The History Blazer, July 1995

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArECIS OF UTAH'S PAST FROAf THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake C i t ~ Z'T 84101 (801) 533-3500

FAX (801) 533-3503

July 1995 Blazer Contents Party Politics and Utah Statehood Springville Photographer Elfie Huntington Captured Ordinary People and Things Mountain Green, Morgan County, Was Scene of International Conflict in 1825 Utah's First Territorial Capital, Fillmore, Was Too Remote for Legislators John Jarvie-"the Sage of the Uintahs, the Genius of Brown's Park"

The USS Salt Loke Ciry Made History during and after World War 11 Artist John Held, Jr., Created Many Cultural Iwns of the 1920s Kanab Has a Long Tradition as a Place to Make Movies Indians, Traders on Ulc Spanish Trail,and Ordinary Folk Have Enjoyed Fish Lake Courageous Emma Lee Endured Many Hardships in Pioneer Utah Hoskaninni Avoided the Navajo Ordeal at Bosque Redondo and Prospered President Harding Got an Enthusiastic Welcome on His 1923 Visit to Utah Ute Severalty: Reform vs. Reality

Ithamar Sprague's Big Feet Created Panic in One Southern Utah Town The Salt Industry Was One of the First Enterprises in Utah Could SLC Have Handled the UUlBW Rivalry within Its Borders?

The Broad Ax and the Plain Dealer Kept Utah's African Americans Informed

Alice Parker Isom Faced Frontier Utah's Challenges with True Grit

Deseret Alphabet Exemplified the Mormon Quest for Perfection Chemical Weapons Testing Created Controversy at Dugway

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEI1'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROAMTHE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande

.

Salt Lake City. L7T84101

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

Party Politics and Utah Statehood

A. D.R I C H ~ X O NA, J O U R N V~ I S ~ GDENVBR IN 1859, had this to say about the politics of settlement along the western frontier: "Making governments and building towns are the natural employments of the migratory Yankee. He takes to them as instinctively as a young duck to water. Congregate a hundred Americans anywhere beyond the settlements and they immediately lay out a city, frame a state constitution and apply for admission into the Union, while twenty-five of them become candidates for the United States Senate."

Granting the loquacious journalist a bit of allowance for exaggeration, his observation fits the Utah experiennce pretty well. Within two years of permanent settlement of the Great Basin in 1847 the Mormon pioneers had drafted a proposed constitution for the State of Deseret and petitioned for admission to the Union.

This attempt at statehood was premature for many reasons. State-making was an incredibly complex process in the years preceding the Civil War, and Congress was not about to be rushed into admitting a new state at the risk of upsetting the delicate balance holding the Union together.

Deseret also presented technical problems with its limited population. Additionally, there was the matter of polygamy among its populacenot yet officially announced but generally known to be practiced. Congress rejected the petition for statehood and instead granted temtorial status for Utah under provisions of the Compromise of 1850.

The 1849 petition was the first of seven attempts to gain statehood. Success did not wme until 1896, nearly a halfcentury later. It was a period of intense political conflict pitting the power of federal authority, which strengthened greatly after the Civil War, against the conscience and commitment of a determined religious group. The process-a series of federal laws designed to end polygamy and theocracy in Utah Temtory-has been aptly if unimaginatively termed by one historian as 'the Americanization of Utah for Statehood." By 1890 the Mormon leadership had capitulated and issued the Manifesto which began the rapid phase-out of officially sanctioned plural marriages. From there, events moved quite expeditiously toward statehood.

Yet, just as matters seemed to be falling into place, the march to statehood stalled. The issue was no longer slavery, polygamy, or theocracy but rather good old-fashioned party politics.

Congressional leaders wanted to take a closer look at Utah. Would it come into the Union with Democratic or Republican senators and representative?

During most of the territorial era, Utah's party system was aligned strictly according to religious preference. The Peoples party was Mormon; the Liberal party was non-Mormon. Now (more)

that statehood was within reach, both elements scurried to integrate themselves into the national two-party system. Much of this was accomplished under a Mormon initiative. Striving for balance, church leadership sought to "assign" its members into the Democratic and Republican prtks. But as the summer of 1894 approached, the U.S. Senate held the Utah enabling bill in committee, . uncertain just how effectively the Utah population had been in achieving party balance.

Finally,under some very adroit lobbying by friends both inside and outside Utah Territory, the Senate passed the enabling bill on July 10, 1894, and President Cleveland signed it a few days later. In the election of 1895, Utahns chose Republicans as governor and U.S. Representative, and they elected a Republican legislature that would choose two men from that party to fill the U.S. Senate vacancies. While that tended to suggest a strong Republican preference, keen political observers of the day noted that the Republican majority was small. And as a matter of fact, in the presidential election of 1896, the year of statehood, Utahns gave their electoral votes to Democrat William Jennings Bryan and elected a Democratic legislature.

Throughout its first century, Utah has maintained a strong two-party commitment and a pronounced tendency to voteaccording to national trends. Even though they worried about it at the time, Senate leaders of a hundred years ago could rest assured that, over the long haul, Utah would not be dominated by a single party preference.

See Frank H. Jonas, "Utah: The Different State," in Politics in the Aman'cun W a t ed. Ftank H. Jonas (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1969); Edward Leo Lyman, Political Deliverance= me M o w n Quest for Utah

Statehood (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1986).

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.

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEM'S OF UT..H'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Gra~lde Salt Lake City. ZTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

Springville Photographer Elfie Huntington Captured Ordinary People and Things

Tm m o m B. LEEIJBRARY

BRIGHAM YOUNOU N I V E Rhouses S ~ a collection of roughly 20,000 glass plates, nearly all of them portraying ordinary people doing ordinary things.

This extensive documentation of Utah and Utahns constitutes most of the life work of Elfie Huntington, a remarkable Springville, Utah,photographer. It is often personal and r e v a g of both subject and photographer. In a 1988 catalog accompanying an exhibition of Huntington's work, Cary Stevens Jones noted that "her autobiography is visual poetry on glass."

Huntington was born in Springville on December 29, 1868. A bout with scarlet fever at age four left her deaf and largely mute; later, she became an adept lip-reader. After her mother's death young Elfie was raised by her grandmother and then lived with her uncle, Don C. Johnson, as a teenager. Fortunately for Huntington and posterity, SpringviUe has a long history of support for the arts, and her uncle was sympathetic to artistic inclinations in his niece. He encouraged her to pursue the visual arts, eventually arranging an apprenticeship for her with George Edward Anderson, an established commercial photographer, in 1892.

Historians of photography have noted the relatively large number of accomplished female photographers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They suggest that the new medium, generally ke of artistic strictures or a strong male tradition, offered women opportunities unavailable in other media. From the beginning women have exceled at photography.

Elfie began her apprenticeship by retouching Anderson's negatives, eventually learning darkroom techniques and general camera skills. The introduction of dry-plate technology and the development of faster lenses helped free photographers from their bulb old equipment and their subjects from static, unnatural poses. In 1894 Elfie acquired a new small-view camera suitable for album-sized portraits. These innovations allowed her to develop her characteristic candid style.

In 1903 Elfie and another assistant, Joseph Bagley , quit Anderson's shop and established their own nearby (to Anderson's lasting annoyance). The Huntington and Bagley studio on Main Street in Springville eventually offered such services as film finishing, professional portraiture, framing, and a traveling tent gallery. Huntington and Bagley became a well-known team in Utah County and could often be seen traveling in tandem on a motorcycle. They also toured southern Utah and Colorado in the fall to document Indian ruins and offer their tent gallery portrait service in small towns along the way.

Huntington's work portrays Springville and its people in a way that few towns have ever been seen. Jones suggests that Huntington moved beyond the 'purely historical or geographical photographs that dominate nineteenth-century photography" to "evoke, suggest, and communicate (more) AT

complex thoughts and feelings" about life. In so doing, Jones concludes, she 'established herself as one of the most creative and innovative photographers of her time. " A significant number of her photographs depict children, whom she often photographed at play. Jones suggests tha Huntington might have favored children as subjects because she had none of her own. Elfie also displayed remarkable sensitivity and insight in her portraits of "handicapped" subjects, perhaps because of her own personal experiences. But the range of 'the lady photogapher with the raspy voice" exfended to all areas of life, from a Protestant gospel meeting to a drunk asleep under a tree, from a beautiful bride to a group costumed for Halloween.

At age 68 Huntington d e d her longtime partner, Joseph Bagley, a widower, but he died a mere six weeks later. Elfie herself survived until July 24, 1949, when she died in a Provo hospital, leaving behind a unique vision of her time and place.

See salt Lcrkc Tn'bune, Apil 17, 1988; Cary Stevens Jones, A Woman 'S Eew: 2he Photography of E@e Huntington (I868-I949), exhibition catalog for Springville Museum of Art, February 12-March 10, 1988;Springville Herald, July 28, 1949.

THE HJSTORY BLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant fiom the Utah Statehood CenteMial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

-

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEMS '

OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

Mountain Green, Morgan County, Was Scene of International Conflict in 1825

h THE SPRING OF

1825 TWO MAJOR FUR TRADINGCOMPANIES explored Utah to identify the region's beaver supply; American trappers m a t e d with William H. Ashley and led by Johnson Gardner had traveled westward along the Strawberry River and ultimately into Weber Canyon.

Meanwhile, Peter Skene Ogden of the rival Hudson's Bay Company, a British outfit, led his Snake

River Expedition southward along the Green River. For several months the two saw little of each other. Aside from a few impromptu encounters, each company left the other alone. But the solitude quickly ended when both groups met at Mountain Green on the Weber River in what would later be part of Utah's Morgan County.

On May 22 Ogden set up camp at a spot on the Weber River now known as Mountain Green. Also in the vicinity was Etieme Provost, a Frenchman up from Taos, New Mexico, who was trapping with a license issued by the Mexican government. Provost, who would give his name to the future town of Provo, Utah County, was a neutral bystander in the events that soon followed. When Johnson Gardner's American trappers camped less than 100 yards from the British group on May 23 and flew the U.S. flag, the stage was set for an international incident. Gardner and his men were prepared to fight for temtorial rights; they claimed that the camp was located in United States territory. Ogden countered that it was in an area under the joint control of the British and American governments. (Actually, Provost had the better claim since he had a license from the Mexican government. The Adams-Onis Treaty of 1819 had recognized Mexican rights to land south of the 42nd Parallel.) On the morning of May 24 Gardner took his claim to Ogden's tent and ordered the Hudson's Bay trappers to leave. Ogden naturally refused, and tension Nled the rival camps.

But Ogden's position was quickly eroding. Gardner informed his trappers that they had no further obligation to the Hudson's Bay Company. He offered each employee high wages of $3.50 a beaver and cheap goods if they would join the Americans. The offer was hard to refuse. Ogden's overcharged and underpaid men had little loyalty to the company. Several Iroquois and one French trapper, deserters who had joined the Americans a year earlier, visited the tents of Ogden's trappers to encourage them to desert the British company. Convinced by their stories, some men began taking down their tents and preparing to leave. One of them,John Grey, an Iroquois trapper, told Ogden, "You have dealt fair with me and with all of us. But go we will.. ..If every man in the camp does not leave you, they seek not their own interest."

As the they left camp, some of the deserters took with them company horses and supplies.

