Utah Historical Quarterly, Volume 58, Number 2, 1990

UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY (ISSN 0042-USX) EDITORIAL STAFF MAX J. EVANS, Editor STANFORD J. LAYTON. Marmging Editor MIRIAM B . M.VR.?H\, Associate Editor

ADVISORY BOARD OF EDITORS KENNETH L CANNON ii. Salt Lake City, 1992 ARLENE H . EAKLE, Woods Cross, 1990 J O E L C. JANETSKI, Provo, 1991 R O B E R T S . MCPHERSON, Blanding, 1992 CAROL A. O ' C O N N O R , Logan, 1991 RICHARD W. SADLER, Ogden, 1991

HAROLD SCHINDLER, Salt Lake City, 1990 GENE A. SESSIONS, Boundful, 1992

GREGORY C. THOMPSON, Salt Lake City, 1990 Utah Historical Quarterly was established in 1928 to publish articles, documents, and reviews contributing to knowledge of Utah's history. T h e Quarterly is published four dmes a year by the Utah State Historical Society, 300 Rio Grande, Salt Lake City, Utah 84101. Phone (801) 533-6024 for membership and publications information. Members of the Society receive the Quarterly, Beehive History, and the bimonthly Newsletter upon payment of the annual dues: individual, $15.00; institution, $20.00; student and senior cidzen (age sixty-five or over), $10.00; contribudng, $20.00; sustaining, $25.00; patron, $50.00; business, $100.00.

Materials for publication should b e submitted in duplicate accompjinied by return postage and should be typed double-space, with footnotes at the end.

Authors are encouraged to submit material in a computer-readable form, on 5W inch MS-DOS o r PCDOS diskettes, standard ASCII text file. Additional information on requirements is available from the managing editor. Articles represent the views of the author and are not necessarily those of the Utah State Historical Society.

Second class postage is paid at Salt Lake City, Utah.

Postmaster: Send form 3579 (change of address) to Utah Historical Quarterly, 300 Rio Grande, S;dt Lake City, Utah 84101.

HZSTORZCAZ* aiTJLRTERrnr

Conte^nts S P R I N G 1990 / VOLUME 58 / NUMBER 2

IN THIS ISSUE

107

CROSSROADS OF T H E WEST: AVL\TION COMES TO UTAH, 1910-40 . . .

CHAUTAUQUA AND T H E UTAH PERFORMING ARTS N O PROPER J O B FOR A STRANGER: T H E POLITICAL REIGN O F MARK BRAFFET T H E INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC O F 1918-19 IN UTAH T H E INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC O F 1918: A CULTURAL RESPONSE

ROGER D . UUNIUS

108

JANICE R DAWSON

131

NANCY J. TANIGUCHI

145

LEONARD J. ARRINGTON

165

MCPHERSON

183

MELVINT. SMITH

201

ROBERT

S.

IN MEMORIAM: JUANITA BROOKS, 1898-1989 BOOK REVIEWS

204

BOOK NOTICES

212

T H E C O V E R Youthful members ofthe Salt Lake Union Boot Blacks, Local No. 6, posed with their mascot, Troubles, on the steps of the City and County Building before the Labor Day parade, September 2, 1907. Shipler photograph, USHS collections

© Copynght 1990 Utah State Historical Society

Books reviewed

BRUCE R. HAWKINS and DAVID B. MADSEN.

Excavations of the Donner-Reed Wagons: Historic Archaeology along the Hastings Cutoff DAVID L. BIGLER 204 WARREN A. BECK and YNEZ D . HAASE.

Historical Atlas of the American West WAYNE L. WAHLQUIST Preserving Different Pasts: The American National Monuments ... THOMAS G. ALEXANDER

205

H A L ROTHMAN.

207

Exiles in a Land of Liberty: Mormons in America, 1830-1846 MARVIN S. H I L L

209

and ROBIN MAY. Buffalo Bill and His Wild West: A Pictorial Biography PAUL L. H E D R E N

211

KENNETH H . W I N N .

JOSEPH G. ROSA

^ ^

4..iM^ 'ÂŤ*.

Early flight demonstration.

Photograph courtesy of L V. McNeely, USHS collections.

In this issue With the beginning of commercial aviation in the early twentieth century the familiar theme of Utah as " crossroads of the West" took on new meaning as the Salt Lake City Airport quickly became a hub for air mail service second in importance only to Chicago until World War II. The first article in this issue tells the fascinating story of Utah's air pioneering. In July 1911, five months after businessmen sponsored an air meet near Saltair, Ogden trendsetters produced that city's first Chautauqua, an independent, ten-day educational/ entertainment extravaganza at Glenwood Park under the able direction of Methodist minister Frederick Vining Fisher. Like aviation enthusiasts, those involved with Chautauqua proclaimed it as "a good omen for the state" and "the beginning of a new era." The great success and gradual decline of Chautauqua are explored in the second article.

Not all the "omens" of that era appeared good. Utah Fuet Company viewed labor unrest in its tightly controlled coal camps with alarm, and from about 1903 to 1917 company attorney Mark Braffet, wielding enormous political power as the "king" of Carbon County, countered every move the miners made. The third article examines his questionable tactics and inevitable fall.

The final two articles treat the influenza epidemic of 1918-19, which was especially deadly in Utah. The first provides a broad look at the disease and a detailed view of Ogden's experience. The second focuses on the remote southeast corner of the state where isolated white communites and a scattered Indian population responded to the epidemic according to cultural dictates.

Taken together, the five studies provide a kaleidoscopic view of Utah communities in a period of profound change.

Salt Lake City Airport ca. 1925. Earl Lyman photograph, courtesy of L V. McNeely.

USHS collections

Crossroads of the West: Aviation Comes to Utah, 1910-40

BY ROGER D. LAUNIUS

Dr. Launius is command historian. Headquarters Military Airlift Command, Scott Air Force Base, Illinois.

^m^'S^

of the transMississippi West since the Mormons settled along the Great Salt Lake in 1847. Throughout the nineteenth century wagon trains, stage lines, and railroads passed through Utah Territory as the nation expanded between the Atlantic and the Pacific. Indeed, a noted western historian recently concluded that between 1850 and 1870 Salt Lake City was the most important and widely publicized transportation center between the Missouri frontier and California^ The territory's importance as a transportation center became even more critical afi;er the completion of the transcontinental railroad at Promontory, Utah, in 1869. The proliferation of railways in all directions from the Union Pacific and Central Pacific tracks soon linked th(^ Intermountain West, and Utah T H E CENTRAL ROCKY MOUNTAINS HAVE BEEN THE HUB

'W. Turrentine Jackson, "Salt Lake City: Wells Fargo's Transportation Depot during the Stagecoach Era," Utah Historical Quarterly 53 (1985): 4-39, esp. p. 5.

^M'tl,

no

Utah Historical Quarterly

emerged as the hub of both east-west and north-south rail traffic in the region as well as the business center of the Mountain West.^ The development of highways near the turn of the century only reinforced the importance of the area between the east bank of the Great Salt Lake and the Wasatch Mountains as a transportation center.

The happy combination of climate, geographic location, and reasonably large urban populations assured that the region would also exploit aviation effectively. The Salt Lake City-Ogden axis, which had most of the population, most of the investment funds, and most of the political leadership, embraced aviation developments, assuring that the area would continue its role as a transportation crossroads. This essay will discuss how the air transportation system became established in northern Utah and the importance this held for the Rocky Mountain West During the first decade of the twentieth century, the airplane began to be touted by some Americans as the great promise of the nation.

These advocates had fostered a romance with aviation by 1910, emphasizing the wonders of a machine that allowed men to fly like birds. Some predicted it would make war impossible because of its ability to strike at the interior of an enemy nation and destroy its manufacturing capability. Others foresaw the linking of the world together in a great network of transportation routes. A few even argued that airplanes would improve people's health and refine their aesthetic sensibilities.^ The enthusiasm of aviation proponents found tangible expression in several early aerial exhibitions. The first airplane flight in Utah took place on January 30, 1910, when French barnstormer Louis Paulhan appeared at an exhibition at the fairgrounds in Salt Lake City. Before a crowd estimated at 10,000, Paulhan flew for approximately 10 minutes and 30 seconds above the city. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, he "established a new world's record, for he sailed to a height of approximately 4,600 feet, while his best previous performance was 4,165 feet above sea level, done at Los Angeles." Unfortunately, because of the altitude of the city above sea level, the crowd saw the aircraft fly only about 300 feet above them. The pilot was disappointed that he T h e literature on railroads is vast. See for example the winter 1969 issue of Utah Historical Quarterly c o m m e m o r a d n g the centennial of the completion of the transcontinental railroad.

S e e j o s e p h J. Corn, The Winged Gospel: America's Romance with Aviation, 1900-1950 (New York Oxford University Press, 1983); Billy Mitchell, Oz/r/lzrForc^(NewYork: E. P. Dutton, \92\)andWinged Defense {New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1925); Alfred F. Hurley, Billy Mitchell: Crusader for Air Power (New York: Franklin Watts, 1960).

Aviation Comes to Utah

111

"couldn't rise to a greater height, but the heavy biplane could not soar higher in this rarified atmosphere." He hoped "to come back some day with a lighter machine and do some real highflying.'"^ The next year S^dt Lake City businessmen sponsored an air meet at the Barrington Aviation Park near Saltair. During February 11-13, 1911, some 10,000 people paid $1.00 each to view the aerial exploits of such renowned pilots as Glen H. Curdss, Eugene B. Ely, and Charles S. Wdlard. Several aerial stunts and record attempts highlighted the meet.

Lt. Alva Lee of the Fifteenth Infantry accompanied one of the flyers "to make observations in the interest of mditary science . . . ." This important event firmly established public interest in aviation in northern Utah beyond any hope of ending the romance. Subsequent air shows fostered this trend.^ The spirit of flight prompted several Utahns to embrace the aircraft in these early years. In 1910 the Salt Lake automobile sales firm of Hill, Blake, and Irving marketed briefly a personal biplane. The partners predicted that "before another year there wdl be many styles of aerial craft on the local market and enthusiasts wdl be seen flying over and around the city."^ Although this predicdon failed, it demonstrates some of the local opdmism. Another Utahn, Salt Lake City resident Clarence H. Walker, entered the February 1911 air show at Barrington Park. He had purchased a Curds 30-horsepower biplane toflyat the show but was unsuccessful in getting the plane airborne during several attempts. "It was a bitter disappointment to me that I was unable to make a good flight," he said, "and especially so because this is my home town. The rarified atmosphere [at that aldtude] is too much for my thirtyhorsepower engine . . . . The soft ground also retarded my machine considerably."^ Also in 1911 a few enthusiasts formed the Utah Aviation Company and began construcdng an aircraft prototype. Dyke Palmer designed a

"Aviators Sail in Beautiful Flight," Salt Lake Tribune, January 31, 1910. See also the preparatory discussions in "Famous Aviators to Exhibit Here," Salt Lake Tribune, January 25, 1910; "Everything Ready for Aviation Meet," Salt Lake Tribune, January 2%, 1910; "French Aviator Unable to Soar," Salt Lake Tribune, January 30, 1910. '"Aviator Who Will Appear at the Meet Here," Salt Lake Herald-Republican, February 11, 1911; "DareDeathioStartXeThrong," Salt Lake Herald-Republican, February 13,1911. Apparently another air meet took place in Salt Lake City on May 5-10, 1911, as well. See "Meet Near Barrington Park," 5aft Lake Herald-Republican, May 2, 1911. ''"New Biplane Which Will be Handled by Salt Lake Firm," Salt Lake Tribune, lanuary 1, 1910.

"Salt Lake Man to Make Debut as Aviator in His Home City," Salt Lake Herald-Republican, February 6, 1911. Quote from "Dare Death to Starde Throng," Salt Lake Herald-Republican, February 13, 1911.

112

Utah Historical Quarterly

biplane with a 14-foot wingspan using a 6-horsepower Emerson twocycle water-cooled engine. Two investors, Joseph Kaufman and William Smith, put up the capital necessary to budd the plane. In April 1911 construction was begun on the airplane at the company's property in Grantsville. The builders faced numerous problems. Dyke Palmer remembered: " It was impossible to get aircraft fittings at that time. I had to make turnbuckles out of motorcycle spokes. Plain galvanized wire was all I could find for flying drag and landing wires. I used three-fourth inch gas pipe for wheel supports on the landing gear." In spite of these difficulties, by June 1911 the airplane was ready for flight tests. Palmer made two attempts to get the machine airborne, each ending in serious damage to the delicate craft As this drama was acted out in a pasture, the Utah Aviation Company underwent marked organizational changes.

Wdliam Smith quit and was replaced by Phillip Aljett. Aljett pushed out inventer Dyke Palmer and carried on further design tests with a series of mechanics over the next three years. By 1914 the company's leadership believed it had an airworthy machine and took it to Logan for a public demonstration; when this aircraft also failed to fly the Utah Aviation Company went out of business. Nevertheless, these efforts provide some measure of more widespread interest in aviation in the region and the possibdities of transcontinental air linkage.^ With the exception of the Utah Aviation Company's activities, most aerial episodes were essentially spectacles with little practical application. The use of the airplane in World War I, however, changed the way Americans viewed the flying machine. Advances in the technology of flight and the forward thinking of some individuals encouraged private and commercial aviation developments. One early application was the delivery of mail by air across the country. In February 1916 the U.S. Postal Service, at the urging of assistant postmaster general Otto Praeger, advertised for bids to carry airmail on seven routes in the wdds of Alaska and one in Massachusetts.^ Although this first attempt stalled before getting underway, on May 15, 1918, the Postal Service established the first overnight airmail route, between New York City and Washington, D.C.^^ Between 1918 and 1920 routes ^"Utah's First Plane Flew But Briefly, in 1911," Salt Lake Tribune, April 20, 1946. ^Flying 5 (March 1916): 53-59, 62-63; Annual Report of the Postmaster General, 1916 (Washington, D . C : Government Printing Office, 1917), p. 46; Congressional Record, 65th Cong. 2dsess., Mav 1918, p.

643. ^^Aviation 4 (April 15, 1919): 389; "Report on Actions Taken by the Flying Branch in Regard to the Aerial Postal Route," April 11, 1918, Army Air Force Central Decimal Files 311.125, Records of the Army Air Force, Record Group 18, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C; Air Service Journal 2 {May 23, 1918); 727-43.

Aviation Comes to Utah

113

i i ^

DeHavilland 4-B aircraft was often used for airmail operations Courtesy of author. connected other cities along the Atlantic seaboard with Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Chicago. ^^ As the expansion proceeded, postal officials laid plans for a transcontinental airmail system. With funding for a route to San Francisco via Chicago secured through a sleight-of-hand by postal officials for fiscal year 1921,^^ the Postal Service began to search for the most favorable route, one that had adequate airfields and a business community willing to build the necessary facilities for airmail service.

J o h n A. Jordan, a field operative seeking the best route for the western part of the airmad system, visited several cities in 1920 for this purpose.

The Postal Service induced the Cheyenne, Wyoming, business com" T h e finest study of the development of theaiimail system is WiUiam M. heary. Aerial Pioneers: The U.S. Air Mail Service, 1918-1927 (Washington, D . C : Smithsonian Insdtudon Press, 1985). '^A stretched argument about the airmail's ability to supplement rail transport enabled postal officials to take almost $1.3 million out of railway a])propriations in 1921 and use it to pay airmail costs. See Post Office Department, "Amount Expended for Air Mail Service by Fiscal Years," September 17, 1924, Records of the House of Rep resentatives, Select Committee of Inquiry into Operations of U.S. Air Service, Record Group 233, National Archives.

114

Utah Historical Quarterly

munity, for example, to provide suitable fields and hangars for the proposed airmad route. The city fathers made $15,000 available for these facilities to ensure that Cheyenne became an airmail stop. The Postal Service did the same in Reno, Nevada ^^ The linkage on the route to San Francisco was complete before the end of 1920.

Salt Lake City was a logical way-station between Cheyenne and Reno on this transcontinental air route. It had been used as early as August 1919 as a stopover for military flights from the West Coast, and special aircraft had carried letters from Washington to Salt Lake City a month later in a publicity stunt to demonstrate the potential of airmail service.^^ When John Jordan visited Salt Lake City in May 1920 city leaders were anxious to secure the air station rather than allow rival Ogden, thirty-five miles to the north and a contender for the stop, to reap the probable economic benefits and prestige associated with airmail service. The local business community and city officials put up $27,000 to budd a flying field; a hangar; and other repair, office, and storage buildings. ^^ In July 1920 Otto Praeger, the Postal Service's "Father of the Air Mail," fixed September 1 as the official starting date for transcontinental air operations. He appointed Andrew R. Dunphy, a former Marine and as tough a manager as anyone could want, to supervise the Omaha-Salt Lake City section of the route. Dunphy made his headquarters in Cheyenne. Praeger then named Johnjordan to head the Salt Lake CitySan Francisco section. Both men were charged with ensuring that fields, aircraft, pilots, spare parts, and other resources were ready to support the operation.'^ In 1920 Praeger directed James Clark Edgerton, one of his chief assistants, to establish a radio network between each of the new western airmail stations. Edgerton acquired generators to power transmitters and receivers by trading the Air Mail Service's linen, used to repair aircraft, for surplus items. He also visited each city on the route and persuaded civic leaders to donate facilities for their radio stations, U.S. House of Representatives, Subcommittee of the Committee on Post Office and Post Roads, Hearings: Claims for the Construction of Hangars and Maintenance ofFlying Fields Air Mail Service, 6 7 th Cong, 4th sess. (Washington, D . C : Government Printing Office, 1923), pp. 9-27. " Quartet of Air Cruisers Reach S. L. from Elko," Salt Lake Herald, August 9, 1919; Improvement Era, December 1919, as quoted in Journal History, September 28, 1919, p. 4, Church ofJesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Historical Department, Salt Lake City.

