eagerly purchased the once forbidden liquors; in the first fifteen days of operation receipts totaled $54,866.

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Women Strived to Establish a Silk Industry in Utah R - ~ s p o ~TOmBRIGHAM ~ YOUNG'SCALL for self-sufficiency,-Mormon women in the1870s began the seemingly impossible task of producing silk in Utah. Since silk dresses were the fashion of the time, the Deseret Silk Association was established by the women to prevent dependency on costly imports.

The project began in 1875 with the mass distribution of silkworm eggs and machinery to local Relief Society throughout the temtory. Women were asked to devote one room in their house to caring for the worms. Mulberry trees were also needed to feed the worms. Brigham Young agreed to donate mulberry cuttings from the church f m to local congregations involved in the effort. A year later nearly every Relief Society in the West had agreed to grow mulberry trees and produce silk. By 1877 nearly 10,000 new mulberry trees and five million silkworms had been introduced into the tenitory. .

The process of producing silk proved to be no easy task. Historian Leonard J. Amngton explained that in some cases silkworms nearly took over the house. The package of eggs given to each woman seemed so small that some asked for additional packages-more, it turned out, than their small homes could accommodate. In such cases the silkworms occupied more than one room in the house. Family tales include stories of worms taking over whole houses and forcing people to sleep outside in their orchards. Minutes from a Relief Society meeting in St. George on May 6, 1880, recorded the complaints~~f~oame~wamen that .their-parlors-were. being taken over by the worms. Others said that the smell drove their families from the house to eat in the woodshed.

Despite these troubles, women remained devoted to the effort for nearly twenty years.

Daily routines of washing and cutting mulberry leaves, feeding the worms, and cleaning trays kept silk producers more than busy. Some successes encouraged women to continue their hard work.

Christine Forsgren of Brigham City was known for making 130 yards of silk using only the small loom her husband had made for her. In addition to making underwear, neckties, and handkerchiefs, Forsgren produced a "genuine silk dress. " With the exception of a few success stories, however, the silk industry in Utah was never profitable. In 1880 the Utah Silk Association was established and proceeded to erect a building at the mouth of City Creek Canyon dedicated to producing silk. After several years of manufacturing only silk handkerchiefs, the operation ceased. In 1896 the effort was revitalized by the creation of a Utah Silk Commission responsible for donating $3,000 per year to the production of cocoons. By 1905 the commission had been abolished because of the unprofitability of the industry.

By the turn of the century, when better transportation and communication tied Utah's economy more closely to the outside world, the silk industry was coming to a gradual end. Despite (more)

the apparent failure of the industry, the effort to produce silk in the territory was a remarkable attempt that amazed the national and international world. During the World's Fair of 1893 the exhibit of Utah silk caught the eye of U.S. Department of Agriculture officials, Japanese silk experts, and French judges. Many were surprised and some even doubted that silk could be produced in a semi-arid place like Utah. The definitive evidence of numerous silk products made in Utah showed that they were wrong.

See Leonard I. Arrington, "The Economic Role of Pioneer Mormon Women," Western Humunities Review, spring

1955.

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Chief Pocatello Struggles to Survive on Utah's Northern Frontier

CHIEF POCATELU)-C,WE

*

TO

BE KNOWN IN THE 1860samong Mormon leaders, Indian

agents, and army officers headquartered in the Salt Lake area for his exploits as the head of a socalled outlaw band of Indians. Although the Shoshones under Pocatello's lead did terrorize settlers and immigrant trains, such acts were largely retaliatory in nature and done in hope of securing equal and humane treatment. The encroaching whites had destroyed game and grass cover and had killed Pocatello's tribesmen in wanton attacks.

Born around 1815 in the Grouse Creek region of present northwestern Utah, Pocatello was headman of his band of Shoshones by the time the Mormons arrived. As settlers began converting Indian ancestral lands into farms and the California gold rush led to increased traffic westward, Indians increasingly responded with raiding attacks. Pocatello's band was blamed for the rise in violence along the California Trail, Salt Lake Road, and Oregon Trail. Brigham Young tried to appease Pocatello's group with food and supplies, but the Indians grew ever more uneasy with the arrival of Johnston's Army in Utah Territory in 1858. Pocatello's band did raid and kill at times along immigrant trails, but in the chiefs mind the violence was provoked. In response, in January 1863 Colonel Patrick Edward Connor and soldiers from Fort Douglas set out to "chastise" the Shoshones. Pocatello and part of his people learned of the approaching troops and fled a day before Connor arrived. They thus escaped the infamous Bear River Massacre during which Connor's men killed hundreds of-Indians: Soldiers-continued to-pursue-Pocatel10,-and the chief soon sued for peace.

Eventually, in the hope of decreasing the despair and hunger among his band, Pocatello consented to relocate to the Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho where the government promised relief.