Ogden accused the men of theft and tried to seize the horses. As the atmosphere grew more tense, (more)

Gardner announced that he was prepared to defend any deserter. Then, an Iroquois who had left the Hudson's Bay Company in 1822 shouted, 'We are superiors in numbers! Let's fire and pillage them!" Some of Gardner's men pointed guns at Ogden while the deserters left camp.

Meanwhile, Ogden's Indian wife was having her own troubles with the deserters. While she was busy collecting her children, several men stampeded the company horses outside her tent. Her eight-month-old son Michael had been tied to the saddle of one of the mares that was herded off.

The frightened mother quickly ran to the American camp and managed to seize the child and mare before being caught. On her way back she coIlected several company horses loaded with furs.

That night rumor spread throughout Ogden's camp that the Americans were planning an attack. But all was quiet, and the next morning Ogden gave a call to abandon the camp. The Hudson's Bay Company, greatly reduced in numbers and supplies, retreated to the Flathead Post.

Though the two parties managed to avoid further confrontation, the incident at Mountain Green only strengthened the long-standing rivalry between the B a s h and American companies.

The irony of the situation was that neither party had a territorial claim to the land. Under the Adams-Onis Treaty Mountain Green was part of Mexican territory in 1825. Ogden might have argued that the British were not involved in that treaty. Still, neither w m p a n y had a license to trap in Mexican temtory. Gardner and Ogden, both ready to fight for territorial claims to the land, were wrong from the beginning.

Sources: David E. Miller, ed., "Peter Skene Ogden's Journal of His Expedition to Utah, 1825, " Utah Historid Quarterly 20 (1952);LeRoy R. Hafen, ed., lke Mountain Men and the Fur Trade of the Far West 10 vols. (Glendale, Calif.: A. H.Clark Co., 1965-72), vol. 4; Peter Skene Ogden 3 Snake Country JournaLr, 1824-25 and 1825-26, ed. E. E. Rich (London: Hudson's Bay Records Sociw, 1950); Jack B. Tykal,Etienne Prowst: Man of the Mountains (Liberty,Utah, 1989); Arcbie Binns, Peter S ' Ogden, Fur Trader (Portland, Ore., 1967).

THE HISTORY B w ~is produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant fiom the Uteb S t a t e h d Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEIZ'S OF UTAH'S PAST FRO31 THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

Utah's First Territorial Capital, Fillmore, Was Too Remote for Legislators

U m 1851 MORMON SETTLEMENT IN UTAHWASCONFINED mostly to the western slopes of the Wasatch Mountains. When Utah became a temtory through the Organic Act of 1850 settlement patterns began to change. Since the new boundaries of the temtory enclosed a smaller land area than expansive Mormon hopes had included in the proposed state of Deseret, LDS leaders anticipated settlement of the entire temtory.

Planning for the eventual settlement of Utah, the Legislative Assembly decided to locate the temtorid capital at the geographic center of Utah. Pauvan Valley was chosen because of its location midway between the Sierra and Colorado Rockies and in the center of Utah. On October 4, 1851, the remote Pauvan Valley was designated as the site of the temtorial seat of government.

On the same day, the Assembly named the surrounding area Millard County and planned to create a capital city called Fillmore. A committee of four men was appointed to survey the area and determine the exact location of the city and the capitol building site.

The party, led by Orson Pratt, left Salt Lake City for Pauvan Valley on October 2 1, 1851.

When they arrived at the uninhabited region, Jesse W. Fox laid out the boundaries for the capital city. Streets were outlined for future construction. The site of the temtorial capital was located.

Orson Pratt later wrote a letter to Brigham Young describing the city boundaries as square blocks of ten acres. The letter noted that a law was established that no trees were to be cut in the city or for two miles out.

Anson Call and a company of several families arrived in Fillmore at the same time as the Pratt party. The group had been asked by church leaders to settle the area. Before he left for Salt Lake City, Pratt instructed Call to construct the city as it had been outlined. Streets, houses, public buildings, and, most important, the territorial capitol had to be built. During the next year the Fillmore settlers worked to create a city out of a wasteland. The immediate need of building homes and public buildings took up most of the time and energy of the workmen. Because of this, construction of the capitol was delayed until the following spring.

In 1854, three years after the selection of the site, the walls of the capitol were W l y completed. But construction was further delayed because of a shortage of funds. Though Congress had awarded the temtory $20,000 to begin the project, no further funds were given to continue construction. After months of hard work and limited supplies, local workmen finally wmpleted the roof on the east wing of the capitol in the summer of 1855. The interior was rushed to completion in preparation for the Utah Temtorial Legislature to convene in Fillmore. On December 10 the fifth annual legislative session was held in the new temtorial capitol-the only complete session held there. Tradition says that the next day Brigham Young officially dedicated the building. (more)

The legislature convened in Fillmore again in December 1856, after organizing, the assembly returned to Salt Lake City to complete its session. Legislators complained about the lack of housing and adequate facilities in Fillmore. Rather than being the thriving capital city that many had imagined, ~ i l l m o 6 remained a small rural community with little outside communication or industrial development. Realizing that Utah's population had not centralized as anticipated, the tenitorial leaders quickly lost interest in Fillmore. In December 1856 Salt Lake City was officially designated as the capital of territorial Utah. Until the completion of the State Capitol in 1916, the legislature met in five different buildings in the city-the Council House, Social Hall, old Salt Lake City Hall, Salt Lake City and County Building and the Women's Industrial Christian Home.

Meanwhile, the completed east wing of the Fillmore capitol building took on many different functions. In 1872 title to the building was passed to Fillmore City. It was used on different occasions as a jail, school, church, meeting house, and office building by local residents of Fillmore. Today, the site has been converted into a state park and museum of pioneer relics.

Although Fillmore never became the capital city envisioned by early Mormon leaders, the uncompleted capitol is a reminder of an era in which the settlement of Utah was new and its patterns undetermined.

See Everett L. Cooley, Everett, "Utah's Capitols." Utah Historicul Quarter& 27 (1959); Everett L. Cooley, Everett.

"Report on an Expedition to Locate Utah's First Capitol," Utah Historical Quarter& 23 (1955).

niE HISTORY 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.

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArEIIrSOF UTAH'S PAST FROlIl THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande

Salt Lake City. LTT84101

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

John Jarvie-"the Sage of the Uintahs, the Genius of Brown's Park"

m BROWN'SPARKINTHE SUMMER

1880 with the idea of building a general store that would serve all the residents of the surrounding area. Born in Scotland in 1844, he left his native land as a teenager to start a new life in the United States. By 1870 he was managing a saloon in Rock Springs, Wyoming. There he met 22-year-old Nellie Barr. The two were married in 1880 and decided to move to Brown's Park the same year. Even before he built a home, Jarvie was busy working on a store on the north bank of the Green River. During their first year in Brown's Park, Jarvie and Nellie lived in a small dugout with a door made from a tree trunk. Later they lived in a three-mm log cabin, and the dugout became a storage area.

Jarvie's general store and trading post was the only place within 70 miles that the area's families could buy supplies. As a result, Jarvie canied a wide variety of goods, including tepee poles for the local Indians. He also stocked liquor. The sale of this popular item led to rumors that Jarvie was operating a saloon as in his Rock Springs days. In 1892 Sheriff Pope of Vernal took Jarvie to court on the charge of selling liquor without a license. The jury sampled the liquid found in the bottles but could not determine if they contained alcohol. They found Jarvie not guilty.

Alcohol was not the only reason people flocked to Jarvie's store. Some came simply to enjoy the owner's lively personality. Jarvie's physical appearance seemed to draw people to him.

His hair had turned white while he was in his early 20s and remained so throughout his life. When he grew a full white beard and moustache, people called him 'Old John" or 'Santa Claus." In addition to his unique a w c e , Jarvie had peculiar hobbies-such as phrenology-that made him stand out from ordinary folks. He would read people's heads in order to make predictions about their future. Minnie Crouse Rasmussen, a woman who lived in Brown's Park during the period, remembered that Jarvie 'couldn't keep his hands off people's heads." He often played chess with customers, recited poetry, and sang. He loved to read and often shared his knowledge of current events with anyone who happened to be in the store. Outside of store hours, Jarvie often engaged local children in foot races and ice skating competitions.

Besides serving as the area's storekeeper, Jarvie provided other services to the community.

He was postmaster for six years beginning in 1881, and from 1881 until his death in 1909 he ran the ferry across the Green River. One of his ferry operators was Albert Williams, a black man affectionately called Speck, a well-liked resident of Brown 's Park.

Like the other settlers of Brown's Park, Jarvie accepted outlaws into his store and home, and he may have helped launch young Matt Warner's criminal career by aiding in an unusual twist to thievery. When Warner heard that Aaron Goldberg, a bankrupt merchant, had fled Rock Springs with merchandise the sheriff wanted to attach, hoping to selling it in the Uinta Basin, Warner knew (more) JOHN J A R ARRIVBD ~

OF

he could rob the man without being turned in to the police. He stole the goods-mostly clothing-and then travelled to Jarvie's store to ask him to invite Brown's Park residents to a masquerade dance. Soon everyone was dressed in a mismatched outfit of stolen togs. It was, Warner declared, 'the hnniest sight I ever saw." The costumed Brown's Parkem included an old rancher in a minister's outfit cinched with a gun belt and a weather-beaten woman in a bridal gown. The festivities continued until daybreak, and everyone had a good laugh.

In 1895 some of the outlaws living in the area wanted to repay Jarvie for his kindness to them by hosting a Thanksgiving dinner for the entire community. The event was held at the Davenport Ranch on Willow Creek. For some residents the dinner was the first formal occasion they had ever attended. Tables were decked with candles, linens, and silver. The menu included turkey, oysters, cmnberries, and all manner of desserts. Billie Bender of the Bender Gang and Butch Cassidy paid for most of it. Few of the guests knew how to act in such a formal setting.

According to Ann Bassett, Butch Cassidy became so 'panicky" trying to pour the coffee proper1y that it seemed by the time he finished that "his nerve was completely shot to bits."

Jarvie's kindness won the respect of many, but his hospitality to one criminal proved disastrous. Jarvie met George Hood, a sheepman, in 1908. Jarvie gave the man food and lodging in exchange for help in the store. Little did he know that Hood had recently stolen horses from the Cary Ranch in Colorado. While working in the store, the thief learned that Jarvie had saved a large amount of money from his business. Hood left the area but returned a year later intending to rob Jarvie. When Hood and a companion named McKinley arrived at the Jarvie ranch on July 6, 1909, they were received with the usual hospitality. After dinner the two men forced Jarvie to open the large safe in the basement of the store. When they saw that most of the money had been deposited in the bank only a week earlier, they became angry. Jarvie tried to escape but made it only to a small bridge by the river. He was shot in the back with two bullets, tied to a boat, and sent down the river. The murderers ransacked the store but got only $100 worth of merchandise and a silver revolver. Jarvie's body was discovered several days later on the banks of the Green River. Though a search party looked for several weeks, Hood and McKinley were never caught.

Jarvie's death was greatly mourned by the people of the surrounding area. The Vemul &press described the feelings of many when it stated in July 30, 1909, 'It is hard to imagine John Jarvie dead....He was the sage of the Uintahs, the genius of Brown's Park. He could almost be called the wizard of the hills and river."

Though John Jarvie, Jr., tried to keep the business running, the store was not the same without its popular owner. He eventually tore down the store and built a home in its place. The impact of John Jawie in bringing the people of Brown's Park together could never be replaced.

