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The Sego Lily: Utah's State Flower
Sego lilies by Eastmond Art Service, Provo, Utah, 1932, from the cover of "When Segos Bloom in Utah, " a song by Will Hanson. USHS collections.
The Sego Lily, Utah's State Flower
BY BRIAN Q. CANNON
PEOPLE LAY CLAIM TO A STATE OR REGION in a variety of ways In addition to working to improve a tract of land and obtaining legal title to it, people may cultivate affective ties to the land by highlighting distinctive features of the landscape and endowing them with symbolic meaning. Often those features possess practical value, beauty, historical significance, or psychological meaning A small but important feature of the natural environment that Utahns have memorialized in this manner is the sego lily. In 1911 the Utah State Legislature designated the sego lily, a delicate white blossom, as the state's floral emblem. They were neither the first nor the last Utahns to make use of the sego lily
In tracing Utahns' evolving relationship with the sego lily, the geographer Yi-Fu Tuan's ideas offer a useful theoretical framework. Tuan has observed that the ways in which a society perceives or interprets facets of the physical world may change "as mastery over nature increases and the concept of beauty alters." As this article demonstrates, Utahns during the first century of white settlement depicted the sego lily differently as their physical circumstances and relationship to the natural environment changed.1
Pioneer Mormons learned from local Indians that the bulb of a plant that the Indians called sego was edible. For instance, Newman Buckley "watched squaws go out every day and return loaded with something." Upon further investigation he "found it was sego and thistle roots to store for the winter."2
Although some settlers may have eaten the sego lily out of curiosity after observing the Indians, most ate their first sego lily bulbs when starvation threatened in the winter of 1848-49. According to Brigham Young's Manuscript History, "many" settlers survived this lean season by eating sego lily or thistle roots and boiled rawhide.3
Pioneer Utahns who wrote about the sego lily in their autobiographies told how they had unearthed the bulbs with a sharpened digging stick or grubbing hoe. Mosiah L Hancock detested "the back aching job" of digging sego lilies with a sharpened stick Richard Ashby, who herded cattle on the foothills as a youth and "often brought home a pint or so of segos," quipped years later that he was "still sore where the stick hurt him while leaning on it to punch into the soil for segos."4
Some sego bulbs were as large as hens' eggs or walnuts and others as tiny as peas, but most were about the size of marbles. Few settlers relished this food of last resort Louisa Morris Decker remembered all wild roots as "almost tasteless." Eliza R Snow praised the sego bulb's nutritional value highly but described the taste more modestly as "not unpalatable." M. Isabella Home wrote that the bulbs were "quite nice when fresh cooked, being mucilaginous," but "thick and ropey" when cool.5
Perhaps some pioneers paused to admire the sego lily's beauty or to attach symbolic significance to the plant's color, shape or hardiness. If they did so, they failed to record these reflections in their diaries and autobiographies. Regarding the sego lily primarily as a source of food, they focused instead on the size and taste of sego bulbs or on harvesting and cooking techniques
Although the sego lily itself apparently held little symbolic significance for early Utahns, the act of eating the sego lily came to symbolize many things for members of the pioneer generation. When it was no longer necessary to eat the sego bulb, some pioneers related tales of eating them in order to prove that they had suffered greatly. For instance, Aroet Hale told of eating the bulbs to "show to our children and the rising generation how their parents suffered in the early days."6
While some told of eating the sego bulb purely to demonstrate their tenacity in the face of adversity, others did so to prove that Utah belonged to them. By choosing to remain in Utah even when they had to eat sego bulbs, they maintained that they had earned the right to call Utah their home. Moses Thatcher ridiculed newcomers in the 1880s, charging that they "look upon the fair vales of Utah, and say it is too good for the 'Mormons.'" Thatcher retorted, "I can remember when it was not too good for us; when we had to boil roots and thistles for a livelihood; when we had to go on the hillsides and dig segoes."7
For some pioneers the fact that they had eaten the sego lily signified their virtue. Faithful pioneers who had followed the counsel of their leaders and shared their provisions with neighbors "had to dig roots to mix with their meal and flour," George W Bean explained This was "better" than being "too selfish to give of their plenty and surplus to the needy." Bean contrasted the actions of the faithful with those of a "prominent" woman who "prayed in the sisters' meeting for the Lord to bless the poor. . . . and open the way for them to find thistle and sego roots to sustain themselves. At the same time she had three barrels of flour buried in her dooryard, two of which spoiled that Spring."8