The $5,000 in annual supplies agreed upon rarely arrived, and the Indians continued to suffer.

In 1875, when news of Gwrge Hill's Mormon missionary farm near Corinne, Utah, reached Pocatello, the chief saw an easy solution to his people's hunger. Hill, with the help of Indian converts, had planted wheat, corn, potatoes, and garden vegetables. All that was required to receive assistance was baptism into the Mormon faith. In May 1875 Pocatello and his band, traveled to Utah and requested baptism; the missionaries joyfully obliged. The influx of Indians did not sit well with Corinne residents, however, and townsfolk soon agitated for their removal.

Federal troops responded and forced the return of the converts to Fort Hall.

Pocatello and many of his people felt betrayed and rejected Mormonism. They continued their struggle against hunger on the reservation. Pocatello withdrew from participation in reservation affairs and lived his remaining years in discontent. In October 1884 the chief died. According (more)

to his instructions, his body, dong with his clothing, guns, knives, and hunting equipment, were bound together and tossed into a deep spring in southern Idaho. Eighteen horses were also slaughtered and rolled iGo the spring on top of the chief.

For additional information see Brigham D. Madsen, Chief Pocatello.. Z k "WhitePlume" (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1986).

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Woman's Home Association Tried to Help the "Fallen"

THELATE 1 9 AND ~ EARLY ~ -~OTH-CENTURXES WITNESSED an international campaign to - -

. .

eradicate prostitution, the "social evil. " Locally, the Woman's Home Association began in Salt Lake City in 1894 as an interdenominational church program to rescue "fallen" women from a life of prostitution. Lack of funding and support from the sunounding community prevented the association from achieving its original goal, but the organization did provide employment for poor women for a number of years.

The association's president and chief spokesperson, Cornelia Paddock, was well known for her charitable work and her authorship of anti-Mormon novels. The wife of Alonzo G. Paddock, who was engaged in mining, Cornelia had a city directory listing under her own name in the 1890s as an "authoress." Two of her works, The Fate of Madame La Tour and in the Toils,helped to fuel the national debate of the 1880s over Mormon polygamy and church political control of Utah Temtory.

According to Paddock, the Woman's Home Association spent months attempting to find a suitable location for a "home for erring girls" where they could be reformed. A committee reportedly investigated about thirty suitable homes but could not find an owner willing to rent a building for such purposes. While condemning Salt Lake City's lack of compassion for "women who are destitute and homeless," Paddock wryly noted that "there have always been some property t 10 reform. " Blocked in its effort owners willing to rent houses .to.those Cwomen].who ..do n ~..wish to change the lives of prostitutes, the association decided to concentrate instead on providing employment training for poor women.

By January 19, 1895, the association had opened offices in the Alexander Block at 372 South Main Street. The WHA operated a free employment agency, receiving applications from women who desired work and from persons wishing to engage them. By the end of the month Paddock could report that between 30 and 40 women had applied for work and that the association had successfully placed many of them, mostly in domestic, laundry, and sewing work.

Paddock continued to plead for donations of food, clothing, and equipment, especially for the WHA's immediate goal of establishing a sewing room on the premises so that the association could directly employ applicants. By late February the sewing room had been completed, and a number of women were engaged in "plain sewing" jobs for individual customers.

The association continued to live a precarious financial existence, surviving on contributions ranging from fifty cents to twenty-five dollars. Paddock reported in March that while applications and walk-ins continued to pour in, the WHA did not have enough funds to continue beyond the end (more)

of riie week and still lacked the facilities to provide overnight shelter for the homeless. The association was forced to give up its sewing room, but its first annual report indicated that 139 women and 167 girls had registered for employment.

Paddock persisted in her efforts to aid "fallen women" and reported in 1896 that sixteen had been cared for, including eight who had been sent to the Home for the Friendless in Ogden.

She became a f d a r figure in Salt Lake City's Police Court, exhorting women arrested for prostitution to allow the association to help them reform and gain honest employment. After her death in January 1898 Paddock's associates tried to continue the work, but the association was apparently disbanded by 1901.

Ironically, seven years later, in December 1908, the Salt Lake City Council, then dominated by members of the American party, took the opposite approach to prostitution and welcomed the opening of a red light district called The Stockade on the city's west side (between 500 and 600 West and 100 and 200 South), operated by the notorious Ogden madam Belle London. Widespread opposition to this officially sanctioned "sin district" forced its closure in September 1911; For more information on The Stockade see John S. McCormick, "Red Lights in Zion: Salt Lake City's Stockade, 1908-11,"Utah Historical Quarterly 50 (spring 1982): 168-81.

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Alma Richards Was Utah's First Olympic Gold Medalist ALMA RICHARDS, A-LANKY,

UNASSUMINGPAROWAN;.

