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Frolics and Free Schools for the Youthful Gentiles of Corinne
Utah Historical Quarterly
Vol. 48, 1980, No. 3
Frolics and Free Schools for the Youthful Gentiles of Corinne
By Brigham D. Madsen
ABOUT SIX WEEKS BEFORE OFFICIALS of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads met at Promontory Summit to drive a golden spike, a group of former officers in the Union Army and some non-Mormon businessmen from Salt Lake City met on the banks of the Bear River near its confluence with the Great Salt Lake and laid out a Gentile town, Corinne, named by one of its founders, Gen. J. A. Williamson, for his fourteen-year-old daughter. The town, located on the west bank of Bear River about six miles west of the Mormon settlement of Brigham City, expected to capture the freight-transfer business from the new railroad for the teamsters and freighters who would carry needed goods to the north and also hoped to win the sympathy and support of other Gentiles, both locally and nationally, in a struggle to break the theocratic and economic control of Brigham Young and his Mormons over Utah Territory. Corinne never had more than a thousand permanent inhabitants, a figure that might swell to fifteen hundred people during the busy freighting season each summer. The Gentile period of Corinne lasted only about a decade, coming to an end in 1878 when the Mormonbuilt Utah Northern narrow-gauge railroad intercepted the Montana Trail and effectively cut off the wagon-freighting business from the small town. During the ten years of its uncertain existence, Corinne reflected the optimism and hopes of Utah Gentiles to fashion a successful livelihood and a satisfying life and culture in the midst of Mormondom.
To the young people of Corinne the raw, western, end-of-the-trail town provided a fascinating setting for participation in many activities. They watched the daily trains coming from the East or from California, disgorging eager tourists excited at the prospect of seeing a real Mormon with his many wives or of following the signals of the brakemen switching off carloads of merchandise bound for Montana; the wagon trains camped north of the tracks with the oxen lowing, the mules braying, and the campfires twinkling at night; the Gilmer and Salisbury stagecoaches swinging to a stop in a glorious cloud of dust in front of the Uintah House after a three or four day-and-night ride from Helena or Fort Benton; the fifteen or more saloons ablaze with lights and crowded with thirsty and pleasure-seeking teamsters, miners, and cowboys; the careful and alert Marshal Dan Ryan making his obvious presence felt as he leaned against a bar with his six-gun hanging at his hip; the queer sights and sounds of Chinatown at the lower end of Montana Street; and the many Shoshoni Indians sitting along the board sidewalks playing their strange gambling games or returning on paint ponies to their camp a couple of miles north of town. As the well-traveled Baron de Hubner observed during his visit in 1871:
The mothers and fathers of Corinne did not agree with the disdainful baron about the "savagery" of their town and were determined to create for their families a stable and enlightened culture that would provide Christian training for their children in contrast to the apparent barbarism of polygamous Utah. To this end the town leaders soon had enticed the religious leaders of three sects—the Episcopalians, the Methodists, and the Presbyterians—to establish chapels in Corinne, aided by rather generous gifts from eastern missionary societies determined to convert the Utah Saints from their misguided ways. But, evidently, the sons and daughters of Corinne were not too often encouraged to attend Sabbath School, and divine service seemed to be a rather hit-and-miss affair. On special occasions when visiting church dignitaries were preaching, as many as four hundred people might crowd into the three small buildings, at least according to the exaggerated claims of the local newspaper editor. At other times, he noted twelve communicants in the Episcopal church, twenty-six members of the Methodist church, and a Presbyterian Union Sabbath School with an initial attendance of forty-one scholars. More commonly, the local newspaper had to record the melancholy news that "barely enough attend to break the hollowness of an empty house" and to recognize that there was serious talk of converting all three church buildings into warehouses, paint shops, or poor houses.