Sources: William L. Tennent, John Jurvie of Brown's Park Cultural Resources Series No. 7 (Vernal: Bureau of Land Management, Utah, 1981); Diana A. Kouris, Zhe Romantic and Notorious History of Brown s' Park Wjloming (Greybull, Wyo., 1988); Gale Rhoads, "Brown's Hole, A Ghost Walk, " Golden West, July 1971, p. 26; Matt Warner, 3he Last of the Bandit Riders (Caldwell, Ida.: Caxton Printers, 1940).

I'm ~

O

R

BLAZER Y is produced by the Utah State Historical Society rrnd funded in part by a grant from the Utah

Statehood Centennial Commission.For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

THE MISTORY BLAZER ATE11'S OF LTAH'S PAST FROJMT H E

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grailde Salt Lake City. tTT84101

.

.

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

The USS Salt Lake City Made History during and after World War 11

TIIECRUISER USS SALT

CII1,ALSO C U D THE 'SWAYBACK MARu," helpd gain

revenge for the sinking of the USS Utah at Pearl Harbor. In fact, before the war was over, the Salt Lake City would be unofficially credited with taking part in more naval engagements than any ship in the fleet. The 'one-ship fleet," another of her nicknames, survived everything, including its own nation's most destructive weapons.

The Salt Lake Ciry was one of eight modem cruisers authorized under the Washington Arms Limits agreement of 1921. When she was launched on January 23, 1929, she was one of the most powerful and high-speed vessels in the U. S. fleet. By 1941, however, the cruiser had been extensively modified and was considered near the end of its useful life. By good fortune the Salt Lake City was accompanying the canier USS Enterprise as it delivered aircraft to Wake Island on December 7, 1941, and so avoided the disaster at Pearl Harbor.

The cruiser was part of Admiral Halsey's force that retaliated for Pearl Harbor with a raid on the Marshall Islands in February 1942. The Salt Loke Ciry apparently opened fire on Wotje Island a few seconds before other American vessels, and it is credited with being the first ship to fire on Japanese-held territory. In April she helped escort the Doolittle raid that bombed Tokyo.

Wartime secrecy dictated that ships' real names not be used, so war correspondent Robert J. Casey nicknamed the old ship the "Swayback Maru" (m is Japanese for 'ship") in his dispatches home.

The Salt Lake Ciry continued to be in the thick of the action, including the fierce fighting near the Solomon Islands. In the Battle of Esperance on October 11, 1942, the cruiser took so many hits and delivered so many in retum that she was nicknamed 'the one-ship fleet." In the battle of the Komandorskie Islands, part of the effort to block the Japanese occupation of the Aleutians, the Salt Loke City was so badly damaged that her crew shook hands and prepared to die when she went down. The ship was ultimately saved, however, by near-suicidal attacks on the powerful Japanese cruisers by lightly armed American destroyers.

The American offensive island-hopped across the Pacific, meeting desperate resistance from the Japanese. The Salt Lake Ciry participated in fierce battles for the Gilberts, Marshalls, Philip pines, and Iwo Jima. Its final action included the bombardment of Okinawa in March 1945.

The immense atomic explosions that flattened Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war and inaugurated a new and frightening chapter in modem warfare. The Salt Lake City played a role in the further development of these powerful weapons. In 1946 the Swayback Maru and other obsolete vessels served as part of the atomic bomb test fleet near Bikini Atoll in the Pacific.

(more)

Although the ship survived, she was deemed highly radioactive and on May 25, 1948, the Salt Loke City was sunk off the southern California coast by ships and aircraft. e

See Robert Anthony Sumbot, 'The Utah Fleet: A History of Ships in the United States Navy that Bore Utah Place

Names and Personality Names."

THE HX~TORY BLAZBRis pmduced by the Utah State Historid Society and W e d in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood C e n d a l Commission. For more informati011about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

950706 (JN)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArE1~'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande

Salt Lake City. LTT84101

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3303 C

Artist John Held, Jr., Created Many Cultural Icons of the 1920s ][N AMERICAN CULTURALMYTHOLOGY THE 1920s CONJURE U P images of bathtub gin, raccoon coats, and tall, impossibly thin, short-skirted 'flappers. " F. Scott Fitzgedd nicknamed the period 'the Jazz Age" and wrote novels that chronicled the lifestyles of the young and funloving. Many of the period's most enduring visual images were created by one of Utah's most famous artists, John Held, Jr. His father, John Held, Sr., was born in Geneva, Switzerland, and showed a l y promise as an artist. Mormon educator John R. Park discovered Held while searching for talented individuals in Europ. As he had with other gifted youngsters, Park brought Held to Salt Lake City, legally adopted him, and began training him as a futwe art instructor at Deseret University. He was not to become an educator; instead, he enjoyed a successful career as an engraver, draftsman, and leader of a popular band. John Jr. 's maternal grandfather, James Evans, an English convert to Mormonism and a handcart pioneer, helped design sets for the theater, and his daughter Annie frequently acted in local productions. John Held, Jr., was born to John and Annie Evans Held on January 10, 1889.

John Jr. received no formal art training and always claimed that his father and sculptor Mahonri M. Young, a grandson of Brigham Young, were his only teachers. By age three John Jr. was drawing animals. A family legend maintains that when the child became lost in the mountains his frantic parents found him happily modeling figures out of some clay soil. The two John Helds became a familiar sight in downtown Salt Lake City. Eight-year-old John Jr. drove a horse-drawn cart with advertising panels, behind which John Sr. played his cornet to attract attention.

John attended West High School and then joined the staff of the SaU Luke Tribune as a cartoonist with his classmate, Harold Ross. Held left Utah in 1910 to seek his fortune in New York City; Ross and Mahonri Young did likewise. Ross went on to found IAe New Yorker magazine, which often featured Held's drawings; Young achieved success as a sculptor and remained lifelong friends with his fellow expatriate Utahns.

In addition to The New Yorker, Held sold cartoons to Judge, Ruck, VVonty Fair, and Lve-some of the most popular magazines of the era-and a number of other publications. His gentle satires and witty caricatures became enormously popular in the 1920s. He created Betty Coed, 'the flapper," along with her escort, Joe College. The characters both borrowed from and contributed to the real-life image of the 1920s 'Flaming Youth." The artistic versatility and restless energy that marked Held's life were already evident; although he quickly became a commercial success, he also engaged in 'serious" art-including watercolor and sculpture, designed Broadway sets, wrote a comic ballet, illustrated other authors' books, and wrote children's stories. (more)

Held made a fortune in the 1920s and traveled in the high-society circles that his art ever so gently satirized. He served briefly as constable of Weston, Connecticut, and even ran unsuccessfully for Congress, noting that he had never made an arrest and promising to redesign the C o n g ~ o n a l Record and to do the cdvers himself. Like so many others, Held lost most of his wealth in the stock market crash of 1929. By 1931 most of his art markets had dried up, and he suffered a severe nervous breakdown. He gave up his Connecticut home, and his first marriage ended in divorce. He began painting somber works and writing novels and short stories.

Although Held never recovered his commercial success, he continued to create during the succeeding decades. Critics praised his painting and sculpture, and his Jazz Age cartoons never lost their appeal. The Carnegie Corporation sponsored him as artist-in-residence at Haward and the University of Georgia. Held eventually settled on a farm in Belmar, New Jersey, with a new family and his beloved animals.He died of throat can= in 1958.

Sources: Z b Most of John HeU,Jr.. (Bdeboro, V-t: Stephen Greene h, 1972); Shelley Armitage, John Held, Jr., lllwtrator of the Jazz Age (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1987).

Rrr!HISTORY BLAZERis pmduced 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 Ssciety telephone 533-3500.

950707

(JN)

THE MISTORY BLAZER I ATEN'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State ~istoricalSociety 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3303

Kanab Has a Long Tradition as a Place to Make Movies

h 1951 HOWARDKOCH,THEN AN ASSISTANT DIRECTOR AT MGM

STUDIOS in Hollywood,

was assign& to find an appropriate location to film Lone Star, a picture starring Clark Gable and Ava Gardner. Koch recalled, 'We needed horses and riders and good country that would look like Texas." An associate gave him the name of Fay Hamblin in the southern Utah town of Kanab and told Koch that Hamblin would help him with everything he needed. After talking to Harnblin on the telephone, Koch drove to Kanab and with Hamblin's help arranged for the necessary animals and location to shoot the picture. That meeting, according to Koch, 'began a relationship of twelve films and . . . a frimdship of 25 years." Other Hollywood movie executives had similarly positive experiences working with residents of Kanab which, in part, accounts for the more than 200 pictures filmed there over the years and the nickname 'Little Hollywood" sometimes applied to the town.

Actually, the Hollywood connection had begun almost 30 years earlier. Tom Mix and his wonder horse introduced movie making to Kanab with the 1922 filming of Deadwood C m h . Soon thereafter brothers Whitney, Gronway, and Chauncey Parry began actively promoting southern Utah's spectacular scenery in Hollywood. They had already established a guided tour business, taking visitors to Zion, Bryce Canyon, and Grand Canyon national parks. Convinced of southern Utah's potential as a movie location, they put together a portfolio of photographs that they took to Hollywood in 1934 to show to producers. It was not long before several studios began to seek out the cedar and juniper covered hills, the canyons of red and yellow sandstone, the stretches of wasteland, the deep gorges and the desert sands as backdrops for their films. Universal, 20th Century Fox, and Republic all made movies on location in Kanab-such films as Arabian Nights, Smokey, Westward the Women, and 7 7 Lone ~ Ranger. The Parry brothers developed 'Parry Lodge, which became well-known within and outside the movie industry. When films were in production in Kanab the Parry Lodge staff was responsible for feeding, lodging, and transporting as many as 900 actors and technicians. With so many movies being filmed nearby, big name stars became almost commonplace at local motels and shops during the 40s, 50s and 60s.John Wayne, Fred MacMurray, Burl Ives, Barbara Stanwyck, Maureen O'Hara, and Rita Moreno were among the many celebrities who worked in Kanab.

Obviously the wonderful landscape was a big reason many directors kept going back to southern Utah, but the friendly townsfolk were also a drawing factor. Koch recalled times when crew members would beg for assignments in Kanab because they enjoyed it so much. That made a difference to the directors because 'a happy crew is a good movie, an unhappy crew is trouble," Koch said. The clean rooms and great food at Parry's Lodge made for a pleasant experience as did (more)

the wonderful residents who treated the movie crews with respect.

Kanab's citizenry also benefitted from the friendships they developed with those in the movie industry. Everyone from the Mormon bishop, to the mayor, to the butcher, got a chance to take part in several movies, but the financial boost to the community seemed the biggest gain.

Koch estimated that the pictures he alone made 'brought in something like four or five million . dollars to Kanab." Town motels did brisk business, local carpenters built sets, ranchers rented land, and residents worked as extras. School was even dismissed one we& as teachers and students alike took part in one movie. During the filming of Wanvard the Women nearly 150 southern Utahns worked in various capacities, but the biggest epic filmed in Kanab was nK Greatest Story Ever Told.With a budget of over $25 million and eight months to complete, it employed nearly everyone who wanted to work. In essence, most Kanab denizens profited from, or were at least affected by, its reputation as 'Little Hollywood. " See Adonis Findlay Robinson, H i s t o ~of~Kane Comfy (Salt Lake City, 1970); Howard Koch interview by Dennis Rowley,James D'Arc, November 'lo, 1976; and Pury Family Papers, Harold B. Lee Library, Special Collections, Brigham Young Univmity.