UTAH,farm-boy seemed an unlikely -

competitor in the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, Sweden. Fellow athletes, while aboard a ship sailing to the games, amused themselves by prodding the "raw youngster" on his hick upbringing.

Richards made it to the games on a supplementary list and only then at the insistence of a U.S. Olympic commissioner who had watched the Utahn perform and became "convinced that he was one of the greatest jumpers in the world." A few days into the games the commissioner's instincts proved true; Richards won the gold medal in the running high jump and set a new Olympic record.

Richards was born February 20, 1890, in Parowan, Iron County, to Morgan and Margaret Richards and began his track and field career while attending the Murdock Academy at Beaver. He later claimed that his running and jumping prowess came from chasing jackrabbits in the fields near his home. After a successful high school athletic career Richards attended Brigham Young University where he perfected his technique under the coaching genius of Eugene L. Roberts.

Richards's unorthodox style startled the jumping world. He leapt with his body erect and his legs crossed under him but still managed to reach great heights. Regardless, he was not considered a serious contender at the Stockholm games. All the world's greatest jumpers had gathered in Sweden, including George L. Horine, the world record holder from Stanford University. Yet, as the athletes began their jumps, many of the top contenders failed to clear the bar and soon even Horine missed;-Only-Richards-and-Hans4ieschede-German competitor were left; The bar was at 6' 3". Both jumpers cleared this height and it was raised again. When the bar reached 6' 3.3" Richards again flew over, but the German did not.

The f m boy from Parowan won the gold, becoming Utah's first Olympic champion in any sport. Richards later recalled his feelings at the medal ceremony: "Nothing ever will erase that memory, when King Gustav stepped fonvard to place the gold medal around my neck while the Stars and Stripes rose to the top of the highest flag pole and the band played the Star Spangled Banner. " Throughout his entire athletic career Richards won more than 245 medals and trophies in track and field events worldwide. As a soldier in World War I he competed at the 1919 American Expeditionary Force Games in Paris and was the high point athlete of the meet. Such a showing prompted the U. S. commanding officer, General Pershing, to comment, "Lieutenant Richards, you are the greatest athlete in the armed forces."

Richards also excelled academically, and after attending the University of Southern California was admitted to the California Bar. Instead of practicing law, however, he taught high (more)

school in California for thirtyone years. He died April 3, 1963,and has since been inducted into the Utah Sports Ha3 of Fame, Helms Hall of Fame, Brigham Young University Hall of Fame,and the U.S. Track and FieldHall of Fame.

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Traveling Gypsies Brought an Exotic Lifestyle to Rural Utah

To MOST RESIDENTSOF RURAL UTAHIN THE EARLY

-1900s-summertimemeant hauIing hay, digging ditches, irrigating crops, and tending livestock. Other than the usual dances and town parties there was little diversion from the monotony of farm labor--that is until traveling bands of Gypsies began making appearances and causing stirs of excitement. In Deseret, Elsinore, Oak City, Kanab, and other remote communities news of these exotic visitors would spread quickly.

Most of the Gypsies were of Balkan, Eastern, and Central European descent and had come to America at the turn of the century. Their nomadic lifestyle took them from ranch house to farm village where they would entertain, beg, and allegedly even steal to survive.

The men in their big hats and spangled vests and the women in full skirts, black braided hair, bright scarves, necklaces made of coins, and large earrings would lead their caravan of wagons, horses, dogs, and children through town. They often entertained the townsfolk with trained animals. In Manti, Sanpete County, one resident remembered a band of Gypsies that owned a large black bear that danced; this group also had a monkey, perched atop an organ grinder, that caught all the nickels thrown to him. In Oak City, Millard County, a Gypsy singer entertained town residents for hours at the city hall with his extensive repertoire. In Elsinore, Sevier County, another Gypsy performed rope tricks; an hour-long demonstration of his skill was a highlight of the town's Fourth of July celebration.

In addition to showcasing their various-talent~eOypsies-employed other methods to-earn a living. Gypsy women would often tell fortunes for fifty cents, many of the men were ardent horse traders, and there are also stories of persistent Gypsy begging. Burt Hales told of the family garden in Oak City from which his father peddled produce to help support the family. One day after his father had given the Gypsies some vegetables, one lady was not satisfied and returned to get more. Hales explained that he had given all he could and needed the rest for his customers.

When the woman persisted and started into the garden, Hales's father had to call the family dog to induce her to leave.

The Gypsies generally traveled in groups of five to ten families and camped in vacant lots on the outskirts of town. They would stay a few weeks to a month before moving on to other communities. In the end, industrialization, the coming of the automobile, and the Great Depression all combined to bring an end to the Gypsies' way of life. In order to obtain government relief many were forced into a sedentary urban lifestyle, b d their nomadic wanderings largely vanished. (more)

Regardless, memories of the entertainment and adventure that the Gypsies seemed to create linger among.older residents of seveml rural Utah communities. *

For additional information see David A. Hales, "'The Gypsies Are Coming! The Gypsies Are Coming!,'" Utah Historical Quarterly 53 (fall 1985): 367-79.

