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A Pioneer Paper Mirrors the Breakup of Isolation in the Great Basin
Utah Historical Quarterly
Vol. XX, 1952. No. 1
A PIONEER PAPER MIRRORS THE BREAKUP OF ISOLATION IN THE GREAT BASIN
BY A. R. MORTENSEN
FOR SEVERAL YEARS following the initial settlement in 1847, Mormon isolation in the Great Basin was complete. Although much has been said and written that the Saints wanted it that way, all evidence and much common sense points to a different conclusion. With the railroad in the more settled East an old story and the telegraph rapidly becoming so, neither Brigham Young nor his people were satisfied to be tied to the speed of the ox.
Testimony in the form of all sorts of schemes looking toward breaking the shackles binding rapid communication and transportation bears witness to the fact that the Mormons were indisposed to view their isolation complacently.
The Deseret News with all the motives of the rest of the community, plus publication problems of its own, likewise was interested in more rapid communication. In its pages were early reflected many schemes and proposals: Some carried out, some failing, and some only hoped for and not to be realized until the far distant future.
Late in 1850, in referring to the recent settlement at Little Salt Lake (Iron County), Brigham Young spoke of the possibility of a railroad to that area and eventually to southern California. For half a century or more such a hope was only a dream.
From time to time, other possibilities were mentioned: A Nicaraguan route for swifter transportation to California; steamer service up the Colorado River, from which a railroad would be built to Salt Lake City; Federal legislation for a wagon road to southern California; and, a memorial from the citizens of California requesting Congress to construct a similar road from Missouri to California via Salt Lake City. A San Francisco paper, late in 1853, said the Mormons were then discussing the building of a railroad to southern California. A more recent writer sums up the ambitious hopes of the people of Utah by saying that the legislature in 1852, "memorialized Congress in one and the same breath, as it were, for a national highway, and electric telegraph, and a national central railroad."
Most of the above types of proposals were nebulous or long range in character. Of more immediate concern was the adequacy of mail service here and now. On this qusetion the Deseret News, over the years, had much to say.
During the first three years of Mormon settlement in the Great Basin, mail service was of a private nature. Letters were carried by immigrants and other overland travelers.
In the winter of 1849, the government established a post office at Salt Lake City and appointed J. L. Heywood as postmaster. However, it was not until the summer of 1850 that official arrangements were made for regular mail service to the Mormon capital. A four-year contract was let to Samuel H. Woodson, of Independence, Missouri, under which he was to carry the mail by stage from the Missouri River to Salt Lake City, from July 1, 1850, to June 30, 1854, for $19,500 per year.
The News briefly but prominently took note of this service when it announced: "U. S. Mail is expected to leave for the States, about the 27th, of July. Postage, Single letters to any part of the States, 40 cents."
Several months later the same issue of the News that carried the act establishing territorial government for Utah announced the appointment of Willard Richards, the paper's editor, as postmaster of Salt Lake City.
In spite of valiant efforts of Feramorz Little of Salt Lake City and other subcontractors, the mail service under Woodson's contract was very irregular and unreliable, especially in the winter. Poor pay, inadequate preparations, Indians, and obstacles of nature contributed to the difficulties encountered.
In 1854, with the awarding of a new contract to W. M. F. Magraw for a monthly mail over the route, the Deseret News took hope that for the future adequate mail service would be forthcoming. This hope was expressed by the editor along with proper compliments to the new contractor for his prompt delivery of the first mail in good order.
At about this time (August 24, 1854) the News carried an advertisement of interest. J. M. and Isaac Hockaday announced the opening of a monthly mail and passenger coach service between Independence and Salt Lake City. This service was to be operated in conjunction with Magraw's mail contract, and a profit was expected from carrying passengers to the California gold fields.
With the arrival of winter, Magraw's service proved to be no better than the earlier contractor. In one or two items shortly after the first of the new year, the editor began to wonder, and then expressed mild disappointment at late arrival of the mail in bad condition.