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

950708 (PR)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArEIt'S OF CSIIAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande

Salt Lake City. VT 84101

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 333-3503

Indians, Traders on the Spanish Trail, and Ordinary Folk Have Enjoyed Fish Lake

h THB 1910s WASATCHFRONTresidents seeking relief from the summer heat and a chance to fish or just relax by a mountain lake could board the 7:30 A.M. Denver & Rio Grande train in Salt Lake City and arrive in Richfield at 3 P.M. They could stay overnight in town and take the regular stage run to Fish Lake the next morning for $5 round trip or take the special Fish Lake car that would get them to the lake before dark for $8. In July and August the lodge, tent city, and camps at Fish Lake often became the most populous "town" in Sevier County with as many as 7,000temporary residents.

J. Cecil Alter, founding editor of Utah Hiktoricul Quarrerly and a tireless promoter of the state, described the scene in a ca. 1912 brochure advertising Fish Lake's wonders: 'The site chosen for the tented city, the quaint hotel, the large pavilion, the long boat pier, and the interesting State fish hatchery, is near a small but violent mountain creek whose waters wme dashing noisily down from the mountain above. On this stream a hydroelectric plant has been built, which carries a tungsten electric lamp in[to] every tent, and a score of them into the hotel, on the pier, and along the rustic pathways, besides supplying the current for electric cookers in the tents."

This was certainly the luxury camping experience of its day.

Board and room at the lodge was $2 a day; a tent with board floors, bed, stools, tables, electric light, and other camping needs cost $1 a day; an unfurnished tent could be rented for just 50 cents a day; and fishing boats cost $1 a day. Small wonder thousands flocked to the lake's shores d u ~ its g June 15 to October 15 season.

At 8,843 feet above sea level, Fish Lake is the result of faulting. Its basin was formed when land between two faults dropped. Water was trapped in the basin, and streams continue to bring water to it from the towering mountains above the lake. Fish Lake is one of the largest natural lakes in Utah with a length of over five miles and maximum depths of 80 to over 100 feet.

For generations the Paiute Indians had made use of the lake's bountiful supply of fish and the deer and other wildlife in the surrounding forest. Trappers, traders, and explorers visited it on the Fish Lake alternate route of the Old Spanish Trail through central Utah popularized by George D. Brewerton and Kit Carson. Brewerton called the waters Trout Lake. Such a splendid place did not escape the notice of Utah's pioneer white settlers. In June 1873 a group of Mormons that included Albert K. Thurber, George W. Bean, and William B. Pace set out to explore the area and to "bring about amiable relations with the Indians after eight years of war." They arrived at the lake on the afternoon of June 23 with 'two pack horses with blankets, shawls, beads, butcher knives and calico" from the federal government to present to the Indians as a p e e offering. The (more)

men negotiated a prrliminary treaty with the Paiutes at the lake and in July firmed things up with a second treaty at Cedar Grove between Burrville and Kwsharem.

Joe Nielson of Grass Valley, who first visited the lake in 1908, came under its spell when he and a friend launchea a log raft on its sapphire waters and saw mackinaws "as big as logs." Joe the Guide was a notable figure at the lake for 45 years, helping movie stars and ordinary fishermen and women find the big ones with his special homemade spinners and other lures.

Nielson's daughter Lea recalled watching the state build a dirt road to the lake to replace the old wagon trail. She saw the dynamite blasts and what looked like a straight line up the steep mountainside. She wrote, "When we took our first ride to Fish L a k in a car we found the road was not straight as it appeared from the valley. It was full of curve after curve-hairpin hairraising curves-a single lane of dirt, and if two cars needed to pass, one of them would have to back up to an inner curve that was a little wider. I was carsick and terrified."

The Fish Lake resort was launched in 1910-11 when Charles Skougaard built the first tent cabins and an eight-room lodge. The third and present Fish Lake Lodge complex, built between 1928 and 1932, was considered the largest wooden structure west of the Mississippi at that time. A gala opening on August 15, 1930, drew a large crowd to an afternoon program, an evening banquet, and a dance.

If time and popularity have taken their toll on the lake, it nevertheless remains one of Sevier County's jewels. No one before or since J. Cecil Alter has written so rhapsodically about this lake's undoubted charms: 'In the gentle springtime, and the gentler summer when even married folks' thoughts turn to things of love-the love of a vacation trip into the hills to wear away the cobwebs of winter and recreate the spiritual man at camping and fishing and boating and climbing, then it is that the Fish h k e country makes its most entreating love calls.. .."

Sowces: J. Cecil Alter, noting at Fish Lake (Salt Lake City, ca. 1912); Revo M. Young, Ten Penny Nails: Pioneering Sevier Valley (Richfield, 1980); Pearl F, Jacobson, comp. and ed,, &Iden Sheawsfim a Rich Field= A Centennial History of Richfield, Utah (Richfield, 1964); Ward J. Roylance, Utah=A Guide to the State (Salt Lake City, 1982); C. Gregory Crampton and Steven K . Madsen, In Search of the Spanish Trail: Santa Fe to Los Angeles, 182% 1848 (Salt Lake City: Gibbs Smith Publisher, 1994); Lea Nielson Lane, "Joe the Fish Lake Guide," Utah Historical Quarter&52 (Spring 1984).

THEHISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a gnnt from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Histori4 Society telephone 533-3300.

950709 (MBM)

THE HISTORY BLAZER i3'EllrS OF U7'.AH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande salt Lake City. LTT88101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3303

Courageous Emma Lee Endured Many Hardships in Pioneer Utah BATCHELOR LEEFF~ENCH WAS OFTEN one of hardship, struggle, and loss. In her 61 years she witnessed and participated in some of the most memorable and important events of Mormon and western history. Her story-like that of so many women on the western frontier-was also one of hard work, dedication, and perseverance.

Emma Batchelor was born in Sussex County, England, on April 21, 1836. Along with thousands of other English men and women, she and her friend Elizabeth Summers were converted to the Latter-day Saint faith by Mormon missionaries and convinced to emigrate. Emma suffered the hardships of a handcart pioneer, crossing the plains and mountains to Utah with the Willie and Martin companies. These two groups, which got a late start from Iowa City in 1856, suffered perhaps 200 dead when early winter conditions struck. Emma sunived, however, and on December 27, 1857, she met John Doyle Lee, a prominent Mormon pioneer, colonist, and aide to church president Brigharn Young. On January 7, 1858, Young sealed the two as man and wife.

At the time, Emma was apparently ignorant of the fact that her new husband was in serious trouble. Only months before, in September 1857, Lee had participated in--many said directed-the infamous Mountain Meadows Massacre in which 120 members of the Fancher immigrant party on their way to California had been attacked and killed by Indians and Mormon militiamen. John and his 19 plural wives, espcially Emma, would spend much of the next two decades in an ultimately vain attempt to keep him out of reach of the law.

John Doyle and Emma set up housekeeping at Harmony, one of Brigham Young's 'outer cordon" communities established in 1852 at the edge of the Great Basin in southwestern Utah.

There, Emma and her growing family lived a rough frontier life, growing their own food and supplying most of their other wants themselves. She eventually gave birth five times, including a set of twins.

By the late 1860s, however, external pressures were mounting on Utah. Federal officials and others demanded justice for the Mountain Meadows Massacre, and John D. Lee was the man most wanted. In 1870 Brigharn Young officially excommunicated Lee, although the church continued to assign him important task. In late 1871 Lee was requested to establish a ferry crossing on the Colorado River, approximately 15 miles south of the present UtahlArizona border, near where the Paria River entered the Colorado (hence the early name Paria Crossing). The spot had been used for at least 200 years; it is the only place between Moab, Utah, and Needles, California where a wagon could easily be driven to the river's banks from either side. Fathers Dominguez and Escdante attempted to cross at the spot, which they called Salsipuedes ('get out if (more)

Tm ~JPEOF

you can"), during their historic explorations on October 26, 1776, but high and fast-flowing water frustrated the attempt.

The Lees established their ferry s e ~ c in e 1872, and the site soon became an important link between southern Utakand the Mormon settlements in Arizona and beyond. Emma and John built their home here at a site they called Lonely Dell, reflecting its isolation. Over the ensuing years Emma, along with Lee's wife Rachel and thirteen children who accompanied them to the site, made many improvements, including a substantial house and gardens. Lonely Dell became an important resupply point for thousands of immigrants and explorers; in July 1872, the Lees entertained members of John Wesley Powell's Colorado River exploration party. Lee was frequently absent from Lonely Dell,however, sometimes fleeing fram the law and sometimes visiting his other homes and wives. Emma and her family were left to manage the ferry and homestead.

In the summer of 1873 Lee went into hiding, but the noose was tightening. He was finally captured at Panguitch on November 7, 1874. Emma remained loyal to him for the three years of his confinement and through his two trials; she brought food to him in the Beaver jail and was even accused of helping to plot his escape. On March 23, 1877, John Doyle Lee was executed by firing squad at the site of the ~0untai.nMeadows Massacre-the only person to pay with his life for this notorious crime.

Emma continued to operate the ferry, as she so often had during her husband's absences. In 1879 the LDS church purchased the s e ~ c efrom her and operated the ferry until 1909. Emma married a prospector named Franklin French and moved to Winslow, Arizona. For the remaining years of her life she put her childbirth experiences to use as a midwife; many of her loyal 'customers" called her 'Dr. French. " Emma died on November 16, 1897.

See Utah Histoty Encyclopedia, ed. Allen Kent Powel (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1994); Juanita Brooks, h m a Lee (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1975); Richard D. Poll et al., Utah'sHistmy (Provo: Brigham Young University h, 1978).

THa HETORYBLAZBRis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in psrt by a grant from the Utah Statehd Centennial Commission. For mom information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

950710 (JN)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArE14'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT84101

.

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 333-3503

Hoskaninni Avoided the Navajo Ordeal at Bosque Redondo and Prospered

Tm SCENIC AREA

KNOWN AS

MONUMENT VALLEYin the extreme southeastern corner of

Utah was at one time dominated by a little known Navajo chief called Hush-Kaaney (anglicized Hoskaninni and also H~skinnini).From 1862 until his death in 1912 Hoskaninni was 'emperor" of the valley and largely kept white visitors out in protection of the land, his people, and his 'secret" silver mine. Legends of the chiefs exploits in defense of his private kingdom cloud his history.

The most detailed information known about him was gathered in an 1939 interview of his son, Hoskaninni-begay, by forest ranger Charles Kelly and refutes much of the more sensational stories.

According to Hoskaninni-begay , his father' s independent 'rule" of Monument Valley g n w out of the 1863 roundup of Navajos in that region by Col. Christopher "Kit" Carson. Under orders from Gen. James H. Carleton to track down every Navajo, some 700 troops under Carson's command began in the summer of 1863 to attack the scattered Navajo enclaves, killing those who resisted and capturing the others. The once-rich Navajos saw their hogans and crops burned and their flocks confiscated. Utes,Pueblos, and Eumpean Americans joined the military in rooting out their former enemy. Over 300 Navajos were killed outright, more died of hunger and exposure during the winter, and hundreds of women and children were sold into slavery. It was one of the most violent campaigns waged against a major Indian tribe in North America. Starving and disheartened, an eventual 8,500 Navajos made the 'long walk" to Bosque Redondo on the Pecos River in eastern New Mexico, there to be watched by troops at nearby Fort Surnner. General Carleton's plan was to make the Navajos into self-sufficient, settled farmers. The plan faikd, and after years of intense suffering the Navajos were allowed to return in 1868 to the area now encompassed by their resewation in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah.