"Salt Lake is Selected Air Mail Control, Route Between New York and San Francisco to Pass Through City, News Service Announces," Salt Lake Herald-Tribune, May 15, 1920.

Otto Praeger to C A. Parker,June 23, 1920, Personnel Files, Howard M. Garney, Division of Air Mail Service, Records of Post Office Department, Record Group 28, National Archives.

Aviation Comes to Utah

115

promising in return to provide them v/ith emergency communications.

All the community leaders were pleased with this arrangement. "Each success induced others," Edgerton wrote. "In what had become a triumphal procession, the publicity preceded me as my journey took me from city to city along the transcontinental [route]. Within ten days all work was in progress."^^ In spite of these efforts, Praegefs September 1, 1920, inauguration of transcontinental airmail service had to be delayed until September 8 when pilot Randolph Page took off from Hazelhurst Field, Newjersey, on the first leg of the route. Relaying raail between aircraft like the Pony Express of sixty years earlier, the first airmail reached Salt Lake City by the evening of that first day An Army pilot, LL Buck Hedron, flew a De Havilland DH-4 aircraft on the Cheyenne-Salt Lake City route.

Carrying 380 pounds of mail, Hedron reached the temporary strip named Buena Vista Field at 5:03 p.m. Mountain Time on September 8.

The Salt LAe Tribune reported that the DH-4 "first appeared in the north, flying low, and in a few minutes made a safe and easy landing in front of the hangar. The pilot, who made the trip alone, stood up in his plane, smiling as though he had just come in from an easy jaunt in an automobde."^^ By September 11 the first airmail from the East had reached San Francisco. Ferhaips Aerial Age Weekly, a booster periodical, summarized the event best: "September 8, 1920, will go down in history as the great day when the epoch-making event, the first trip of the transcontinental aerial mail, took place.^'^ Meanwhde, Salt Lake City officials began construction of a new airfield for the Postal Service. In late August 1920 the city had purchased Basque Flats, about 106 acres of partially water-logged salt grass pasture, for $6,000. No plans were developed at that dme for a paved or graveled runway; the field would have only a single, cinder-covered landing strip.

It was to be named Jordan Field in honor of route manager John Jordan.^'^ City officials delayed building the promised facilides at Jordan Field, however. By the beginning of operations in September, although " j a m e s Clark Edgerton, "Horizons Unlimited," in possession of Edgerton Family, Miami Springs, Florida, as quoted in Leary, Aerial Pioneers, o. 120. '''"First Air Mail Pouches Reach Salt Lake Field," 5a/^I<2^<?rn7)Mn6>, September 9, 1920; Charles S. Davey, "The Beginnings of Commercial Aviation," Beehive History 8 (1982): 13-15; "Veteran Dispatcher Recalls First Landing of Postal Plane in Salt Lake," Deseret News (Salt Lake City), May 15, 1943. ^''Aerial Age Weekly 12 (September 13, 1920): 5. ^""Landing Field for Planes Bought," Salt Lake Telegram, August 21, 1920; A. B. Larson, "Salt Lake Municipal Airport," February 1941, Salt Lake lAP Authoritv Files, Salt Lake City.

116

Utah Historical Quarterly

there was much discussion of it in the press, no construction had begun.

John Jordan issued an ultimatum on September 30: make arrangements to build a hangar or he would move the airmail stop to Ogden.

The rivalry between the business communities in both cities was well known, and postal officials had used it before to gain concessions. The ploy worked, for late that same day the Commercial Club, a forerunner of the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce, organized the U.S. Air Mail Hangar Holding Company to raise money for the facility. "The company will consist of about 200 local people," reported the Deseret News, "each of whom will subscribe $100 to the enterprise." The $20,000 from this company would be sufficient to build a hangar and start other facilities. ^^

By December 21, 1920, the airfield was sufficiently completed to warrant a dedication. Gov. Simon Bamberger, Salt Lake Mayor C. Clarence Neslen, and sports idol Jack Dempsey gave short speeches on the importance of aviation for the West. They named the new facility Woodward rather than Jordan Field for John P. Woodward, an airmail pilot who had died on November 7, 1920, when his De Havilland DH-4 flew into a mountain near Tie Siding, Wyoming, while en route to Cheyenne from Salt Lake City during a winter storm.^^ Airmail pilots flying through the Rockies encountered many problems, most of them related to winter weather. Daily operation over the forbidding terrain of the Cheyenne-Salt Lake City segment was especially challenging. From Cheyenne at 6,000 feet, pilots had to climb to 9,000 feet above sea level to cross the Laramie Range twelve miles westward. Crossing the Continental Divide, they usually followed the Union Pacific tracks through the narrow mountain passes. After a refueling stop at Rock Springs, these pilots, flying in open cockpit Jennys or De Havdland aircraft, had to cross the rugged Wasatch Range into Salt Lake. This part of the flight required a minimum altitude of 12,000 feet, at which height sudden snowstorms, erratic winds, subzero temperatures, and mountain peaks still hindered flights. Only the most diligent efforts could bring the mail to its destination over such terrain.^^ Pilot James F. Moore expressed well the sentiments of many ^'"Commercial Club Forces Company to Build Hangar on Jordan Field," Deseret News, September 30, 1920. ^^"Woodward Field Is Nameof Local Station," Deseret Evening News, December22, 1920; Leary, Aerial Pioneers, p. 255. ^^A. K. Lobeck, Airways of America: Guidebook No. 1 (New York: Columbia University, Geographical Press, 1930), pp. 105-108; U.S. Air MaiX Service, Pilots'Directions: New York-San Francisco Route (Washington, D . C : Government Printing Office, 1921), pp. 17-20.

Aviation Comes to Utah

117

flyers when he wrote to the airmail's chief of flying that the route "from here [Cheyenne] to Salt Lake City is a good one to kill the men that you seem to have a grudge against or want to see out of the way."^^ Most pilots had better luck than John Woodward, although accidents still took place. On October 18, three weeks before his fatal accident, another airmad pilot, James P. Murray, left Salt Lake City for Cheyenne. He crossed the Wasatch Front without incident, but after passing Rock Springs he encountered a blinding snowstorm. Realizing that massive Elk Mountain lay ahead, but unable to see it, Murray tried to gain altitude. "1 gradually climbed the machine full engine," he wrote, " untd I felt it stalling [ at] the treetops [ on the mountain] not more than fifty feet away." Since he could neither climb nor turn to miss Elk Mountain, he had to settle for a crash landing. Although his DH-4 was demolished, Murray was not seriously injured. He wandered eastward through the forest for several days, eventually finding a road that took him to Arlington, Wyoming, and help.^^ Flying haz^lrds west of Salt Lake City were different but no less dangerous. The route to Elko, Nevada, passed over the Great Salt Lake, swampland, and alkali desert. In winter the Great Salt Lake, which would not freeze because of its salt content, could drop as low as 20 degrees Fahrenheit. If a pdot crashed into the lake, he would quickly suffer hypothermia and drown before he could be rescued or swim ashore. A landing in the sparsely settled desert was tantamount to being marooned on an island. Unless rescue workers found a downed pilot within a few days his chances of survival were slim; and without location transmitters or radios, finding a crashed aircraft or pilot, assuming he survivedâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a fifty-fifty chance at bestâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;was not easy.^^ The danger of a crash landing was underscored on February 22, 1921, when, during an attempt to set a transcontinental airmail record, William E. Lewis crashed en route from Elko to Salt Lake City. He died instantly.^^ In spite of these hazards. Woodward Field became the focal point for transcontinental air travel in the central Rockies. A few records were even logged. On December 16, 1920, pilotjames F. Moore flew the first round trip between Salt Lake City and Cheyenne in one day. First Lt. ^''james F. Moore to D. B. Colyer, November 30, 1920, Air Mail Service Personnel Files, Murray, Record Group 28. ^^James P. Murray to Andrew R. Dunphy, October 20, 1920, Air Mail Service, Personnel Files, Murray, Record Group 28. ^^Lobeck, Airways of America, pp. 108-15; Air Mail Service, Pilots' Directions, pp. 21-27.

New York Times, February 23, 24, 1921; Otto Praeger to Albert Sidney Burleson, February 24, 1921, Air Mail Service, General Classified Records, 1918-1925, Record Group 28.

118

Utah Historical Quarterly

C. C. Moseley, on a record-setting flight from Sacramento to West Point, transited the field on May 21,1923. It was also a stopover on a recordsetting 24-hour transcontinental flight in June 1924.^^ Indeed, by 1925 Salt Lake City had become the center of expanding aerial activity that extended to Los Angeles and Denver, as well as to San Francisco and Cheyenne. Daily flights both westward and eastward operated through the station. ^^ The swashbuckling days of airmail operations began to pass by the mid-1920s, however. The lone pilot dressed in a leather flight suit who sat in an open cockpit battling the elements to deliver the mail was romantic but inefficient To increase efficiency, the Postal Service emphasized safety and reliability as well as expanding operations during this era. Its leadership added immeasurably to flying operations.

To make night operations possible Otto Praeger began a concerted effort to light airfields and build emergency landing sites. Under Praeger's direction, Charles I. Stanton, an assistant in the Air Mail Service, established minimum lighting requirements for all airmail stations: a 500-watt revolving searchlight, projecting a beam parallel to the ground, to guide pdots; another searchlight, projecting into the wind, to show the proper approach; and aircraft wingtip flares for forced landings. Stanton also noted that landing fields should be at least 2,000 feet by 1,500 feet to allow plenty of room for landings.^^ A searchlight, to be mounted on airmail planes, was appended to his requirements.^^ Although common in the East, these requirements were implemented in the West only during the middle years of the decade. On January 14, 1926, lights were first tested at Salt Lake's Woodward Field.

The main searchlight, it was estimated, could be seen 150 mdes away.

The Tribune reported: In addition to this, the field lighting system includes a 5,000,000 candlepower beacon on top of the hangar, a 3,000,000 candlepower b e a c o n to flood the high tension wires supplying the field in o r d e r to eliminate the possibility of flying into t h e m while landing, two additional flood lights of

S. George Ellsworth, Utah's Heritage [Salt Lake City: Peregrine Smith, 1981), pp. 405-6; "City Visitedby Noted Airmati," Salt Lake Tribune, Mav 22, 1923. See also, "Aviators on Long Flight Arrive," Salt Lake Tribune, October 25, 1923; "First 24 Hours Mail from N.Y. to S.L. Arrives," Deseret News,juXv 1, 1924. ^^ C<msolidated Schedules and Fares for Air Passengers {Chicago: American Air Transport Association, 1928); "Two New Aerial Routes Mapped," Salt Lake Tribune, March 1921. ^V.S. Air Service 5 (March 1921): 13-16. ^'Christopher B. Pickup to Otto Praeger, March 31, 1921, Air Mail Service, General Classified Records, 1918-1925, Record Group 28.

Aviation Comes to Utah

up

1,000,000 and 800,000 candlepower and sixty red obstacle lights which are used to bound the field and to indicate objects to be avoided by the pilots in landing. These smaller beacon lights can be viewed at least sixty miles, it is said.

Two years later Salt Lake City upgraded these lights and constructed a new control budding. ^^ In July 1928 the Post Office selected six sites in the area for emergency landing strips: near the L^nion Pacific station at laho, near Therma, near Mada, near Lund, near Aron, and on the Union Pacific line between Lund and Cedar City, all in Utah.^"^ State leaders took pride in assisting with the development of these emergency fields, each with its own lighting system.^'' Night flying adso required more effective navigational aids than the seat-of-the-pants approach airmad pioneers had used. As early as 1921 the Postal Service had stressed the placement of light beacons along the airmail routes to guide pilots. A little later, radio beacons emitdng direcdonal signals were placed on certain parts of the transcondnental route. It took many years before the routes surrounding Salt Lake City received radio beacons, for as late as 1933 only certain parts of the eastern routes had these advanced instruments.^^ Other types of less complicated directional markers pointed the way to Woodward Field, however. The first of these was essentially a highway sign painted on the top of the Mormon church's Salt Lake Tabernacle. In September 1928 the Mormon First Presidency agreed to allow the words "Salt Lake Airport" and an arrow pointing toward Woodward Field to be painted on the tabernacle roof in 30-foot-high white letters. The directional aid was needed, according to the Deseret News, because "Many fliers, not acquainted with the city, have in the past had to fly around the city until the landing field could be spotted." This was not too difficult at night, because the airfield was illuminated, but during the daytime no such directional aids were available. "As it is now," the News said, "the sign is easily seen and clearly legible within a

" Lights Tested at Air Field" Salt Lake Tribune, January 15, 1926; J. Parker Van Zandt, " O n the Trail of the Air Mail," National Geographic 49 (January 1926): 1-61, especially 56-59. ""Field Now Blazes of Varicolored Lights with Completion of New $30,000 System; Public Inspection Following Finish," Salt Lake Tribune, J u n e 15, 1928; "Airport Light Fete Viewed by Thousands," Salt Lake Tribune, J u n e 30, 1928 "Landing Fields Ordered for 6 Points in Utah," Salt Lake Tribune, July 6, 1928.

"Airmindedness.^ Yes," Deseret News, June 18, 1927; "Organization Formed by Progressive Group to Push Work for Safety," Salt Lake Tribune, January 21, 1928. *'U.S. Air Service S (March 1921): 13-11; luohecV, Airways of America, pp. 186-89.

Aerial view of Temple Square, 1930s, shows navigational sign painted on the roof of the Tabernacle to help pilots find the airport. Courtesy of author.

radius of ten miles and in the language of one Boeing Air Transport pilot, who flies over the building daily, 'You'd have to be blind to miss it.'"^^ The best evidence indicates that this sign remained in place until at least the late 1940s. In 1933 a high-intensity light beacon was erected on the roof of the First National Bank in downtown Salt Lake to send messages in morse code to aircraft overhead.^^ Other directional aids followed throughout the remainder of the decade. By 1940 the transcontinental air routes through the northern Rockies were fully integrated into the modern navigational system.

While these advances were underway, other regional communities became increasingly interested in aviation and sponsored the building of airfields. In March 1921 the Utah State Legislature passed a law granting county governments authority " to lay out landing fields and to ^'"S.L. Establishes First Air-Highways Sign in Westâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;Huge Arrow on T o p of Tabernacle Guides Fliers," Deseret News, September 29, 1928. ^^" Powerful Plain Beacon Placed on T o p Bank Building as Guide for Airmen," Salt Lake Telegram, May 24, 1933.

Aviation Comes to Utah

jilji**j-'

??-.'-

-

y^y

build hangars," and with this "Utah is credited with having one of the most progressive laws in aid for commercial aviation to be enacted anywhere in the United States. ^^ Manv Utah cities took advantage of this authority.

The first to do so was Salt Lake's historic rival to the north, Ogden.

After Ogden faded to win the Utah airmad station in 1920, the local impetus for an airfield flagged until 1927 when the Ogden Chamber of Commerce organized an Aviation Committee as an official pressure group to secure "a first-class Airborne or Aviation Field for Ogden." A year later this group, together with Utah Pacific Airways, a flying corporation created by Ogden aviation boosters, successfully established an airfield on the southeast side of the city on a plateau near the Wasatch Mountains. This airport was dedicated on June 30, 1928.