Some nineteenth-century Utahns who wanted to demonstrate that their religious convictions had not waned averred that they would gladly renounce the comforts of the world for a lowly diet of sego bulbs. Addressing a congregation in 1854, Jedediah Grant criticized all who "love[d] the world and the glory of the world" and who "liked to associate with our enemies, those who have a sneering and malicious spirit." Grant boasted, "I would rather dig thistle roots and sego roots to live upon, and eat boiled hides, and drink the broth from them, than to take such enemies into my house." Grant's contemporary Ezra Benson testified that he did not fear the persecution and famine that he believed would precede the second coming of Christ: "When these things come, we can eat thistle roots and drink buttermilk, and honor God, and have His Holy Spirit with us."9
Tales of eating sego lilies also served as a means of reminding Utahns how affluent and comfortable they had become. Mormon divines who feared that their congregations had become ungrateful hastened to contrast their listeners' relative prosperity with the early pioneers' dependence on wild plants Brigham Young wished aloud that those who took lightly their blessings of "wheat and corn and fine flour" would be "obliged to gnaw the ground in order to get out the thistle roots, and have no fingers to dig them with . . . until they know who it is that feeds them." Apostle Heber C. Kimball reminded a congregation in 1855 that they should not complain about their material circumstances: "When we first came here, and lived on thistle roots, segos, wolf skins, and like articles of food, we considered that we were doing well; then let us go to, and strive by the help of God to be Saints." George Q. Cannon likewise chastened a congregation for their ingratitude in 1889. Even in pioneer times when "many families never tasted bread for days and weeks together, the people living upon such roots as could be dug . . . rejoiced to an extent, I think, far greater than they do in their present comfortable position."10
For most Utahns prior to 1890, then, the sego lily was strictly a food—and an undesirable one that they had eaten out of desperation. The plant itself possessed little aesthetic or symbolic significance. The fact that people had eaten the plant, however, symbolized their tenacity and righteousness in the face of great adversity and buttressed their claim to Utah. Although many acknowledged, like William Leany, that "the Lord was with the people and none of them starved to death," few if any singled out the sego lily as an emblem of their divine deliverance.11
Although first-generation Utahns apparently attached little symbolic importance to the actual presence of the sego lily or its physical characteristics, subsequent generations romanticized the plant and ascribed new symbolic significance to it. Removed in time from the privations of the pioneer era, these later Utah residents perceived the sego lily primarily as a beautiful ornament laden with symbolic significance.
Other wild plants with flowers, most notably the thistle, had been mentioned by almost twice as many early settlers in their reminiscences as a source of food. Second- and third-generation Utahns ignored the historical reality and memorialized the sego lily rather than the thistle, though. Both the sego lily and the thistle boasted striking blossoms, but the thistle—the bane of western ranchers— also possessed sharp, spiny leaves that made it a nuisance. The Biblical tale of Adam and Eve, moreover, portrayed the thistle as part of a divine curse that befell the earth These factors may have predisposed Utahns to emphasize the sego lily's importance in the pioneer diet and to ignore the thistle altogether.12
Utahn women took an early step in glorifying the sego lily in 1892, as they prepared a display for the Woman's Building at the Chicago Columbian Exposition. The display, designed to reflect Utahns' industriousness and love of beauty, included two portieres made of Utah silk and graced by an embroidered sego lily motif In a description of the portieres, the editor of the Woman's Exponent explained that the sego lily was "the floral emblem of Utah."13 In a poem that was published shortly after the Columbian Exposition had opened, Lula Greene Richards, former editor of the Woman's Exponent, justified the selection of the sego lily as a symbol of Utah: "What other flower so well could represent thee/Dear Utah, in high courts, where kings may tread," referring to the Columbian Exposition Although she did not romanticize the sego lily's beauty and admitted that "many [flowers] we find more elegant and splendid/In rich attire, with luscious, sweet perfume," she did rhapsodize about the plant's 'juicy bulbs," which she likened to "fat quails and precious manna." Richards concluded:
Although Richards's poem resembled other Utahns' writings from the 1850s onward, which had employed the sego lily story to reinforce virtues such as hardihood and faith, its emphasis differed from that of the earlier writings. Whereas previous writers had focused upon the pioneers' willingness to eat the sego lily as a demonstration of their faith and hardihood, Richards focused upon the actual plant, identifying it as the state flower and maintaining that it symbolized faith because it "lent. . . hope" and hardihood because it bloomed "oft in sterile waste, all unattended."