At the beginning of this campaign against the Navajos the 35-year-old Hoskaninni heard that some of his family members had been caught. In response, he angrily vowed to his immediate family and friends that he would die before he would leave. Despite this determination, when the soldiers came looking for Hoskaninni they surprised him, and the small band of seventeen barely escaped capture by scattering haphazardly in the desert to hide. Luckily, the soldiers did not find any of them, and when night fell they regrouped and began walking north into enemy Ute temtory. They had no food and only one horse and one rifle among them, but they had managed to round up a flock of twenty sheep to take along. The exiles traveled at night and slept during the day. They survived primarily on seeds, with an occasional rabbit as a 'feast. " After traveling several days in a northwesterly direction the group-by now footsore, hungry, and tired of climbing in and out of deep canyons-eventually reached the south end of Navajo Mountain (more)

I

where they came upon a little stream of water surrounded on all sides by green grass. There Hoskaninni's wife sat firmly upon the ground and refused to go any farther. As a result, the group made camp and remained there for the following six years. The spot was still in Ute territory, but due to its remoteness only one Ute ever found the group and he chose not to betray them.

By the time the weary band had reached their isolated spot it was late in the year, and Hoskaninni sent them into the surrounding country to gather grass seeds and pine nuts for winter use. AU twenty sheep had survived the journey, but the chief refused to allow any to be eaten as he hoped the herd would increase in the spring. Knowing that they might starve without enough winter food, he pushed them hard and angrily reprimanded anyone he felt was lazy. Although this harsh attitude earned Hush-Kaaney his name (meaning 'the angry one"), it was essential in saving them from starvation that first winter.

The ensuing years proved good. Their sheep herd increased so that they had plenty of meat and wool for blankets. In addition, on one exploratory trip into the mountains, Hoskaninni returned with several large pieces of silver that the group made into ornaments and jewelry. Hoskaninni periodically returned to the mountains to retrieve more of the precious mineral but never told anyone the silver mine's loCation.

In 1868 most Navajos were released from internment at New Mexico and returned to their lands where each was given two sheep and some seeds to start a new life. The following year when Hoskaninni and his band came out of hiding and moved into the heart of Monument Valley they were the strongest and richest Navajos in the entire region.

Other Navajos began to take notice of the group's large amounts of silver, and soon rumors spread to white settlers of a silver mine in Monument Valley. Many came in search of the hidden silver, but Hoskaninni refused to divulge the location of his mine and would not return there himself for fear of being followed. In 1879 two white prospectors came looking for the secret mine and reportedly even located it, but both ended up dead. Hoskaninni's band was blamed for the killings; no proof was ever produced, and in the 1939 i n t e ~ e wHoskaninni's son maintained it was renegade Utes who committed the murders. Regardless, most whites stayed away for fear of the chief.

Hoskaninni's family continued to prosper in Monument Valley until his death in 1912.

According to custom, much of Hoskaninni's silver was buried with him and the remainder of his property was divided among his survivors. His son Hoskani~i-begaydied in poverty in 1941.

Hoskinnini Mesa, 11 miles west of Goulding, San Juan County, was named in memory of the chief.

See Charles Kelly, 'Chief Hoskaninni," Utah Histon'cul Quarterly 21 (July 1953): 219-26; Garrick Bailey and Roberta Glenn Bailey, A Histoty of the Navajos: 3he Reservation Years (Santa Fe: School of American Research, 1986).

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.

950711 (PR)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEM'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. ZPT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

President Harding Got an Enthusiastic Welcome on His 1923 Visit to Utah

MIDENT WARREN G. HARDING'S 1923 VISIT TO UTAHwas part of a broader tour of the western Unitsd States designed to bring him 'closer to the people and their conditions." After touring Colorado, Utah, Idaho, and other states, he proceeded to Alaska, his primary destination, and became the first president to visit that territory since its purchase in 1867. Tragedy unexpectedly struck the tour, however, when the president became ill and the trip ended abruptly with Harding's death in San Francisco on August 2, 1923.

Harding's train the ''Presidential Alaska Special" arrived in Ogden on the morning of June 26 to the cheers of an enthusiastic crowd gathered at Union Station. President and Mrs.Harding and their entourage were then escorted to IRSter Park where nearly 2,000 persons waited to greet them. Harding commented that he had not anticipated seeing so many people at such an early hour-8 A.M.-and then briefly addressed the eager Ogdenites before traveling on to Salt Lalce City. All along the highway between Ogden and the state's capital city people had gather4 to greet the president, including scores of flag-waving children. One tiny Ogden girl, d e d by her father, even approached the president's car and handed him a bouquet of roses. Harding eventually arrived at Liberty Park in Salt Lake City where a huge crowd waited in anticipation. The president was clearly overwhelmed with the Utah welcome and told the cheering throng: 'Words are unable to express my appreciation of the warm friendly spirit of this reception." Some of their enthusiasm may have sprung from the fact that Utahns had helped to elect Harding in November 1920, giving him some 82,000 votes to 57,000 for losing Democrat James M. Cox. Then, too, as a U.S. senator, Harding had endorsed causes popular with many Utahns, including woman suffrage, the Volstead Act's provisions for enforcing prohibition-passed over Wilson's veto, i d anti-strike legislation.

After speaking at Liberty Park the president and his party moved on to the Hotel Utah where children bearing armloads of flowers lined both sides of the hotel entrance. Later that afternoon Harding and Mormon church president Heber J. Grant were parhered for a round of golf and handily defeated their opponents. The president toured Fort Douglas where he received a 21-gun salute, and he was treated to a private organ recital at the Mormon Tabernacle. The musical offerings were wide ranging and included the Mormon hymn 'Come, Come Ye Saints," a selection from Tristan tznd Isolde, and a personal favorite of Mrs. Harding's, 'A Perfect Day. " That evening the president returned to the Tabernacle where he delivered a political w h on the subject of ''Taxation and Expenditure" to an overflow crowd.

The presidential party continued its dizzyingly paced tour as it boarded the 'Alaska Special" and set out for southern Utah where the group planned to visit Zion National Park the (more)

next day. The morning of June 27 President Harding was again greeted by enthusiastic Utahns, this time at Cedar City. From there the delegation continued south in thuty-two highly polished cars furnished by Cedar City residents. All along the route the official entourage passed SCOFCS of friendly southern UtahnCsattracted by the chance to see the country's president in person.

In Toquerville townsfolk had spent much of the previous night carrying buckets of water to sprinkle the threequarters of a mile of road that dissected their town in order to prevent any dust from stirring when the president's car passed over it. Fortunately, the road remained dust fire and, as planned, the presidential caravan stopped in Toquerville for a rest, giving Harding a chance to address the pioneers of that area. As he spoke, local residents showed their appreciation for the honor of having the president of the United States in their town by loading each official car in the entourage with a brimming basket of prize Dixie fruit.

After winding through several other small towns the group finally Mved in Zion Canyon where they found a number of the region's best horses waiting. President Harding domed leather chaps, tied a kerchief around his neck, and, joined by Heber J. Grant, Gov. Charles R. Mabey, Sen. Reed Smoot, and other dignitaries, proceeded on horseback up the scenic canyon.

After enjoying the beauty of southern Utah the party returned to Cedar City where Mrs. Harding told the people how thoroughly she had enjoyed the day: 'I am glad I came....I would not have missed this trip for anything." The presidential party then boarded its train and headed for its next scenic destination, Yellowstone National Park.

Unfortunately, before President Harding's western tour ended he was stricken ill and died of a probable heart attack. News of his death came as a shock and Utah joined the rest of the nation in mourning the loss of its leader. On August 10, 1923, while Harding was laid to rest in Marion, Ohio, many Utah stores, businesses, and factories closed in deference to the nation's fallen leader. In Salt Lalre City several memorial ceremonies were held, including those at Fort Douglas, the Cathedral of the Madeleine, and St. Mark's Cathedral. Crowds also thronged the Mormon Tabernacle for s e ~ c e sto honor the memory of the president who had spoken to a much less solemn congregation in that same edifice only six weeks earlier.

Sources: Deseret News, June 25,26,27,28, 1923, August 10,1923; Salt Ldz Tibum, June 27, 1923; Millennia1 Star, August 2, 1923.

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

950712 (PR)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEM'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake Citv, tTT84101 (801) 533-3300 FAX (801) 333-3303

Ute Severalty: Reform vs. Reality

UTAH'STEFUUTORIALDELEGATE TO CONGRESS, Joseph L. Rawlins, made an unannounced trip back to Salt Lake City on February 27, 1894. Newspaper reporters, hearing he was in town, tracked him down the next day and, note pads in hand, queried him on the status of statehood.

Saying he did not know exactly why the process seemed to be delayed, Rawlins asserted his confidence that the enabling bill would nevertheless be passed during the present session.

Events would prove Delegate Rawlins correct. Passed by both houses of Congress, the Enabling Act was signed by President Cleveland on July 16, 1894. It did not grant statehood, of course; that was still a year and a half away. Rather, it authorized the calling of a convention to draft a state constitution and in several other ways put the statehood procedure into high gear.

Known for good reason as the father of Utah statehood, Joseph Rawlins nevertheless seemed much less interested in discussing statehood that early spring day than in sharing details of another measure he was sponsoring in Congress: opening the Indian Resenation in eastern Utah to white settlement. Under provisions of his bill, certain land within the reservation would be given in severalty (individual ownership) to the resident Utes, and the rest of the land would then be sold in lots not exceeding 160 acres to whoever submitted the highest sealed bid.

In his proposal for sweralty of Ute lands, Rawlins was marching in cadence with the reform movement of the times. Feeling that the reservation policy had been a failure, certain social thinkers, particularly in the East, began working for an Indian policy that de-emphasized tribal lifestyles in favor of individualism, education, vocational training, and property ownership. Congress, responding to the call for reform, passed a series of laws in the 1870s and 80s. Key among them was the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 which provided for the allotment of tribal lands directly to the Indians as individuals. Lots of up to 160 acres were to be given but only after being held in trust by the government for twenty-five years. In the meantime, the remainder of the native lands could be sold to the public, with proceeds going into an Indian education fund.

The Utes were understandably nervous about severalty. Beginning with permanent white settlement of the Great Basin in 1847, the central Utah band had seen their traditional lifeways destroyed over the next twenty years and had been forced to accept removal to the Uinta Basin reservation in the 1860s. Then in the early 1880s Congress enlarged the reservation by some 2 million acres and forced the relocation of two other Ute bands, the White River and Uncompahgre from western Colorado, to take up residence there. Hardly had these three distinct Ute bands, each with its own customs and values, reached a degree of accommodation and stability than they were faced with Rawlins's proposal for yet another radical change. (more)

While Joseph Rawlins may have been in step with the reformers of the East, he was in bed with miners, farmers, and other capitalists in Utah. An important hydrocarbon known as gilsonite, useful for a variety of industrial purposes, and other asphalt materials had been discovend on the reservation a decade klier, and they had immediately sparked the interest of mining oompanies.

