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DEEP CREEK COUNTRY, WENDOVER, AND THE GREAT SALT LAKE AND ITS DESERT Ibapah and the Deep Creeks Ibapah is located on the extreme west side of Tooele County, near the head of Deep Creek. Ibapah is located in a valley bisected by several streams that run through the valley to form Deep Creek. Possibly the earliest recorded trip to the area was in December 1852 by Major Howard Egan of the M o r m o n Nauvoo Legion. After exploring that part of the county, he settled down there, using the Deep Creek Valley as his headquarters during the 1860s.1 A year later, Lieutenant E.G. Beckwith with his surveying party came down Skull Valley to Orr's Ranch, turned due west, traveling through the Cedar Mountains, and headed for the Deep Creek Mountains. He left a descriptive account of the valley. The hub of activity in the valley during the nineteenth century was the Howard Egan Ranch. In the 1860s this ranch was a stage station between Salt Lake City and Carson, Nevada, and was also used for the Pony Express. When telegraph lines were strung across the valley from Salt Lake City on the route to California, Howard Egan became the area's first telegraph operator. 2 Egan had mapped out a 311