In the years following the Columbian Exposition, Utahns increasingly recognized the sego lily as an emblem of Utah. On April 3, 1896, the Utah Legislature adopted a seal for the new state. Like the territorial seal, it contained a large beehive as a symbol of Utahns' industriousness, but the new seal also contained numerous additional images, including "growing sego lillies" that replaced buzzing bees on the sides of the beehive.15
The new state seal inspired Orielle Curtis to write a poem entitled "Utah" that was published early in 1897. Curtis portrayed the sego lily on the state seal not only as a food for men and bees but as a "type of liberty"—an emblem of the new state's commitment to the American nation's traditional ideals She advised her fellow Utahns:
In 1897 the Woman's Exponent published a prize-winning poem by Utah author and historian Orson F Whitney for a statehood poetry contest In fifteen verses he related a romantic tale whose principal characters were two symbols of the new state: a sego lily, introduced as an emblem of moral purity, and a honey bee. In Whitney's verse the sego lily, a "divinely fair" blossom, was overlooked by the restless breezes and warm seasons in their quest for "a beauteous bride" because "her chastity their ardor chilled/For she was as the snow." One day, however, a bee "reached the lily's rock-girt land" and "bent and kissed the blushing flower," turning her tears to nectar which "sweetened all that bitter land." The poem concluded by describing the "lily's marriage feast," which Whitney likened to the fruitful union of Utah's desert landscape and the industrious Mormon pioneers.
As the sego lily became more widely recognized as a symbol of Utah, entrepreneurs capitalized upon it to attract the attention of consumers. In 1904 the newly organized Utah Condensed Milk Company, headquartered in Richmond, Utah, began marketing condensed milk under the label Sego Milk. Shortly thereafter, H. B. Prout, a Salt Lake dealer in agricultural implements, carriages, and wagons, became the first Utahn to include the sego lily in the name of his business when he renamed it the Sego Implement and Vehicle Company18
By 1911, when Utah's lawmakers formally designated the sego lily as the state flower, the plant was already widely regarded as a fitting symbol of the state. In a poll taken among school children shortly before the legislature formally selected a state flower, the children "almost unanimously" identified the sego lily as their choice for the state flower Introduced by William Newjent Williams, a member of the State Senate from Salt Lake City, the brief bill formally designating the sego lily as the state flower read, "Be it enacted by the legislature of the state of Utah: Section I. Utah State Flower: That the Sego Lily is hereby selected as, and declared to be, the Utah state flower."19
A prominent resident of Salt Lake City, Williams managed a prosperous furniture company and socialized with other well-heeled residents in the Salt Lake Commercial Club He was a member of the Third Quorum of Seventy of the LDS church and had served in the State Senate for eleven years when he introduced his sego lily bill. Far removed from the necessity of subsisting on the roots of wild plants, but imbued with a respect for the pioneers, Williams could philosophize about the symbolic value of the sego lily
His bill, along with thirty-one other measures, passed the House on March 17, the day before the legislature adjourned, "with little discussion," the DeseretNews reported. In summarizing measures "worthy of special note" that had been passed by the legislature, the News failed to mention Williams's sego lily bill.20
Although the sego lily bill attracted little attention in the press, it caught the attention of Senator Williams's wife. A daughter of George A. Smith and Susan E West Smith, Clarissa Williams was serving as first counselor in the LDS General Relief Society presidency when her husband introduced his state flower bill. Early in 1913 she joined with her associates on the Relief Society Board in designating the sego lily as the official emblem of the Relief Society because of "its usefulness in sustaining life in the early pioneer settlements."21
As the officially designated floral emblem of Utah and of the Relief Society, the sego lily commanded increased attention. Photographs or illustrations of sego lilies adorned guidebooks and popular histories of the state as well as the cover of the Relief Society Magazine. In 1916John W. Pike, an attorney in Salt Lake City, penned an ode to the state flower entitled "Our S>egoLily" that was subsequently revised slightly and published in the Salt LakeTribune. Like Whitney, Pike used the symbol of the snow-white lily to encourage moral purity:
Whereas earlier poems about the sego lily all contained at least oblique references to the sego's role in sustaining life in pioneer Utah, such as "juicy bulbs," sweet nectar, and "manna," Pike's ode did not refer at all to the lily as a food. Far enough removed in time from the historical events of the 1840s and 1850s that had initially drawn Utahns to the sego lily, he was able to regard the plant solely as a beautiful object, a symbol of virtue, and a reminder "that Beauty's charm is Chastity!"