By March 21, 1855, the paper was definitely disgusted at the miserable aspect of the mail situation. Not only were the carriers the recipients of blasts from the editor, but the government, the Postmaster General, and nearly everyone handling mail between the city and the Missouri River were scolded for their negligence and dishonesty. If the mail had only been late, the editor might not have complained so much, but its eventual arrival in bad condition and half or more pilfered, was more than he could stand, particularly when the illustrated newspapers and magazines were among the missing.
However little comfort it might give, the Great Basin was not the only section of the West suffering from inadequate mail deliveries, nor was the Deseret News the only paper to criticize the poor service. A Los Angeles paper was as vociferous as the News on this point: "When it (the mail) finally reaches here the news it contains has a very fishlike smell." Another southern California paper also was indignant, and said of the mails: "We get them occasionally from God knows where."
During the spring and summer of 1855, practically every issue of the News carried articles reflecting interest and concern over the communication situation. Conditions were so bad that even the First Presidency of the Church felt moved to remark in the "Twelfth General Epistle" on the scarcity of news respecting Church activities as a result of irregular mail service.
For the most part the eastern mail was the object of most criticism. On the other hand, the arrival of the California mail was the occasion for the editor to remark that it was the only reliable channel of communication. Less than a month later the editor had to revise his opinion of even the western mail. Not on the ground of irregularity, but mainly because of missing exchange papers, which were the grist for the mill of the pioneer journal: "Are the papers not put in the mail? Or is the old system of stoppages so long practiced between here and Independence, also beginning to be exercised by Western Postmasters? Or is Uncle Sam getting so far in his dotage that he actually cannot, or will not, faithfully transmit mail matter?"
It appeared sometimes as though the editor of the Mormon paper clutched at every straw in the form of a plan for better postal service. On May 9, the paper quoted a letter which said; "There is about to be a proposition brought before the House, to run a daily line of stages from Independence, by Salt Lake, to California." And then again, on May 30, the editor thought that with increased compensation to Magraw, the mail contractor, plus a proposal "to furnish the sticky fingered gentry, between here and Independence, with such periodicals and papers as they are disposed to abstract from the mail bags," it would be possible for "Deseretians" to obtain the papers they subscribed for.
During August and September the eastern mail seemed to be improving. At least the exchange files were fuller than usual, the result of brass locks on the through sacks. The paper did not, however, relax its bitter criticism of the mail service generally, or the contract carriers in particular, and warned that if improvement was not forthcoming, private express companies would take over the work. This latter was no idle threat, for during the ensuing winter under the leadership of Brigham Young, a grandiose scheme for the establishing of a great express line from the Missouri River to the Pacific Coast developed.
It appears that this project was first agitated at Fillmore during the meeting of the territorial legislature of that winter. William Chandless, the British traveler, who visited there shortly after the turn of the new year, said that the chief topic of discussion was this ambitious proposal. Late in January an enthusiastic mass meeting was held in Salt Lake City, where the Deseret News announced that "One thousand miles were subscribed for, and the large number present unanimously voted to sustain the chartered company in carrying a daily express from the Missouri river to California, and in extending the line as fast and as far as circumstances may permit." Brigham Young personally offered to furnish 300 miles of the line.
During the spring and summer of 1856, while the proposed express line was being organized, the News kept up its criticism of Magraw and the government mail service generally.
At this juncture, inefficient service coupled with continued requests for added compensation resulted in the annulment of Magraw's contract after August 18, 1856. Best of all, the new contract was awarded to Hiram Kimball, a Mormon, and an agent of the proposed express line. This development gave added impetus to the staffing and stocking of the express concern, and work to that end went on apace.
Here, but for subsequent events that ended the whole enterprise, was the beginning of a concern that might well have developed into a great daily overland mail, passenger, and freight service several years before the achievement of such a line in 1861.