Church-oriented residents of Corinne also attempted from time to time to get a Sunday closing law passed to ensure a tranquil Sabbath. In 1876, for example, double petitions were presented to the city council, forty-two citizens asking for a closing law and ninety-one opposing such an order. The council voted with the majority. The atmosphere towards Sabbath observance was much different in Mormon Salt Lake City where fifteen boys were arrested and fined $2.50 apiece for playing baseball on Sunday.
With three active churches in Corinne, some residents were concerned that a surfeit had been reached in religious structures while there was no school building. A day school branch of the Salt Lake Grammar School was conducted during the winter of 1869-70 by Nellie Wells in one of the churches. A ladies' sociable, held on January 13, 1870, to raise funds for seats and other conveniences for the church and schoolhouse, netted $126.25. This "first entirely Gentile school in Utah" enrolled thirty students and was followed, on April 18, 1870, by a district school of twenty-two students taught by a Miss Huntoon, just arrived from the East. But three days later the newspaper announced that Miss M. Q. Barnes planned to open a select school on May 2 and later reported an enrollment of twenty-two scholars, a nucleus for a possible high school. Dennis J. Toohy, a local editor, visited the schoolroom and warned the parents of students not to expect too much in the way of maps, charts, globes, and blackboards. He invited the citizens to provide these necessities before the start of another term.
The rapid comings and goings of various little educational units aroused the town fathers to the need for a more comprehensive public system. The Box Elder County Court had formed the Corinne School District, a rectangular area two-by-six miles with the town as the nucleus, in July 1870, but its organization was left to the citizens. The Corinne City Council awarded a bid for the emplacement of a stone foundation and was preparing to accept bids for the rest of the schoolhouse structure when, in a surprise move, the Opera House Association offered its building to the community for school purposes. The council accepted at once, agreeing to pay $1,730 down and the balance of $1,000 in six months. The scholars of Corinne were invited "to come and enjoy the feast of education" under the tutelage of Principal H. H. Heckman and his assistant, Ettie Closser.
The first year of Corinne's free public school was a decided success despite such minor problems as the need for another stove to heat the classroom and the effort to provide additional financing by such means as selling the old city hall. The basement was used for the primary grades, and the final enrollment figure showed that 129 pupils had recited 2,678 lessons with 2,373 being perfect, 293 imperfect, and 12 failures. After a month's vacation in March, the students returned to classes until commencement exercises on June 27, 1873. An interesting highlight of the year was a Valentine's Day masquerade ball held for the benefit of the public school at which two hundred couples danced until four o'clock the next morning.
From this time on Corinne's free school offered public education to the youth of the town in contrast to the Mormon system of private schools. In an 1873 LDS conference sermon, Brigham Young hurled anathemas at the idea of a free school system, saying, "I am utterly opposed to free schools" and later adding, "I will not give one dollar to educate another man's child." With righteous indignation Corinnethians condemned the prophet's dearth of democracy in not caring about the education of Utah children.
To the young people of Corinne, the emphasis on schooling and the desultory attention to religion did not detract from the earthly pleasures of which there seemed to be an abundance in the Gentile town.
The most extravagant social events in Corinne were the celebrations staged in commemoration of the founding of the town and the nation. The first Pioneer Day, held March 25, 1870, on the anniversary of the sale of city lots, was an all-out affair starting with a sunrise cannonade followed by a thirteen-gun salute at ten o'clock in the morning, the exact hour the first lot was sold to Harry Creighton. Col. A. W. Taylor of the Oriental Powder Company had thoughtfully donated several kegs of powder to the Pioneers' Association to ensure adequate explosive demonstrations. At noon a mass meeting was held at the baseball grounds with a program that included an address by the historian of the Pioneers followed by another salvo of artillery. A baseball game ensued with guns being fired at intervals and another bombardment at the end of the game. In the evening a banquet was followed by an all-night dan
Of even more importance to Corinnethians than their founder's day was a celebration of Independence Day as a symbol of patriotism in the land of the suspect Mormon people. The first Fourth of July, in 1869, had gone by without any recognition because there had been some uncertainty about the longevity of the new town. But by the following year Corinne could present a prosperous appearance, and ambitious plans were laid for a magnificent holiday. A. M. Fitch threw open his newly completed bridge across Bear River free to all until after July 5, and three refreshment bowers were completed. Dr. O. D. Cass made a special trip to Camp Douglas and returned to Corinne triumphantly with a big gun, a "splendid brass piece," for an appropriate noisemaker.