During the First World War, Utah residents added yet another symbolic property to the sego lily by portraying it as an emblem of peace. A good example is Karl E. Fordham's poem "Sego Lily," which was set to music and published. It portrayed the plant as a symbol of home, divine mercy, freedom, and peace for Utahns fighting in Europe:
Shortly after the close of the war, historian Levi Edgar Young of the University of Utah echoed Fordham in identifying the sego lily as an emblem of peace as he related an alleged Indian tale:
Young neglected to cite the source of his tale, but the stereotypical references to "many suns," "many moons," tomahawks, and the Great Spirit suggest that the "legend" may have been embellished, if not fabricated entirely, by non-Indians.
Whether or not it was authentic, the story, along with the idea that the sego lily symbolized peace, persisted long after the end of the First World War. Writing in 1932, historian J. Cecil Alter echoed Young, identifying the sego lily "as a symbol of peace between the Indian tribes, sent by the Great Spirit." As an indication of the legend's authenticity, Alter noted that sego lilies particularly abounded in the Salt Lake Valley, a place that had been regarded as "neutral ground between the Indian tribes."24
In historical lessons that she compiled for the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers in the 1940s and 1950s, Kate B Carter also helped to perpetuate the image of the sego lily as "the legend flower of Utah, which long has been sacred to the Indians . . . [as] an emblem of peace."
In addition to identifying the sego lily as a symbol of peace, Carter and Young discussed the plant's role as a source of food for the pioneers. Far removed from those who had actually eaten sego lilies, they exaggerated the plant's desirability as a source of food. Carter fulsomely praised the "small succulent tuber" of the sego lily, claiming that it was "very palatable a sort of sweetmeat or tidbit, affording vitamins and variety." Similarly, Young averred that the sego lily was a "dainty food" whose taste was "sweet and pleasant."25
By 1947 when Utahns commemorated the one hundredth anniversary of the Mormon pioneers' arrival in the Great Basin, then, the sego lily's importance in Utah society had changed dramatically. A plant that had sustained life in the 1840s and had served until the 1880s as a symbol of the difficulty of life in early Utah had become in the popular imagination a delicacy and an abstract symbol of a state, a religious organization, and moral qualities such as peace and chastity.
These shifting portrayals of the sego lily reflected changes in Utahns' relationship to the environment Pioneers who had eaten the sego lily viewed the plant in utilitarian ways as a source of food. Even later in the nineteenth century, when most Utahns still lived close to the land in rural regions, this was reflected in Lula Richards's selection of "fat quails"—wild game that had sustained Mormons on their western hegira—as a metaphor for the luscious taste of the sego lily Writing as a member of the urbanized consumer culture that flourished in post-World War II Utah, Kate Carter by contrast likened the sego lily to something that could be purchased in a fine market or upscale restaurant: a "sweetmeat."
The symbolic metamorphosis of the sego lily reflected not only urbanization, commercialization, and an increased mastery over nature but also shifts in the relationship between whites and Native Americans in the region. Just as early white settlers lived close to the land, they lived near the encampments of Indians and saw them frequently. They sensed no need to romanticize the fact that Indians harvested and ate sego bulbs. Instead, they matter-of-factly reported that Indians had taught them about this new food. By the 1920s, though, the American Indian seemed to be vanishing, and Utahns of other races rarely interacted with them. For many Utahns of Levi Edgar Young's generation, and particularly for academicians like Young, Native Americans had become a highly romanticized, stereotypical abstraction It was natural that a generation interested in preserving the mythology of a seemingly vanishing culture should link the Native Americans and sego lilies through a romantic, highly symbolic legend.