A conspiracy of events culminated in the rescinding of Kimball's contract after June 30, 1857. The people of Utah, shortly thereafter, became embroiled in a full-scale war against the government and the mail question was lost among the greater causes and events of the imbroglio itself. It goes without saying, that for the duration of the Utah War mail service to Utah, at least from the East, was nonexistant.
Following the war, communication facilities to the West entered a new and more satisfactory phase. In June, 1858, while the crisis of the Utah War was still in the process of solution, the Deseret News carried a news item from an eastern exchange, which said that a contract for a weekly mail had been awarded to John Hockaday and associates. The service was to be in four-horse coaches, through each way in eighteen days. The paper also announced a contract for a semi-monthly mail from Salt Lake City to California through each way in twelve days. The details of Hockaday's contract actually called for a twenty-two day schedule at $190,000 per annum beginning May 1, 1858. The western line to California was awarded to George Chorpening and by July was improved to a weekly service through each way in sixteen days at $130,000 per year.
Thus by July, 1858, a weekly through overland mail and passenger service was in operation from the Missouri River to California on a thirty-eight day schedule.
Lack of any appreciable comment or criticism, so common in earlier years, would indicate that for the most part the citizens of the Great Basin were currently satisfied with the overland mail service. Even the local mail situation was about to improve, if post office department advertisements calling for bids for routes within the territory are any indication.
Over the ensuing years the Deseret News continued to evince interest in the mail, but what a change in tone compared to the years prior to the Utah War. Occasionally there was a minor note such as the comment over the continual strife between advocates of the southern and central routes. According to the Washington Union, quoted in the News, the Salt Lake route ran through deep snow-filled gorges and chasms of fathomless depth, where it was not reasonable to expect stages to operate in the winter. The Mormon paper's answer to this charge was, "what's the use of such continual 'bloodless war of words,' when there is a disposition in Congress to annihilate the whole concern? When we can secure an administration who will maintain the public weal, even to the utter demolition of private 'pickings and stealings,' then it may be feasible to enter into discussion as to which is the best route; till then it is vain."
Then again, the News was in the peculiar position of finding fault with the local post office. The inability of the editor to get exchange papers from the post office following arrival of the mail, and before going to press, was the occasion for uncomplimentary remarks about those responsible. Times certainly had changed from the years when Willard Richards was both editor and postmaster, and consequently got first chance at the news from abroad.
However, for the most part, the paper's occasional comments were either in the form of simple announcements advertising a change in schedule or outright compliments.
On July 4, 1860, the News said: "Eastern Mail.—With its usual punctuality, the mail from St. Joseph arrived on Monday morning." Several weeks later the paper could do even better than that, when it remarked that the mail occasionally arrived four or five days ahead of schedule. Even in the winter the paper could comment favorably on the regularity of the postal service—in sharp contrast with conditions in the early and middle fifties.
With the turn of the decade of the sixties events in the development of western communication moved rapidly. Salt Lake City, as an important midway point on the most direct route from the Missouri River to San Francisco, was sure to be affected by any changes or developments. Furthermore, it always served as the most important junction, supply, and administrative center on the central overland route.
The pages of the Deseret News do not reflect the great legislative struggles between the advocates of the southern (Butterfield line), and the northern or central overland routes. Neither does the News shed light on the changes in administration or ownership of the various great vehicles of western communication and transportation; nor even the struggle for establishment of a daily service on the central route. For a complete story of these important developments, reference must be made to the official documents and journals of the 33rd-37th Congresses; also several excellent special studies and reminiscences have been published.
The Mormon press, however, did carry numerous small items which when followed chronologically mirror the rapidly changing scene as viewed from the vantage point of Salt Lake City. It is sometimes difficult, in retrospect, to understand the brevity with which some events were treated, which history and the glamour of time have clothed with importance.
