Great Salt Lake and Great Salt Lake City: American Curiosities

Great Salt Lake and Great Salt Lake City: American Curiosities

BY RICHARD H. JACKSON

ON THAT JULY DAY HI YEARS AGO WHEN Brigham Young overlooked the Salt Lake Valley and reportedly uttered his immortal words, "This is the place," he was participating in one of the great traditions of America, visiting geographic curiosities. His selection of the name of the city as a reflection of the most curious element in the geography of the region insured instant recognition of the place and space occupied by the Mormons. Jackson County, Kirtland, Independence, or Nauvoo were essentially indistinguishable places on the American escutcheon, but Salt Lake was and is a unique place. Implicit in its name is recognition that the Great Salt Lake is different from all other lakes in the new land. Examination of the lake, visitors to its shores, and its namesake the Mormon capital reveal that it has been a symbol of the American West.

Henry Nash Smith in his landmark work Virgin Land: The American West as Symbol and Myth discusses the symbolic aspects of American lands and places, but he ignores one of the most important character traits of Americans that is reflected in their symbols—the unusual or curious. From the time of the first visitors to the New World the curious has attracted the most attention. We have become a nation of travelers and tourists because of our preoccupation with the unusual. From the geysers of Yellowstone to the Great Salt Lake to the soaring Rocky Mountains the unusual symbolizes the West. Even today's concern for saving the western environment reflects attempts to save oddities not found in the humid East. It was fitting that as oddities in the eyes of most contemporary observers, the Mormons located near one of the most curious American landforms and named their city after it. Mormon and Salt Lake become, thereafter, virtually synonymous.

Was it simple serendipity that led Mormon leaders to postmark their first general epistle to the Saints from Great Salt Lake City? Or did the name epitomize the hardheaded practicality of the self-taught New Englander Brigham Young, who recognized the logic of naming the city after the most recognizable and widely known landmark in the region? Had a more visionary leader like Joseph Smith been in charge, would he have called it New Nauvoo or named it after some uniquely Mormon element such as Moroni, Nephi, or Goshen as subsequent Mormon settlements in the West were? Perhaps more intriguing, why wasn't it named after the martyred Smith? The City of Joseph, Smithville, or the City of Zion appear on the surface more logical selections than the name of a nearly lifeless body of water that was largely superfluous to their attempts to establish a new Zion. Given the central role of Smith and the reverence in which his memory was held, the failure to name the city after him may have reflected a conscious or unconscious attempt by Young to transfer allegiance to his new administration. Conversely, it may represent implicit acceptance of Smith's vision, since he had earlier said the Saints would go to the valley of the Great Salt Lake. Whatever the reason, the designation Great Salt Lake City instantly created a pairing of physical and cultural geography unrivaled in America.

A number of factors combined to give the lake an unusually high profile among the geographic phenomena of the West. First, it is important to recognize that the existence of such a large body of water in a region of scant rainfall is a curiosity itself For trappers and explorers emerging from the mountains the broad expanse of blue shimmering on the horizon was enough to make it dominate their reports of the region. Discovery that the lake had a high salt content immediately distinguished it from all other known lakes in the new land and gave the geographically ethnocentric Americans a new feature to boast about. Additionally, salt was an important resource used in a variety of everyday activities at home and in industry and commerce, the most important of which were food preparation and preservation. The Great Salt Lake offered a seemingly endless source of salt that was already at a concentration obtainable only after weeks of evaporation of ocean water. The combination of size, salt, and location made the lake a natural addition to the litany of curiosities found in the West.

Reports of the lake from the very beginning to the present reveal a fascination with its salty nature, the limited life of the lake proper, and the lake's changing level. As early as the 1880s the geologist Grove Carl Gilbert predicted the lake would dry up completely as irrigation continued to deplete the inflow. As late as 1987 engineers watched attempts to pump water into the west desert because its rising level threatened lands around it. The lake thus remains of central concern to the people of Utah because of its impact on their use of the land around it. But like the early explorers and visitors to its shores, the residents of its valley remain strangely unaware of its nature and potential.