The glorious day started with a 100-gun salute at sunrise, followed by a procession of military companies, the local fire department, the civic association, two baseball clubs, and most of the remaining citizens. The new Opera House was dedicated at 10:00 A.M., the program including a reading of the Declaration of Independence and an oration by Gen. George R. Maxwell. Then there were aquatic sports, baseball exercises, dinner, a "great fat man's race, when several leviathans of the mountains . . . contested] for the supremacy of weight and speed," a lean man's race, horse racing, the championship baseball game, a trial of Babcock fire extinguishers, a display of fireworks, and finally, at 9 P.M., a "great terpsichoreal" event in the opera house to close the day.
The Utah Northern rail connection between Gentile Corinne and Mormon Logan, completed in 1873, inaugurated a feeling of detente wholly unexpected just a few months before, and this influenced that year's Independence Day. On June 20, without any warning, about 400 school children arrived in Corinne from Logan to visit the strange and exotic town beyond the Bear. Cool beverages were offered them, the mayor made a hasty speech of welcome, and the Reporter applauded this first excursion ever from the Mormon settlements to Corinne. A week later a party of Corinnethians reciprocated the visit by traveling to Logan where "they were very agreeably surprised, and almost overwhelmed with the extreme kindness and attention shown them by the honorable people of that place." The reception included conveyances to take them from the depot to the city hall, ice cold lemonade, the inevitable speeches, and an invitation to attend the Mormon conference then in session. Not to be outdone, the citizens of Corinne invited the Loganites to join them in their celebration of the Fourth of July at the Gentile headquarters and made grand preparations to receive the Mormon brethren and sisters in hospitable style. Three hundred curious Mormons from Logan and many more from Brigham City, Willard, North Branch, and other settlements traveled to Corinne to commemorate the day, to partake of the fifty mammoth hams, to be cooled by the ton of ice furnished by Mr. House, and to enjoy the program which featured an opening prayer by Rev. D. Jameson of the Methodist church and a benediction by Moses Thatcher, a Mormon leader.
The efforts to outdo the Mormons and to display Gentile loyalty by celebrations of Independence Day were matched in Corinne by a determination to defeat every Saints' team in the territory in the national pastime of baseball. In March 1870 the Corinne Base Ball Club was organized with J. Q. Harnish as captain. An exhibition game was played on Pioneer Day between the Corinne first nine and the second team, called the Pioneer Club for that day. The Reporter remarked on the magnificent appearance of the players who won admiring glances from the ladies present, or so thought the manly editor. The score was 79 to 20 for the Corinne club, the two teams having elected to use a live rather than a dead ball. A number of practice games were then played, and the newspaper followed these sporting events rather closely, commenting on such incidents as D. R. Short, captain of the second nine, being hit on the proboscis by a flyer, and Mr. Taylor of Chicago who acted as catcher and gave the boys some "valuable hints as to how things ought to be done" before knocking over several spectators while trying to catch a foul.
As the players began to feel their oats, challenges were directed to the Eureka Club of Salt Lake City; to the Carlin, Nevada, team with whom the Corinnes were willing to compete for the championship of the Pacific slope; and particularly to the first professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, whose president replied that he was pleased to learn that the national sport had reached Utah and the West and indicated that his team would be pleased to play Corinne if the Red Stockings should again travel past the railroad town. An impromptu game was played at Corinne with the Box Elder Base Ball Club of the county, the latter losing by a score of 90 to 50 because, as the Reporter explained, "they have had but little experience in this game." A return game was scheduled as part of Corinne's July Fourth celebration for the territorial championship. The Corinnes apparently won this contest also. In another practice game, a team from the U.S. Thirteenth Infantry, just in town after a 400-mile march, met the Corinnes during a terrific dust storm and lost by a score of 62 to 41. In a more important match with a team from arch rival Ogden, the Corinnes bested the Junctionites 46 to 44 in an extra inning.