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Utah Expatriates Formed a Club in New York

h THE EARLY DECADES OF-THE 2m'CENTURY PMs claimed a-grOUp of American -

-. -

expatriates that included the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, to mention a few of the more famous names. Similarly, New York has exerted a magnetic force on Utahns, drawing many of them to the great metropolis to pursue careers in the arts, education, business, science, and other fields.

Like their counterparts in Paris, Utahns in New York occasionally longed for companionship with others from home. According to Leon L. Watters, Utah-born scientist and author of me Pioneer Jews of Utah, by the early 1890s Utahns living in New York "felt the urge of common memories of their former home and came together more or less informally to exchange news and experiences." This desire to meet continued, but not until Verona Pollock Roach put her organizing genius to work ca. 1924 was the Utah Club of New York founded. Born in Virginia, Roach said she had lived much longer in Utah and "spent several of the happiest years of my life in Salt Lake City. " Her first husband, Alexander Pollock, was a newspaperman associated with the Salt Lake Herald and the Salt Lake Z'lntes. Their son, Channing Pollock, became a noted writer and dramatist. His plays boosted the acting careers of Douglas Fairbanks, Ed Wynn, and Lillian Gish.

Channing became an active member of the club founded by his mother as did his brother John, a Broadway show manager,-w h a - s e daka-Utah-Uub-board .member. Both traced their theatrical beginnings to performances in a barn Elbert D. Thomas (later a U.S. senator from Utah) converted into an auditorium.

Verona Roach served as president of the Utah Club for five years and saw it grow from the eleven women who organized it to an association of men and women which at its maximum strength in the 1930s would attract almost four hundred participants.

The 1936 National Dinner, held at the Hotel McAlpin on January 25, was one of the club's most dazzling affairs. Leon Watters, then president of the Utah Club, welcomed a distinguished group of guests, including Utah's congressional delegation, Supreme Court Justice George Sutherland, Federal Reserve Board chairman Marriner S. Eccles, and Secretary of War Gwrge H. Dem. The pre-dinner reception featured an exhibit of Utah artists residing in New York and music by the 16th Infantry Band. Both the 'Star Spangled Banner" and 'Utah, We Love Thee" preceded the meal. The dinner featured several Utah foods-turkey, courtesy of the Utah Poultry Dealers Association, Utah celery sent by express, and Martha Washington Candies made in Salt Lake City with Utah-Idaho sugar. The floral centerpiece was sent by the Salt Lake Chamber of

Commerce and the Utah Manufacturers Association. The speaker's gavel was made of Utah copper* Artist John Held, Jr., creator of the Flapper who symbolized the Roaring Twenties, served as toastmaster. Other notitbles on the program included Ogden native Phyllis McGinley (Pulitzer Prize poet, 1961) and Broadway composer Otto Harbach who, like Held, was born and raised in Salt Lake City.

In addition to formal dinners, members of the Utah Club of New York cheered the Utah Aggies basketball team when it played in Madison Square Garden on January 23, 1937; and 150 of them purchased a block of tickets to applaud Utah actor Moroni Olsen when he appeared on the New York stage in Mary of Scotland. The club also sponsored a summer outing at the New York University camp on Lake Sebago, probably arranged by NYU professor Howard R. Driggs. A writer as well as an educator, Driggs served a term as club president; an elementary school in Salt club held a ball at the Men's Faculty Club of Lake City is named for him. On another.oaaSi~n.~th~ Columbia University, sponsored by-Harold W. Bentley, professor of English and Spanish 'there and later dean of the University of Utah Division of Continuing Education.

Club newsletters touted the accomplishments of Utah expatriates such as Mrs. Floyd B. Odlum of St. George, president of the fashionable Bonwit Teller store; Miss Lyle Nelson, an assistant buyer for Lord & Taylor; actresses Hazel Dawn, Donna Jones, Helen Mencken, and Nana Bryant; writer Vardis Fisher; inventor Harvey Fletcher; sculptor Mahonri Young; and FBI agent Sam Conley of Logan who assisted in the capture of the notorious criminal John Dillinger.

Although many members of the Utah Club of New York lived most of their lives outside of the Beehive State, the records of this organization confm the love these expatriates felt for their western roots and their pride in each other's accomplishments. In the highly competitive New York arena they had proved their merit, and somehow they wanted their achievements associated with Utah.

Source: Leon L. Watters donated his records, incomplete but including newsletters and correspondence, of the Utah Club of New York to the Utah State Historical Society Library; see MS A1255.