THE PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE GREAT SALT LAKE

Three major characteristics of the physical geography of the Great Salt Lake are important in understanding its nature: (1) its existence as a terminal lake with no external drainage, (2) the shallow valley floor it occupies, and (3) its isolation from other water bodies and the ocean in a region of arid to semiarid climate. Each of these in turn affects the physical attributes of the lake. Its terminal nature means that the only change in water level at the present is through evaporation or diversion of streams flowing into the lake (discounting the efforts to pump it). Water loss by evaporation has made the lake saltier and saltier over time. The shallow nature of the valley floor means that fluctuations in volume result in much greater fluctuation in area. Because of the relatively level shore areas a rise of only a foot may cover as much as halfmile or more of horizontal area, greatly expanding the surface of the lake. Its location in an arid to semiarid region produces great fluctuation in the lake level. The amount of precipitation in the surrounding mountains, drained by streams that flow into the lake, is reflected in variation in the water volume and level of the lake. Wet periods in Utah have resulted in massive changes in the surface area of the lake and attempts to stabilize its level by pumping (see tables on following page). Finally, its isolation from other water bodies makes it less useful for transportation purposes.

The physical characteristics of the lake that attract tourism and recreation are offset by its physical geography. The high salt content, always a point of interest, has attracted people who want to experience the phenomenon of being unable to sink. Likewise, the existence of a large water body in a semiarid region has drawn boaters and swimmers. Unfortunately, the terminal nature of the lake in its broad interior basin creates shorelines that are generally muddy and marshy, ill-suited for either swimming or boating. In addition, fluctuations in level have destroyed manmade modifications designed to provide better access for swimming and boating. The recent histories of such developments as Saltair (ultimately left stranded by the receding lake) or Long John Silver's beach development (inundated by the rising lake) epitomize the problems of utilizing the lake for recreation. In spite of its geographical perverseness, the lake continues to be a major geographic lodestone in the West because of its unique properties.

EARLY REPORTS OF THE LAKE

The earliest information about the lake emphasized its high salt content. Baron Lahontan reported in The Hague in 1703 that he had information about a region far to the west of the Mississippi in which the principal river ran into a salt lake "three hundred leagues in circumference and thirty in breadth." Its large area and salty nature made it a curiosity. Subsequent visitors to the lake may or may not have included French trappers, but the first recorded information from explorers actually in the drainage of the Great Salt Lake comes from the Dominguez-Escalante expedition. In September 1776 they arrived in Utah Valley. They named Utah Lake Timpanogotzis Lake and were informed by the Indians that it joined another much larger lake to the north whose waters were "harmful or extremely salty wherefore the Timpanois Indians assured us that anybody getting a part of his body wet instantly feels severe itching around the wet part." Their lack of interest in a salt lake is evident, since they did not go north to explore it. The importance of the Dominguez-Escalante expedition to the Great Salt Lake and information concerning it came from their report of it and expedition member Miera's map that showed the Great Salt Lake connected to the Pacific by a river. The most enduring effect of their information was the mistaken notion that a river joined the lake to the Pacific. The significance of such a river for potential settlement and trade with the West, the basis for subsequent government explorations, emphasizes the importance of the descriptions of trappers who had direct knowledge that disproved the existence of such a water connection.

The experiences of the Dominguez-Escalante expedition and of Baron Lahonton typify the strange curiosity/disinterest of early visitors. In both cases, beyond ascertaining that the lake was indeed curious in being large and salty, the explorers were not enticed to travel on to the lake shores. Subsequent exploration and description of the lake reflects a similar dichotomy. Not until the emergent United States government officially sent explorers to map the lake and determine its actual utility was a broad-based understanding of the lake and its geography available.