But these games were only preliminary to the real contest between Mormon Salt Lake City and Gentile Corinne. On June 21, the following challenge was printed in the Deseret News: "We, the Ennea Base Ball players of this city, considering ourselves champions of the Territory, are willing to meet any other club within the limits of the Territory who wish to dispute the claim and contest for the same." Corinne, the obvious target of this invitation, immediately accepted, and the first of three games was played at Corinne on July 4 with the Corinnes the victors by 42 to 31,
However, disaster struck the Corinnes at the territorial capital when the Enneas won an easy victory in the second game by a score of 74 to 23. A few days later a Montana visitor reported seeing a tombstone in the center of the town, arrayed in a flag of mourning and with the following epitaph touchingly inscribed: "Base Ball Club No. 24 of Corinne, U.T., died July 24, 1870, at Great Salt Lake City, for the want of breath. The members of this deceased club are requested to wear a badge of mourning for thirty days." With some determination, the Corinnes played several practice games in anticipation of the third and decisive contest at neutral Ogden on October 1. At the end of the game, a correspondent telegraphed the Utah Reporter, "Kill the fatted calf. Corinne walks away with the championship. Corinne 12. Enneas 8."
Concern with Mormondom did not occupy all the time and thought of Corinnethians, and even the competition in baseball had engendered considerable enjoyment apart from the strong desire to defeat their Mormon neighbors. Corinne was a happy town, and with the cessation of the freighting business by December of every year the citizens were faced with a winter season devoid of much commercial activity and with time to pursue things social and cultural. The stagnant winter of 1869-70 had demonstrated the need of a public hall, large enough to seat four or five hundred people for lectures, concerts, meetings and for the traveling artists and exhibitors who stopped off at this midway station on the Central Pacific Railroad. The need was satisfied by the completion of the Corinne Opera House in October 1870.
The typical opera house audience was rather well behaved, although sometimes a few roughs might upset the decorum of the various productions. Members of the audience were cautioned against whistles and catcalls, men from the freight lines and horse corrals were asked to walk more quietly in their heavy boots during the musical numbers, and others were requested to leave their dogs at home. This last appeal was not always followed, the Reporter occasionally noting dog fights in the aisles. Within a month of the grand dedication, the local newspaper reported the structure was busy two or three times a week with lectures, concerts, and other performances.
The social activity most often held in the opera house, and at times in other buildings in Corinne, seemed to be dances and formal balls. During the early years a rather settled pattern developed for the important dance festivities: an opening ball in the early autumn, a Christmas dance, a New Year's Eve and sometimes a Valentine's Day Masquerade Ball, an evening in commemoration of the founding of the town, and a Fourth of July hop. There were special ballroom occasions such as the dedication of the opera house and the launching of the City of Corinne. And finally, there were dances announced for no reason other than the desire to dance.
The dances usually started at 10 P.M., recessed for a midnight supper, and then continued until 4 A.M. or daybreak. At the Opera House, Winschell's building, the Uintah House, the Central Hotel, the Metropolitan Hotel, or at the Corinne Mills—the place didn't seem to matter —couples numbering from forty to two hundred crowded on the dance floor. The local newspaper editors often could not contain their romantic memories of the previous evening as they described a dance as "an uncontrolled rollicking, rolling rout. . . simply a wild romp by all, unfettered by ceremony or tone" from which the participants could not depart without a sigh. A reader one hundred years removed from these congenial scenes is left with the strong impression that Corinne was a joyful town, a fun place to spend an evening. It can be understood why errant Mormons from nearby hamlets often drove their buggies to the Gentile town for a night of rhythmic bliss.
