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Archaeology Underfoot: Salt Lake’s Downtown Fremont Village
The unique discovery of an ancient Fremont Village in the heart of downtown Salt Lake City tells a story of a time before Utah was settled by European pioneers.Thousands of people ride the Trax line through downtown Salt Lake City every day. As they…
Early Education in Utah
In Utah, one-room schoolhouses evolved into the publicly supported education system we have today. Utahns struggled to find an adequate solution to the question of education, and was the last territory in the nation to provide a free public school…
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…
The United Order of Orderville
The United Order of Orderville, a Utopian living experiment, thrived for a decade in southern Utah.When people hear the term “communal living,” what often comes to mind is a group of hippies, not a group of 19th Century Mormons. However, the…
Old Ironsides
Every year American sports fans gear up for the World Series. Learn how Salt Lakers used to get their baseball fix on the streets of downtown.Throughout its storied history, the game of baseball has been broadcast via the internet, on television, and…
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,…
Steen’s Folly: Utah’s Frenzied Uranium Boom
A frenzied uranium boom swept up southern Utah in the 1950s. The boom had a long term impact on the health of countless miners.On July 6, 1952, a down-on-his-luck uranium prospector named Charlie Steen made a major strike near Moab, Utah. His…
Salt Lake City’s Red Light District
Salt Lake City’s Red Light District was the target of an unusual cleanup campaign in 1908.Prostitution is known as "the world’s oldest profession," and was established in Utah by the 1850s. While laws made prostitution illegal, Salt Lake City…
Citizen Activists Derail MX Missile System
A grassroots movement of Utah citizens helped derail government plans to base the MX Missile System in Utah’s Great Basin.When the United States Air Force announced its plans in 1979 to build its new MX Intercontinental Ballistic Missile System in…
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…
Harry’s Dream: Beaver Mountain Ski Resort
Like many Utahns, Harold Seeholzer loved snow and skiing. But how did his enthusiasm for outdoor recreation turn into one of Cache Valley’s most notable ski resorts?In the late 1930s, Harold and a few local ski fanatics engineered the first…
Christmas Gift Giving in Pioneer Cedar City
Imagine you live in 19th century rural Utah. Christmas is coming and your children look forward to a celebration with Santa and gifts. There are no stores, no mail orders. How would you meet their expectations?“It [was] a two-room log house with a…
Solstice Sun Tunnels
Sun Tunnels, an art installation by Nancy Holt, has become a unique part of Utah’s heritage.On June 21, 1976, the day of the summer solstice, New York artist Nancy Holt gathered several friends under the massive skies of Utah’s west desert to…
Monticello's Hispanic Pioneers
In 1899, Ramon Gonzalez, his wife Guadalupe, and his children Romana and Prudencio, left their home in Dixon, New Mexico, to settle in Monticello, Utah. A wagon carried all their household possessions, while a few head of livestock followed on the…
John Wesley Powell's First Run of the Colorado River
More than 140 years ago, on August 30, 1869, six men in two wooden boats emerged into open country from the high cliffs and rough waters of the Grand Canyon. They were “blackened, bearded, emaciated, in rags,” and down to their last stash of…
My Life on Three Continents: Jewish Refugees in Utah
Utah has become home to people of many backgrounds and cultures since the first Mormon Pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in July 1847. What brought these people to Utah? The convoluted journey of one family is told in Fred Linden’s…
Intermountain Indian School
The “I” is fading fast on the mountainside above Brigham City, Utah. Winter snows threaten to erase it for good and with it, the memory of one of Utah’s more significant stories: The Intermountain Indian School, a federally-run Native American…
Jewish Pioneers of Clarion
On September 10, 1911, twelve Jewish families arrived in Gunnison, Utah, to establish a Jewish agricultural community. The group was part of the “Back to Soil” movement, which believed Jews needed to leave the city and live on farms. The…
The Crossing of the Fathers
One of the goals of the Dominguez-Escalante expedition was to find a northern route to the Spanish missions in Monterey, California from the Spanish colonial stronghold of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Led by two Franciscan friars named Silvestre Velez de…
The Adventure of Bobby Donohue
Any parent who has ever lost a youngster in a crowd can imagine Park City resident Bridget Donohue’s panic when she couldn’t find her thirteen-year-old son, Bobby. Believing he had gone to nearby Heber in the fall of 1898, Bridget must have…