Trappers, emigrants, gold rushers, and Mormon pioneers continued the general view of curious disinterest in the lake. For the trappers, discovery that it did not connect to the Pacific and that it had no beaver was sufficient to cool their interest. For the emigrants it was important only as an obstacle to bypass. For the Mormons the lake was a curiosity and a resource, but a resource whose importance dwindled as means other than salt became available for preserving food.

For fifty years after Dominguez and Escalante the record is unclear as to the visitors to the lake and the mountains around it. It seems very likely that Spanish from the settlements of today's New Mexico and Arizona traded north with the Indians of Utah and Salt Lake valleys but no written observations remain concerning the lake. The primary visitors to the lake from 1776 to 1826 were the fur trappers from the British forts to the north and the emerging American nation to the east.

The first information about trappers in the West was recorded by the returning Lewis and Clark company of 1806. The subsequent spread of trappers across the West reflected the demand for beaver in Europe and led to intimate knowledge of the geography of the region among those trappers. Few bothered to write the details of their knowledge for their competitors' use, however, so their views and understanding of the Great Salt Lake are dimly perceived.

Dale L. Morgan points out the tantalizing closeness to the Great Salt Lake achieved by several parties between 1810 and 1825. The Astorian Robert Stewart was within the physical bounds of the Great Salt Lake Basin for seven days in 1812 near the Bear River but left before seeing the lake. Donald McKenzie trapped and explored south and east of the Snake River in 1818 and 1819 and sent a letter dated Black Bear's Lake, September 10, 1819, to fellow Astorian Alexander Ross. Morgan concludes that Mackenzie had reached Bear Lake, but the trapper made no mention of a salt lake.

The first recorded visitors to the Great Salt Lake were clearly fur trappers, but it remains debatable as to which company they represented and who the individuals were. Etienne Provost was in the region by 1824 and may well have reached the lake. That same year a group of trappers representing William Henry Ashley (under the direction of William Sublette) camped in Cache Valley. In response to questions about the course of the Bear River, on which they were camped, Jim Bridger reportedly followed the river to its junction with the Great Salt Lake. The accepted story is that on bending to drink from the lake he found that it was salty and exclaimed, "Hell, we're on the shores of the Pacific!"

The first official information from the trappers to filter back east is contained in a report by Daniel T. Potts, a trapper with Ashley's Rocky Mountain Fur Company during 1822-27:

G.S. Lake lies in a circular form from N.E. to N.W. a larger circle being to S. it is about 400 miles in circumference, and has no discharge or outlet, it is generally shallow near the beach, and has several islands which rise like pyramyds {sic\ from its surface. The western part of the lake is saturuated {sic\ with salt, as not to dissolve anymore when thrown into it. The country on S.W. and N.W. is very bare, bearing but little more than wild sage and short grass.

His knowledge was no doubt derived from exploration of the lake by trappers during 1823-26. Most of it appears to have come from a journey made around the lake by four men in 1826. They circumnavigated the lake in skin boats. Corroboration of their trip is contained in a story in the Missouri Herald of November 8, 1826, reporting the experience of a party of Ashley's men who "occupied four and twenty days in making the circuit." The letter of Potts is important because it clearly puts to rest the idea that there was a river extending from the Great Salt Lake to the Pacific Ocean, a thesis current as late as March 11, 1826, when the Missouri Advocate printed an account maintaining that Ashley

fell upon what he supposed to be the sources of the Buenaventura and represents those branches, as bold streams from twenty to fifty yards wide, forming a junction a few miles below where he crossed them, and then empties into a large lake, (called Grand Lake) represented by the Indians as being 40 or 50 miles wide, and 60 or 70 miles long. This information is strengthened by that of the white hunters who have explored parts of the Lake. The Indians represent, that at the extreme west end of the Lake, a large river flows out, and runs in a westwardly direction. . . . To the north and northwest from Grand Lake the country is represented as abounding in Salt.