Additionally, in 1929 Logan dedicated its airfield, and a year later both Provo and Payson followed suit.*° The aviation business in the West grew rapidly with the passage of the Air Mail Act of 1925. Providing for the contracting of airmail routes, this act brought forth a group of aviation companies offering bids. On October 7, 1925, the first contractors on the transcontinental lines were announced.'^' Western Air Express, incorporated in Los Angeles onjuly 13, 1925, received the Salt Lake^Los Angeles airmad contract.^^ Other contracts were signed for other routes throughout the Rockies later, with Salt Lake City as a major hub of operations. As a result, by 1928 several aviation companies routinely used Woodward Field for their airmad activities.'*^ A few of these companies deserve comment. One of the first was the Thompson Flying Service. In 1922 Kenneth Ungar, a pilot who

^''"Utah Leads in State Aid for Commerical Aviation," Salt Lake Tribune, March 6,1921. "^^Annual Report to the Members of the Ogden Clmmber of Commerce (Ogden, Ut.: Chamber of Commerce, 1928), p. 6; Annual Report to the Members of the Ogden Chamber of Commerce (Ogden, Ut.: Chamber of Commerce, 1930), pp. 3-4; "Wright Field Purchased for City Airport," Deseret News, May 10, 1928; "Ogden Airport Opening Draws Huge Throng," Salt Lake Tribune, July 1, 1928; "Logan Opens Airport With Big Ceremony," Salt Lake Tribune, September 3, 1929; "Provo Club Urge Airport Project," Deseret News, November 1, 1929; "Provo Advised to Get Land for Airport," Salt Lake Tribune, J u n e 24, 1930; "Gov. Dern Dedicates New Airport at Pavson During Celebration," Deseret News, May 16, 1930. *'f/.5. Air Service 10 (November 1925): 25. ''^Elmer S. Nelson, "Flying with the Air Mail," Pacific Mutual News, J u n e 1927, pp. 202-8; Western Airlines, A Brief History of America's Pioneer Airline (Los Angeles: Western Airlines, [1961]), n.p. ''^"The Aerial Crossroads," Municipal Record 17 (July 1928): 3-4. These included Boeing Air Transport, Inc., Western Air Express, Varney Air Lines, National Parks Airwavs, Inc., Air Service and Survey Company, Howard Brown Aviation, Aero Corporation of Utah, Flying Club of Utah, Ray L. Peck Aviadon, Salt Lake School of Aviation, H. A. Sweet Company, Intermountain Air Transport Company, Thompson Flying Service, and Utah Pacfic Airways.

122

Utah Historical Quarterly

Original Ogden Airport, 1928, was located southeast of the city. Courtesy of anther

sometimes flew the mail, organized and operated a company from Woodward Field. Three years later A. R. "Tadspin Tommie" Thompson, another pdot, purchased this company atnd renamed it the Thompson Flying Service. This air transport company carried all manner of cargo on a charter basis throughout the Rocky Mountain West."*"^ Carl Helberg, one of Thompson's employees, recalled that when Thompson purchased the company he "fell heir to a large corrugated barn laughingly called a hangar. Inside was the fleet: a Curtis Oriol with a Curds C-6 engine and a Curds K-6 powered Standard.

These together with a Hisso Standard he flew into town with were the flying stocL'"*^ Stdl, Thompson turned a small profit there. The company passed to others upon his death, February 9, 1937, when the DC-3 he was flying crashed into San Francisco Bay.*^ Another local aviation firm was Utah Pacific Airways, founded in 1926 and based in Ogden. Dean R. Brimhall and Robert H. Hinckley, two native Utahns with a decided interest in aviation, operated this company untd the mid-1930s. They sold aircraft on a retad basis, operated a chcirter air transport firm, promoted the idea of using aircraft " j . L. Smith, "It All Began With Tailspin Tommy," Mountain West, August 1929, pp. 40-41; "Company History of Thompson Flying Service," n.d.. Salt Lake lAP Authority Files. *^Carl Helberg, "How 1 Went from Assistant Gas Boy to Chief Gas Boy in 50 Years," n.d., typescript, Salt Lake lAP Authority Files. "^Douglas Wilson to Joseph L. Smith, November 3, 1978, Salt Lake lAP Authority Files.

Aviation Comes to Utah

123

to conduct a census of wild game at Yellowstone National Park, and pioneered the use of aircraft for the control of forest fires. Utah Pacific Airways enjoyed a remarkable record, largely because of the founders' emphasis on safety procedures and awareness. No fatalities occurred during their operations.^'' Clearly the most important of the Utah aviation companies arising in the 1920s was Western Air Express, later renamed Western Airlines.

Although orginally an airmail service, its leaders quickly grasped the potential profitabdity of providing regularly scheduled passenger service to and from Salt Lake City.*^ Just five weeks after beginning scheduled airmad operations, the company carried its first passengers.

The Salt Lake Tribune enthusiastically noted that "The schedule calls for departure from Salt Lake at 10:10 a.m. (Mountain Time) and arrival at Los Angeles at 5:25 p.m. (Pacific Time) after a stop at Las Vegas.'"*^ Passenger service finally started on May 23, 1926, and the company's first traffic manager, James G. Wooley, boasted before flight that it was the first "regular commercial aerial passenger traffic in America. . . ."

Wooley predicted that "the new service wdl cut 19 hours from the traveling time between Los Angeles and eastern points and that Salt Lake wdl become an important junction for both air and rad travel." He also thought passenger flights would bring prominent visitors to Utah and lengthen their stay since they would be able to decrease their traveling time.^° The first passenger was Ben F. Redman, chairman of the Aviation Committee of the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce and a major stockholder in Western Air Express. He had lobbied long for the distinction, using his influence in the company to secure the first flight.

He made that first airline reservation with a $20 check as a deposit on the $90 one-way ticket. Another Salt Lake City resident, J o h n A. Tomlinson, accompanied Redman on the flight. Outfitted with coveralls, leather helmets, goggles, and parachutes, they climbed into the open compartment atop a bag of mail on a Douglas M-2 biplane behind pilot Charles N. "Jimmy" James. They received box lunches and portable "Register of the Papers of Dean R. Brimhall (1886-1972) (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Library Special Collections, 1978), pp. 6-7, 35; Robert H. Hinckley to Gov. George H. Dern, J u n e 22, 1929, Hinckley Papers, Box 26, flaS, Manuscripts Division, Special Collections, University of Utah Library, Salt Lake City. '"*" New Air Line Connects S.L. withL.A.," Deseret News, April 17, 1926; "Salt Lake Speeds First Mail Plane to Los Angeles," Salt Lake Tribune, April 1 8, 1926. ''^"Air Express is to Start Soon," Salt Lake Tribune, March 16, 1926. ^°" Air Route to L. A. O p e n s on Sunday; First of Its Kind," Deseret News, May 22, 1926. See also "Passenger Air Service to L.A. Starts May 2 3 , " Salt Lake Tribune, May 17, 1926.

124

Utah Historical

Quarterly

Ben Redman, right, and John A. Tomlinson posed before boarding the first passenger flight from Salt Lake to Los Angeles, May 23, 1926.

USHS collections

toilet facilitiesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a tin can. The aircraft took off at 9:30 a m . and after a short stop at Las Vegas arrived by 5:30 p.m. at Los Angeles. That same day. May 23, the first commercial air passengers from Los Angeles arrived in Salt Lake Cityâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;A. B. Nault and P. Charles Kerr, both prosperous Los Angeles businessmen.^^ Regularly scheduled passenger service grew rapidly. By the end of 1926 Western Air Express had carried 209 passengers at a profit of $1,029. Included among them was the first woman passenger, Maude Campbell of Salt Lake City, who flew about two weeks after Redman's May 23 flight.^^ Other airlines operating throughout the region ^'" Plane Conveys H u m a n Freight," Salt Lake Tribune, May 24, 1926; Robert J. Serling, The Only Way to Fly (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday and Co., 1940), passim; Wain Sutton, ed., Utah: A Centennial History (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Co., 1949), pp. 15-16. ^^A Brief History of America's Pioneer Airline.

Aviation Comes to Utah

125

expanded into passenger service after Western's experiment By the end of the decade Varney Transport routinely flew passengers into Portland and Seattle, connecting from Boeing .\ir Transport which had the San Francisco to Chicago air routes. Pacific Air Transport, National Park Airways, and several other smaller companies operated passenger service regularly through the Salt Lake City hub.^^ While commercial aviation was growing in the West, the military perceived the advantages of operating through Utah for its transcondnental aerial operations. As early as 1922 the Air Service located a detachment at Fort Douglas on the east side of Salt Lake City. It erected a hangar on the post and used the parade grounds as a flying field for its three aircraft.^"^ The military used Salt Lake City as a stopover for virtually every flight over the northern Rockies before 1940.^^ More important, in 1934 the Army Air Corps become involved intimately in aviation in northern Utah. President Franklin D. Roosevelt decided that government mail contracts with the commercial airlines, initiated by his Republican predecessor's postmaster general, had been arranged through collusion and fraud and therefore warranted immediate cancellation. After reviewmg options, on February 9 FDR directed Maj. Gen. Benjamin D. Foulois's tiny and antiquated Army Air Corps to begin domestic airmail operations effective February 19 until the contract issue could be resolved.^^ Anxious to demonstrate the effectiveness of his Air Corps, Foulois immediately began organizing for this mission. He and his chief advisors developed a plan that called for Brig. Gen. Oscar Westover, assistant chief of the Air Corps, to oversee the operation from Washington, D.C, with three commanders to manage operations in eastern, central, and western zones. Since Air Corps resources were insufficient to continue the extensive airmail service provided by the commercial carriers, the Air Corps planned to operate only fourteen of the twenty-six routes previously flown by contract carriers and to accept

Davey, "Beginnings of Commercial Aviation," p. 15; "Three Planes Branch Out from Local Air Port with First Loads Under New Contracts," Deseret News, juhy 1,1927;" Fifteen Carried on Great Falls Plane's First Day, Salt Lake Tribune, August 9, 1928. ^*"Airplane Hangar Material Arrives at Fort Douglas," Salt Lake Telegram, October 17, 1922. ^^"Courier Lands Safely in City," Salt Lake Tribhne, J u n e 28, 1925.

Benjamin D. Foulois and Carroll V. Glines, From the Wnght Brothers to the Astronauts: The Memoirs of Benjamin D. Foulois (New York McGraw-Hill, 1960), pp. 237-38; Executive O r d e r No. 6591, February 9, 1934, Benjamin D. Foulois Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D . C ; John F. Shiner, "General Benjamin Foulois and the 1934 Air Mail Disaster, Aerospace Historian 25 (Winter 1978): 221-30.

126

Utah Historical Quarterly

a corresponding degradation in the efficiency of the mail service.^^ Lt Col. Henry H. " H a p " Arnold was playing golf with Maj. Carl A. Spaatz on February 10, 1934, near March Field, California, when he was summoned to his office and learned that he was to command the western sector of the airmail route from a hub of operations in Salt Lake City. Arnold moved quickly to carry out his orders. On February 12 he dispatched thirteen aircraft, some of them transports but most P-26 single-seat fighters, to Salt Lake City along with mechanics and a small headquarters contingent Capt Ira Ll. Col. Hap Arnold at Salt Lake C. Faker's Pursuit Group took the City Airport, 1934. He became chief Salt Lake Cit}^-Los Angeles routes of staff of the Army Air Corps during and Maj. Clarence Tinker, with his World War II. Courtesy of author.

2d Bombardment Group, handled the Salt Lake City-San Francisco runs. In all, fifty-seven pilots operated within the western zone, most of them out of Salt Lake City.^^ Arnold appointed Maj. Charles B. Oldfield as regional commander and gave him authority to schedule and control the movement of all aircraft on the routes from Salt Lake City to their first control stop.

When the pdots landed at their first destination out of Salt Lake City, control then passed to one of four route commanders, depending upon the final destination. Oldfield, a fine manager, had matters well in hand by the time Arnold arrived in Salt Lake City from March Field, California, three days later. Arnold established his headquarters at the ^'PaulTillett, The Army Flies the Mails (Tuscaloosa: Universir\'of Alabama Press, 1956), p. 41; U.S. War Department, "Transcript of the Shorthand Report of Proceedings, Transactions and Testimony before the Special Committee on the Army Air Corps," 1934, pp. 26-27, 226-30, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress; U.S. H o u s e of Representatives, Committee on Post Office and Post Roads, Hearings on H.R. J, H.R 8578, and Other Air Mail Bills CWashington, D . C : Government Printing Office, 1934), pp. 97-98. ' ' ' H . H . Arnold, Global Mission (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1949), p. 104; Arthur k.

Marmor, Interview with Lieutenant General Ira C Faker, January 1966, pp. 30-35, Oral History Collection, United States Air Force Historical Research Center, Maxwell AFB, AL; Thomas M. Coffey, Hap: The Story of the U.S. Air Force and the Man Who Built It: General Henry LT "Hap" Arnold {New York: Viking Press, 1982), pp. 155-58; DeWitt S. Copp, A Few Great Captains: The Men and Events That Shaped the Development of US Air Power (Garden Citv, N.Y.: Doubledav and Co., 1980), pp. 178-81.

Salt Lake City Airport, looking north, with Lincoln Highway (North Temple) and railroad tracks in foreground. USHS collections

Newhouse Hotel in the city's central business district^^ Although Arnold thought his flyers could handle the airmad operation indefinitely, the Air Corps operated out of Salt Lake City only for about four months. Because of several disastrous accidents, poor efficiency, and bad publicity it was relieved of airmail responsibilides.

Arnold had stressed upon undertaking the airmail operation that safety was the principal factor governing the mission. When challenged by reporters that Air Corps pdots were inferior to the commercial fliers, he replied that about 90 percent of the civifian airmail pilots had received their training in the Air Corps.^^ In a letter to Lt Gen. Malin Craig, the ^^See previous note; "City Will Provide Airport Space for Army Air Mail Plans," Deseret News, February 14, 1934, p. 1; "Army Expects to Fly Mail ibr Several Months at Least," Las Vegas (Nev.) Evening Review Journal, February 14, 1934, p . l . ''""Safety First Rule of Army," Los Angeles Times, Februar>' 19, 1934, p. 1; Scrapbook; "Press Clippings File, Army Air Corps, Air Mail Route 4," presented to C o l H. H. Arnold, C O. USAAVO, Western Zone, by Capt. I. C Faker, C O . A.M. Route 4, H. H. Arnold Papers, Box 223, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

128

Utah Historical Quarterly

army assistant chief of staff, Arnold had identified the safety issue as critical and predicted that the press expected the Army to fail: I have stressed upon all the Route Commanders the necessity for doing their utmost to make this thing a success. I have told them that the Army, the Air Corps, and they themselves are "on the spot" . . . This . . . was brought to my attention . . . in an interview which I had with the newspapers. I have put them off all week and would not say anything until t o d a y . . . . The undertone of their converstation was that commercial lines were much better than the Army. . . . I personally am of the opinion that they are waiting like a bunch of hungry dogs to grab up any mistake or misfortune which may overtake us and make the most of it.

The press was right Reporters did not have to wait long for disaster to strike. Very few Air Corps airplanes were equipped with either lights or navigational instruments. Only a small number of pilots had night flying experience and even fewer knew anything about instrument flying. These deficiencies, coupled with harsh winter weather conditions, created incredible problems in the West On the very first day of the operation two fatal crashes occurred in the western zone. During the remainder of the operation, through June 1, 1934, the Army Air Corps nationwide suffered sixty-six crashes and twelve deaths.^^ Except for the tragic loss of life the airmail episode proved advantageous to the Army Air Corps. It brought to the attention of Congress the inadequacies of the aerial defense forces. Its concern prompted a review of the organization by a special committee appointed by Secretary of War George H. Dern, a former governor of Utah, during the summer of 1934. Dern instructed the Baker Board to carry out "a constructive study and report upon the operations of the Army Air Corps and the adequacy and efficiency of its technical flying equipment and training for the performance of its mission in peace and war."^^ In a little more than two months the review board compded 4,283 pages of testimony. Among its many significant recommendations the Baker Board called for the establishment of an airdrome board to determine requirements, select sites, and establish Army Air Corps bases throughout the United States. These efforts prompted the War Department and the Army Air Corps to think in terms of base expansion, and Hap Arnold's experiences in the Rocky Mountain West impelled him and his associates to consider a location on the Wasatch Letter quoted in Copp, A Few Great Captains, pp. 179-80.

Tillett, The Army Flies,, p. 57; Shiner, "Foulois and the 1934 Air Mail Disaster," p. 229.

U.S. War Department, Final Report of War Department Special Committee on Army Air Corps (Washington D . C : Government Printing Office, 1934), p. 2.

Aviation Comes to Utah

129

Front as a site for a major airdrome.^'^ This ultimately led to the establishment of Hill Field near Ogden in 1940.

None of these developments, private or military, would have been possible, however, without the commitment to aviation of some of the region's leading citizens. A Deseret News reporter commented in 1927: The people of Salt Lake and the intermountain country generally are interested in the art of flying and stand ready to lend it every encouragement. When conditions were not as reassuring as they are today business men in Salt Lake supplied.. . funds... to equip Woodward Field which has since become one of the leading of the west if not the nation.