Shifting interpretations of the sego lily also reflected what the historian Gustive O. Larson termed the "Americanization" of Utah— the adoption of virtues enshrined by middle-class American society.26 Fearful of intrusions by non-Mormons into the territory, Jedediah Grant during in the 1850s and Moses Thatcher in the 1880s pointed to the role of the sego lily in the diet of pioneer Mormons to distinguish Utah Mormons from other American settlers. By 1892, when Lula Richards penned her poem, Utahns were renouncing distinctive religious and political practices and were scrambling to curry favor with Americans elsewhere. The sego lily had become a symbol that could give outsiders a favorable impression of Utah "in high courts, where kings may tread," as Richards noted. The fact that Utahns had selected a white lily, a symbol of moral purity, as the emblem of their state, might help to counteract silent films and popular literature that portrayed Utah as a land of harems and lascivious activity. Those like K. E. Fordham, who identified the sego lily as an emblem of freedom, underscored Utahns' devotion to American values His song "Sego Lily" not only portrayed the lily as an emblem of liberty but touted the patriotism of Utah's pioneer generation who "in their hour of deepest grief/To their country's call . . . gave relief by serving in the Mexican War. Fordham reminded listeners that Utahns in the past and in the present generation "sang America, I love but thee."27
In the years since 1947 the sego lily has remained the symbol of both Utah and of the LDS Relief Society. Much of the symbolic significance identified by commentators beginning with Lula Richards in 1892 is still mentioned in recent publications. A 1991 pamphlet entitled Symbolsofthe GreatState ofUtah, for instance, identifies the sego lily on the state flag as "a symbol of peace." The most recent Relief SocietyHandbook, published in 1988, mentions the plant's role in sustaining the lives of Mormon pioneers and also indicates that the plant "is an appropriate symbol of purity, beauty, patient waiting through winter and darkness, and storing of strength for a time of blossoming."28
Few Utahns today have eaten a sego lily bulb, and no one subsists on them For some the term sego lily means nothing Many others recognize the lily as an attractive flower, as a foodstuff in the pioneer era, or as an emblem of Utah. Over the past century Utahns have identified the sego lily as a symbol of peace, beauty, modesty, liberty, resilience, faith, and patience. Early Utah pioneers who subsisted on sego lily bulbs and regarded the plant purely as a source of food might be surprised at the multiple layers of symbolic meaning that have been attached to the plant The contrasting ways in which pioneer Utahns and residents of the state in this century have viewed the sego lily illustrate the importance of historical context as a factor in shaping environmental perception.
NOTES
Dr Cannon is assistant professor of history at Brigham Young University.
1 Yi-Fu Tuan, Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974), pp 4, 13, 99, 246.
2 Newman Buckley, quoted in Kate B Carter, ed., Treasures of Pioneer History, 6 vols (Salt Lake City: Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, 1952-57), 4:78.
3 Manuscript History of Brigham Young, 1849, p 95, quoted in Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of Utah (San Francisco: History Co., 1890), p. 288.
4 Benjamin Ashby, quoted in Robert L Ashby, ed., Ashby Ancestry (Salt Lake City: Stringham Ashby Stevens, 1941), p 23; "Mosiah L Hancock Journal," typescript, p 42, Brigham Young University Special Collections (BYUSC), Provo, Utah.
5 Hyrum Theron Spencer, quoted in Carter, Treasures ofPioneer History, 4:78; Howard Stansbury, Exploration of the Valley of the Great Salt Lake, 1852 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988), p 397; Eliza R. Snow: An Immortal: Selected Writings ofEliza R. Snow (Salt Lake City: Nicholas G. Morgan, Sr., Foundation, 1957), p 93; Louisa Morris Decker, quoted in Woman's Exponent 37 (April 1909): 50; M Isabella Home, "In Early Days: Home Life in the Pioneer Fort,"Juvenile Instructor29 (1894): 181-85.
6 Aroet L Hale, "Diary [Autobiography] of Aroet L Hale," typescript, p 20, BYUSC.
7 Brian Stuy, comp., Collected Discourses, vol 1 (Burbank, Calif.: B.H.S Publishing, 1987), November 11, 1888.
8 Flora D. B. Home, comp., Autobiography of George W. Bean: A Utah Pioneer of 1847, and HisFamily Records (Salt Lake City: Utah Printing Co., 1945), p. 38.
9 Journal of Discourses, 26 vols. (Liverpool, 1854-86) [hereafter JD], 2:73, 3:61.
10 p , 3:196; 3:58; Stuy, Collected Discourses, vol 1, May 26, 1889.