Whether the information in the Missouri Advocate simply reflected confusion on the part of the reporter who interviewed Ashley or whether Ashley misunderstood the information given him by trappers is unclear. The maps available at the time might have led him to conclude that there was an outlet to the sea, but the clear description of Potts in 1826 proves that the trappers knew the geography of the lake and referred to it as the Great Salt Lake. Thereafter, the lake would be a lodestone in the West.

In spite of the clear evidence presented by Potts the mystery of the lake persisted. In 1837 Washington Irving related Captain Bonneville's adventures in the West and described his visit to the Great Salt Lake. Bonneville himself did not visit the lake, but a detachment from his party under the leadership of Joseph Walker set out from the 1833 furtrapping rendezvous purportedly to explore its mysteries. Walker was actually headed for California to find information about Mexican settlements there, and information about the lake was purely secondary. Irving maintained that

they beheld the Great Salt Lake, spread out like a sea, but they found no stream running into it. A desert extended around them, and stretched to the southwest as far as the eye could reach, rivaling the deserts of Asia and Africa in sterility. There were neither tree, nor herbage, nor spring nor pool, nor running stream, nothing but parched wastes of sand, where horse and rider were in danger of perishing.

Did Irving simply misunderstand Bonneville's report? Or did Bonneville misunderstand the information he obtained from the trappers? The description of the landscape seems to refer to the area west of the Great Salt Lake, a region the party under Walker struggled through going to California and returning. Evidence for this is found in the account of Zenas Leonard who accompanied Walker to California. He reported that the party crossed north of the lake, struck west towards the mountains, and found the region "so dry and sandy that there is scarcely any vegetation to be found—not even a spear of grass, except around the springs." Leonard's narrative demonstrates conclusively that in spite of the misinformation contained in Irving's account, the trappers and explorers of the region knew and understood the lake. Leonard concluded that "the big Salt Lake" was fed by two streams, the Bear and "Weaber's River," two streams "about the same size, say from two to three hundred yards wide, and from three to four hundred miles long.—They run south parallel with each other, and empty into the Big Salt Lake on the Norh \sic\ side, and no great distance apart."

GOVERNMENT EXPLORERS

The trappers who traversed the valleys of the Rocky Mountains had a broad-based geography but a geography that was only partially shared with the eastern establishment. Moreover, when the information from the trappers was at variance with that of published textbooks and geographies, too often the latter took precedence. For example, Fremont, before arriving at the lake for the first time, confided to his journal an account that borders on the mystical:

we were now entering a region . . . around which the vague and superstitious accounts of the trappers had thrown a dehghtful obscurity.... Hitherto this lake had been seen only by trappers who were wandering through the country in search of new beaver streams, caring very little for geography; its islands had never been visited; and none were to be found who had entirely made the circuit of its shores. ... It was generally supposed that it had no visible outlet; but among the trappers, including those in my own camp, were many who believed that somewhere on its surface was a terrible whirlpool, through which its waters found their way to the ocean through some subterranean communication. All these things had made a frequent subject of discussion in our desultory conversations around the fires at night; and ... I was well disposed to believe. . . .

Fremont's statement that the "accounts of the trappers had . . . thrown a delightful obscurity" denies the reports of Potts and others published in the East. Although it is uncertain whether Fremont was downplaying the trappers' information in order to emphasize his own contribution to the geographical knowledge of the region or whether he had faded to read other accounts, the old ideas of the lake clearly colored his views.

When Fremont reached Promontory, from which he could view the lake, his response was verbose and poetic:

Immediately at our feet we beheld the object of our anxious search— waters of the inland sea stretching and still in solitary grandeur far beyond our vision. It was one of the great points of the exploration; and as we looked eagerly over the lake in the first emotions of excited pleasure, I am doubtful the followers of Balboa felt more enthusiasm when, from the heights of the Andes, they saw for the first time the great western sea. It was certainly a magnificent object . . . and to travellers so long shut up among mountain ranges, a sudden view over the expanse of silent waters had in it something sublime.