"There is a project in Washington City to start a horse express from St. Joseph to Placerville, to carry important dispatches through in ten days." Such a slim item as the above, unaccompanied by comment, could hardly have drawn much attention from the readers of the News. And besides someone was always dreaming up fantastic and impractical schemes, which came to naught. Several weeks later the first direct reference to the proposed Pony Express occupied but little more space in the paper.
By April 9, 1860, the Pony Express was a reality and the citizens of Salt Lake City had witnessed the arrival of both the east and westbound expresses, and so at least a few details for the pages of the Deseret News were in order.
In comparing times of departure and arrival, it appeared Utah was now four days from California and six days from St. Joseph or seven from Washington, which caused the editor to remark: "... a result which we Utonians, accustomed to receive news three months after date, can well appreciate." Subsequent arrivals of the Pony were often noted, and usually were the occasion for short news summaries from the East only a few days old. These items were generally headed "The Very Latest" or "Pony Express."
Adequate communication was getting to be an old story. Yet there must have been much interest when on March 13, 1861, the News briefly announced that the Butterfield line was to be transferred to the central route. Furthermore, the mail was to be carried daily to California and delivered tri-weekly at Salt Lake City. In addition a semi-weekly pony express was to be operated. Three weeks later, April 3, 1861, the paper carried a short item from which it appeared the mail and pony services from St. Joseph to Placerville would be divided between the two contractors Russell and Butterfield. The former was to operate east of Salt Lake City and the latter westward to California. Somewhat of a climax on the communication scene was portrayed by the Deseret News in July, 1861, when it carried on the front page an item headed "Anticipated Events." It read:
Nearly any discussion of the mail situation in the Great Basin after this time would appear as an anticlimax. However, the paper did continue to reflect further improvements and minor interruptions during the ensuing years.
On March 19, 1862, the News briefly announced the daily dispatching of mails both east and west. During the same spring bad weather seemed to be the cause of several brief lapses in mail service. Then again, Indian depredations caused temporary stoppages on the line east of Green River. In connection with the latter, the paper fell to fault finding of the agents of the Overland Mail Company. The criticism was reminiscent of articles so common in the fifties and especially during the regime of Magraw on the mail route. The News gave the impression that some of the Indian stories were not true, and, in any case believed that many of the attacks were inspired, if not actually taken part in, by white men.
Of particular interest, in contrast with earlier years, was an article dealing with the Overland Mail. In comparing mail service by rail between St. Louis and New York with that by Overland Mail to California, it appeared that the latter was, strangely enough, more efficient. In complimenting the Overland Mail and its contractor, the Deseret News was moved to say: "There was a time when other language was justly used by this paper against the mail line east and to some of its agents and employees; but to withhold our moiety of favorable testimony when such an opportunity presents itself would be unfair."
After the establishment of the daily overland mail service and subsequent developments of a minor nature, any substantial improvements in transportation would have to wait the coming of the iron horse. For the immediate future and while awaiting the mechanical wonders of the railroad, the citizens of Utah and the great West had yet one more mechanical device for the instantaneous transmission of human thought.
We have already seen in the pages of the Mormon paper the beginning of construction of the western telegraph line at Salt Lake City. Once again, a careful perusal of the Deseret News reveals much concerning the inception, construction, and final realization of a communication facility.
As far back as 1858, the editor found occasion to write a column giving good reasons for the building of a telegraph and railroad from the Missouri River to California via Utah.
Short items with respect to the more immediate and local scene appeared from time to time. The paper noted the crossing of the Sierra Nevada by the western telegraph from Placerville, and its completion to Genoa, Carson Valley. The arrival of the eastern line at Leavenworth, Kansas, several months later also was noted.
While the Deseret News made no comment about the congressional act of June 16, I860, which provided for and subsidized an overland telegraph line to the Pacific, subsequent developments received plenty of advertisement, especially as they affected Salt Lake City.