11 "Autobiography of William Leany, 1815-1891,"typescript, p 10, BYLSC.
12 A list of pioneer autobiographies available at Brigham Young University was compiled using Davis Bitton's Guide to Mormon Diaries and Autobiographies (Provo, Ut.: Brigham Young University Press, 1977) Seventy-three autobiographical accounts written by pioneers of 1847-48 were identified and examined with the assistance of my research assistant, Richard Kitchen. Ten of the writers, or 13.7 percent, mentioned eating the sego lily, while 18, or 24.7 percent, mentioned eating the thistle Only two of the writers who mentioned eating the sego lily failed to also mention the role of thistles in their diet The Biblical reference to thistles is found in Genesis 3:18.
13 Woman's Exponent 22 (February 1 and 15, 1894): 90.
14 Woman's Exponent 21 (November 1, 1892): 65.
15 Benjamin F. Shearer and Barbara S. Shearer, State Names, Seals, Flags, and Symbols: A Historical Guide (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1987), p 58; Carter, Treasures of Pioneer History, 4:70-71; Bancroft, History of Utah, p. 460; Laws of the State of Utah, Passed at the Special and First Regular Sessions of the Legislature of the State of Utah (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Publishing Co., 1896), pp 297-98; Kate B Carter, comp., Heart Throbs of the West, 26 vols. (Salt Lake City: Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, 1939-51), 1:11-14; 2:256.
16 Orielle Curtis, "Utah," Woman's Exponent 25 (January 1, 1897): 91.
17 Orson F Whitney, "The Lily and the Bee," Woman's Exponent 26 (July 15 and August 1, 1897): 169.
18 Joel E Ricks and Everett L Cooley, eds., The History of a Valley: Cache Valley, Utah-Idaho (Logan, Ut.: Cache Valley Centennial Commission, 1956), pp 217, 253; R L Polk and Company, Salt Lake City Directory (Salt Lake City: R L Polk, 1906), p 802 An early advertisement for Utah Condensed Milk Company's Sego Milk is found in Utah State Gazetteer and Business Directory (Salt Lake City: R L Polk, 1908).
19 Carter, Treasures of Pioneer History, 4:76; Laws of the State of Utah Passed at the Ninth Regular Session of the Legislature (Salt Lake City: Skelton Publishing Co., 1911), chap 97, p 137.
20 AndrewJenson, comp., Latter-day Saint Biographical Encyclopedia, vol 1 (Salt Lake City: Andrew Jenson Co., 1901), pp 673-74; Deseret News, March 18 and 20, 1911; December 29, 1927.
21 Jill Mulvay Derr, Janath Russell Cannon, and Maureen Ursenbach Beecher, Women of Covenant: The Story of Relief Society (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1992), pp 194, 228; Relief Society Handbook (Salt Lake City: Corporation of the President of the Church ofJesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1988), p. 1.
22 Roberts, A Comprehensive History of the Church ofJesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Century I, 6 vols (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1930), 3:353 The revised version printed in the Salt Lake Tribune was reprinted in Carter, Treasures of Pioneer History, 4:78-79 R L Polk and Co., Salt Lake City Directory, 1915 (Salt Lake City, 1915), p 779, identifies John W Pike as a lawyer.
23 K E Fordham, "Sego Lily," copy in BYUSC.
24 Levi Edgar Young, "The Sego Lily," Utah Educational Review 11 (September-October 1917): 10; Levi Edgar Young, The Great West in American History, University of Utah Extension Division Bulletin, vol 1, no. 6 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah, 1920), p. 7; J. Cecil Alter, Utah: The Storied Domain, 3 vols. (Chicago: American Historical Association, 1932), p 84.
25 Carter, Treasures of Pioneer History, 4:71-72, 76; Young, 'The Sego Lily"; Carter, Heart Throbs of the West, 1:12.
26 Gustive O Larson, The "Americanization" of Utah for Statehood (San Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library, 1971).
27 I am indebted to my colleague Steven Epperson for encouraging me to explore these broader relationships.
28 Symbols of the State of Utah (n.p., [1991]), copy in BYUSC; Relief Society Handbook (Salt Lake City: Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Chr.st of Latter-day Saints, 1988), p. 1.