The people of this city and state have implicit faith in the possibilities of the airplane and are strongly behind any movement looking to its development and growth. That is why we are out to make Salt Lake one of the most important airplane centers in the United States.^^

The result was apparent in 1928 when Salt Lake City was judged the second most important airmail aviation center in the nation behind Chicago, a distinction the city held until World War 11.^^ Robert H. Hinckley commented on this in 1942 when he described what he called " air- conditioning"â&#x20AC;&#x201D;" conditioning people to the air; just as the people of the South Sea Islands are conditioned to the water, that other strange element to man." He wrote, "to be air-conditioned means to be in a state of readiness to do something about aviation and not just feel strongly about it"^'^ This concep>t firmly entrenched itself in the West during the 1930s because of aviation's ability to link areas separated by an almost desolate environment As only one gauge of aviation's impact, the number of pilots licensed in Utah rose from 76 in 1938 to 230 in 1940. The hosting of a well-attended Intermountain women's aviation conference in Salt Lake City in May 1939 was another example of this phenomenon. Finally, regional support of an initiative

by Hinckley and Dean Brimhall, by this time director and assistant, respectively, of the federal Civil Aeronautics Administration, for a college-level pdot training program demonstrated further interest^^ "ibid. ^^"Airmindedness.^ Yes," Deseret News, June 18, 1927. ''*'"4000Milesof Airmail Lines Center in S.L.,"5aAla/^e7(?/fgram, March 19, 1928; "S.L. Now Second Airmail Center of Entire Nation," Salt Lake Tribune, juXy 20, 1928; "Salt Lake Second!" Salt Lake Tribune, May 3, 1929; "S.L. is Second Largest U.S. Airmail Post," Deseret News April 7, 1932. '"'Robert H. Hinckley, Air-Conditioning American Youth (Washington D . C : GPO, 1942).

"Aviation Convention: Sessions in Salt Lake City," Salt Lake Tribune, May 26, 1939; Robert H. Hinckley, Notebook n.d.; J. E. Garn to Robert H. Hinckley, November 4, 1938; Herman W. Pary to Robert H. Hinckley, October 31, 1938; R. McQuesten and H. A. Dixon to Robert H. Hinckley, December 12, 1938, all in Box 59, fd. 1, Hinckley Papers; Frederick?. Champ to Robert H. Hinckley, May 24, September 13, 1939, all in Box 24, fd. 3, Hincklev Papers; Dean H. Brimhall to Editors, The Pilot, March 13, 1939, Box 22, fd. 8, Hinckley Papers.

130

Utah Historical Quarterly

Western Air Express mail and passenger plane leaving Salt Lake City at dawn. W. W. Barkhoffphotograph, courtesy of Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce USHS collections T h e years between 1910 and 1940 constituted the formative period of aviation in the W e s t During this time Utah, particularly Salt Lake City, established itself as a crossroads of air routes just as it had been a crossroads for land and rad transport for nearly a century. This condition resulted from b o t h location and circumstances and because several Utahns exploited opportunities to establish p e r m a n e n t facdities in the state, charter commercial aviation companies, and make the most of mditary requirements in this area. After World War II the air h u b for the West shifted to Denver, Colorado, but by 1940 the region was already firmly incorporated into the burgeoning American aviation industry, a development that has continued. Aviation in the West contributed to economic growth, provided good access to other cities and thereby a firm linkage to the mainstream of American society, and established a basis for attracting additional business and industry to the region.

Unidentified Mikado cast. Condensed operatic works were popular Chautauqua offerings USHS collections.

Chautauqua and the Utah Performing Arts

BY JANICE P. DAWSON

S I N C E PIONEER DAYS UTAH'S CITIZENS have furthered the cause of the performing arts. From Brigham Young's notable Salt Lake Theatre to today's diverse offerings, the performing arts have been squarely at the forefront of Utah's cultural scene. Beginning in 1911 the Chautauqua movement played a significant role in this development The performing arts came naturally to Utah as a tradition of the musical and theatrical experience that accompanied the pioneers across the plains. As communities became established and Utah's settlers were able to pursue their artistic interests, brass bands, choirs, and local theater groups blossomed in the desert The Social Hall and the Salt Mrs. Dawson lives in Layton, Utah. Aversion ofthispaperwas presented at the 1989 Annual Meeting of the Utah State Historical Society in Salt Lake City.

132

Utah Historical Quarterly

Lake Theatre were physical manifestations of this cultural legacy which eventually produced such luminaries as Lucy Gates, Maud May Babcock, and others.

Chautauqua becaime an important part of Utah's artistic heritage and furthered its growth by furnishing opportunities for Utah performers and bringing professional talent to local audiences. Three phases of the movement are apparent, beginning with Ogden's permanent Chautauqua held each summer from 1911 through 1914 and continuing, with varying degrees of success, with the circuit Chautauquas through the mid-twenties. Since the decline of the circuits, various pseudo-Chautauqua programs have continued to influence Utah's cultural scene.

The Chautauqua movement began in 1874 as a week-long Methodist Bible-study retreat at Chautauqua Lake, New York. It soon expanded to include a wide variety of educational and cultural offerings. By the turn of the century 300 imitators of the original assembly offered similar programs each summer, principally in the Midwest The self-improvement idea furthered by Chautauqua was attractive, especially to many rural settlers who had no cultural contacts. By 1907 several entrepreneurs, capitalizing on the success of the permanent Chautauquas and the genuine needs of the rural population, successfully combined the ingredients of entertainment and respectable culture with the circuit concept and produced the traveling tent Chautauqua The circuits brought their seven-day programs to thousands of rural communities where many individuals first experienced theater, classical music, and new ideas. The circuits soon spread the uplifting "spirit of Chautauqua" throughout the United States and Canada.^ Utah was not included in the earliest circuit routes, but nevertheless Chautauqua's high ideals were extolled in the Beehive State.

Two Episcopalian ministers urged Logan's citizens to embrace the movement in 1907; and in 1909 the Salt Lake Herald regarded "the Chautauqua lecture platform with considerable respect" and defended William Jennings Bryan and Robert LaFollette, drawing cards on the circuits, against criticism from several New York City newspapers. The Herald noted that, despite the critics, "the welkin [heavens] will ring just

There are many Chautauqua histories, including Victoria Case and Robert O. Case, We Called It Culture (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948); Harry P. Harrison and Karl Detzer, Culture under Canvas: The Story of Tent Chautauqua (New York Hastings House, 1958); Charles F. Horner, Strike the Tents (Philadelphia: Dorrance and Co., 1954).

Chautauqua

133

July 1912 advertisement in the Ogden Examiner

the same and many a truth will be pounded home during the present season."^ In 1911 a number of Ogden's leaders organized Utah's "first" Chautauqua^ Rather than contract with a circuit group, they established an independent "permanent" Chautauqua, as locally organized assemblies were then known. The ten-day extravaganza, an amalgam of local and national, amateur and professional talent, was held daily during July 21-30 at Ogden's Glenwood Park, Educating its readers to the coming event, the Ogden Morning Examiner explained, "a Chautauqua is a non-sectarian, non-partisan assembly for the dissemination of practical knowledge and wholesome amusement" Those who might yet be leery because it was an educational event were reminded that many days "of lectures and speeches would prove irksome to a great majority, so a liberal amount of amusement and entertainment has been added." In addition, "there will be entertainment which no other Chautauqua in the country, regardless of its prominence, can secure."^ Under the direction of its enterprising manager, Frederick Vining Fisher,^ the Chatuauqua agenda was described as "probably one of the most varied and capable collections of talent ever brought together at Joel E. Ricks and Everett L. Cooley, eds. The History of a Valley: Cache Valley, Utah-Idaho (Logan, U L : Cache Valley Centennial Committee, 1956), p. 305; Salt Lake Herald, August 8, 1909.

The assertion that Ogden's Chautauqua was tfie first ever held in the state was incorrect " T h e first annual assembly of the Utah Chautauqua" was held at Calder's Park in Salt Lake City, August 817, 1892, but this was long forgotten by 1911. Sponsored by a group of Protestant ministers, the first effort survived only one yean Heavily oriented toward Bible study and worldwide missionary w o r k it adso included Delsarte, elocudon, and a variety of speakers, including representatives from the Women's Chrisdan Temperance Union. The performing arts were represented by the choir or congregation singing hymns and Chautauqua songs. See Salt Lake Herald and Salt Lake Tribune, August 9-18, 1892.

Ogden Morning Examiner, July 18, May 2, 1911.

Ibid., March 7, 1911. See also Janice P. Dawson, "Frederick Vining Fisher: Methodist Apologist for Mormonism," Utah Historical Quarterly 55 (1987): 359. The initial success of the Ogden Chautauqua was due in no small a m o u n t to Fisher. He was a hard working and enthusiastic minister, and with his ecumenical spirit, rare at that time in Utah, he worked with the clergy of all faiths.

Utah Historical

134

Quarterly

one time in the intermountain country." In arranging this marathon of events, Fisher endeavored to uphold the standard of excellence set by New York's "mother" Chautauqua. Concurrent lectures and round table discussions, along with the children's Junior Chautauqua, filled the morning hours. During the afternoons and evenings a number of prominent speakers were scheduled, including "statesmen, theologians, and scientists, all men who stand in the foreground of their respective professions." Musical interludes and pageants added variety. Devotional services, representing all local Christian denominations, were arranged for Sundays. Examiner editor and Ogden mayor William Glasmann said that the program offered "a Methodist minister greater feast of reason and flow of soul than Frederick Vining Fisher could be obtained in a year of travel were organized Ogden's first one to go out in random search of the Chautauqua. edifying."^ Onjuly 21 various state and local dignitaries, headed by Gov. Wdliam Spry and Mayor Glasmann, gathered to open the Ogden Chautauqua Spry observed that "the holding of a Chautauqua assembly in Utah at this dme marked the beginning of a new era in the educational and other fields of useful cidzenship," and he praised it as "a good omen for the state."^ One of the musical highlights of the extensive program was the pardcipation of both the Ogden and the Salt Lake Tabernacle choirs.

The Ogden group, under the direction of Joseph Ballantyne and designated as the official Chautauqua choir, presented the grand opening concert as well as music for both Sunday gatherings. Due to the summer recess the choir's ranks were thin, but the program was described as "one of rare merit" The Sunday praise sendee consisted of soloists, duets, and quartets presenting numbers such as "Calvary," "Oh It Is Wonderful," and "Beautiful Isle." Congregational singing was also included. A unique number was the recitation of the Lord's Prayer ^Ogden Morning Examiner, May 7, July 22, 1911.

^Ibid.,july22, 1911.

Chautauqua

135

in sign language by a student of the State School for Deaf and Blind. ^ Salt Lake's Zion Choir, led by Evan Stephens, sang in the open-air amphitheater on Women's Day. The 200m e m b e r chorus presented a strong program featuring many operatic e;xcerpts. Two of Stephens's orginal creations, "Vales of Deseret" and "A Song of Freedom," were also heard. The grand evening concert concluded with the "Hallelujah Chorus."'^ The stirring airs of great brass bands were indispensable, and the Evan Stephens led 200-voice Chautauqua scheduled two. The "fachoir at 1911 Chautauqua. m o u s " Morgan brass band, directed by USHS collections S. H. Frey, gave "splendid" recitals on Farmers' Day. E. W. Nichols then led Ogden's official Chautauqua band in regular open-air concerts as well as the Sunday evening vespers concert which included " T h e Holy City," the overture from Martha, and concluded with the "Star Spangled Banner." The highlight of their contribution was a patriotic National Day concert, " T h e Story of America in Music." ^^' Musical interludes were furnished by other local groups as well. An ensemble in great d e m a n d in Salt Lake City, the Romania Hyde Ladies Orchestra, provided over six separate concerts. With soloist Gad M. Dimmitt, their repertoire consisted of both classical and m o d e r n numbers. A prominent Provo pianist, Mrs. F. O. Kelly, also offered several "splendid" piano recitals.^^ Professional imports augmented these regional musicians. The Imperial Quartet, well-known on the Chautauqua circuits, furnished music for weekday and Sunday concerts where they were well received. '^ The Don Phillippini Italian Band performed for the enjoyment of overflow crowds. The highly regarded, forty-five-member group of "master musicians" carried a national "reputation second to none."

Their spirited two-hour presentations consisted mostly of classical ^lbid.,July23, 24, 1911. ''ibid.. May 2, July 26, 1911; Salt Lake Tribune, juXy 27, 1911. ^°Ogden Morning Examiner, juXy 13, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 30, 1911. "ibid., July 13, 26, 27, 28, 1911; Deseret News, December 7, 1984. ^^Ogden Morning Examiner, July 22, 1911.

136

Utah Historical Quarterly

overtures and operatic excerpts but Phillippini added severed of his own compositions, including a new march entided "Utah."^^ Dramatic readings were a popular cultural entertainment, and Ruth P. Iglehart of Salt Lake City offered three different programs. Her selections included Josephine Preston Peabodys prize-winning poetic drama, "The Piper," after the "The Pied Piper of Ham elin," and "Paolo and Francesca" by English author Stephen Phillips, which was based on an unhappy affair in 1289 that ended in the death of the illicit lovers. In her final appearance, Iglehart presented "another of her delightful elocutionary readings entitled 'Southern Song and StorV," in which she quoted "from the great negro poet, Paul Dunbar, one of the sweetest singers the great south has known, and from Harris Page and [Harry Stillwell] Edwards," contemporary authors well known for their writings on the South. ^^ No less than three pageants were featured at Ogden's first Chautauqua The chddren's pageant was the culmination of the Junior Chautauqua work With the girls dressed in white with floral head wreaths and the boys in their Sunday best, over 200 children marched into the grove to present a variety of drills, games, and folk dances to a delighted audience. ^^ Several days later it was reported that "never in the history of Ogden has there been such a sight" as the Pageant of All Nations, featured on Old Home Day. Local societies representing the Scotch, Welsh, Irish, Scandinavian, German, and Japanese people of Utah displayed their individual cultures through handicrafts, costumes, folk dances, music, and grand marches. The Thistle and Caledonian societies, nearly 600 strong, with their corps of uniformed pipers and drummers, provided a stirring experience. This event drew participants from as far away as Denver. ^^ Onjuly 24 the Pioneer Day celebration commenced at 9 a m . and continued until nearly midnight Following B. H. Roberts's "stirring and patriotic address on 'The Romantic Events in Utah's History,'" the grand pageant was performed. Both afternoon and evening audiences viewed twelve historical and mythological scenes beginning with "the prehistoric contest of Neptune and Ceres for the valleys of Utah" on '^Ibid.,July27,29, 31, 1911. '^Ibid., July 26, 27, 28, 1911; The Reader's Encyclopedia, ed. William Rose Benet (New York Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1963), pp. 831, 402, 848, 322, 333. ^^Ogden Morning Examiner, July 27, 28, 1911. "'Ibid., May 3, July 28, 29, 30, 1911.

Chautauqua

137

through the eras of the Indians, trappers, and Mormon pioneers. Next came scenes depicting irrigation, religion, the flag, the birth of the state, and the budders of Utah today, ending with Utah's tomorrow, when the hundreds of participants reassembled and "the retinue of Neptune and Ceres sang: 'The sea, the sea, the great s^dt sea. No more the Master, but thy servant be.'" The chorus and audience completed the event by praising Utah in song with "Utah, fair Utah, Thy star has dawned at last" and then, to the tune of "America," "My Utah, 'tis of thee. Mountain land of the free. Of thee I sing" as the pageant participants slowly withdrew. After this event the Examiner noted "the Chautauqua movement and its meaning are beginning to be understood and appreciated" in Utah.i' This grand production was difficult to surpass, but an independent Chautauqua continued in Ogden through 1914. Under different management after Fisher took over the Pocatello Chautauqua in 1912, the ensuing programs were more moderate in scope. The use of outside, professional talent increased each year, but Utah performers were stdl present In 1912 the Romania Hyde Ladies Orchestra and the Ogden Tabernacle Choir were again featured, but it was their final appearance.

Two new musical organizations were heard from in 1913, an Ogden band and a twenty-five-member symphony orchestra under the direction of L. P. Christensen. By 1914 the Chautauqua music was entirely imported.'^ The Pioneer Day pageant provided the only local dramatization in 1912. On a much smaller scale than the twelve-scene presentation of a year earlier, it depicted various aspects of daily pioneer life. In 1913 the pageant took to the streets and then disappeared from the Chautauqua scene. That year, under the direction of David O. McKay, it became a parade in which various floats featured the themes of growth and development, from the first trapper to the present After 1913, July 24 was not included in the Chautauqua schedule. ^^ The stage was not left bare, however. The 1913-14 seasons introduced the work of Utah thespian Maud May Babcock to Chautauqua audiences. In 1913 her student dramatic club presented yl Midsummer Night's Dream, and the following year Babcock herself performed. In addition to excerpts from Macbeth, she offered Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's

' T b i d . , J u l y 2 4 , 25, 1911. ""^Ogden Examiner, July 18, 21-28, 1912; Ogden Standard, May 31, 1913. ^'^Ogden Examiner, ju\y 25, 1912; Ogden Standard, July 11, 1913.

138

Utah Historical Quarterly

House, which dealt with the question of a w o m a n ' s social position, a n d Charles Rann Kennedy's The Servant in the House, which related how peace came to a troubled household. Babcock e n h a n c e d the enjoyment of her performances by preceding them with informative lectures. This was u n d o u b t e d l y the dramatic highlight of the O g d e n Chautauquas.^^ Beginning in 1915 the circuit Chautauquas, sans local talent, gradually spread across Utah.