On April 10, and 17, 1861, the paper carried articles dealing with proposals by the California telegraph companies to complete lines between that state and Salt Lake City. Less than three months later, the editor reported a visit of James Street, general agent of the Overland Telegraph Company. Street was in Salt Lake City on business in connection with the completion of the line from California. According to Street it was the intention of both eastern and western companies to join their wires in the Mormon capital during the coming fall.
Following the issue for July 10, 1861, which announced the setting of the first telegraph pole at Salt Lake City in the construction of the western half of the line, the pages of the News were silent, because no paper resulted in a two-month suspension of publication. This period of silence was contemporaneous with a similar interval of great construction activity on the part of the telegraph. It is interesting to speculate on the details which the paper would have carried had this suspension not occurred.
When publication was resumed on September 11, the paper devoted considerable space to communication facilities. A report was given on the progress of the telegraph lines. It appeared that the western line would be completed within the next fifteen days and the eastern line by the middle of November at the latest. The paper expressed satisfaction at the progress of the construction and also spoke of pleasant relations with the builders of the lines.
October 23, 1861, was a red letter day for the Deseret News, for Utah, and for all who were interested in better and faster communication. It marked the completion of the overland telegraph and the spanning of the continent with lightning speed. Ironically enough, it was also the end of the highly romanticized Pony Express, the financial burden of which broke the pioneer freighting and staging firm of Russell, Majors and Waddell. On the other hand, Edward Creighton, one of the moving spirits behind the Pacific Telegraph Company and a relatively late comer in the field of western communication, saw his fortune made by the financial success of the transcontinental magnetic telegraph. For Utah and the News, the arrival of the telegraph was the consummation of a long cherished hope and a giant stride toward the breakdown of geographic isolation.
The October 23 issue of the News devoted generous space to the completion of the eastern portion of the telegraph, which had taken place on October 18. Included were the congratulatory messages of Brigham Young and Acting Governor Frank Fuller to the president of the telegraph company and to the President of the United States on that occasion. The paper also indicated that the western line would be opened in the course of that day, which would make the spanning of the continent complete.
The consummation of the overland telegraph was the climax, but not the end of interest in telegraphic communication. Brigham Young was determined to have a home telegraph service and in the fall of 1865, steps were taken toward that end.
A circular letter addressed to all bishops and presiding elders in the territory set forth the need and desirability of such an enterprise. They were urged to organize their communities for obtaining and erecting the poles. Detailed instructions were given as to size of poles, distance apart, and other technical information. Subscriptions were to be taken for the purchase of wire, insulators, and equipment obtainable only in the East. Settlements desiring telegraph stations were instructed to send one or two young men to a special school in Salt Lake City for training in telegraphy. The coming of winter with its cessation of farm work would permit many people to take part in the enterprise. Thus was initiated, under the leadership of Brigham Young, a territory-wide enterprise, which later was incorporated as the Deseret Telegraph Company.
A special train of sixty-five wagons bearing the wire and insulators arrived in Salt Lake City on October 15, 1866. By December 1, the line was established to Ogden; by the following January 15, it was extended to Logan on the north and St. George on the south, a distance of five hundred miles. This completion of the telegraph between the major settlements of the Mormon empire was of course the occasion for proper celebration in the editorial pages of the Deseret News. Within a few years the line was expanded to connect communities in southern Idaho with the extreme southern settlements in Utah and southeastern Nevada.
While the Deseret News and the people of Utah continued to show much interest in the more immediate problems of improved mail service and other types of communication, such as the telegraph, they very early evinced interest and laid plans for realization of the acme of transportation, the railroad.
Mention has already been made of Mormon proposals and memorials during the opening years of the fifties looking toward railroad construction in and through the territory. Early in 1854, the people of Utah renewed their interest in a railroad to the Pacific. Doubtless this interest was inspired by the Federal provision, of the previous spring, for several surveys to determine the best railroad route to the Pacific Coast.
On February 2, the Deseret News reported in some detail on a public meeting, held in the Tabernacle several days before, to express views and sentiments respecting the contemplated railroad. The same issue carried a memorial from the governor and legislature to the Congress requesting the construction of a railroad and recommending the best route, which of course should run through Utah.