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Boxing Fans Take the Plunge at Saltair Saltair on the evening of - May 12, 1910. As the match between Pete Sullivan and 'Cyclone" Johnny Thompson came to an end at 11 o'clock, several hundred of the 3,000 fans rushed to the exit to catch the next train from the famous resort to the city. The overanxious would have done better to wait. Due to the weight of SO many people heading to the train station from the Saltair coliseum, a poorly constructed, temporary stairnay collapsed. Nearly 100 people fell, fully dressed, into the salty waters of the Great Salt Lake.

Though the water came up only to their armpits, none were prepared for the sudden plunge.

More dangerous than the cold water were the flying timbers of the broken stairnay which caused bruises and even broke bones. Rescue teams quickly arrived to pull people out of the water with ropes and shovels. Within five minutes most of the victims had been recovered and were drying on land. Those seriously injured, some ten people, were put on the first train to Salt Lake City. The rest had to wait their turn for another train to take them home.

Meanwhile, rumors quickly spread throughout the city. From the first trainload of "survivors" to return home, residents heard an exaggerated account of the event. One story circulated that the stairway had been destroyed by rowdy fans angered by the defeat of Sullivan.

Others thought that the entire Saltair resort was sinking into the lake and that thousands of people were dead and dying. Concerned -family-members-andSriends-uraited-for--their loved ones at the - train station late into the night.

When reactions to the event finally settled the next morning, newspapers came out with a statement from the manager of Saltair, apologizing for the collapse and asserting that the building was well constructed and safe for further use. The event, he claimed, had not been caused by faulty workmanship but by the excessive weight of too many people on the structure. He denied responsibility for the accident, saying that the injured should seek redress from fight promoter R. A. Grant who had leased the arena.

FORSOME FANS;

BOXING WAS NOT THE ONLY EXCITEMENT at

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Judge Orlando W. Powers Was a Key Political Figure

Tm MORMON~GENTILE C O ~ ~ T . ~ . T LATE F I E1

9 CENTURY ~ ~ produced a-numberof talented and colorful figures. One of the most prominent was Orlando Woodworth Powers, "the prince of omtors," who was highly visible and active in law, politics, and mining in Utah from 1885 until his death in 1914.

Powers was born on June 16, 1850, in Pultneyville, Wayne County, New York, ironically but a few miles from the birthplace of the Mormon religion. After receiving his law education at the University of Michigan, Powers practiced in Kalamamo and became active in Democratic politics. In 1872 he was defeated in a race for the Michigan legislature, and in 1880 lost a bid for Congress. These losses proved characteristic; although Powers would eventually gain respect as a political tactician he lost more elections than he won.

In 1885 Powers was nominated by President Grover Cleveland as an associate justice for Utah Territory. Powers held this post, as well as that of judge of the First Judicial District in Ogden, while waiting for Senate confirmation of his position. The appointment was opposed by some Democrats in Washington, as well as by some Utahns (probably because of Powers's supposedly anti-Mormon leanings), and the nomination was withdrawn in August 1886.

Powers briefly retumed to Michigan, but in September 1887 he took up permanent residence in Utah, establishing a law practice in Salt Lake City. His political experience came to the attention of the (non-Monn~n)-Libed.party,wbich was .engaged.in.a long struggle to wrest political control away from the (Mormon) People' s party. Powers' s organizational talents served the Liberals well, as he promoted clubs, marching bands, and parades. Liberal efforts were finally rewarded when they gained control of Salt Lake City in 1889.

The final, successful push for statehood resulted in Utah politics being reorganized along national party lines. When the Republican and Democratic parties were established in Utah, Powers returned to his Democratic roots, serving as party chairman and making several unsuccessful congressional bids. His law firm prospered as Powers pursued an active criminal practice and also served as corporate counsel for a number of f m s .

Judge Powers (as he was widely called) received a nearly fatal reminder of his brief time on the bench on August 26, 1899. The Wells, Fargo Express company delivered a package to his office that Powers originally took to be an ore sample from his Eureka mines. When a few grains of gunpowder leaked out, however, Powers called the police who discovered two pounds of dynamite and a crude detonating device. The originator of this "infernal machine" was identified as John Y. Smith, a train robber whom Powers had sentenced to prison in 1886. Smith sent (more)

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Judge Orlando W. Powers Was a Key Political Figure

Tm MORMON~GENTILE C O ~ ~ T . ~ . T LATE F I E1

9 CENTURY ~ ~ produced a-numberof talented and colorful figures. One of the most prominent was Orlando Woodworth Powers, "the prince of omtors," who was highly visible and active in law, politics, and mining in Utah from 1885 until his death in 1914.

