CHAPTER
2
THE LAND
T,
he story of Summit County begins with the land. To those who love Summit County, mention of the land invokes a flood of images. Rolling sage-covered hills. A remote m o u n t a i n lake. Fir trees draped in snow. The first cutting of hay lying golden in the fields. Stunted spruce mats and scree at timberline. A moose glimpsed through the white of aspen trunks. Mine dumps. Red earth and cedar trees. A stream meandering through a pasture. This is high country, indisputably Utah's summit. Some 60 percent of the county's area of 1,849 square miles is covered by national forests. And that number doesn't include all the mountainous land in private hands. The ancient Uinta M o u n t a i n s stretch eastward, broad, rich with alpine meadows and lakes. To the west, the steep Wasatch M o u n t a i n s rise up, flanked with aspen and fir. S u m m i t County is the place where these two ranges converge in a mosaic of foothills, secondary ranges, and high valleys. But this land is m o r e t h a n images or a joining of m o u n t a i n ranges. The land here is a historical force. It has shaped the development of the county—its economy, its politics, its culture. The land