Of historical interest today and surely of interest to the peopleof Utah at the time was a lengthy extract from the Annual Report of the Secretary of War of December 1, 1853, concerning the various surveys authorized by Congress and then in process of accomplishment. Along with other surveying parties, both north and south, Gunnison's party in Utah was referred to.
In the years after the Pacific railroad surveys, which demonstrated the practicability of several routes, nothing was done of a concrete nature toward construction of a railway until southern influence was eliminated in 1861. National interest got lost in the growing sectional storm. One observer correctly gaged the situation when he said: "Slavery and the Pacific railroad are concrete illustrations of the two horns of the national dilemma." And then again the comments: "The sectional problem, which had reached its full development in Congress by 1857, prevented any action inthe interest of a Pacific railway so long as it should remain unchanged." It should not be supposed that Congress neglected the question during those years. Practically every session of Congress battled with the problem to no avail. Various bills were proposed in each house and died aborning, were amended to death, or failed of passage in the other house.
In the spring of 1859, the Deseret News, now getting back to normal after the Utah War, took note of the activities of Congress looking toward a transcontinental railroad program. In speaking of the events of the last session (35 Congress 2 session) the News said: "The three leading measures—if they may be so called—of this session, as we learn from a Democratic contemporary, are the Pacific Railroad—the acquisition of Cuba—and the remodeling of the Tariff." The first measure, of course, was the only one of particular interest to the Mormons.
Several weeks later the paper carried some of the details of the long-drawn-out Senate debate, during the winter, on "a bill to authorize and invite proposals for the construction of a railroad from the valley of the Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean on three separate routes." The bill after much changing and amending had been passed by the Senate on January 27, 1859. Of it, one writer commented: "it had taken a form in which its best friend could not have recognized it." Then again he said: "When the 'farce' passed by the Senate was sent to the House of Representatives for concurrence, that body did not even take time to laugh at it."
Such treatment was the fate of all railroad bills until after the Civil War removed one of the contesting sections from the floor of Congress.
Finally in the summer of 1862, the Pacific Railroad bill, incorporating the Union Pacific Railroad and providing for construction of a transcontinental railroad with Federal aid, was passed by Congress and became law on July 1, 1862.
Subsequent details of construction did not appear in any quantity in the Deseret News. However, some items occasionally were carried, especially as they interested or affected the people of Utah. On September 24, 1862, the paper devoted a column to a meeting in Chicago of the Board of Commissioners named in the act providing for construction of the railroad. Shortly thereafter, on November 19, an advertisement of interest signed by Brigham Young offered for sale capital stock in the Union Pacific Railroad Company. Citizens of the territory were urged to support such a useful project.
On June 15, 1864, brief comment was made on progress of the surveying for the Union Pacific in Weber Canyon. Nearly a year later, May 24, 1865, the paper noted the first payment of a million and a half dollars to the Central Pacific Railroad on completion of a section of thirty miles. Occasionally other small items appeared from time to time relative to progress of construction. One such article pointed out that construction of the Central Pacific was so satisfactory that the summit of the Sierra would be reached before winter set in, and that cars would be running between Sacramento and Salt Lake City within three years.
The actual completion of the first transcontinental line was effected subsequent to the period of this study. However, it should be recorded that the "union of the rails" was made at Promontory, near Ogden, Utah, on May 10, 1869, amid great festivities and celebration.
Over the recent years signs had been rapidly multiplying that the pioneer era of Utah and the West was coming to an end. The arrival of the railroad marked the close of one era and the beginning of another. For Utah the days of isolation were over. The great influx of gentiles and the increase in industry, mining, and business tended to curb the secular power of the Church.
If the publishing of a daily paper after November 20, 1867, marks the end of the pioneer period for the Deseret News, the coming of the rails eighteen months later makes a similar division point for the entire West.
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