Powers was born on June 16, 1850, in Pultneyville, Wayne County, New York, ironically but a few miles from the birthplace of the Mormon religion. After receiving his law education at the University of Michigan, Powers practiced in Kalamamo and became active in Democratic politics. In 1872 he was defeated in a race for the Michigan legislature, and in 1880 lost a bid for Congress. These losses proved characteristic; although Powers would eventually gain respect as a political tactician he lost more elections than he won.

In 1885 Powers was nominated by President Grover Cleveland as an associate justice for Utah Territory. Powers held this post, as well as that of judge of the First Judicial District in Ogden, while waiting for Senate confirmation of his position. The appointment was opposed by some Democrats in Washington, as well as by some Utahns (probably because of Powers's supposedly anti-Mormon leanings), and the nomination was withdrawn in August 1886.

Powers briefly retumed to Michigan, but in September 1887 he took up permanent residence in Utah, establishing a law practice in Salt Lake City. His political experience came to the attention of the (non-Monn~n)-Libed.party,wbich was .engaged.in.a long struggle to wrest political control away from the (Mormon) People' s party. Powers' s organizational talents served the Liberals well, as he promoted clubs, marching bands, and parades. Liberal efforts were finally rewarded when they gained control of Salt Lake City in 1889.

The final, successful push for statehood resulted in Utah politics being reorganized along national party lines. When the Republican and Democratic parties were established in Utah, Powers returned to his Democratic roots, serving as party chairman and making several unsuccessful congressional bids. His law firm prospered as Powers pursued an active criminal practice and also served as corporate counsel for a number of f m s .

Judge Powers (as he was widely called) received a nearly fatal reminder of his brief time on the bench on August 26, 1899. The Wells, Fargo Express company delivered a package to his office that Powers originally took to be an ore sample from his Eureka mines. When a few grains of gunpowder leaked out, however, Powers called the police who discovered two pounds of dynamite and a crude detonating device. The originator of this "infernal machine" was identified as John Y. Smith, a train robber whom Powers had sentenced to prison in 1886. Smith sent (more)

another bomb to the warden of the state prison, who had placed him in solitary confinement,but this package was intercepted before delivery. Smith, who was eventually captured and convicted, committed suicide in prison.

Powers continued-his political and legal interests. His attempts to win a U.S. Senate seat met with defeat, but his law practice thrived, eventually gaining him clients in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada, and Colorado. Powers died in Salt Lake City on January 3, 1914.

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The Civilian Conservation Corps Was a Boon to Utah

COMPARED TO THE REST OF THE NATION UTAHWAS HIT particularly hard by the Great Depression of the 1930s. In 1933 Utah's annual per capita income of $300 was--amere 80 peroent of the national average, and 35.8 percent of Utah's work force was unemployed. The New Deal legislation of Franklin D. Roosevelt created sweeping changes and brought federal government involvement to relieve the nationwide suffering. One of the New Deal's most popular programs, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) had a profound effect in Utah.

The CCC aimed to provide work for the nation's estimated 5 to 7 million unemployed young men who ranged in age from sixteen to twenty-five. In order to qualify for CCC employment, men in this age category had to be jobless, unmarried, and from families with parents on relief. Across the country applications far outnumbered allotments, and in Salt Lake County the situation was no different: over five men applied for each vacancy on the initial enrollment. Pay was $30 per month, $25 of which was sent home to help support the worker's family.

On April 5, 1933, President Roosevelt signed the bill creating the CCC, and less than six weeks later construction started on several Utah camps. Most were like the camp built in American Fork Canyon. It consisted of officers' quarters, a mess hall and kitchen, a shower room, a hospital, a recreation hall, and utility buildings. A standard camp had four barracks and 200 men. During the CCC's nine years of operation 116 camps were built throughout Utah, although not all were in use at one time. were + the largest users of the The Forest Service and - the-Bureau-ef- laR8h!fa.nagme~t corpsmen. From 1933 to 1942 CCC workers planted more than 3.2 million trees on Utah's mountains and range lands. They also built several large dams, including the preliminary work on the Deer Creak Dam. They built roads, renewed streams and lakes, developed and improved thousands of campgrounds and recreational areas, and constructed several ranger stations that are still in use.

The purpose of the CCC extended beyond providing employment and improving the land.

Workers also learned valuable skills that increased their chances of obtaining permanent employment when jobs became available. During an average eighteen months of service a CCC worker could gain skills in a variety of vocations such as rock masonry, carpentry, road construction, and cooking. In addition, the daily discipline and regimen of the corps created a group of war-ready young men, many of whom went on to serve in World War II. Before this program was terminated, the CCC had spent over $52 million in Utah and brought thousands of young men from across the nation to work in the state. It helped keep Utah's (more)

economy alive, renewed the state's environment, and provided job haining and military disciple to its team of youthful workers.