Because of a lack of c o m m u n i t y financial support O g d e n aband o n e d its i n d e p e n d e n t assembly that year and contracted with the Ellison/White circuit W h d e the local committee remained responsible for ticket sales, the contract relieved them of the formidable Utah theater immortal Maud May task of negotiating and organizing Babcock directed and performed on the a p r o g r a m which by this time was Chautauqua stage USHS collections. m a d e u p almost entirely of imported talent ^^ T h e circuits provided complete, prepackaged, seven-day programs with a varied but predictable bill of fare. Interspersed a m o n g the uplifting lectures were n u m e r o u s musical offerings featuring bands, small orchestras, instrumental a n d voccd quartets, glee clubs, a n d soloists. Bell ringers a n d Swiss yodelers were showcased as was music from Africa and Hawaii. Classical overtures and operatic excerpts appeared on most programs. At times audiences were treated to condensed operatic productions such as Robin Hood, ll Trovatore, or The Mikado. T h e comic o p e r a Chimes of Normandie was a circuit favorite.

Sometimes an excerpt, such as the second act o{ Norma, provided the highlight of the evening. World War I music such as " O v e r T h e r e " and " T h e Stars and Stripes Forever" stirred patriotic fervor. T h e melodious °Ogden standard, July 11, 1913; July 14, 20, 1914; Readefs Encyclopedia, pp. 306, 1012. ^Ogden Standard, July 16, 1914.

Chautauqua

139

strains of musical favorites were often the highlight of the Chautauquas. Many people who had never before seen an opera or heard a symphony orchestra first experienced music in the grand manner in a Chautauqua tent Although theater came to Utah with the first setders, it was sdll taboo in much of rural America Mindful of this attitude, the circuits selected their dramas carefully. With highly moral productions they broke the trail and "carried 'The Little Theater Movement' across the country, a n d . . . forwarded the Civic Theater idea"^^ It Pays to Advertise, featured by Elhson/White in 1920, was billed as "clean and wholesome through and through and packed full of fun." In 1923 The Shepherd of the Hills, set in the Ozarks and the "most beloved of all American dramas," was described as "a sermon in actionâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a splendid moral lesson." Daddy Long Legs, Jean Webster's story of a young orphan girl, was another play of this genre. Dramatic readings included scenes from Shakespeare and other classics. The Fortune Hunter, Green Stockings, and The Witching Hour, a play by Augustus Thomas, entertained Utah audiences in 1920.^^ Litde imaginadon is needed to realize that circuit quality was inferior to that of urban theaters, both physically and dramadcally.

Scenery was minimal; platforms were? cramped and lacked backstage facilides. Operadc accompaniment was limited to a handful of musicians or even a single pianist, and somedmes the chorus was nonexistent And, of course, the cast was usually composed of those yet aspiring to greatness. Summertime temperatures and temporary seating, along with sticky flies and buzzing mosquitoes, were part of the cost of culture. But the entertainment was nonetheless appreciated as when, in 1915, a condensed version of// Trovatore received six curtain calls from the Ogden audience.^"^ When the Chautauqua years were recalled by those who experienced them, it was most often with awe and wonder.

Although the coming of the circuits precluded participation by local ardsts, there were still occasions where they were udlized. If a regularly booked number failed to arrive on time, homegrown talent filled the gap with impromptu offerings. Also, several towns began free Sunday evening concerts as part of the Chautauqua schedule but usually presented by local performers. Logan and Ephraim, in 1916 and 1919 respectively, featured their own tabernacle choir, and in Ogden a Irene Briggs and Raymond F. DaBolI, Recollections of the Lyceum and Chautauqua Circuits (Freeport, Maine: Bond Wheelwright Co., 1969), p. 84. ^^Ephraim Enterprise, J u n e 4, 1920; J u n e 29, 1923; American Fork Citizen, J u n e 12, 1920. "^^Ogden Standard, June 15, 1915.

140

Utah Historical Quarterly

sixty-two-piece band and a ladies band performed on Sunday evening programs in 1923 and 1924. The very aura ofChautauquawas a drawing card that provided an enthusiastic audience for Utah performers.^^ The phenomenal growth of the Chautauqua circuits opened professional doors for a number of Utah performers. Byron Kay Foulger and Franklin Rasmussen played the summer circuits. Joseph Williams and Horace Beck also trod the Chautauqua boards. Soon after joining the Ellison/White circuit, Williams and Beck were assigned to open up Australia and New Zealand to Chautauqua with plays of their own choosing.^^ After World War I, Ogden native Moroni Olsen became a wellknown circuit actor performing in Canada and the United States, including Utah, in such plays as Carson ofthe North Woods, Turn to the Right, The Taming ofthe Shreuj, and Their Honor the Mayor. He also offered dramatic readings such as "The Terrible Meek." Olsen later organized a popular repertory company, the Moroni Olsen Players, which toured California and the Northwest for many years. He eventually worked in Hollywood, appearing in over 100 films, mcludin^ Brigham Young, Madame Curie, My Favorite Spy, Mildred Pierce, and many others.^^ Midway's Lethe Coleman was another Utahn to carve out a Chautauqua career. Beginning in 1917 as a platform manager, she emerged as an eloquent speaker, writing her own talks which covered subjects from home-front girls during World War I to the home as the foundation of the nation. After a world tour, accompanied by Maud May Babcock, she gave her most popular discourse, "A Young Woman Looks at Her World." She is now best known for her performances in several LDS church-sponsored films such as The Mailbox and The Windows of Heaven.^^ Historian Joseph E. Gould noted that Chautauqua was "one of several waves of mass enthusiasm for self-improvement, social betterment, and reform that have periodically swept over our nation." The organization "filled avast need for adult education opportunities" and led the way toward other new concepts such as university extension courses, summer sessions, civic music and opera associations, and ^^ Deseret News, June ll, 1915; Logan Republican, June 20, 1916; Ephraim Enterprise, june29, 1918; Ogden Standard-Examiner, July 29, 1923, J u n e 22, 1924. ^^GlennE. Sacos, "TheCircuit Repertory Company of the Moroni Olsen Players" (M.S. thesis.

University of Utah, 1965), pp. 52, 54. ^'Olsen to Miss Browning, March 23, 1947, Special Collections, Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah; Wasatch Wave, May 25, 1917. ^^Interview with Lethe Coleman Tatge, Midway, Utah, September 5, 1985.

141

Chautauqua

Moroni Olsen and Janet Young in a Moroni Olsen Players production of

Taming of the Shrew. Special Collections, University of Utah Library.

many other improvements.^^ In this spirit Brigham Young University adapted some of the Chautauqua concepts when it officially created the Bureau of Lectures and Entertainments in 1921. Paralleling the Chautauqua circuits, it fdled a need in the surrounding communines for informative and high-class programs. This officiad organization only confirmed a system long in effect, however.^^ In the days of the Brigham Young Academy, the early Polysophical Society had offered lectures to the students. In 1903, when the school became a university, a regular course was established, professional speakers hired, and tickets offered to the public to defray expenses.

Music was added later on.^^ As early as 1919 programs referred to as BYU Chautauquas, embracing lectures, drama, and/or music, traveled ^'Joseph E. Gould, The Chautauqua Movement: An Episode in the Continuing American Revolution (New York. University Publishers, Inc., 1961), pp. vii, viii. ^^Keith L. Smith, "An Historical Study of Adu]t Educadon Programs of the Brigham Young University from 1921 to 1966" (M.A. thesis, Brigharr. Young University, 1968), pp. 49, 85. ^'Autobiography ofjohn Canute Swenson, pp. 25, 31, 32, 47, Special Collections, Lee Library, BYU. Swenson was director of the Polysophical Society and the later Lecture Bureau. H e was also associated with the International Lyceum Association and the Ellison/White Chautauqua circuit

142

Utah Historical Quarterly

to towns throughout southern Utah and into Nevada.^^ Summer sessions at BYU were adso a Chautauqua spinoff. The six-week program in 1930, billed as "a free public Chautauqua," consisted mostly of lectures preceded by a short concert furnished by the music department^^ Leadership Week, first held on the BYU campus in 1922, "was patterned after the Farmers Roundup and the old Chautauqua Circuits." Its purpose was "to train leaders in priesthood quorums and the auxiliaries." Here the original purpose of the 1874 Methodist Chautauqua, that of a Sunday school teacher training course, came full circle.

Leadership Week was later reorganized to include a broader participation and, now known as Education Week, is held in numerous locations around the country as well as in Utah.^"^ Chautauqua rode the waves of popularity in Utah, as well as across the United States and Canada, untd the late twenties. Out of the numerous different circuits, at least five traversed Utah. The Ellison/ White circuit was by far the most popular traveling group in the Beehive State, but the Redpath, Cadmean, Mutual, and Radcliffe circuits also presented programs. Nationally, the peak year was 1924 when "an estimated 30,000,000 Americans sat in the brown tents pitched near some 12,000 Main Streets and enjoyed the lectures, music, drama, and other cultural items" associated with Chautauqua By 1926 the popularity of such programs was declining rapidly, and in 1932 "the last circuit Chautauqua ground to a weary halt"^^ What happened to "the most American thing in America"? One participant summed it up succinctly. After a "glamorous and footloose life," the traveling Chautauqua "died in 1932 under the hit-and-run wheels of a Model-A- Ford on its way to the movies on a new paved road.

Radio swept it into the ditch, and the Wall Street crash and the subsequent depression gave it the coup de grace.''^^ But many audiences had diagnosed the patient as sick before the accident In Chautauqua's declining years, most complaints about the programs were directed toward the stale, canned mediocrity then being delivered in the circuit tents.

Deseret News, July i, 1919; Wasatch Wave, April 6, 1928. Lethe Coleman traveled to southern Utah and Nevada with a BYU glee club in 1928 as a reader. Also see Hollis Scott, "Interview with Lowry Nelson," September 3, 1963, Special Collecdons, Lee Library, BYU. "^^Deseret Neivs, J u n e 7, 1930. ''''Smith, "Adult Educadon," p. 59.

Case and Case, We Called it Culture, p. v; George J. Dillavou, " T h e Swarthmore Chautauqua: An Adult Education Enterprise" (Ph.D. diss.. University of Chicago, 1970(, pp. 151-52, 158, 171; Gould, The Chautauqua Movement, p. 85. ''Harrison and Detzer, Culture under Camas, p. xvii.

Chautauqua

143

But the "spirit of Chautauqua" had permeated American culture to the point that it could not be completely abandoned when the circuits vanished. A number of new programs sprang up bearing the name of Chautauqua Some were mainly commercial endeavors, while others attempted in their own way to emulate the original cultural and eductional aura of Chautauqua After hosting the Elhson/White program for some time Richfield gave up the circuit, but the local Kinema Theatre kept the idea alive for several years. The first Annual Motion Picture Chautauqua was held there in 1921 and promised a week of pleasure accompanied by a full concert orchestra The following year, band concerts, vocal and instrumentad music, and three separate musical programs from local LDS wards were included. Free refreshments for the "old folks" and an ice cream party for the children topped off the event^^ By 1925 Cedar City had also quit the circuits because many felt they were " not filling the place in our cultural life that was orginally intended, that of being an inspirational and educational instead of an entertaining performance." Paying out "good mioney" for "mediocre entertainment" was unacceptable, especially when it "could be surpassed by local talent" The Music Arts Society was formed to provide opportunity for local performers, augmented by professional musicians.^^ In 1927 community boosters in southern Utah picked up the banner and organized a tri-city Chautauqua for St George, Cedar City, andParowan. Beaverjoined the group in 1928. The local people felt that their efforts would "be better than any given by the traveling Chautauqua organizations." Through a system of sales premiums and a grand prize drawing, the intercommunity Chautauqua improved locad businesses and kept the money at home. " How ever, the main object..., that of creating intercommunity interests..., w^as accomplished as well as giving theatre goers in each place four nights of excellent entertainment" For over six years these towns viewed assorted vaudeville numbers and a variety of musical comedies, mysteries, and dramas such as White Collars, Purple Towers, Under Cover, Jane, Stray Cats, and Your Uncle Dudley. It is difficult to judge the performance quality against the earlier circuit offerings, hutxh^ Beaver Press claimed the local Chautauqua plays got better every year and were well supported by the public.^^ '^''Richfield Reaper, June 16, 1919; July 6, 1922. ^Vran County Record, October 3, 1925. ^'^Beaver Press, October 5, 1928; October 23. 30, November 13, 27, 1931; December 22, 1932.

144

Utah Historical Quarterly

In addition to the intercommunity effort, Beaver enjoyed another local Chautauqua for several years. Drama, vaudeville, dance, and music were presented by the Beaver LDS Mutual Improvement Associations. Along with local talent, the MIA also took advantage of outstanding performers from the surrounding area Prominent among these in 1927 was T. Earl Pardoe, head of the Drama Department at BYU, who offered "dramatic readings, patriotic and dialect'"^^ Sponsored by the four wards of the Beaver Stake, which included MinersvilleandMilford, the 1936 MIA Chautauqua echoed the original purpose of the early New York years by stressing learning. Its purpose was to "encourage the reading of the Improvement Era,"" the official church magazine, and to promote the "assembly programs that have been outlined by the General officers, covering . . . music, drama, drawing and hobbies, as well as literature and other . . . subjects.'"^^ In addition to these specific examples, a number of other local programs throughout Utah were patterned after Chautauqua. Some were sponsored by local Lions Clubs or Chambers of Commerce and others by schools or church groups.

This pattern of the rise and decline of Chautauqua in Utah coincides with that experienced in other areas of the United States.

Historian Theodore Morrison identified three representative phases: "first an independent assembly, then with its decline importing packaged circuit programs, and finally attempting 'local talent' Chautauquas as a last effort to maintain a fading tradidon.'"^^ Each of these stages is seen in Utah, from Ogden's 1911 independent program, to the spread of the circuits from 1915 to 1927, and, finally, the BYU, tricity, MIA, and other local efforts. Within this context, but principally at the beginning and the end, the Utah performing arts flourished.

*°Ibid.,July 1, 15, 22, 1927. '"ibid., November 13, 22, December 4, 1936.

Theodore Morrison, Chautauqua: A Center for Education, Religion, and the Aris in America [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), p. 167.

r*^ Utah Fuel attorney Mark Braffet, lower right, posed in Price, Utah, in 1902, with former gunmen, clockwise from Braffet, Mid Nichols, Jack Egan, and Matt Warner From M. E. King's The Last of the Bandit Riders.

No Proper J o b for a Stranger: The Political Reign of Mark Braffet

BY NANCY J. TANIGUCHI

A JANUARY 1927 OBITUARY A N N O U N C I N G THE DEATH OF M a r k Braffet recognized h i m "as a political p o w e r in C a r b o n C o u n t y . " This was a

Dr. Taniguchi is assistant professor of history ai California State University, Stanislaus.

146

Utah Historical Quarterly

modest understatement For over a dozen years Braffet had virtually ruled the county by controlling the votes of the employees of the Utah Fuel Company, the major coal- mining subsidiary of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. From his power base in the legal department of UFC he manipulated first the judiciary and, later, city and court officials to meet his company's audacious political and financial goals.^ Braffet's political career epitomized the kind of devotion described by his contemporary, the notorious George Washington Plunkitt of New York's T2immany Hall: "The politicians who make a lastin' success in politics are the men who are always loyal to their friends, even up to the gates of State prison, if necessary; men who keep their promises and never lie."^ In a more scholarly vein, political scientist V. O. Key identified the techniques of political graft as including bribery and extortion, control of public funds, biased legislation and selective enforcement, unequal administration of services, and "auto-corruption," or the self-enrichment of the boss himself Mark Braffet excelled at most of these in the heyday of his career, when a combination of political and economic forces enabled him to rule as Carbon County's "king."3 Braffet maintained his ascendancy, enriching himself and his employers, untd his "friends" turned on him. Local independent (nonrailroad-affiliated) coal operators could never permanently remove him from power, despite their alliance with the Progressive party, active as nationwide reformers in the early 1900s. He remained in command until corporate infighting eroded his power base. His acerbic presence etched an impression on Carbon County politics that long outlasted the man himself Braffet was a man of decisive preferences who decided early on who his friends were. He joined the colorful crowd who exercised free rein in eastern Utah, often without benefit of law. When he arrived in Utah from lUinois in the late 1800s, he settled in Scofield, then one of Carbon County's largest towns. He began his local political career by serving as the first Carbon County clerk in 1894. Then he struck up a friendship with C. L. "Gunplay" Maxwell, anotorious outlaw of eastern Utah. In 1897 Braffet and Maxwell liberated accused thieves from the

'"Mark P. Braffet Funeral Tuesday," Deseret News, January 3, 1927. ^WiUiam L. Riordan, Plunkitt of Tammany Hall {Nev/ York E. P. Dutton, 1963), p. 35.

V. O. Key, Jr., "The Techniques of Polidcal Graft," in John A. Gardiner and David J. Olson, eds., Theft of the City (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1974), pp. 23-28.