By the time he arrived at the lake that mood had ebbed, and his comments emphasized the saltiness of the water and the party's lack of food. In anticipation of exploring the islands with a collapsible rubber boat, Fremont again engaged in flights of fancy concerning the prospects of finding a Shangri-la. On September 9, 1843, the men explored part of the lake and arrived at Fremont Island, finding no fresh water or trees. They spent the night there, and Fremont provided some sketches of the lake's major features. The next day they left and shortly thereafter departed northward from the valley.

After traveling on to the Columbia River, Fremont turned south along the western slope of the Sierra Nevada in search of the supposed Buenaventura River to the Pacific. Falling to find it, he ultimately turned east and, after a journey of severe hardship across the Sierra in the winter, arrived in Utah Valley on May 5, 1884. He did not revisit the Salt Lake Valley, presumably having satisfied his curiosity about the Great Salt Lake. His journey had proven to him that there was no outlet to the sea. He concluded that there was a "great basin" with no exterior drainage, suitable only for sparse settlement because of its desertlike nature. Fremont's formal report finally destroyed the idea, long held in the East, of a great river providing access from the Great Salt Lake to the Pacific Ocean.

Subsequent government exploration would come only after the Mormon pioneers had created a new curiosity in the West that attracted the interests of the American people and their government. Once the Mormons had established a settlement in the Great Salt Lake Valley the words of Fremont upon leaving the valley in 1843 became strangely prophetic:

... the bottoms of this river [Bear], and of some of the creeks which I saw form a natural resting and recruiting station for travellers, now, and in all time to come. The bottoms are extensive; water excellent; timber sufficient; the soil good, and well adapted to the grains and grasses suited to such an elevated region. A military post, and a civilized settlement would be of great value here and cattle and horses would do well where grass and salt so much abound.

THE MORMONS OF THE GREAT SALT LAKE

From their location in Nauvoo the Mormons received information about the curiosities and wonders of the West from trappers, travelers, and explorers. Newspaper articles from St. Louis to Philadelphia were reprinted in their Nauvoo Neighbor, providing information that ultimately affected their decision to locate in the Great Salt Lake Valley. As early as 1842 Joseph Smith "prophesied that the saints would continue to suffer much affliction and would be driven to the Rocky Mountains . . . and build cities and . . . become a mighty people. . . ." On another occasion he "mapped out on the floor with a piece of chalk a diagram of what he called the Great Salt Lake Basin or Valley and said that the Latter-day Saints would go there. " After the death of the prophet the church continued its discussions of moving to the West and "resolved that a company of 1500 men be selected to go to Great Salt Lake Valley and that a committee of five be appointed to gather information relative to . . . the emigration." Clearly, church leaders had access to most information about the Salt Lake Valley before their departure westward, including data from Fremont's journal, interviews with trappers, emigrant guides such as Hastings's, and newspaper accounts.

The Mormons prepared for nearly two years before finally arriving in the Salt Lake Valley. During this time the Great Salt Lake remained the reference point in their mental map of the West. Their knowledge clearly included an understanding of its saline nature and of the lack of an external outlet as well as an understanding that settlements would have to be located on the east side where, the reports of Fremont, Hastings, and others indicated, the land was suitable for agriculture.

Orson Pratt and Lorenzo Snow entered the valley on July 21, 1847, and Pratt recorded in his diary that

Mr. Snow and myself ascended this hill from the top of which a broad open valley, about 20 miles wide and 30 long, lay stretched out before us, at the north end of which the broad waters of the Great Salt Lake glistened in the sunbeams, containing high mountainous islands from 25 to 30 miles in extent. After issuing from the mountains among which we had been shut up for many days, and beholding in a moment such an extensive scenery open before us, we could not refrain from a shout of joy which almost involuntarily escaped from our lips the moment this grand and lovely scenery was within our view.