Utah agriculture had reached its commercial phase by the 18909, and speculators had noticed for some time the enclaves of promising farmland that dotted the reservation. It was a classic push-pull situation. If the concept of reform provided the framework for allotment, economic motives provided the impetus.

Under these circumstances it is probably surprising that opening the reservation took as long as it did. Not until 1898-two years after statehood, when Joseph RawJins was a U.S. senator-did the process begin. That was with the Uncompahgre Reserve-the portion of the resexvation that had been added in 1882. The larger opening, occasioning much greater activity, came on the original Uintah Reservation in 1905. Together they constituted one of Utah's most spectacular land grabs. In the latter action alone, some 1,600 Indian allotments-weremade, and 5,772 homesteading permits were issued in the lottery that followed.

In 1934 Congress recognized the failure of severalty and repealed the Dawes Act. Unforbnately, for many of the nation's native inhabitants, the damage was irrevocable. Such was certainly the case in Utah. When the Indianapolis Sentinel editorialized on January 5, 1896, that 'Miss Utah comes into the family bright and smiling," it caught the spirit of euphoria that most Utahns felt upon achieving statehood. For the Utes, however, it was a time of wony over a threatening and uncertain future.

See Joan Ray Hanow, "Joseph L. Rawins, Father of Utah Statehood," Utah Historical Quarterly 44 (1976).

THEHISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant h m the Utah Statebod Centemid Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

950713 (SJL)

THE HISTORY BLAZER A'EM'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande

.Salt Lake

.

City. tTT84101

(801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3303

Ithamar Sprague's Big Feet Created Panic in One Southern Utah Town PRoCEsS OF C0LX)NIZING VAST EXPANSES OF THE GREATBASIN,

settlers d o m y tainted actual events with exaggerations and absurdities that became lively folklore for younger generations tb smile at. Such was the case in the small southern Utah town of Washington where one particularly imaginative young Swedish settler named Ithamar Sprague was at the heart of an amusing legend sometimes referred to among early residents as "Sprague's hoax."

According to tradition, Sprague was big, gawky, and had feet like barges. His assigned daily task was to herd the family cows to pasture in the green fields across the Virgin River from town. One day, following a thunderstorm, as the young man took the cows across the river he happened to notice a peculiar mark left by one of the cows that had slipped and struggled to cross the slick river bottom. There in the mud was an imprint remarkably resembling a huge human shoe print. The cow's mud art was all it took to send Sprague's mind spinning.

Within a few days Sprague had constructed a pair of huge 'clodhoppers" and at night began leaving gigantic human footprints, at least three feet long, on the dusty village streets. As the story goes, it was a few playful children who fvst discovered the oversized prints. Their parents, however, would not believe the fanciful story until investigating for themselves. Sure enough, the huge tracks were there, just as the children claimed. News of the mysterious prints spread quickly through town and stories of explanation did too. Some residents dismissed the large footprints as the work of a prankster, others believed a huge creature was stalking the village, and still others resewed judgment for future developments.

Spumed on by the uproar he had caused, Sprague made tracks again the following night.

With the second day's trail of prints, more and more townsfolk became convinced there was a ferocious being plaguing the town. Local Indians only added to the unrest when they rehearsed tells of a legendary giant who had once prowled that region, killing and plundering the countryside. As the hysteria grew other explanations were also offered, two of which involved Mormon religious traditions. Some said the tracks must have been left by one of the Three Nephites.

According to the Book of Mormon, these Nephites were disciples of Jesus Christ and were promised by Jesus that they wuld tarry on the earth until he returned. Mormon folklore abounds with stories of mysterious appmances by the Nephites, but why the people of Washington thought one of them would have such large feet is not clear, other than residents were searching for any explanation of the tracks.

Those who believed neither the Indian legend nor the Nephite explanation turned to another Book of Mormon tradition for an answer. It was commonly told in Washington County that (me)

h

Brigham Young, on one of his visits to that region, had attributed a string of mysterious tool thefts at a local sawmill to a band of Book of Mormon outlaws hown as the Gadianton Robbers. Upon visiting the mill, Young apparently told the owner that his mill was built upon the burial ground of a band of Gadianton Robbers and if he moved the mill the tool thefts would cease. The mill owner followed the Mormon prophet's counsel and had no mori trouble with missing tools. Some .

Washington residents reasoned that if a band of dead outlaws could steal tools elsewhere in the county they could certainly make large mysterious tracks through their town.

In the midst of this desperate search for an explanation Sprague laughingly continued his prank. He made tracks in the cemetery one night and outside Bishop Robert D. Covington's home another night. Soon residents began attributing all the mishaps in town to the mysterious beast: the hens were too frightened to -lay, the milk soured too soon, and one lady had a m i d i a g e due to her fright. The city fathers even organized a posse to try and capture the monster, but the tracks always either disappeared abruptly or led to rocks where they were no longer traceable.

Several versions of how Sprague's hoax was finally discovered evolved over the years.

According to one version, a town mass meeting was called wherein residents discussed deserting the village for a safer area or at least sending a messenger to Brigham Young to ask for advice.

During the meeting a girl that Sprague had romantically pursued in vain noticed his smug attitude and told him to 'fess up. " He asked the attractive young lady what she would do if he did admit to being the prankster. She replied that she would finally consent to marrying him. According to this story, Sprague excitedly jumped to his feet and confessed, and the couple was married shortly thereafter.

A more probable conclusion, however, is that Sprague was no longer able to keep his secret and finally told of his exploits. In this version Sprague did not get a girl but, rather, faced the wrath of certain citizens who were determined he should be disciplined. In response Sprague chose to spend time with relatives in neighboring towns while the commotion blew over. By the time he returned, most Washington residents were able to laugh with the ingenious prankster at the fright he had given their unsuspecting town.

Sources: Andrew Karl Larson, 'Ithamar Sprague and His Big Shoes," in Thomas E. Cheney, ed., Low of Faith and Folly (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1971),pp. 31-35; Austin and Alta Fife, Saints of Sage and Saddle: Folklore among the Monnom (Bloomingtcm: Indiana University Press, 1956), pp. 272-73.

THEHISTORY BLAZER is 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.

950714 (PR)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATE12'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM

THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. 'ITT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3303

The Salt Industry Was One of the First Enterprises in Utah is one of the most useful and sought-after substances on earth. It has long been used to flavor otherwise bland foods and to preseme perishables in the absence of refrigeration. The various inhabitants of Utah over the millennia have recognized the value of the Great Salt Lake and its surrounding salt flats. The lake is, of wurse, the remnant of a much larger ancient inland sea that scientists have dubbed Lake Bonneville. As the lake shrank over time, the concentration of minerals in its waters, including salt, increased, while the resulting driedup areas became coated with salt to a depth of several feet.

Father Escahte's 1776journal noted that local Indians used the surrounding salt deposits for their needs, Mountain man Jedediah S. Smith obtained salt near the lake and took some to William Henry Ashley's fur party in 1825. John C. Fremont and Kit Carson mentioned the easy availability of the mineral along the lake shore, but since most immigrant parties already carried sufficient salt, the lake shore did not attract many overland travelers in need of the mineral.

The first Mormon settlers visited the lake on July 28, 1847. Brigharn Young and others gathered salt from the surrounding rocks and noted how easy it was to simply scoop up the product; this method would be used by some well into the 20th century, although salt gathered that way contained impurities. In August 1847 a committee was assigned to get salt for the new settlement; they returned four days later with 125 bushels of coarse salt that they had shoveled out of deposits, along with some fine white table salt obtained by boiling. Historian John Clark said that the Mormons considered the salt deposits to be a communal resource, much like water or timber.

A crude, temporary saltworks, including apparatus for boiling down lake water, had been built by 1848. In 1849 the LDS Quorum of the Twelve directed a company of men to establish a permanent saltworks. By 1850 Charley White and his family were operating the saltworks on the lake shore opposite Black Rock and producing fine, coarse, and common grades of salt. White advertised that he would accept 'cattle, grain, flour, hams, bacon, cheese, butter, pigs, sheep, lumber, poles, or firewood" in exchange for salt. The demise of the White saltworks is shrouded in mystery; a persistent local legend maintains that the Whites separated and that Mrs. White continued to run the works until she was murdered by unknown persons who wanted her cattle.

Salt even entered into the Utah War of 1857-58. Washington authorities had reasoned that Johnston's Army was going to Salt Lake City and therefore did not need to be supplied with a commodity that was relatively costly in the East. Government bungling and indecision, however, meant that the Army was forced to winter at Camp Scott near Fort Bridger, well short of its Salt Lake Valley destination. There the federal troopers spent a miserable winter, complaining about (more) &DW

CHLORIDE, OR COMMON S&T,

the insipid food. Besides salt, tobacco, sugar, and coffee were scarce and expensive; whiskey cost $12 a gallon when it was available. Brigham Young, hearing of Johnston's troubles, sent several mule loads of supplies to the general, along with a note urging him to accept the gift (and leave).

The proud Johnston ~ntemptuouslyrefused the gift, although apparently his men accepted it gladly.

Wilford Woodruff reported that an Indian named Ben Simons earned over $2,000 selling salt to the Army*

The laborious boiling method of obtaining salt declined in use in the 1870s, to be replaced by specially constructed solar evaporation ponds. Initially, saltmakers relied on the wind to fill their ponds; when this proved unreliable they installed pumps. The resulting product tended to be bitter and damp, until by trial and error the saltmakers established the fractional crystallization process, which used a series of ponds to create a nearly 100 percent pure product.

The demand for Utah salt greatly increased when the Butte, Montana, silver mines opened, since salt was used in the reduction of ore. Until milroad lines were constructed, the salt was d e d by mule load to the mines at the rate of $200 a ton. Eventually, the Utah Central, Utah southern, Utah Eastern, and Utah Western railroads connected the saltworks with mining customers at Butte, Juab County's in tic District, Park City,and elsewhere.

The h a 1 two decades of the 19th century saw the salt industry go from a highly decentrati d , competitive business to a near monopoly. Eventually, the Mand Salt Company and its coprate successors dominated the industry, producing coarse salt for industrial use as well as refined table salt. In 1990 salt production in Utah totaled almost 1.8 million short tons with a value of $50.4 million-considerably less than the $200/ton rate paid by the Butte mine owners more than a century ago.

See John A. Clark, "History of Utah's Salt Industry, 1847-1970" (M. A. thesis, Brigham Young University, 1971); "Pioneer Salt Industry,- MS in Utah State Historical Society Library subject files; David E. Miller, "The Great Salt

Lake: Its History and Economic Development" (Ph.D. diss. University of Southern California, 1947); Dale L. Morgan, lhe Great Salt Lake (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1947).

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

THE HISTORY BLAZER hTEM'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City, LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

Could SLC Have Handled the UU/BW Rivalry within Its Borders?

BRIGHAM YOUNGACADEMYOF SALT LAKECITY, hter known as Young University and the Church University, had a brief and troubled life. One of three institutions of higher learning built on property endowed by Young, the Academy-University was meant to serve as the central and highest school operated by the LDS church. Although the school was eventually doomed by the Panic of 1893 and opposition from rival institutions, its demise helped the University of Utah, the LDS Business College, and Brigham Young University achieve their success. Best of all, perhaps, the U. and the flagship Mormon university ended up in different counties!

Brigham Young had deeded the land for the Salt Lake City academy in 1876, the year before his death, but various disputes kept the institution hanging fire for years. The land for the proposed academy became part of the bitter contest over Young's estate. The academy was also opposed by his successor as LDS church president, John Taylor, who preferred the establishment of a Salt Lake Stake Academy, possibly because a stake academy would have no connection with Young's heirs nor bear his name.