Mark Braffet

147

cuLStody of the sheriff at Scofield. A year later the men parted; Braffet went to work as the Scofield telegraph operator for the D&RG and Mcixwell soon wound up in the Utah State Penitentiary for his role in a Springville bank holdup where two men were killed. For a time Braffet sold Navajo blankets, then he went to law school, passed the Utah bar examination, and joined a law firm in Salt Lake City. However, he spent most of his time in Carbon County where he entered the legal department of the Utah Fuel Company upon its incorporation in 1901. There he met Cyrus "Doc" Cyrus "Doc" Shores From Men of Shores, a Rio Grande special agent Affairs in Utah an d former lawman, whose involvement with railroad coal lands would later bring Braffet grief Braffet's easy movement through the twilight of the law's fringe epitomized the talents with which he would madce his greatest impact"^ Not long after Braffet officially joined the Utah Fuel administration, in 1903-4, a volatile coal miners' strike shook Carbon County.

Disdainful of the strikers, Braffet personified the position of the antiunion Rio Grande. In a much-publicized trial he claimed to be "assisting the county attorney" when he confronted William H. King, later a U.S. congressman and senator, who was defending an accused union organizer. The defendant, also a trained attorney, proved a special target for Braffet's wrath when he branded one of his statements an outright lie. Braffet exploded, "You shut up! You make a few statements like that and there will be real trouble here." In the courtroom packed with Utah Fuel guards and other officials, the

*"MarkP. Braffet Funeral Tuesday;" Complaint, Criminal Case 8 (1897), 7thJudicial District Court, Carbon County Courthouse, Price, Utah; "Gets Eighteen Years," (Price) Eastern Utah Advocate (hereafter ÂŁL>1), September 22, 1898; "Short Stories," EUA, December21, 1899; "Mr. Braffet Gives His Entire Time to Company," EUA, March 24, 1904; Charles A. Siringo, A Cowboy Detective (1912; reprint ed., Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1988), pp. 192, 306; M. P. Braffet to Henry McAllister, April 18, 1916, Denver and Rio Grande Collection, MS. 513, Box 15, fd. 3271, Colorado Historical Society, Denver, Colorado.

148

Utah Historical Quarterly

A Long R.a.nge View of A Carbon, County Covirtroom.

Salt Lake Herald cartoon of 1903 trial of a union organizer shows courtroom packed with armed Utah Fuel guards

defense pleaded for an end to such intimidation. The organizer was found guilty. After the trial King declared, "I have never seen a place where the desire to railroad a man through to jail is so m a n i f e s t . . . .

There is not another place where an attorney for a corporation is supreme to the court"^ However, Braffet could act with impunity. Not only was "Doc" Shores among the Utah Fuel guards, but also another friend. Gunplay Maxwell, had received a timely pardon that enabled him to return to Carbon County to serve as Braffet's bodyguard during the strike. Braffet and Maxwell, cradling their weapons, arrogantly posed for a photo^"Bitter Legal Fight Occurs in Court at Scofield," Salt Lake Tribune, December 11, 1903.

April 1904 photograph of striking Carbon County miners and guards, including on rock pile, C. L "Gunplay" Maxwell, left, and Mark Braffet in overcoat. Third from left is union organizer Charles DeMilli USHS collections

graph in front of Utah Fuel's Castle Gate bullpen, flanked by unarmed, striking miners. After the strike ended. Maxwell partnered Braffet in a mining venture, worked in various enterprises, and remarried. When the outlaw murdered a man in Carbon County in 1907, Braffet helped put up the $5,000 bail. Horrified local citizens protested his release, noting, " . . . before C. L. Maxwell left Price with his bondsman, M. P. Braffet, he procured firearms which he concealed about his person."

Local residents expressed fear as to where and how he might use them.

Maxwell's undoing finally came with his addiction to opium. In 1909 the outlaw met his fate at the end of a deputy sheriffs smoking gun.

Braffet eulogized, " H e was a bad man, but a good servant"^ Many people would have said the same thing of Mark Braffet, particularly in the heated campaigns that characterized the rise of Progressive reforms nationwide during the years from 1900 to 1917.

The Progressive impulse reached Utah somewhat later than other parts of the country. It arose in the state's eastern coal fields after an â&#x20AC;˘^"Mark P. Braffet Talks about His Bodyguard," EUA, August 26, 1909; " T h e Ozokerite Mines Near Colton," State Coal Mine Inspector's Report, 1904, p. ] 26; "Petidon Totally Ignored," EUA, October 3, 1907; " C L. Maxwell is Killed by Deputy Sheriff J o h n s t o n e , " EUA, August 26, 1909.

1^0

Utah Historical Quarterly

unsuccessful 1906 attempt by the U.S. Department of Justice to break the Rio Grande Trust, which ended in an out-of-court settlement in 1909.^ Ironically, the government's failure to control the trust, along with the Rio Grande's self-congratulatory reorganization, tightened the noose that would finally force local Progressives to challenge Braffet's control. But that development was still years away.

Naturally, the Rio Grande gloried in the clear title to the most valuable coal lands in Utah which it had won as the result of the out-ofcourt settlement Braffet's star rose accordingly. Among the company duties delegated him in 1909 were "all matters in relation to lands, water rights, etc. in Utah . . . . [also] looking after the political interests of the Company in Carbon County . . . . [and] aiding . . . County officials in regulating . . . liquor traffic in and about the Company's camps."^ The monopolistic D&RG and its saloon-owning subsidiary, the Magnolia Trading Company, represented only two of the known evds in early twentieth-century America The decade and a half just prior to World War I has been labled "progressive" by historians because of nationwide attacks on the sins of the day. It was under this banner that President Theodore Roosevelt's Justice Department had filed the original indictments against the Rio Grande mining subsidiaries. The compromise of these suits belied Roosevelt's success in other areas: in the much-touted Northern Securides Case of 1902, which disbanded a railroad monopoly, and in the passage of 1906 reform legislation that included the Pure Food and Drug Act, the American Andquities Act, and the Hepburn Act which struck at the root of radroad monopoly in coal.^ The state of Utah experienced its own flood of Progressive reforms, including in 1911 the Utah prohibition referendum. Ironically, its passage actually strengthened Braffet's hand as, alone among Utah's counties. Carbon went wet, making the vending of alcohol which he

At the time, the federal government privately had misgivings about the efficacy of its own prosecudon. As the leading government lawyer in the D&RG coal lands cases wrote to the attorney general: "I have thrown in a little historical matter and generally arranged in such a way to make the settlement appear to have been a proper one on the part [of the Secretary of the Interior] and yourself. . . . " M. C Burch to Attorney General, March 26, 1909, RG60,Justice Department Straight Numerical Files, Box 654, file 48590, National Archives, Washington, D.C. E. N. Clark to C H. Schlacks, "Suggesdons Relative to the Conduct of Some of the Affairs of the Utah Fuel Companv," April 10, 1909, Denver and Rio Grande Collecuon, MS. 513, Box 13, fd.

4586.

The H e p b u r n Act came just too late to be of use in combating the D&RG monopoly due to a pending statute of limitadons. For a full treatment of the Utah coal lands cases, see Nancy J. Taniguchi, Necessary Fraud: Utah's Coal Lands Cases and National Law, under consideration for publication by the Universtiy of Nebraska Press.

Mark Braffet

•

151

supervised even more lucrative than usu^d. Other reforms, inidated in Utah by the dominant Republican party, included laws reguladng child and female labor, food purity, minimum wages, and the tax structure. ^° Elsewhere in the United States, the power of the political boss, such as Mark Braffet, was beginning to draw heavy fire. This impetus gained pardcular strength after Theodore Roosevelt's affiliation with the Progressive party in the elecdon of 1912. But, as historian Robert Wiebe pointed out, "Most progressives had acted as if the bosses would of necessity disappear in the face of modernity. Instead, with an impressive display of resdience, these professionals emerged late in the decade more powerful than ever." He identified the states as the final bastion of bossism and corporadons as their accomphces. This system persisted despite the urgings of celebrated muckrakers like Lincoln Steffens who called for "a finer plan, a nobler ideal, a higher vision" in the treatment of labor—the voters who traditionally powered political machines such as Braffet's. Utahns followed this nadonal pattern of unconcern, more worried over possible electoral dominance by the hierarchy of the Mormon church than by the mardpulation of corporate power.

Furthermore, no lesser entity would attack the Rio Grande where the mighty federal government had failed. In the corners of Carbon County's coal camps, Braffet could pursue his interest undisturbed.^^ Like all coal corporations of the (^arly 1900 s, Utah Fuel dominated its company towns. The miners, living in company-owned houses, were in perennial debt to the high-priced company store and saloon. Prior to unionizadon in 1933, bosses' wishes carried the strength of law. Since the coal camps nesded at the mouth of the mines, miles distant from service centers like Price, the miners had little recourse to outside stores and services. Their only transportation link, prior to widespread automobde ownership during World War II, was the D&RG Railroad itself Obviously, company men would notice a miner returning from town with a kitchen table or a keg of blasting powder. The offender would then lose his job. Consequently, miners had to pay close attention to bosses' whims, to include voting as directed in carefully observed company balloting booths. This system, backed by the

'°"A11 but One County Goes Dry in Utah," EUA, October 5, 1911; Thomas G. Alexander, "Political Patterns of Early Statehood, 1896-1919," in Richard D. Poll, ed., Utah's History (Provo: Brigham Young University Press, 1978), pp. 415-21.

"Robert H. Wiebe, The Searchfor Order, 1877-1920 [Ne^Yovh Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1967), p. 213; Lincoln Steffens to Laura Steffens in James Weinstein, The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State, 1900-1918 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1968), pp. 178-79; Alexander, "Political Patterns," pp. 417-23.

152

Utah Historical Quarterly

apparently uncontestable power of the Rio Grande, made Braffet the "king" of Carbon County.

In 1910, just one year after Braffet accepted his new political responsibilities, the first published objections to his election activities appeared. The public exchange over his power, carried in the proBraffet Eastern Utah Advocate and the opposition-controlled Carbon County News, provided an excellent indication of his political influence. "The good people of Scofield are tired of politics as conducted in Carbon County," one writer complained. "While we believe the Utah Fuel company ought to have representation, the people here are extremely tired of Utah Fuel Company interference in politics."^^ But such remarks by themselves could not stop Braffet In fact, just before the election, the Carbon County News reported "Politics are dead in Winter Quarters [the Utah Fuel mine adjacent to Scofield]. The Utah Fuel Co. has voluntarily raised the wages of miners and laborers." The coal camp then voted as the company wished, according to the newspaper's analysis, as the linking of pay scale to political preference had cowed the captive miners. ^^ Nevertheless, the rivulets of opposition to the Braffet machine were begining to converge. During the period of the federal suit against the Rio Grande, a number of independent coal operators had entered the eastern Utah coal fields. By 1912 they had grown sufficiently muscular to pit themselves against the "king." Under the Progressive banner they sought to break his political grip. An economic power struggle for control of Utah's coal had become political, and Braffet was the most visible target This Progressive fervor, and Utah Fuel's repressive tactics, led to the Braffet machine's first defeat During the 1912 campaign the independent-backed Progressive party arranged for use of the town hall in Sunnyside, largest of the Utah Fuel coal camps. When the speakers arrived they found the hall closed. They proposed a street meeting instead, but the Sunnyside deputy sheriff (^dso a Democratic nominee for four-year county commissioner) threatened to run them out of town if they said anything against his bosses. With that, the Progressives moved to the post office, presumably under the protection of federal law, where the candidates were able to speak Campaigning effectively against such repressive tactics, the Progressives won two seats on the

"Letter From Scofield," (Price) Carbon County News (hereafter CCN), October 7, 1910. '^"Winter Quarters," CCN, October 28, 1910.

Mark Braffet

153

county commission. They joined alone Democrat who was completing his four-year term.*"^ The newly elected Progressives set out to get even with Mark Braffet and the power he wielded for Utah Fuel. Two weeks after being seated, they cracked down on gambling, a faivorite pastime in locad saloons, especially for captive miners in company towns. They also decided that the Magnolia Trading Company would no longer be the sole alcohol vendor in the towns of the Utah Fuel Company. Trying to preserve his hold on the liquor trade, Braffet took the commissioners to court and lost^^ When this case was aired in the press, a News reader questioned "whether the Utah Fuel Company knows and approves of the fight its man Braffet is making on the duly elected county commissioners of Carbon County." The newspaper replied that the company probably did know since it had just cancelled its advertising with the proindependent News, restricting its business to the Repubfican Eastern Utah Advocate. The political affiliations of the two local newspapers soon provided a lively battleground for the continuing power struggle. ^^ As the Progressive-Democratic commission sought to license various proprietors to sell liquor during 1912, they were dismayed to learn that the Republican county clerk, backed by Braffet, refused to issue the necessary certificates. During increasingly heated debate, the clerk remained in "constant telephone communication with 'King' Braffet, who had fled to Mand to obtain a restraining order from Judge Christensen" to prevent the licenses from being issued. The clerk also forbade his assistant, who just happened to be his wife, from processing licenses. The warring parties sought redress in the courts, and the county commission also filed suit against the clerk for insubordination.^^ In the two weeks before a legal decision was reached on the liquor certificates, local citizens were treated to further mudslinging. When the commissioners met again at the end ofjanuary, they faced hostility from the county treasurer and attorney as well as the continued recalcitrance

'''"Sunnyside Closed to Progressives," CCN, Ociober 31, 1912; " T h e Official Returns," EUA, November 7, 1912. '^"Gambling Closed in Carbon County," EUA, November 28, 1912; "New Officials on the J o b , " CCN, January 9, 1913; "District J u d g e Sustains County Commissioners," CCN, February 6, 1913. '*'"The Question Answered," CCV, January 30, 1913. " " C o u n t y Commissioners Are on the Warpath," CCA', January 16, 1913.

1^4

Utah Historical Quarterly

of the clerL The treasurer had refused the commissioners the county's financial statement Yet it had been published by Braffet as an " Extra" in the Republican Advocate. Carbon County was insolvent, he proclaimed.

Somehow, in the two weeks since Braffet had lost control of the county commission, this disgraceful condition had suddenly emerged. The News quickly issued a rebuttal headed, "The King Is Nutty! Pity The Poor King!" It continued: The "extra" caused some talk and considerable amusement in this city [Price] but the News has not heard how it was received in the [Utah Fuel] coal camps, where it was distributed freely â&#x20AC;&#x201D; In the meandme, the county commissioners are going right ahead attending to their dudes as they see them . . . endeavoring to devise ways and means for reducing county expenses to a point where the deficit inherited from the former [Republican] board can be wiped ouL^^

At the final January meedng the county commission asked Republican county attorney C. C. McWhinney, who had supplied derogatory comments on the legality of commission decisions in the "Extra," to explain his remarks. He replied he "didn't consider it anybody's business." Discussion grew so acrimonious that a stenographer had to be called in to record the arguments. That afternoon the county clerk endorsed a specific person to serve as deputy in his absence, his wife having vacated the post, and refused to accept the person nominated by the commissioners. Nevertheless, the Progressives held firm. By the following week the newspaper could report "Peace Now Prevads at the Courthouse." The Braffet-controlled county clerk and treasurer had resigned their offices and were replaced by Progressive appointees. This move also broke the liquor monopoly of the Magnolia Trading Company in Utah Fuel camps, as licenses were finally issued to other proprietors.^^ Despite the apparent truce, the batde over liquor sales was far from moribund. Instead, Utah Fuel changed its tactics. Braffet carried the fight to the state level where he threatened to incorporate Sunnyside and Casde Gate, the two largest Utah Fuel coal camps, so that they could vote "wet" in the upcoming elecdons. Then, he claimed, he could guarantee that the rest of the county would go dry, giving Utah Fuel a liquor monopoly. In desperadon, the Progressives husded one of their

'*" Doings at the Courthouse," "The King is Nutty! Pity the Poor King!" both CCN, January 30, 1913. ''"Peace Now Prevails at the Courthouse, CCN, February 6, 1913; "District Judge Sustains County Commissioners," CCN, February 6, 1913.

Mark Braffet

755

Sunnyside, Utah, ca 1909, shows liquor store Large building in background is the school USFIS collections

Stalwarts to the halls of the Senate J udiciary Committee, which was deliberating Braffet's bdl on town incorporation. The legislation under discussion would require simply 100 signatures from municipal residents. The Progressives demanded that the number be changed to 300, with 100 of those being freeholders. Since no one within a company camp could own his own land, this proposal would effectively gut Braffet's plan. After discussion, the Judiciary Committee tabled the measure. ^-^ After Braffet's appeals to the state legislature faded, Utah Fuel took a more direct route to monopolize liquor sales within its domain. In April 1913 the company began fencing Sunnyside to keep unwanted salesmen off its property. The Progressive county commission retaliated by condemning land for a road that necessitated a large hole be left in the fence. Testing the company, an independent liquor dealer tried to enter Sunnyside but was arrested for an alleged illegality, despite holding wholesale and retad liquor licenses. ^^ ^""Liquor Company Given a Grilling" CCN, February 27, 1913. ^'"War Declared At Sunnyside," CCN, April 10, 1913.