Wilford Woodruff entered the valley on July 24 and was even more ecstatic in his reaction:

This the 24th day of July, 1847, was an important day in the history of my life, and in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. After travelling from our encampment six miles to the deep ravine valley ending with the canyon, we came in full view of the valley of the Great Salt Lake, or the Great Basin—the land of promise, held in reserve by the hand of God as a resting place for the saints.

We gazed with wonder and admiration upon the most fertile valley spread out before us for about 25 miles in length and 16 miles in width, clothed with a heavy garment of vegetation, and in the midst of which glistened the waters of the Great Salt Lake with mountains all around and towering to the skies, and streams, rivulets and creeks of pure water running through the beautiful valley.

The original pioneer company of 1847 was primarily concerned with the suitability of the valley for settlement, but the scenic splendor of the lake caused Brigham Young to lead an exploring party to its shores on July 27. Included in the party were Young; Apostles Heber C. KimbaU, WiUard Richards, Orson Pratt, WUford Woodruff, George A. Smith, Amasa Lyman, and Ezra T. Benson; Sam Brannan; and several others. According to Woodruff's account:

We took our dinner at the freshwater pool and then rode six miles to a large rock, on the shore of the Salt Lake which we named Blackrock, where we all halted and bathed in the salt water. No person could sink in it but would roll and float on the surface like a dry log. We concluded that the Salt Lake was one of the wonders of the world.

Having determined that a person could float in it and that salt was easily obtainable from it, the pioneers largely ignored the lake in their diaries, other than occasional notices of a "lake-effect" on the climate. William Clayton observed, for example, that high daytime temperatures were moderated by a "regular bracing salt breeze which comes from the north west off the Great Salt Lake." For the eternally practical Saints, however, planting crops, erecting a fort with rooms for the people to reside in, and preparing for the pioneer group following them took precedence over visiting one of the great wonders of America.

An expedition to get salt was undertaken, though, and on August 12

a party of men who had been to the lake to boil down salt, returned, reporting that they had found lying between two sand bars on the lake shore, a beautiful bed of salt all ready to load into wagons. Several loads were brought to camp, and two of them taken east by the company that set out a few days later for the Missouri River.

THE CITY BY THE LAKE

With the beginning of colonization the Mormon capital became the focus of interest in the Great Basin. The lake remained a curiosity, but until the railroad made access to the Black Rock Beach area easier, it was largely ignored by the settlers and was mentioned by visitors primarily in terms of its buoyancy, which caused most of them to make the seemingly mandatory trek to the lake to float.

The relegation of the lake to a position of secondary importance behind the city was formalized by the adoption of the name of the lake for the city. Great Salt Lake City, Great Basin. Immediately after returning from their journey of exploration and tourism to the lake on July 27 and 28, Brigham Young called the apostles together and laid out the parameters of the city. It was to be rectangular, with a temple lot of forty acres as the center, (subsequently reduced to ten). Each block comprised eight lots measuring 10 rods by 20 rods (exclusive of the streets), each lot having one and one-quarter acres. The streets were to be eight rods wide (132 feet) with a sidewalk 20 feet wide on each side, with each house located in the center of the lot 20 feet from the front. The same evening the actions of the apostles were formalized by a vote of the members to make the valley their permanent home. The city was thus established, and on August 22 when the Saints held a General Conference "The City of the Great Salt Lake" was adopted as the formal name of the city.

Having appropriated the name of the most famous landscape feature in the West, the industrious Saints set out to build a city that would overshadow the lake itself. Instructions to the pioneers to build a city of such a grand scale, combined with their previous city-building experience, resulted in one of the wonders of the West. Although it did not immediately become more than an agricultural settlement, the influx of settlers to the Great Salt Lake Valley meant that within a short time a rudimentary city began to take form. Although the settlers spent the first winter in the fort in temporary structures or in wagon beds that had been removed from their running gear, by the next year they had begun to move out onto their individual lots.

