FROM DEARTH TO DELUGE: Utah's Coal Industry BY THOMAS G. ALEXANDER
From the date of their entrance into the Valley of the Great Salt Lake, the first settlers saw the need for coal in their regional economic development. As early as the summer of 1847, exploring parties sought coal and other resources. The territorial legislature and county courts gave further encouragement by offering bounties for the discovery of bodies of coal.1 Today, the situation is quite the reverse. Utah now has the capacity to produce so much coal that its mines have had to limit their output. Like Prometheus, who first brought fire to mankind, the mines have been bound by a greater power after contributing a necessary gift. The evolution of Utah's coal industry from acute shortage to damaging surplus is described in six stages: 1849-1868, 1869-1881, 1882-1919, 1920-1941, 1942-1950, and 1951-1963. PIONEER BEGINNINGS
(1849-1868)
In early years transportation costs and limited technical knowledge diminished the usefulness of Utah's coal reserves. After discoveries in 1849 near Coalville, wagons delivered coal to Salt Lake City at $40 per ton by 1863. In 1854, two former Welsh coal miners discovered coal in Sanpete County, founded the town of Wales in 1857, and delivered coke by ox team to Salt Lake City the next year. In 1852, the Deseret Iron Company, a joint L.D.S. Church-Utah Thomas G. Alexander, a Ph.D. candidate and teaching assistant in history at the University of California, Berkeley, was a research assistant in economic history at Utah State University when this article was prepared. The research was supported by a grant from the Utah State University Research Council. The author is grateful for the suggestions and assistance of Professor Leonard J. Arrington of Utah State University, Dr. Everett L. Cooley and the staff of the Utah State Historical Society and Utah State Archives, and Miles P. Romney and W. J. O'Connor of the mining industry. "Leonard J. Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-day Saints, 18301900 (Cambridge, 1958), 42, 435n; Territory of Utah, Acts Resolutions and Memorials Passed at the Several Annual Sessions of the Legislative Assembly (Great Salt Lake City, 1855), 393; Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of Utah, 1540-1887 (San Francisco, 1891), 737n; Ogden Standard Examiner, August 18, 1937.
