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Rural to Rockets: Box Elder County Takes Off
So, you are a giant aerospace company and you want to build a rocket plant: what do you look for? This week, learn how one Utah town met all the requirements to become a center for the US rocket industry and how that decision forever changed its…
The Militarized West
World War II and the Cold War brought the military to much of rural Utah, transforming those places in the process. The economic boost that followed was long-lasting in some communities, but devastatingly short-lived in others.
While the federal…
Boom & Bust: Topaz Concentration Camp
During World War II, a city of more than 8,000 people rose out of Utah's desert for three years, and then returned to dust.
After the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, US President Franklin Roosevelt ordered the relocation and imprisonment of more than…
Navajo Code Talker Samuel Holiday
Meet Samuel Holiday, whose traditional Navajo upbringing shaped his work as a code talker and changed the course of World War II.When Samuel Holiday was forced to attend a government boarding school for Native American children, he was forbidden to…
Utah's Rosies
You’ve seen her. She wears the red bandanna and a blue collared shirt, flexing her bicep with a look that says, “get to work.” She’s Rosie the Riveter, and Utah had an army of them.When American men deployed to the front lines during World…
Exile at Topaz
Thousands of Japanese Americans were forced into exile in the Utah desert during World War II. Two months after the December 1941 attack by Japan on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 mandating the…
Utah Nurses in World War I
Three of the many nurses who traveled from Utah to Europe to serve in World War I. As World War I intensified in Europe, so did the need for medical help. The Red Cross established base hospitals and field units throughout Europe, and launched…
Massacre in Nephi: Archaeology of a Mass Grave
A mass grave was found in Nephi, Utah, proving how archaeology can provide a voice for the dead.In 2006, while digging the foundation for a new house in the central Utah town of Nephi, construction workers uncovered human bones. In fact, seven Native…
A Question of Loyalty: Utah & the American Civil War
Despite Utah’s lack of direct involvement in the Civil War, they played a key role in the interests of leaders in Washington over the struggle for control of the western territories.One of the saddest episodes in American history was the Civil War,…
Japanese Fire Balloons Reach Utah During WWII
The Japanese bombing of Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor brought the United States into World War II in 1941. But one of the best-kept secrets of the War was a Japanese air offensive on the US mainland using fire balloon bombs, some of which actually reached…
Bushnell Military Hospital
A military hospital in Brigham City helped wounded soldiers and transformed the community during World War II.By August 1942, the United States had been involved in World War II for eight months. As British forces halted German and Italian advances…
Protesting the Vietnam War in Salt Lake
The anti-war movement came to Salt Lake City in 1969, culminating in a rally that the Salt Lake Tribune called “the largest peace demonstration in Utah history.”In October 1969, at the height of the Vietnam War, more than 4,000 Utahns took to the…
The Posey War
Tensions between white and Native American populations in San Juan County escalated over limited resources and mutual misunderstanding. The eventual armed conflict between the two groups has been called “The Last Indian Uprising”.In 1923,…
The Morrisites
Eight members of a Mormon fringe group were killed by militiamen in south Weber County.In 1858, Mormon immigrant Joseph Morris sent a letter to LDS Church president Brigham Young naming himself as the church’s true leader. A convert to Mormonism…
The Spark That Ignited the Black Hawk War
Conflict and rising tensions between a group of Ute Indians and Mormons in Manti, Utah led to an incident that sparked Utah’s Black Hawk War. In 1865, on the same day Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee were negotiating an end to the American Civil…