The confidence of the leaders in the selection of the Salt Lake Valley and in their anticipation of a great city is mirrored in epistles written to the members of the church in August when Brigham Young and the other leaders returned east to assist in bringing the major migration of fleeing Mormons to the valley the following year. The epistles described

... a beautiful valley of some 20 by 30 miles in extent, with a lofty range of mountains on the east, capped with perpetual snow, and a beautiful line of mountains on the west, watered with daily showers; the Utah Lake on the south, hid by a range of hills, with a delightful prospect of the beautiful waters of the Great Salt Lake on the northwest extending as far as the eye can reach, interspersed with lofty islands, and a continuation of the valley or opening on the north, extending along the eastern shore about 60 miles to the mouth of Bear River.

In this valley we located a site for a city, to be called the Great Salt Lake City; of the Great Basin, North America. . . .

Pioneers arriving the following year commented more on the settlement than upon the lake. Typical are the remarks of Oliver Boardman Huntington on September 20, 1848. His description includes many of the elements that quickly became almost mandatory for Mormon migrants, newspapermen, and other observers:

In a moment release comes to the weary traveller; he sees at once the then only isolated spot of civilized rest for or within 1,000 miles in any direction. A sudden feeling of joy, grandure and gratitude suddenly filled each heart. . . .

The description of Capt. Howard Stansbury, who came to Salt Lake City in the fall of 1849 to conduct a thorough survey of the Great Salt Lake, incorporated all the elements that became enshrined in descriptions of the city:

A city has been laid out upon a magnificent scale, being nearly four miles in length, and three in breadth; the streets at right angles with each other, eight rods or 132 feet wide, with sidewalks of 20 feet; the blocks 40 rods square, divided into eight lots, each of which contains an acre and a quarter of ground. . . . Through the city itself flows an unfailing stream of pure sweet water, which, by an ingenious mode of irrigation, is made to traverse each side of every street, whence it is led into every garden spot, spreading life, verdure, and beauty over what was heretofore a barren waste.

The city was estimated to contain about 8,000 inhabitants and was divided into numerous wards, each, at the time of our visit, enclosed by a substantial fence, for the protection of the young crops; as time and leisure will permit, these will be removed and each lot enclosed by itself, as with us. The houses are built principally of adobe or sun dried brick, which, when well covered with a tight projecting roof, make warm, comfortable dwellings, presenting a very neat appearance. . . .

Upon a square appropriated to the public buildings, an immense shed had been erected upon posts, which was capable of containing 3,000 persons. It was called "the bowery" and served as a temporary place of worship until the construction of the great temple.

As time passed and the city grew, larger buildings were added, but descriptions continued to focus on the use of adobe, the wide rectangular pattern of the city, the abundant vegetation within the city, (including trees and gardens), and the irrigation water and streams along each street. Completion of the present tabernacle and ultimately the completion of the temple added two new elements to descriptions of the city. Curiosity about the City of the Saints completely overshadowed the amazing natural feature of the Great Salt Lake. Those who came to the city included both believers and travelers passing through. Their conclusion as to the relative merits of the city vary, but it is important to note that perceptive observers always emphasized the neatness, orderliness, and pleasant appearance of the community.

Some few observers who came with an avowed anti-Mormon spirit could find nothing pleasant in the city and compared it unfavorably with New England towns with their two- and three-story painted wood houses. Some Mormons were also less than ecstatic, but they represent a tiny minority. Patience Archer, writing in 1856, typifies the negative views:

When first we arrived in the city to us everything looked dreary and cold. The streets was all covered with snow. ... At that time the city was not built up very much the houses was Scatering to me it seemed a very lonesome place. ... I had been living eleven years in the city of London before I left England and to me it seemed a very loanly place I said to my old friend Annie Thorn if this is Salt L. City what must it be like to live in the country I don't think I will go to Pleasant Grove. . . .

Her negative view reflects in part the time of year she arrived and the difficulties encountered by the handcart pioneers of that year.