Interspersed with the many dances were the private parties and community sociables that permitted the young people of the town to get together and the older people to observe their courting and coquetry.
At one affair given by Mrs. Alex Toponce in honor of her own birthday the town elite enjoyed themselves as they watched, among other things, two sedate businessmen, E. P. Johnson and N. S. Ransohoff, dance an Irish jig. One sociable held at the Opera House engaged the attention of two hundred guests; Gen. Patrick E. Connor bought the cake being raffled off, and all joined in such games as blindman's buff and drop the handkerchief. One Salt Laker who attended a party in Corinne in 1876 wrote that when he wanted "a good time hereafter," he would journey to Corinne which was "composed exclusively of Gentiles."
More serious cultural pursuits in the form of dramatic presentations also attracted good crowds in Corinne. On July 16, 1870, some of the local talent formed a dramatic association to produce amateur plays, but the organization was not successful partly because not one lady joined the troupe. The Reporter said they seemed to require more coaxing.
Professional acting companies found it convenient to stop off in Corinne as part of their transcontinental tours, thus giving Corinnethians some legitimate and delightful productions. Local groups such as the Ogden Dramatic Company offered creditable performances in Rip Van Winkle and other plays, although this particular offering unfortunately was produced without any scenery. By 1874 the better road companies were by-passing faltering Corinne, and the Mail hopefully reported talk of a theatrical troupe coming to the town to provide entertainment long missed. Further evidence of this lack came with the facetious announcement, "Another disappointment. Edwin Booth will not fill his engagement at the Corinne Opera House this season."
One of the reasons for the dramatic and rather sudden decline in performances in the town was due to the numerous one-horse shows which had perpetrated inept performances before the unsuspecting townsmen. In one full column of fulminations and tirade, editor Toohy discoursed on one J. B. Robinson, "a peripatetic bilk," who left town without paying any of his bills, and on the five amateurs from Ogden who supported him. One later example of these wandering cheats, a Dr. St. Clair, was met by a small but appreciative audience that punctuated his performance with large Chinese bombs and caused him and his troupe to take the next freight train to Elko.
There were also literary entertainments and variety shows to entertain the citizens during the dreary evenings of winter: traveling circuses; a Museum of Living Wonders featuring a French giant and a Lilliputian, an armless man, a memorial service to Samuel F. B. Morse complete with a panegyrical poem by Nat Stein, a $25,000 painted panorama of the great Northwest; the Royal Yeddo Troupe—Jugglery and Magic, the Living Head (an illusion); and other entertainments.
But more than drama and traveling exhibits, Corinnethians seemed to love things musical. In June 1870 Miss Kline, just in from Sacramento, started a singing class; and before long there was a Corinne Serenading Club that apparently went around in the evening extracting favors from local businessmen as they sang by the light of the silvery moon. Commercial artists who visited the town included a Tyrolean troupe that featured a zither and a peculiar wood and straw instrument played by Professor Gschwawdner, the Great Western Minstrel Troupe, the Swiss Bell Ringers, the Rocky Mountain Vocalists of Montana, and a grand concert by Madame Anna Bishop, billed as a distinguished vocalist.
Sometimes visiting performers would join artistic forces with local musicians for a concert. A Professor Farini, pianist and baritone singer, came in from Salt Lake City in the spring of 1871 and conducted a series of concerts which elicited ecstatic reviews from the local editor. The Professor's rendition of "Yankee Doodle" as a piano composition was "beyond our reach, for we have never heard so exquisite a performance on the piano before." At his last concert, Farini indicated he had decided to move to Corinne and give voice and piano lessons. But his fame was short-lived as reports began to come in from Salt Lake City, Denver, and other points that the professor had failed to pay certain obligations.
Corinnethians preferred their own musical productions anyway, and the Opera House was usually filled to hear friends and relatives perform. At one event the local newsman, as one who scarcely knew a "discord from a bed cord," advised the participants to sing well known and popular songs rather than those of higher artistic merit. Judging from the programs, most artists followed that advice. As one program was described:
Usually, these entertainments also included tableaux representing such typical scenes as "Pocahontas Saving the Life of John Smith."