156

Utah Historical Quarterly

When the independent vendor went to court, Braffet approached him with a proposal. If the dealer would cease trying to trade in Sunnyside, Braffet would see the charges against him dismissed. Utah Fuel's attorney also characterized the Progressive commissioners as "crazy s-o-b's" (in the delicate newspaper wording of the day) and told the salesman he would "crush his head" if he couldn't stop him any other way.^^ After the judge dismissed the case, the vendor disregarded the threats, loaded up his wagon, and headed for the hole in the Sunnyside fence. There a handful of armed company guards tried to head him off; they were thwarted by a crowd of approximately 300 thirsty miners who escorted the salesman into Sunnyside and demanded their freedom to trade with whom they liked. As the dealer later testified, when he arrived in town he saw "Braffet and a few other Magnolia officials standing in front of the company saloon, expecting to enjoy the show." The company superintendent also met the throng on Main Street and gave an impromptu speech over the possible illegality of their actions. Braffet then asked "for a few words, but was informed by the miners they wanted nothing to do with him." He was forced to back down, and the happy miners got their liquor at a reduced rate.^^ Clearly, the issue of liquor reform, so dear to the Progressives, held little appeal for voters in the camps.

The Sunnyside victory proved to be more symbolic than substantive, however. In the November 1913 municipal contest, the voters were bombarded with the issues of reform, Utah Fuel, and "King" Braffet The Progressives, wanting to continue their reign, engaged a detective to find damning evidence against the Utah Fuel Company.

Their plan backfired when the man they had hired went to Braffet and gave him every scrap of confidential information on the Progressives he possessed. The local Progressive party chairman resigned his position, and Utah Fuel's Republicans rolled into office with pluralities of 31 votes and up. Braffet hosted the liquor-laced celebration at his Tavern Cafe, Price's most up-to-date watering place, where he toasted previously disgraced county attorney McWhinney as "the man who did it"24

^'Ibid. '^Ibid. ^''"Stevenson Resigns," CCN, August 28, 1913; Leonard DeLue and Charles H. Vinton v. C.H. Stevenson, Utah 7 Civil 836 (1914); "Republican Ticket Makes Clean Sweep," CCN, November 6, 1913.

Mark Braffet

15 7

Obviously, the outgoing county commissioners could not stomach C. C. McWhinney nor his Utah Fuel friends. In the closing days of their terms of office they turned to the state attorney general for his removal.

McWhinney, in turn, went to Braffet for legal counsel. At an informal, hearing in Salt Lake City, Mark Braffet heard complaints that his client was charged with selective prosecutions, ignoring the infractions of Utah Fuel bosses. Braffet issued a statement claiming that the county commissioners simply wished to harass their opponents into resigning and that the only poker game McWhinney had refused to prosecute included a Progressive-appointed deputy holding a hand of cards.

While this case was repeatedly stalk;d in the courts, similar hostdity characterized other Carbon County developments. Arguments flew in the press over the county printing contract and the light plant, as well as the usual law enforcement issues.^^ At this juncture, to further dramatize Utah Fuel abuses, the out-ofoffice Progressives mobilized their women who added to the list of local grievances their own particular complaint prostitution. Untd the political mobilization of the Carbon County women, this widespread abuse experienced only cursory regulation. Although the "soiled doves" were occasionally run out of town, a sense of sport predominated over moral indignation. For example, in the fall of 1913 a dozen prostitutes departed at police urging. As the newspaper cheerfully reported, "quite a number of their male friends [appeared] at the depot to bid them farewell. "^^ Progressive women set out to malce changes. In February 1914 the Democratic News announced the formation of a Women's Betterment League, composed largely of wives of the leading Progressives. The following month the league presented the Price City Councd with a petition containing 215 females' signatures asking it to suppress "flagrant gambling and prostitution." Many men had reportedly asked to sign as well, but the canvassers refused them because they were "determined to clean up Price without the aid of the men . . . ." The embarrassed, Braffet-backed councilmen tabled the matter for further study, "untd . . . the council could investigate and ascertain whether conditions were as bad as the ladies represented them to be."^^ ^^"County Commissioners Make Serious charges," CCV, January 1, 1914. "So the People May Understand," CCV, January 29, 1914; "Impeachment Case Started," CCN, February 19, 1914. ^^"Local News Briefs," CCN, November 20, 1913. ^^" Women Organize Betterment League," CCN, February 26, 1914; " H u n d r e d s of Women Petidon the Council," CCN, March 5, 1914; "Big Meedng of Betterment League," CCN, March 5, 1914.

158

Utah Historical Quarterly

Shortly thereafter the Women's Betterment League sponsored a public mass meeting which included a talk on prohibition by the Provo district attorney. League members also planned an economic boycott of businesses that had cancelled their advertising with the anti-Braffet News but were dissuaded by the editor. ^^ However, the News was happy to spodight other female polidcal involvements. It pubhshed the poetic complaints of "Mrs. Grundy," local spokeswoman in the crusade against vice and Mark Braffet Her debut on March 26 lampooned "The Carbon County Vampire." This rhyme lamented vice gone unpunished thanks to "the Company, fierce as a shark. Whose principal tool's a fellow named Mark " Next, Mrs. Grundy complained of "Litde bits of Braffet and his gaudy tribe/Make a man forget his horror of a bribe."^^ In Aprd "the scheming grafters," including the marshal and the "city cops," were all supposedly singing "Mark's Old Sweet Song." In the graveyard setting of the next verse, "A Dream of Price," the epitaph of" King Mark" read: "Here rests from his job Political Mark/Old Nick became so jealous and cut off his spark"^^ Unwdling or unable to counteract these accusations directly, the Utah Fuel Company turned to its employees to salvage political power.

The economically captive miners heeded the remarks of the general superintendent who explained UFC's political position in a pubhshed address. As he explained it, the company, like any taxpayer, naturally wanted efficient and faithful public servants and nothing more.

However, previous payroll robberies (the last had been in 1898) had involved the company directly in politics to counteract shoddy local law enforcement The local Progressives, when in power, had exemplified this slipshod sort of government For example: "Against the protest of all mining companies saloon licenses have been issued for the conduct of saloons two or three mdes distant from human habitation . . . [affording] a rendezvous for agitators and the worst type of undesirable citizens . . . ."^^ The scene at Sunnyside the year before still rankled.

In addition, the general superintendent complained about taxation, noting that the coal companies paid taxes based on 100 percent assessed valuation (ofthe orginal cut-rate purchase price), not the 30-to-

^ ^ " O l d K i n g A l c o h o l G i v e n a L a m b a s d n g , " CCN, April 2, 1914; " T h e Editor's Column," CCN April 9, 1914. ^'"The Carbon County Vampire," CCN, March 26, 1914; "A Spring Poem," CCN, April 2 1914. ^ ' ^""Mark's Old Sweet Song," CCN, April 9, 1914; "A Dream of Price," CCN, April 30, 1914. ^'"SupL Williams States Utah Fuel's Position," EUA, September 10, 1914.

Mark Braffet

159

60 percent charged to private owners. Finally, heunvededathreat If the Progressives won, taxes on company property would undoubtedly go even higher. With irony not lost on the miners, he asserted that as much as Utah Fuel valued its employees, it would then be forced to raise rents to pay these costs. He then called for the election of "a business administradon," an unmistakable signal to miners on how they should vote.^^ Political maneuvering did not stop here. UFC continued an aggressive campaign until elecdon day. It was to no avail. Independents now controlled more miners' votes than Utah Fuel. In November 1914 independent-backed candidates swept all the county offices with the exception ofthe clerk, an earlier appointee with a reputadon for honesty and integrity.^^ Feeling it stdl controlled the judiciary, the UFC, led by Braffet, turned to the courts to contest the elections, again without success. The court ruled that although vodng irregularides had indeed occurred, they did not interfere with the true will ofthe electorate. ^"^ The new Progressive county commission reacted as UFC had feared. It reassessed the company's coal lands at their 1914 value, abandoning the standard ofthe originiil purchase price. Levies on Utah Fuel's holdings soared. Braffet rushed to the local district court to sue for unlawful taxadon. The court issuâ&#x201A;Ź:d a temporary restraining order barring foreclosure of UFC properties for nonpayment of taxes while it deliberated the merits ofthe case. When the Utah Fuel tax cases finally came up late in 1916, the assessment was substantially reduced, as Braffet had requested. Most ofthe money paid under protest by Utah Fuel had to be reimbursed. Nonetheless, Carbon County was once again clearly solvent^^

^^ibid. ^^"Local Democrats Repudiate Fusion with Progressives," EUA, September 10, 1914; "Republicans and Democrats Fuse," EUA, Septem3er 17, 1914; "Progressive Party Sweeps the County," EUA, November 5, 1914. ^^Wetzelv. Forrester, Utah 7 Civil 864 (1914); Hillu Ballinger, Utah 7 Civil 860 (1914); "Braffet's Charges Were Mostly Wind," CCN, January 14, 1915; "Gambhng Stops," EUA, December 24, 1914. "^^Pleasant Valley Coal Company v. Ballinger as County Treasurer, Utah 7 Civil 856 (1914); Utah Fuel Company v. Ballinger as County Treasurer, Utah 7 Civil 857 (1914); "The Utah Fuel Company Restrains Sale of Lands," EUA, December 24, 1914. "Case against Turner Dismissed," CCV, J u n e 19, 1913; "New Charges Filed," CCV, July 24, 1913; "Former Clerk again Bound Over," CCN, December 25, 1913; Carbon County v. Gwilymjones, W. D. McLean, B. F Coffey, andF. N. Cameron, Utah 7 Civil 661 (1913); "Randolph, Hamilton and Sharp Must Dig," (Price) Sun, March 3, 1916; Utah Fuel Company v. Carbon County, Utah 7 Civil 890 (1915) and Utah 7 Civil 965 (1916); Pleasant Valley Coal Company v. Ballinger as County Treasurer, Utah 7 Civil 955 (1915); Utah Fuel Company v. Ballinger as County Treasurer, Utah 7 Civil 954(1915).

160

Utah Historical Quarterly

Old issues returned in the city campaigns of 1915. In a perceptive editorial in June, readers were warned the "the dictator's old henchmen" had designs against the Price city government A new Democratic-renegade Republican amalgam, which billed itself as the Citizens party, had coalesced in opposition to Braffet and the UFC. When the Price city recorder, backed by Braffet, refused to print the new party's emblem on the ballot so that people could vote a straight ticket, the opponents again went to court Although the decision favored the Citizens, Braffet's Republicans won every contest in Price by over 50 votes. As the Democratic paper had previously warned, "Those people who thought when they dethroned the political dictator of Corbon [sic] county they could sit with their folded arms and allow things to run themselves have another guess coming."^^ But Mark Braffet's practiced machine was clearly losing ground. Its only remaining stronghold was Price, the county seat Unaffiliated Democrats took Helper, the D&RG division town only six miles to the north.

Utah Fuel reacted angrily to this loss of its political hegemony.

Even more crucial, it stood to lose actual coal-bearing acreage it had obtained by fraud decades before. In the roiling cauldron of its greatest challenge to date, tempers heated to the breaking point Company unity could not hold.

Part of the schism resulted from the installation of a new vicepresident and chief executive officer ofthe Utah Fuel Company, A. H. Cowie. In trying to establish his own authority, he tread on the very sensitive toes of Mark Braffet Almost immediately, the two men clashed over issues of command. As Braffet reported to his immediate superior, D&RG general counsel Henry McAllister, Jr., in April 1916: . . . last December Mr. Cowie informed me that he had been given supervision over my department and instructed that all communications... must be submitted to and approved by him before mailing.... I have not taken his instruction seriously . . . .^^

However, Cowie had the clear backing of the Rio Grande system's president, E. T. Jeffery. When McAllister sought guidance fromjeffery on the Cowie-Braffet problem, he received this response: "We must have harmony . . . . If Braffet is unwdling to work harmoniously . . . " T h e Editor's Column," CCN, J u n e 25, 1915; "Price Democrats Ignore Primary," (Price) News-Advocate [htrcaktvN-A), October 15, 1915; "Two Tickets Nominated," N-A, October 22, 1915; The People ofthe State of Utah ex. rel Robinettv. L A. Lauber, Utah 7 Civil 948 (1915); "Czar Louis the First Dethroned by Court," N-A, October 29, 1915;" Republican Voteslide Hit Price Last Tuesday," N-A, November 5, 1915.

"Braffet to McAllister, April 18,1916, Denver and Rio Grande Collection, MS. 513, Box 15, fd.

3271.

Mark Braffet

161

Braffet should retire and you should with Cowie's concurrence select cinother attorney."^^ Any thought of a speedy resolution disappeared under pressure from new coal land suits. "Doc" Shores, former Rio Grande special agent and Braffet's friend, became one ofthe unwitting instruments of the "king's" final undoing. In the changing legal atmosphere created by the passage of several Utah coal land cases through the tiers of federal courts, laws were reinterpreted and new precedents set for the ownership of the mineral-bearing public domain. In this unstable A. H. Cowie situation. Shores had filed in From Men of Affairs in Utah.

1915 on coal lands near Castle Gate claimed by two other parties: another D&RG subsidiaryâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Pleasant Valley Coal Companyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and the Ketchum Coal Company.

According to Braffet, this move would prevent the land's acquisition by hostile forces, which, by then, included his own company vice president, A. H. Cowie. Braffet wrote: Mr. Cowie has grossly misrepresented Mr. Shores to [D&RG President] Mr. Jeffery.... He filed at Castle Gate because I informed him that under the law as it was then laid down... the land was open to entry and I knew of various persons who were unfriendly and who had designs upon it; Cowie wasoneofthem. He openly threatened .. that"If New York don'tUke the way I am handling things out here, I will ship coal into the California market myself, and it will be Castle Gate coal, too."^^

Braffet also complained of Cowie's interference in Carbon County politics. He stressed his own efforts in promodng .. . the development from year to year of political prestige ofthe company in Carbon County. Mr. Cowie envied the possession of such strength by me and wanted it for himself The result has been a systematic under-

'^Jeffeiy to McAllister, April 19,1916, Denver and Rio Grande Collection, MS. 513, Box 15, fd.

3274-81.

39 Braffet to McAllister, April 18, 1916, ibid., MS. 513, Box 15, fd. 3271.

162

Utah Historical Quarterly mining of me,-the loss ofthe county in the last elections; a steady increase of tax burdens ofthe company and an utter helplessness in case of hostile litigation or labor troubles. The General Superintendent has been delegated by Mr. Cowie to look after such matters and there is going to be an interesting mess when he gets through with the Fall election. It is not a proper job for a stranger to teA^.* [Italics added.]

Cowie, on the other hand, accused Braffet of plotting with Shores against the Rio Grande. The vice- president also hired a private detective to shadow Braffet, resulting in a report that Braffet had been on a drunken carouse with the lawyer for the opposition in the Castle Gate land case. McAllister, writing to D&RG president Jeffery, concluded that "there was no truth in the statement," and sagely added, "I descredit agreat deal that either says ofthe other. "^^ Internal dissension had obviously reached new heights.

By the time this exchange occurred in September, elections were fast approaching. Jeffery had counseled McAllister to keep peace between Braffet and Cowie, "even though it be only to end this calendar year." For the first dme since Braffet's 1909 mandate, Cowie's man ran the local elections. The results went exactly as Braffet had predicted. In 1916, despite the local demise ofthe independent-backed Progressive party. Carbon County voters selected a mixed party government outside of Utah Fuel control."^^ Onjanuary 10, 1917, Henry McAllister mailed two letters. The first went to D& RG president Jeffery, saying, "Mr. Cowie arrived at the office . . . and [said he] would immediately tell some of his close friends ofthe imminent retirement of Mr. Braffet" To Braffet, McAllister sent this message: By mail this afternoon I have received a certified copy of a resolution ofthe Board of Directors of the Utah Fuel Company, held on January 2, containing the following: "Resolved, That the Vice-President, resident in Salt Lake City, and the General Counsel, resident in Denver, are hereby directed to arrange forthwith for the retirement of Mr. M. P. Braffet from the service ofthe Company."

Particularly galling to Braffet, he was instructed to surrender his "office and files" directly to A. H. Cowie."^^ *°ibid. ""McAllister to Jeffery, September 12, 1916, ibid., MS. 513, Box 29, Letterbook 12. ^^McAllister tojeffery, April 25, 1916, ibid, MS. 513, Box 15, fd. 3274-81;" Republicans Get but Three Places on County Ticket," N-A, November 9, 1916.

McAllister tojeffery and McAllister to Braiffet, January 10, 1917, Denver and Rio Grande Collection, MS. 513, Box 29, Letterbook 12.