The gold rush that brought many travelers through the Salt Lake Valley in the 1850-51 era was followed by the Utah War and an incursion of reporters in the 1858 period. The completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 furthered the attraction of the twin curiosities of polygamy and the Mormon city. Numerous accounts of the city were published in eastern newspapers, travel books, and anti- Mormon broadsides. The following account from the St. Louis Intelligencer describes the city in 1853:

The city itself is unique in its way. In general appearance, and the manner in which it is laid out and built up—the latter especially, it is original and striking beyond most cities that I have ever visited and my first entrance into it was attended with reflections equally as impressive as those called up by the presence of any place I've ever seen. These blocks are divided into smaller lots of one and a quarter acres each which usually belong to a single individual, and upon which he erects his tenement and raises his crop, consisting generally of wheat, oats, corn, and various kinds of vegetables. This gives to the place, at first sight, very much the appearance of a city built in the midst of a corn field. The houses are usually quite small, built out of adobes or sun dried bricks, or rude logs and boards. Most of them are one story in height; some few are not more than half a story.

In addition to the physical appearance of the city, Brigham Young and polygamy were of major interest to visitors and often colored their reports. The perceptive Sir Richard Burton summarized the difference in views:

Parenthetically, I must here warn the reader that in Gt. S. L. City there are three distinct opinions concerning, three several reasons for, and three diametrically different accounts of, everything that happens, viz. that of the Mormons, which is invariably one-sided; that of the Gentiles, which is sometimes fair and just; and that of the anti-Mormons which is always prejudiced and violent.

In consequence, descriptions range from those of believers who found it to be the greatest city in the world; to those who stated, "these houses make little pretention to architectural beauty"; to those who compared it to the country towns of Illinois and Indiana, concluding, "the city is quite an ordinary looking place. "

The increasing growth of the city, the construction of the tabernacle, and the beginnings of the temple were paralleled by the establishment of more imposing buildings in the center of the city. By 1866 the city was of such a magnitude that "Great" was dropped from its name, apparently since any observer would recognize its greatness. The coming of the railroad provided speedy transportation to the West Coast and made Salt Lake City a prime stopover for tourists. The lake once more became of interest, however, as construction of a railroad to Black Rock Beach and development of a resort at Lakeside north of Salt Lake near the railroad line to Ogden provided easy access to its waters.

Prior to the construction of Lakeside in 1870 near Farmington by Brigham Young's son, John W. Young, and the connection of the Utah Western Railroad to Black Rock in 1875, visits to the lake for recreation were limited. Although the early settlers apparently traveled to the lake periodically on July 24 to celebrate, the thirty-five-mile journey seemed to discourage all but hardy tourists. The construction of bathing and boating facilities at Lake Point and Black Rock between 1875 and 1887 culminated in the building of a large pavilion at Garfield Beach. It was 165 feet by 65 feet, constructed over the water 400 feet from the shoreline, and connected by a 300-foot-long covered pier. This latter development foreshadowed the construction of Saltair in 1893. First burned in 1925 and later rebuilt, Saltair was left high and dry during the drought of the 1930s. Repeated attempts to utilize the lake in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries ultimately foundered on the erratic shoreline associated with its geography.

In the post-1870s as entrepreneurs attempted to make the lake into a premier resort to restore its role as a curiosity, the other curiosity, the Mormons and their city, moved towards respectability. Only three years from the time Saltair was completed the Mormons officially separated themselves from their own peculiarity, polygamy. From that time on Salt Lake City has been in a state of transition from curiosity to American prosaic. Neither the city nor the lake are as curious as they once were. The lake has been replaced by modern curiosities such as Lagoon or Disneyland, and the city has overcome its peculiarities to become in large part simply another urban region. The enduring attributes of the lake (buoyancy and erratic shoreline and water level) and of the city (Salt Lake Temple and Tabernacle) add a small note of uniqueness, but except in times of flooding or some other unusual occasion, neither the lake nor the city are the curiosities they once were.

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