After Taylor's death in 1887, Wilford Woodruff, the new church leader, favored carrying out and expanding upon Brigham Young's original plans. Accordingly, in 1890 he asked Brigham's son Willard to serve as the president of a new university that would offer a higher level of education than any currently available in church schools. Young University, as it was to be known, would receive LDS church donations and would firmly establish Salt Lake City as the educational capital of Utah.

Willard Young worked hard to create this university, commissioning a well-known architect to design buildings and hiring James E. Talmage, an English convert to Mormonism and an experienced Utah educator, to oversee academics. In 1892 Willard Young successfully proposed that the school be officially founded by the church and renamed the University of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or Church University), signifying its preeminent status among church schools.

The financial panic of 1893 hit Utah hard. In its wake the LDS church decided to retrench its educational commitments, closing 20 church schools and curtailing the Church University's offerings. The University of Utah, which was also struggling to keep afloat in those uncertain economic times, protested the establishment of the Church University and requested that it be closed; in turn, the U. promised to appoint Talmage as its president. Perhaps as a gesture toward settling decades of gentile-Mormon conflict over education in the temtory, the church agreed to abandon its competing university and subsidized the U. with a $60,000 endowment. (more)

LDS Coflege (later the LDS Business College) benefited from the closure as well,receiving much of the Church University's property. Perhaps the biggest beneficiary was the Brigham Young Academy at Provo. The abandonment of the Church University in Salt Lake City eventually led LDS leaders to develop the Provo academy into the church's leading educational institution, Brigham Young University.

See D.Michael Quinn, "The Brief Crueer of Young University at Solt h k e City," Utah Historical Qua~erly41 (Winter 1973).

nrrj HISTORY BLAZERis pmduced by the Utah State Historical Society and h d e d in part by a grant from the Utah Statehod ~ ~Commission. a For more l information about the Historid Society telephone 533-3500.

950716 (JN)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArEIt'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State ~istoricalSociety 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801) 533-3503

The Broad Ax and the PZuin Dealer Kept Utah's African Americans Informed Although the 1890 census reported only 588 African Americans living in Utah-a figure that would almost double by 1910-Salt Lalce City supported two black newspapers for several years during that time. Julius' F. Taylor, born in Virginia but most recently from Fargo, North Dakota, edited and published the Broad Ax, a weekly newspaper, from August 1895 until June 1899 before moving with his family and newspaper to Chicago. William W. Taylor (no relation) edited the Utuh Plain Dealer for at least 12 years and was active in politics and fraternal organizations.

The two men were political and journalistic rivals. Julius was an ardent Democrat, an unusual affiliation at a time when most African Americans were still Republicans and many Democrats were open advocates of white supremacy. Julius argued that the Republicans had betrayed his race's trust since Emancipation and that the Democratic party was the race's best hope.

The Broad Ax announced that it was 'advocating the immortal principles of Jefferson and Jackson; it will stand for the HONEST SILVER dollar of our forefathers, to be coined free . . . we will also strive to aid and advance the cause of the working man. . . . This paper will also contend for the liberation of the minds of the colored people from political slavery . . . ."

William Taylor was a Republican and served as the city's deputy dog tax collector before running for the state legislature in 1896. Julius attacked William from the Broad Ax's first issue; he called William's paper the Double De& and pronounced him unqualified for o m and not a true representative of the colored people. The Salt Lake Herald, a Democratic paper, printed several editorial cartoons featuring racially stereotyped caricatures of William. Since only one issue of the Plan Dealer is known to have survived (in LDS Church Archives), William's views, including his opinion of Julius and his reaction to the attacks against him, are unknown. William's candidacy was unsuccessful, but he continued to be a prominent figure in the African-American community, publishing his newspaper and serving as president of the Grand United Order of Odd Fellows, a black fraternal organization. William's widow, Lizde, continued to publish the Plain Dealer for a short while after his death.

Julius Taylor's active and outspoken editorial voice struck at his other rivals as well. He apparently had a running feud with Snlt Lake Tribune editor C. C. Goodwin, calling him, among other things, a 'pale-faced two-legged dung-hill rooster" who was the editor of a 'well-known negro-hating sheet." Julius was a tireless advocate for his race, attacking the popular 'cake walks" and 'coon songs" that he felt degraded African Americans. He frequently expressed his disgust over the treatment of blacks in Salt Lake City and in the nation as a whole. His reasons for l e a v i ~Utah are not clear; Julius had briefly resided in Chicago, and that city's larger black population may haw provided a more comfortable and supportive atmosphere for him. (mo=)

Strange as it may seem,the two Taylors did .not have the journalistic M d to themselves.

Other black newspapers published in Utah between 1890 and 1910 include the Wmem &corder owned by S. P. Chambers, the Headlight published by J. Gordon McPherson, Tow TOW with W. P. Rough as editor, Md the Tki-Ciry Oracle published by Rev. J. W. Washington.

The editors of Utah's black newspapers participated in professional journalistic organizations.

Both Taylors were members of the Utah Press Association, and Julius Sewed as historian of the o r g d t i o n before moving to Chicago. These black publishers also took an active part in the Western Negro Press Association. They presented papers at meetings, served as officers, and hosted the WNPA's fifth annual meeting in Salt Lake City in 1900. In 1899 William Taylor was elected president of the WNPA, and when the organization's 1900 convention was held in Salt Lake City black residents hosted receptions for the participants and took their guests on tours of the city.

By 1910 a vibrant black community centered in Salt Lake City had emerged in Utah. In response to their general exclusion from full participation in Utah's social and cultural activities, they established their own churches, fraternal organizations, newspapers, and political and social groups. Like African Americans elsewhere they created and supported those institutions that gave greater meaning to their liv&. In this manner black Utahns embraced the spirit of race consciousness and self-help commonly associated with the national black oommunity during the 'Age of Booker T. Washington. " Sources: Broad Ax, 1895-1901; Ronald G. Coleman 'A History of Blacks in Utah, 1825-1910m(Ph.D. diss., University of Utah, 1980)

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

950717 (JN)

THE MISTORY BLAZER ATElt'SOF UTAH'S PAST FROM

THE

Utah State Historical Society

300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT88101 (801)533-3500 FAX (801)533-3503

Alice Parker Isom Faced Frontier Utah's Challenges with True Grit

R m FAMILY LIFE IN

,-,

I~TH-CENTURY UTAHoften required family members to share daily responsibilities. Frequently wives shouldered heavy domestic burdens as well as helped with fafining and other tasks. Even for two-parent f d e s , providing adequate clothing and food was often very difficult and required stamina and perseverance. For those parents who faced the frontier alone the difficulties must have seemed insurmountable; perhaps for their simple survival they deserve recognition and praise. Alice Parker Isom, a pioneer of the small southwestern Utah village of Virgin City, is one such heroine. Left a widow one month before tumhg 38, she tackled the daunting task of raising a large family alone. Using her keen business skills, she managed a highly successful cooperative store and in the process provided a comfortable home life for her children. Her remarkable story stands as an example of the tenacity that tamed the Utah frontier.

Alice was born January 8, 1848, in St. Louis, Missouri, to John and Ellen Briggs Parker, converts to the Mormon faith from England. In 1852 the Parkers moved west to Salt Lake City until 'called" to grow cotton in Utah's "Dixie." The family settled on the banks of the Virgin River in 1862 at the town of Virgin City and spent their first winter living in a wagon box. Alice thought her new home 'a dreadfbl place, " and it took "years" before she felt content there.

Nonetheless, she set about helping her family establish a home. Before long her father had 'taken up land, put in a crop and set out a orchard," and Alice had learned to card and spin cotton.

In the summer of 1869, following a four-year courtship, Alice married her sweetheart, George Isom, in Salt Lake City. The young couple returned to Virgin City with $1,000 worth of merchandise that Alice's father used to open a Co-op store in the boarded-up back porch of his home. Local residents eagerly shopped at the new store; it did a brisk $100 worth of business on opening day. From the outxt George meticulously kept the Co-op's books, and by 1880 Alice's father had turned the entire business over to him to manage. George soon constructed a new building near his house so Alice could care for their children while clerking. They received 6 percent of the sales in exchange for providing the building and operating the store. By 1885 they were blessed with eight children for which George provided 'a very comfortable home" and "always avoided debt. " The young cbuple still faced challenges, however. In 1875 doctors were forced to remove Alice's right eye in order to cut out a large fibrous tumor that had grown behind it. But this trial must have seemed mild compared to those she encountered ten years later. In December 1885 she experienced her 'first great sorrow" when her youngest daughter, Josephine, died. Fortunately, George was there to comfort her, but less than two months later she 'had a greater sorrow to bear (more)

alone": George, at age 39, died of 'consumption. " Two weeks later Alice gave birth to another girl, making a total of eight children left to her care. Her difficulties did not end there. Alice's father died three month's after George's death, and then, less than two years later, her mother also passed away.

Deeply saddened but undaunted by these personal tragedies, Alice became manager of the Co-op store and under her leadership it flourished: 'I had done most of the buying from the fnst and understood the business quite well. I did well with it both for myslf and the stockholders."

Her children helped her. Ellen, 15 when her father died, assumed many of his old responsibilities.

She clerked at the store, 'tended the horses, cows, and pigs, took her father's place at the table, and did everything.. .to lighten [her mother's] burdens." Still there were times, lik the Christmas of 1887 when all eight children had the measles, that Alice had to cope on her own. Regardless, she always seemed to manage and ultimately provided the best possible opportunities for her children.

Under her direction the Virgin City Co-op continued to thrive, so much so that by the fall of 1894 some of the stockholders had become "jealous," thinking that Alice 'was doing too well."

Some agitated for her repl&ment and argued that a new store should be built. The schism that developed among the stockholders left Alice 'very much grieved" as the store 'was the only way that [she] could see to provide for family." Eventually, "about half" the stockholders withdrew and started a store of their o m , which, according to Alice, 'never paid a dividend" and "died seventeen hundred dollars in debt. " Alice saw this upheaval as a prime opportunity to leave Virgin City and move where her children wuld obtain a good education. She reduced the stock in what remained of her store and left Mary, her recently d e d daughter, in charge. She moved to Provo for three years and enrolled her children in the Brigham Young Academy, taking in boarders to pay expenses.

When she returned to Virgin City in 1898, debt fiee and her children better educated, townsfolk urged her to revitalize her store; she did and soon 'had a nice business again." When oil was discovered near Virgin in 1907 store sales boomed. She also opened her house to boarders, taking in hundreds of oil men over the next year. Then she purchased a sawmill and leased it to experienced operators. With over 500 oil men depending on her for supplies, she stocked the shelves for the fall and winter and stood to turn a huge profit. It all seemed too good to be true-and it was. The Panic of 1907 devastated the national economy, and the oil boom went bust, leaving Alice $5,000 in debt. She patiently collected from townsfolk who owed her money, but not until 1922 was she debt h.

Alice spent the last years of her life near her family, most of whom had established homes in the newly founded community of Humcane about 10 miles west of Virgin City. She lived in "a neat little house" constructed for herself and soon became involved in community and church activities. She died there on August 6, 1924.

C

m]

See William R. Palmer, ed., 'Memoirs of Alice Parkez Isom,' Utah Historical Quurterly 10 (1942).