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THE HISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

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THE HISTORY BLAZER SEI1'S OF UTAH'S PAST FRO.iI1 THE

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Senator Joseph McCarthy9s1950 Visit to Salt Lake City

HISTORIANS DATE THE B E G I ~ GOF - THE MCCARTHY ERA as -February9, 1950, when Senator Joseph R. McCarthy gave a speech in Wheeling, West Virginia, as part of a Lincoln Day weekend celebration. In that speech the junior senator from Wisconsin claimed to have a list of State Department employees who were members of the Communist party. The announcement catapulted McCarthy to center stage as America's most aggressive foe of wmmunists who, he claimed, had infiltrated the national government for the purpose of destroying the American political system and way of life. His unfounded and hysterical accusations, verbal abuse of witnesses, contempt for proper legal procedures, and attack on the loyalty-rather than the ideas-of those with whose policies he disagreed, led to the coining of a new word, "McCarthyism." The process produced widespread hysteria that opponents and victims compared to the infamous Salem witch hunts of the 1690s.

The day after McCarthy's famous Wheeling speech he flew to Salt Lake City where he participated in a Lincoln Day banquet held at the Newhouse Hotel. In Wheeling he had been somewhat vague about the number of alleged communists in the State Department, but in Salt Lake City McCarthy claimed to have a list with 57 names of card-carrying communists in the State Department. While in the Beehive State, McCarthy learned that a spokesman for the State Department said they knew of no communists in their agency. McCarthy offered to give the list of 57 wmmunists to Secretary-.of -State- D ~ c h e s oifA&eson ~-antacted him. The list was never produced.

News of Senator McCarthy's visit to Salt Lake City was carried in the same issue of the daily papers that reported atomic scientist Klaus Fuchs had confessed to giving United States atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. A political cartoon in the Salt Lake Tribune tied the McCarthy and Fuchs stories together in a very dramatic way. The cartoon showed Uncle Sam sitting at a desk going over the national defense plans. A broom-riding witch has just swooped over the desk and gathered an armload of documents labeled 'atomic secrets." As she flies off she cackles "...and give my thanks to all the ANTI-witch hunters, Uncle.. ..!" It was not, of course, the antiwitch hunters who had allowed Klaus Fuchs to give atomic secrets away.

Despite his repeated claims, McCarthy never did produce the name of any card-carrying communist, leading critics to claim that "Joe couldn't find a Communist in Red Square." The McCarthy witch hunts came to a close in 1954 when Utah's Republican Senator Arthur V. Watkins chaired a U.S. Senate Select Committee that investigated McCarthy and recommended he be censured for his behavior.

THEHISTORY BLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Cen-a1 Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

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Hospitals and Health Crazes Engrossed Utahns in the Late 1800s

h THE LAST QUARTER OF-THE I ~ T CENTURY H Utah faced rapid economic -and s~cial -

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change. Many areas of life were affected. By the 1870s improved medical service was needed in the territory. Those physicians who had immigrated to Utah in the early settlement period were growing old. Moreover, the large number of new arrivals in Utah created a demand for more doctors and midwives as well as hospitals. Home care was no longer adequate.

Among Mormons the initiative for medical reform began within the Relief Society.

Responding to the request of several women for a matemity hospital and obstetrical training, the Relief Society subsidized six women to attend eastern colleges and receive medical degrees. One of the eastem-trained physicians, Romania Pratt, returned in 1877 to develop a medical training school in Salt Lake City. Women could attend the six-month program for a fee of $50 for tuition and boarding at Pratt's home.

Other religious groups also entered the medical field, creating hospitals in Salt Lake City.

In 1874 Episcopalians opened St. Mark's Hospital. Two years later the Holy Cross Hospital was established by the Roman Catholic Sisters of the Holy Cross.

The Relief Society followed suit in 1882 with the formation of the Deseret Hospital with Dr. Romania Pratt and Dr. Ellen Ferguson as the physicians. Two male doctors were later included on the staff. The Deseret Hospital served as a women's medical school, emergency hospital, and maternity home.. I n L8Z7- t h e w t a l -opened-.ashool..ofnursing and obstetrics, Each year up to six women were trained in these fields.

The Deseret Hospital ran into financial trouble, however, because of its payment policy.

The Relief Society had relied on donations to the hospital fund to allow patients to receive care regardless of their ability to pay. Learning that care was free, even patients able to pay for treatment often refused to do so. Financial instability finally toppled the institution.

But setting up hospitals and training doctors at prestigious medical schools in the East and locally were only part of the health care scene. Utahns, no longer culturally isolated, also responded to national fads and seemed to be particularly attracted to certain health crazes.