Minor diversions for both young and old in Corinne included ice skating on adjacent Bear River and roller skating in the Opera House at twenty-five cents per ticket, a sport that seemed especially popular judging from the many comments about it in the columns of the Reporter. Occasionally, traveling billiard players would give an exhibition of skill. Spelling bees captured the attention of Corinnethians during the long winter. For the betting fraternity there were cockfights at Burnetts.
And for the outdoorsmen there were the wonderful hunting grounds of the Bear River marshes, an area so teeming with waterfowl that today the national government has set it aside as a migratory bird refuge. To the westerner of the 1870s hunting game was such a natural part of everyday living that it is singular that any mention should be made of the practice, and yet much space was devoted to accounts of hunting parties. Toohy wrote of the geese, ducks, grouse, chickens, brant, snipe, plover, curlew, partridge, pelican, crane, gull, kingfisher, and many other varieties of birds. He concluded one account with, "a blind man can shoot a cart load of birds in one hour. ..." Corinne nimrods brought in wagonloads of ducks. In one instance, three citizens from Salt Lake City shot 176 ducks in a single day. Successful fishing in Bear River was so common that only occasionally did the newspaper mention in rather matter-of-fact fashion that two thousand pounds of fish had been caught in Bear River in just a few days.
One sport, horse racing, was a natural for a frontier trail town whose streets swarmed with teamsters, stagecoach drivers, and horse wranglers. At first the eager horsemen just laid out a straight course west of the town, set up some rickety bleachers with local bartender Cad Pace in a booth under the stand to dispense liquid refreshments and cigars, and awaited the challenges. There were always wagers, and newspaper comments usually included reports on the brisk side betting or that large sums of money had changed hands. Races accompanied the annual celebrations of Pioneer Day and Independence Day and on special occasions like the launching of the steamer—whenever a crowd was at hand.
In 1871 the townspeople completed a circular track east of the river, christened it the Lake View Track, and invited Salt Lakers and people from the other Mormon towns to participate in the racing events. As many as 2,000 showed up to witness the more exciting match races. Finally, in July 1873 twelve prominent citizens of Corinne filed articles of incorporation establishing the Corinne Agricultural and Parks Association with a capital stock of 500 shares of $10 each and with the twin objects of building a fairground for exhibiting stock, vegetables, etc., "and also making a race track within the enclosure for the purpose of trying the speed of horses to be put on exhibition. . . ." The latter seemed to be the real purpose. Thereafter, races were run over the Agricultural Park Track.
During 1872 and 1873 Corinnethians became quite excited over a trotting horse, Mountain Sheep, owned by a town resident. In several match races Sheep rather handily beat Omaha and Dolly Varden, the latter from Salt Lake City, until Toohy bragged for the benefit of his Salt Lake rivals that it was useless for them to bring in any more nags to race the matchless Sheep. Two months later Sheep proved unmanageable and lost a race to Honest Charley which caused great disappointment among the Corinne fans. The Mining Journal thought that Corinnethians were "getting horse racing on the brain."
To the people of Corinne, young and old, the many diversions offered by their hustling, wide-awake town meant days and evenings filled with interest and enthusiasm. If no special events were scheduled, there were always the busy streets thronged with teamsters and horse wranglers, cowboys on their way to Montana with herds of cattle, soldiers en route to frontier posts, Mormon farmers with wagonloads of fruits and vegetables for sale, Chinese merchants, wandering Indians, shops and saloons with their doors nearly always open, and the trains puffing and steaming along Front Street with curious tourists hanging out the windows or debarking to mingle with the heterogeneous crowd. Gentile Corinne, in the 1870s, was a unique western town, the "Burg on the Bear" to its Mormon neighbors but the "Metropolis of the Hills" to its loyal and ever-optimistic citizens.
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