Tim HISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah Stste Historical Society and funded in part by a g r ~ l from t tbe Ut.b Statehood Centexmid Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

950718 (PR)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArEItTSOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State ~istoricalSociety 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. ITT84101 (801)533-3500 FAX (801)533-3503

Deseret Alphabet Exemplified the Mormon Quest for Perfection

FROM 1850 UNTIL BRIGHAM YOUNG'S DEATH IN 1877 the Mormon leadership in Utah

',

pursued an unusual (and highly unsuccessful) experiment. At Young's urging some leading Saints created the Deseret Alphabet, a set of 38 symbols representing English language sounds. Historians disagree over the motivations behind this experiment; some argue that it was part of a larger effort to set the Saints apart from the rest of American society, while others maintain that its creators were simply interested in an orthographic (proper or standardized spelling) reform of the complex and often contradictory English language spelling rules.

The Mormons were neither the first nor the last to attempt a wide-ranging 'reform" of English. Benjamin Franklin and Noah Webster attempted to simplify and standardize s p e w ,an effort that met with some success in Webster's early dictionaries. Both George Bernard Shaw and Mark Twain attempted to create phonetic alphabets-without popular acceptance. A major influence on the Deseret Alphabet was the shorthand system of Isaac Pitman, generally known as 'phonography," which ~ e ~ as e the d foundation for modem shorthand.

In the 1840s an Englishman named George D. Watt, who had learned Pitrnan shorthand, converted to Mormonism. He taught the Pitman system at Nauvao to many Saints, including Brigham Young. In 1850, when Young suggested the creation of a new alphabet, he recalled Watt from a mission to England to work on the project. The creation of the alphabet was the first item on the agenda of the newly created University of Deseret.

The school's Board of Regents labored on the reform, often disagreeing over the form that the new alphabet should take. Young himself wanted an entirely new alphabet, with a single character for each different English sound. Watt apparently did most of the work and presented his finished product in chart form in December 1853. His sounds were adapted from the Pitman system, but his characters' origins are more difficult to trace. Although some characters may have wme from representations of ancient languages in an early Webster's unabridged dictionary and some bear resemblances to Latin, Phoenician, Hebrew, and Greek letters, Watt may have completely invented some of the characters.

Although the Deseret Alphabet was finished in 1853, adoption of it was slow and sporadic.

The LDS church spent thousands in scarce hard currency to have the alphabet cast into type in New York City. The Deseret News printed Bible and Book of Mormon stories in the new alphabet for about six months in 1859 and then gave it up. The church had some children's readers printed

THE HISTORY BLAZER ArEItTSOF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE

Utah State ~istoricalSociety 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. ITT84101 (801)533-3500 FAX (801)533-3503

Deseret Alphabet Exemplified the Mormon Quest for Perfection

FROM 1850 UNTIL BRIGHAM YOUNG'S DEATH IN 1877 the Mormon leadership in Utah

',

pursued an unusual (and highly unsuccessful) experiment. At Young's urging some leading Saints created the Deseret Alphabet, a set of 38 symbols representing English language sounds. Historians disagree over the motivations behind this experiment; some argue that it was part of a larger effort to set the Saints apart from the rest of American society, while others maintain that its creators were simply interested in an orthographic (proper or standardized spelling) reform of the complex and often contradictory English language spelling rules.

The Mormons were neither the first nor the last to attempt a wide-ranging 'reform" of English. Benjamin Franklin and Noah Webster attempted to simplify and standardize s p e w ,an effort that met with some success in Webster's early dictionaries. Both George Bernard Shaw and Mark Twain attempted to create phonetic alphabets-without popular acceptance. A major influence on the Deseret Alphabet was the shorthand system of Isaac Pitman, generally known as 'phonography," which ~ e ~ as e the d foundation for modem shorthand.

In the 1840s an Englishman named George D. Watt, who had learned Pitrnan shorthand, converted to Mormonism. He taught the Pitman system at Nauvao to many Saints, including Brigham Young. In 1850, when Young suggested the creation of a new alphabet, he recalled Watt from a mission to England to work on the project. The creation of the alphabet was the first item on the agenda of the newly created University of Deseret.

The school's Board of Regents labored on the reform, often disagreeing over the form that the new alphabet should take. Young himself wanted an entirely new alphabet, with a single character for each different English sound. Watt apparently did most of the work and presented his finished product in chart form in December 1853. His sounds were adapted from the Pitman system, but his characters' origins are more difficult to trace. Although some characters may have wme from representations of ancient languages in an early Webster's unabridged dictionary and some bear resemblances to Latin, Phoenician, Hebrew, and Greek letters, Watt may have completely invented some of the characters.

Although the Deseret Alphabet was finished in 1853, adoption of it was slow and sporadic.

The LDS church spent thousands in scarce hard currency to have the alphabet cast into type in New York City. The Deseret News printed Bible and Book of Mormon stories in the new alphabet for about six months in 1859 and then gave it up. The church had some children's readers printed

as well in anticipation of converting the entire school system to the new alphabet. But the Deseret Alphabet met with overwhelming public indifference; the conversion from the familiar Latin Alphabet to the Deseret was difficult, costly, and unpopular. Brigham Young remained a champion of the system, but the experiment died with him.

Why, then, did the Saints go to such trouble for this project? One group of scholars has argued that the Deseret Alphabet was a natural part of the larger LDS mission to restolae God's perfect society on earth. A perfected society needed a perfected language, and the Desexet Alphabet was the first step toward that goal. b Juanita Brooks, "The Deseret Alphabet," Utah Histmid QuunerZy 12 (1944);Douglas D. Alder, Paula J. Goodfellow, and Ronald G. Watt, "Creating a New Alphabet for Zion: The Origin of the DeseRt Alphabet,* Utuh H i s t o r i d QuanerZy 52 (1984); Thomas G. Alexander, "WilfordWoodruff,Intellectual Progress, and the h w t h of an Amateur Scientific and Technological Tradition in Euly Territorial Utah," Utah H i s t o r i d QmerZy 59 (1991).

THB HISTORYBLAZERis produced by the Utah State Historid Society and funded in part by a grant fiom the Utah Stateihood Ceatennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.

950719 (JN)

THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEM'S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM

THE

Utah State Historical Society 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake City. LTT84101 (801) 533-3500 FAX (801)533-3503

Chemical Weapons Testing Created Controversy at Dugway

DURING THE EARLY MONTHS OF AMERICAN INVOLVEMENT in World War II, the U.S. War Department began to intensify research in chemical warf' defense. Cautious about conducting chemical tests in well-populated areas such as the military arsenal in Maryland, the War Department sought a more spacious, unpopulated area in which to conduct research. Western Utah fit the criteria.

In 1942 Major John R. Burns of the U.S. Army selected a spot in Tooele County some 85 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. The region's dry climate and altitude made it an ideal location for a military base. Bounded to the east by the Onaqui and Dugway mountains, the land stretched for miles westward with only desert sand and sagebrush. The region had once been part of the Pony Express trail and the nation's first transcontinental highway built in 1919. When Major Bums arrived in 1942, however, it was isolated from any road or town for miles around.

The construction of Dugway Proving Ground began in the spring of 1942. Because of sand dunes and frequent high winds, workers spread two inches of gravel over 130,000 square yards of ground in an attempt to control blowing sand at the construction site. By August wooden barracks and laboratories for chemical and physical experiments had been built. In February 1943 an airport with a 5,200-foot runway was completed. During that same year medical facilities, including a 75bed ward, nurses' quarters, and a medical research building were provided for workers in case of accidents.

Almost immediately workers at the Dugway Proving Ground began testing chemical weapons to be used against wartime enemies. Tests with toxic agents, flame throwers, and chemical spray systems were performed at Dugway. One of the most popular World War 11 weapons, the 4.2-inch chemical mortar, was developed at the base. Animals were the victims of biological warfare research.

In order to test the effectiveness of new chemical warfare agents, whole villages were built in Geman and Japanese architectural styles. Prisoners from Utah jails were transported to Dugway to build the structures. Six German and 24 Japanese full-scale buildings were created. Refugee architect Eric Mendelsohn designed the huge German apartment building, and the Japanese workr housing was designed by Antonin Raymond, a Frank Lloyd Wright student who had worked in Tokyo for 20 years. These authentic buildings, the most expensive constructed at Dugway during World War 11, were constantly repired as testing took its toll on them. The Army tested incendiary bombs and other weapons on these structures. These experiments increased the effectiveness of bombing attacks on enemy production centers. (more)

With the end of World War II the Army began to deactivate Dugway Proving Ground, but the Korean War led to the resumption of testing at Dugway beginning in the summer of 1950.

Area ranchers opposed reopening the facility, but state and local official supported the planned reopening and expansion. Renovation and new ~nstructioncontinued into the 1960s with the government committed to building as normal a town as possible for Dugway employees and their families. The Cold War climate, as well as the Korean and Vietnam wars,justified the new weapons testing at Dugway.

In 1968,however, an unusual event created a public relations turning point for the military at Dugway. In March 6,400 sheep were found dead after grazing in south Skull Valley, an area just outside Dugway's boundaries. When examined, the sheep were found to have been poisoned by a deadly nerve agent called VX. The incident, coinciding with the birth of the environmental movement and anti-Vietnam protests, created an uproar in Utah and internationally. Even after paying more than $1 million in compensation to farmers for their losses and to conduct the investigations, Dugway was unable to restore its reputation as a safe d t a r y site. Then in May 1969 rare antibodies of a disease called Venezuelan Encephalitis were found in birds, cattle, sheep, and rodents around the base. During the same year Air Force pilots flying over Dugway identified an entire region as highly contaminated. Afkr a hearing in 1969 Dugway was required to give the Utah governor and state director of health regular briefings on all planned testing. S p e d scientists called uwatchdogs" by the media were sent to Dugway to study the impact of chemical testing on animals. Meanwhile, Dugway's research budget was cut by 60 percent, and the federal government renounced the use of biological weapons and banned open-air testing of all chemical and biological agents. President Nixan's 1969 and 1970 policy statements limited the U.S. to a defensive stance regarding biological warfare. Subsequent ratification in 1972 of the Geneva Convention on biological warfare seemed to signal the end for Dugway. The mission of the facility continued to evolve, however, with ground- and air-launched missile testing and simulated testing of binary chemical weapons. With the signing of the 1987 INF Treaty with the USSR, short and intermediate missiles were eliminated, and in July 1988 Dugway welcomed 10 Soviet inspectors to the Wig Mountain test site. Concern in the 1980s over Soviet chemical and biological weapons research and development and the use of toxic agents in southeast Asia and Afghanistan led political leaders to reverse Dugway's 10-year decline and begin modernizing the facility.

The changing nature of warfare and society's concern over local and global environmental issues have changed the way Utahns look at the Dugway facility. For some its prance on the desert reassures them that the U.S. is staying abreast of developments in weapons technology; for others Dugway and its mission remain controversial.

Sources: ] [ R o d J. Arrington and Tbomas G- Alexander, 'Smtinels on the Desert,"Utuh Historical QuurterZy 32 (1964); clipping file "Dugway Proving Groundn in Utah State Historical Socie$y Library; Orrin P. Mill= et al., History of Tooele C o u q , vol. 2 (TOOele, 1990).

THEHXSTORY BLAZERis produd by the Utah State Historical Society md funded in part by a grnnt from the Utrh Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533-3500.