A brief skim over advertisements in the Deseret News of January 1896 shows that good health was a major marketing tool. Hood's sarsaparilla, for example, was boldly declared to be "The only true blood purifier" because it cured "cramps and stomach ache." Manyou's Cure boasted more expansive results. In addition to purifying the blood and "restoring lost power to weak ones," its uses included cures for rheumatism, asthma, nerve problems, and even "female ailments. " (more)

Some companies devoted their product line to curing "Female Sickness." An ad for Dr. David Kennedy's Favorite Remedy explained that the disease suffered by thousands of women included such symptomsas nervousness. hgility, weak nerves, and "an awful internal trouble that is wearing out their lives." Dr. Miles' N e h e ad noted that women's ailments caused irritability, fketfuhess, ringing in the ears, and sleepless nights.

Some medicines promised a cure for diseases suffered by specific age groups. Castoris for Infants claimed to destroy worms, prevent vomiting sour curd, relieve teething, cure constipation, and neutralize "poisonous air." Paine's Celery Compound, described as the wonder drug for the elderly, published testimony from a 99-year-old woman who had remained healthy by taking daily doses. Celery Compound worked its wonders by replacing "worn-out parts" with healthy, new ones. " Not only were cures popular in the marketplace, Utah's medical experts also discussed at length new approaches to health.'The Salt Lake Sanitarian, a magazirie'published from 1888 to 1891, offered insights into health trends of the era. An article in the July 1889 issue explained that baldness among men was a result of the scalp's lack of adequate sunlight. To prevent baldness, the article suggested that men wash their heads thoroughly at least once a week, never wear unventilated hats, and seldom smoke.

An article in July 1888 described coffee as twice as bad for the body as a half-pint of light wine taken daily. In another article tobacco's bad effects included enfeebling the nervous system, weakening the stomach, disturbing sleep, damaging mental capacities, and causing long fits of melancholy. Drinking tea caused cold feet.

The magazine also questioned lifestyles. In its November 1890 issue the Sanitarian boldly declared that neglecting to provide dry rooms and beds for guests was the cause of numerous diseases and equal to murder and suicide-surely a frightening thought for prospective hosts! In May 1889 a female physician identified heavy corsets as the cause of spinal deformities among women and birth failures.

Although such explanations may seem absurd to the modem reader, today's health industry continues with the same energy that marked its beginning. The hospitals, remedies, and publications of the late 19th century only represent Utah's introduction into the shifting market of - .*-.. - -- ....- - ..- .. . --*.. . .,- . . .

America's health industry. - -r

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Sources: Jill Mulvay Derr, Janatb Russell Cannon, and Maureen Ursenbach Beecher, Women of Covenant; The Story of Relief Sociery (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1992); Salt Lake Sanitarian, Utah State Historical Society Library; Deseret News.

THEHISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

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Captain Richard W.Young and the Spanish-American War

ONJULY29, 1898, CAPTAINRICHARD W. YOUNGMOVED a platoon from Battery A, Utah Light Artillery, into place around the Philippine capital city of Manila. Two days later Captain Young's artillery and men proved of great service in the bombardment of Manila and the eventual capture of that city during the Spanish-American War. Young was a native of Utah and graduate of West Point whose life, in and out of the military, was marked with distinction.

He was born in the historic Beehive House in Salt Lake City on April 19, 1858, a son of Joseph and Margaret Young and a grandson of Brigham Young. At the age of thirteen Richard began working in the freight office of the Utah Central Railroad and later attended Deseret University for two years. He taught in the district school at Richfield for a brief period before being appointed as a cadet to the U.S.Military Academy at West Point in 1875. The death of his father prevented his leaving home, and instead he returned to work for the railroad. In 1878 the cadetship was again offered to him and this time he took it. He graduated fifteenth in his class and shortly thereafter married Minerva Richards with whom he parented eight children.

In 1884 Young enhanced his military standing when he graduated from Columbia Law School. He was one of the first army officers to take a college law course, and he soon gained prominence as an army lawyer. Nevertheless, in 1888 Young resigned from the military to begin his own law practice in Salt Lake City. He quickly became attorney for several prominent Utah businesses, including the State Bankof Utah and-thcUtah Sugar Company. Yet, at the outbreak of war with Spain in 1898 Young felt duty bound to assist his country and volunteered for service. In addition to the capture of Manila, he took part in nearly twenty-five other engagements in the war and the Filipino Insurrection. Following the end of hostilities he was appointed associate justice and president of the criminal branch of the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands where he served from 1899 to 1901. In that capacity he helped prepare the Philippines' code of government and criminal procedure.

Upon his return to Utah, Young rebuilt his lucrative law practice, but war once again interrupted his life. In 1918 he was promoted to brigadier general and placed in command of the 65th Brigade, 40th Division, American Expeditionary Forces in France during World War I. His military service was brief, and in 1919 he was again practicing law in Salt Lake City. Then, in December of that year, he suffered an appendicitis attack that ultimately brought his influential and prominent life to an end two days after Christmas.

THEHISTORY BLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.