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The Guano Gatherers of Gunnison Island
Wings flashing in the sunlight, raucous calls filling the air, and tons of bird excrement coating the rocks. Learn about guano gathering out on the Great Salt Lake.Making a living collecting bird droppings does not exactly sound like the ideal job. …
The Godbeites
A group of disaffected British Mormons and merchants formed the Godbeite movement after openly declaring their opposition to the LDS Church.In October 1869, a group of men who had been converted to Mormonism in Great Britain openly declared their…
The Glorious Gardo House (Part 2)
Salt Lake City’s Gardo House was home to Mormon polygamists on the lamb and the West’s most shining socialites.The Gardo House, a Victorian mansion in downtown Salt Lake, was once touted as the finest home between Chicago and San Francisco. Its…
The Glorious Gardo House (Part 1)
The unusual history of a remarkable mansion in downtown Salt Lake City.Downtown Salt Lake City was once home to a famously opulent Victorian mansion with an extraordinary history. Construction of the Gardo House began in 1873 on the southwest corner…
The Ghost Town of Old La Sal
Ghost Towns of the old west are generally relics of the mining industry, but Old La Sal in San Juan County is a now-deserted cow town.Situated in the northeast corner of San Juan County at the foot of the La Sal Mountains, old La Sal was once a…
The Eagle Emporium
The Eagle Emporium remains the Salt Lake City’s “only commercial structure built prior to the completion of the transcontinental railroad.”In 1864, English immigrant William Jennings opened a mercantile business in the Eagle Emporium. The…
The Death of Louis Price
In 1895 the burned body of a man was found near Nephi, Utah. The identity of his killer remains a mystery.In 1895 the burned body of a young man named Lewis Price was found up Salt Creek Canyon near Nephi. His parents had sent him up the canyon to…
The Dam that Saved a Town
In the late 19th century, the town of Newton, Utah was almost abandoned. Crops died, there was no water for animals or people… So how did the town survive?
Settled in 1869 on the broad plain of Utah's Cache Valley, the fledgling town of Newton…
The City of Corinne
A steamboat called City of Corinne has been called the “most imposing boat that has ever sailed the Great Salt Lake”.In 1871, the Steamboat City of Corinne was launched into the wide channel of the Bear River near the settlement that shared its…
The Circleville Massacre
Tensions between white settlers and Native Americans resulted in the massacre of over a dozen Paiutes in Circleville, Utah.In 1866, one of the worst tragedies in Utah history occurred in the town of Circleville on what is now the Piute-Garfield…
The Box Elder Tabernacle Fire
An 1896 fire consumed the Box Elder State Tabernacle, just six years after the building had been dedicated.In 1896, LDS worshippers were just assembling for a morning meeting in the Box Elder Stake Tabernacle when the cry of “fire” rent the air.…
The Bee Inspector
Salt Lake City’s bee inspector is an official position that reminds us of Salt Lake County’s very real agricultural past.Few people these days know that Salt Lake County has a bee inspector. Hiring someone to watch bees in Utah’s most urban…
The Bear River Massacre
The Bear River Massacre was an event that changed the landscape of northern Utah and the fate of the Shoshone people.In the early morning cold of January 29, 1863, between 270 and 400 Shoshone men, women, and children were killed by the U.S. Army…
The Bartleson Party
The first emigrant party to cross modern-day Utah on the way to the West Coast.In 1841, a small group of emigrants set out from Sapling Grove, Missouri, to begin a new life in the Far West. Scholars still disagree about how many were actually in the…
The Arsenal Hill Blast
An explosion rocked Salt Lake City in 1876, killing four people.In 1876, as Utahns were converging on Salt Lake City eager to attend the LDS Church’s general conference, a powerful blast rocked the northern part the city, shattering windows,…
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…
The 24th Infantry Regiment
Nearly 600 enlisted African American soldiers and their families migrated to Salt Lake City in 1896. These soldiers discovered that Utahns’ attitudes towards African Americans were much like the rest of the country, and faced racial discrimination…
The 1872 Constitutional Convention
A bizarre political moment in Utah's long trek towards statehood exposes the tension between politics and religion in the Deseret. In 1872, delegates met at the Salt Lake City Hall to create a new state called Deseret out of the old Utah Territory.…
The “Reel” Story of Utah Silk
Have you ever noticed groves of mulberry trees in your neighborhood? These trees aren’t native to Utah, but were planted to support a pioneer silk industry led by Mormon women and girls.It’s hard to imagine silkworms thriving in Utah’s harsh…
Susanna Bransford: The Silver Queen
Meet prominent socialite and millionaire Susanna Bransford, who built her fortune on the back of Utah’s mining boom.Susanna Bransford – Park City’s infamous “Silver Queen” – epitomizes Utah’s glamorous Gilded Age. But Bransford…