Mark Braffet

163

Why did Utah Fuel fire Mark Braffet^ Was the rift with Cowie so severe.^ Or were there larger reasons? Perhaps in concentrating on running Carbon County, Braffet had achieved statewide notoriety that Utah Fuel Company considered detrimental. Politically, 1917 marked a watershed in Utah. For the first time since statehood, a Democrat, not a Republican, sat in the governor's mansion. The legislature elected with him, fired by typical Progressive reforming zeal, began to crack down on numerous abuses. The Rio Grande and its subsidaries were directly affected as state legislators established a public udlides commission empowered to regulate radroads. They also passed a corrupt polidcal practices act Braffet, the lightning rod for trouble in Carbon County, had become a highly visible polidcal liabdity.'^'^ Local events could have also contributed to the corporate decision to retire Braffet The Ketchum Coal Company, counterclaimant to land claimed by Shores, had vigorously pursued its rights in the courts. By the time Braffet was ousted, three Ketchum suits were pending: a tramway condemnation suit, litigation over the Shores land, and, for the first time, an indictment that the Rio Grande was indeed a monopoly under antitrust laws that forbade a railroad to own its own mine. The last suit brought renewed fears of another Justice Department investigation and possible suit McAllister had also previously evaluated Braffet as shrewd, resourceful, and not disloyal, but "not a very able attorney."

Perhaps the possibility of a new federal assault figured prominently in Braffet's demise, just as the first success against the Justice Department began his ascendancy. "^^ Whatever the hidden corporate reasons for Braffet's rise and fall, his reign had long-time political repercussions within Carbon County.

It is still the stronghold of the Democratic party in Utah, despite Republican ascendancy in the rest ofthe state. Although most political scientists have attributed this aberrcition to the support won by the Franklin Roosevelt administration with the passage ofthe Wagner Act allowing unionization, the negative Braffet legacy is also a factor. For years he ran the county for the Utah Fuel Company under the banner of the Republicans. When the union arrived only sixteen years after Braffet's release, many of the electorate remembered all too well the

"Alexander, "Political Patterns," pp. 423-24. *^"Report of Henry McAllister, Jr., General Counsel, to E. T. Jeffery, Chairman," J u n e 16, 1916, MS. 513, Box 15, fd. 3315; McAllister tojeffery, October 9, 1916, MS. 513, Box 29, Letterbook 12; McAllister tojeffery. May 1, 1916, MS. 514, Box 15, fd. 3274-81, all Denver and Rio Grande Collection.

164

Utah Historical Quarterly

unsavory reign of Carbon County's "king." The miners, freed by union strength from having to vote the will of the bosses, were undoubtedly doubly delighted to support the organization traditionally opposed to the party of "King" Braffet Despite his political demise in 1917, Braffet continued his flamboyant ways. First he went to Salt Lake City to practice law; then he returned to Carbon County to pursue business interests, including managing his Price Tavern. He also attempted to wrest ill-gotten coal lands from his former employers in a case later coupled by the courts with that of Shores. Although the shifting national legal climate and other considerations led to his eventual defeat on this issue, he retained a certain grudging respect in the county he had once controlled. Upon his death onjanuary 2, 1927, the newspaper stressed his prominence "in legal circles ofthe state and city " Except for a single line referring to his reputation "as a political power... and a shrewd business man..." his entire political career remained in shadowy silence."^^ However, no one alive during his political ascendancy would ever forget the power of Carbon County's "king."

"â&#x20AC;˘^Interview with George Patterick, April 14, 1988, Price, Utah; "Mark P. Braffet Funeral Tuesday.'

The "riotous revel" on Salt Lake's Main Street, November 11, 1918, was followed by new cases of infiuenza. USHS collections.

The Influenza Epidemic ofl918-19inUtah

BY LEONARD J. ARRINGTON

T H E INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC SPREAD FROM U. S. Army camps in the Midwest to ports and battlefields in France in the spring of 1918 and moved quickly around the world to China, Africa, Brazd, and the South Pacific, infecting millions of people. Because some 8,000,000 Spaniards came Dr. Arrington is Lemuel Redd Professor of Western History Emeritus, Brigham Young University, and a member ofthe Board of State History.

166

Utah Historical Quarterly

down with it, the disease came to be known as Spanish influenza As the Allies neared victory over the Centred Powers in September 1918, the epidemic returned to the United States and spread rapidly from Boston, New York, and Philadelphia to the Midwest and the Pacific Coast Approximately a fifth of the world population endured the fever and aches of influenza during 1918-19, and more than 21,000,000 died in just four months. In the space of one year, approximately 675,000 Americans died from the same disease, more than ten times as many as were kdled during World War I â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and approximately one-half of the soldiers who died in Europe were felled not by enemy firepower but by the influenza virus. ^ People around the world have been famdiar with influenza, perhaps for thousands of years. Almost everyone has had it several times. One goes to bed for three or four days, feels miserable, gets up feeling a little weak and shaky, and then goes about his or her business.

One does not view it as a thing of terror, like AIDS or smallpox, typhoid fever or tuberculosis, perhaps because, in most instances, many have suffered but few have died. This was not true of the 1918-19 virus.

Medical researchers have determined in recent years that the influenza virus, an infectious agent so small that 30,000,000 would fit on the head of a pin, can reproduce only in living cells. Of the several influenza viruses, most of them without serious effect on the human body, one particular strain, perhaps working in combination with a swine virus, proved deadly, producing the 1918-19 epidemic, the worst humanity has undergone since the Black Death (bubonic plague) ofthe fourteenth century.^ 'The best treatment ofthe influenza epidemic of 1918-20 is Alfred W. Crosby, Jr., Epidemic and Peace, 1918 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1976). Other works on the subject include A.A. Hoehling, The Great Epidemic (Boston: Litde, Brown & Co., 1961); Richard Collier, The Plague ofthe Spanish Lady: The Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919 (New York Atheneum, 1974); Edwin O. Jordan, Epidemic Influenza, A Survey (Chicago: American Medical Association, 1927); William Ian Beveridge, Influenza: The Last Great Plague (New York Prodist, 1978).

Published articles include: Irwin Ross, " T h e Great Plague of 1918," American History Illustrated 3 (July 1968): 12-17; Joseph E. Persico, " T h e Great Swine Flu Epidemic of 1918," American Heritage 27 (June 1976): 28-31, 80-86; and Francis Russell, " A J o u r n a l ofthe Plague: The 1918 Influenza," Yale Review, n.s., 47 (December 1957): 219-35.

Two excellent doctoral dissertations are William R. Noyes, "Influenza Epidemic, 1918-19: A Misplaced Chapter in U. S. Social and Institutions History" (Ph. D. diss., University of California at Los Angeles, 1968); and Dorothy Ann Pettit, "A Cruel Wind: America Experiences the Pandemic Influenza, 1918-20" (Ph.D. diss.. University of New Hampshire, 1976).

Model treatments of adjoining states are Richard Melzer, "A Dark and Terrible Moment: The Spanish Flu Epidemic of 1918 in New Mexico," New Mexico Historical Review 57 (July 1982): 213-36; and Bradford Lucldngham, Epidemic in the Southwest, 1918-1919 (El Paso: Texas Western Press, 1984). ^K. David Patterson, Pandemic Influenza, 1700-1900: A Study in Historical Epidemiology (Boston: Rowman & Littlefield, 1986); Alfred W. Crosby, Jr., " T h e Influenza Pandemic of 1918," in J u n e E. Osborn, td.. Influenza in America, 1918-1976 {NewYork. Prodist, 1977), pp. 5-13; and Giovanni Cavini, L'influenza epidemica attraverso i secoti (Rome: Possi, 1959).

Infiuenza Epidemic

167

Not only was the 1918 virus unprecedented for its ferocity, but it was also unique in kiUing a high propordon of those 18 to 45 years of age, the healthiest and most vigorous of its victims. Some 621,000 soldiers caught the flu in 1918, on(>sixth of the total number of combatants in World War I, of whom 43,000 died of influenzapneumonia^ The first cases in Utah were noted in early October 1918, and by October 10, Utah state health officer Dr. T. B. Beatty was sufficiently concerned to issue a directive banning all public gatherings, including church meetings and theater performances. He warned school districts and universities that they should give serious consideration to closing schools and colleges. They did so two days later and most of them remained closed untd early in Januan/ 1919."^ Salt Lake City, as the "Crossroads of the West," began to report an outbreak on October 3, and, because ofthe large number of visitors the city felt the impact ofthe disease intensely. Within four weeks there were more than 1,500 cases of influenza and 117 deaths. On the single day, October 15, Salt Lake City officials reported 161 new cases and 6 deaths.

Entire families were down in many instances. On that same day sixtyfive other towns in Utah reported outbreaks ofthe disease.

Ogden, the leading radroad junction and principal destination for many returning servicemen and western travelers, was also an immediate target ofthe virus. From October 3 to October 26 there were 2,628 cases of flu, with 73 deaths. Because the Dee Hospital, owned at the time by the three LDS Weber stakes, was full, local officials equipped the Ogden LDS Third Ward amusement hall as a temporary hospital, with Myrtle Swainston, a recently graduated nurse from the LDS Hospital School of Nursing in Salt Lake City, in charge. Her salary and the costs of operating the emergency hospital were shared by the American Red Cross, the city of Ogden, and Weber County.^ Ogden was fortunate to have "borrowed" one ofthe finest nurses in Salt Lake's LDS Hospital at the very dme Salt Lake was experiencing its own critical shortage of nurses because of the virulence of the epidemic there.

^Crosby, Epidemic and Peace, pp. 205-6, 216. ''The Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret News for October 10, 1918, to May 1, 1920, contain innumerable articles on what they usually referred to as Spanish influenza There are also ardcles in Utah's smaU town newspapers. For purposes of this study I have followed most carefully the day-byday accounts in the Ogden Standard. Ogden's experience is representative of Utah's experience generally, and the coverage in the Standard is very good. ^Ogden Standard, October 15, 1918. Citadons to the S^an^arrf will be made only when the date of the publicadon is not made clear in the text.

168

Utah Historical Quarterly

The day after Swainston's arrival Ogden reported 40 new cases of the flu. With the help of local authorities Swainston had acquired a few hospital beds from Fort Douglas and some sheets, blankets, and other equipment, and was prepared to treat the initial 6 patients. The Ogden Standard for October 16 reported the emergency hospital to be "splendidly equipped." The next day, October 17, arrangements were completed to move the emergency hospital out of its temporary quarters in the LDS Third Ward into the basement of the First Congregational Church, where beds were prepared for 20 patients.

Swainston appealed for donations of nightshirts, pneumonia jackets, flannel blankets, and screens. She was particularly appreciative ofthe willingness of Weber Valley teachers, whose schools were closed, to serve in homes as volunteer nurses and in the hospitals as practical nurses. All were alarmed at the rapid velocity ofthe deadly disease. On the day the hospital was moved to the Congregational church, there were 26 influenza-related deaths in Salt Lake City and 6 in Ogden.

The flu continued its march across the nation. The Ogden city clerk reported 5 deaths and 175 new cases on October 19. Since October 3, when they experienced the first death, there had been 20 deaths in Ogden. Salt Lake City had had 1,179 cases of flu since October 10, with 40 deaths. The clerk reported 6 patients in the emergency hospital, with 7 others to join that day. Swainston was gratified to acknowledge the receipt of flowers, fresh vegetables, jams and jellies, flannel materials for making nightshirts and pneumonia jackets, bed screens and window curtains, and lamp shades. The hospital was now equipped with telephone connections.^ Most ofthe staff, consisting of eleven persons, were from the Ogden city schools.^ As the epidemic continued, Ogden needed additional hospital facdities, and a temporary hospital annex was built on the north end of the Dee Hospital to provide for 30 patients. The regular hospital staff and nurses of Dee would serve it The annex was ready none too soon, for 82 new cases of flu and 5 deaths were reported the next day.

Meanwhile, the LDS Relief Society provided many women to help in afflicted homes. ^ Influenza was rampant throughout Utah, as it was elsewhere in the nation. On October 30 Salt Lake City reported 2,300 cases, with a

^Ogden Standard, October 19, 1918. 'ibid., October 21, 1918. 'ibid., October 22, 23, 1918.

Infiuenza Epidemic

169

cumulative number of 117 deaths since the siege began. What alarmed everyone was that most ofthe deaths were young mothers and fathers, the most robust segment of the population. There were fewer deaths than usuad among the very young and the very old. The city adopted stringent regulations. Homes where the flu appeared must be quarantined and placarded with the word INFLUENZA in large letters. The order of the State Board of Health prohibiting public assemblages would be rigidly enforced. To make the point clear, the police arrested the proprietor and seven card-playing customers of a soft drink establishment and card room at 547 West Second South. The city also reminded citizens of the requirement that gauze masks be worn in public places.^ The schools, of course, remained closed.

With an average of fifty persons per day coming down with the flu in Ogden and almost double that number in Salt Lake City, the business of the state slowed to a standstdl. The minister of the First Baptist Church in Ogden, the city editor of the Ogden Standard, and Albert Scowcroft, a leading Ogden merchant, all died. Clerks in stores, mechanics, salesmen, farmers, and stockmenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;all were hit In some districts as many as 90 percent ofthe schoolchildren were afflicted with the flu. So urgent was the need for nurses that the Red Cross, which had already put to work the unemployed schoolteachers and actors and actresses, persuaded employers to grant any of their employees who worked all night on a nursing assignment the next day off with pay. The woman's page ofthe Ogden Standard for November 9 carried the names of forty-five schoolteachers, all women, who had volunteered to serve as nurses and helpers in homes, where they had to be housekeepers, cooks, and laundresses. In addition to Nurse Swainston and her two assistant nurses at the emergency hospital, another twenty women worked there regularly. The Standard praised them for their "heroic and selfsacrificing service." In the process, of course, some of them contracted the disease and at least three died.^^ There was no medication for influenza at the time. The patient was put to bed, kept warm with blankets and quilts, and given plenty of liquids. The windows were kept open because of the insistence upon "fresh air." If pneumonia developed, something everyone dreaded because ofthe high mortality, the attendant would put a hot pack on the chest to loosen the infection and to keep the lungs warm and place the

'ibid., October 29, 30, 31, 1918. '"ibid., November 9, 1918.

170

Utah Historical Quarterly

patient in an insulated jacket to keep the heat in. This would make it easier for the patient to breathe— to get oxygen.

Most doctors and nurses also administered "spirits"—the polite name for brandy or whiskey. Although Utah went dry on August 1, 1917, doctors, nurses, and pharmacists could administer alcohol to patients. Inevitably, some persons contracted the disease quite often or at least wanted a good preventive. A certain Ogden citizen was arrested late one evening for public intoxication. When the police dragged him to the municipal court, the man explained that he had merely drunk a bottle of whiskey he had bought two years before in Salt Lake City. He had drunk it, he explained, "to keep down an attack of influenzy." He told the judge that many doctors administered whiskey as "good for influenzy," and he hoped the court would be broadminded enough to agree with the doctors "once in a while." The judge's response: "Doctors don't order you to drink it in doses like those you had last night," whereupon "the horrid, narrow-minded judge," to use the newspaper's language, sentenced the man to a fine of $50 or thirty days in the city jail. ^^ If one were to judge by the newspapers, everyone was preoccupied, not with the deadly pesitlence that was killing so many but with the conclusion ofthe war in Europe. After several false alarms the armistice came on Monday, November 11. Should the authorities attempt to enforce the ban on public gatherings? They didn't dare! They agreed to bow to the will ofthe people "for play and jollification." And Salt Lake City, for one, "went mad," to use the journalist's phrase, and "Great joy reigned uncontrolled and uncontrollable." "It was," wrote the reporter, "a merger of the wildest New Year's Eve demonstration when John Barleycorn wielded the scepter, with the biggest Labor Day and Fourth ofJuly manifestations and the greatest of all festivals and carnivals ever witnessed in Salt Lake all rolled into one." The merged events, he wrote, "would not outshine the spontaneous people's celebration which dominated the entire community from early day to late night" A condition of "happy chaos" prevailed—so much so that an immense parade planned to take place at 3 p. m. could not proceed. The scene was so hectic that Mayor W. Mont Ferry, Commissioner Karl A. Scheid, and Chief of Police J. Parley White decided it was fudle.

Three bands that had expected to participate in the parade instead played for dances on Main Street between First and Second South. The "ibid., November 29, 1918.

Infiuenza Epidemic

171

bands alternated in three-hour shifts. In front ofthe Tribune Building in the evening was a "dense human flood." As the reporter described it, "Government ofthe streets was banished and a screaming multitude laughing and gay took possession, a riotous revel." Whistles shrieked, horns hooted, cans battered noisily, taut drums boomed forth in concomitant cacophony. "Brass bells that once dangled from the neck of a lead cow were employed to swell che dinning chorus." Whde hands manipulated rattles and squawkers, kitchens were raided in search of something to substitute for cymbals. "Even rubbish dumps were denuded of tin and iron waste to add to the uproar." The brass bands tried manfully, in vain, "to drown the inharmonious but happy ruction, which swelled in impetuosity and volume as the day and night wore on."

The Denver and Rio Grande Railroad contributed a steam locomotive that traversed the street along the rails of the streetcar company, emitting "an incessant shrieking scream." On its decks men and women, boys and girls crowded, giving the appearance of a well-laden excursion steamer. Carried away hiraself, the reporter wrote: From the high reaches of skyscrapers great showers of varicolored papers fell upon the masses in the canyon below, forming a carpet on the street. "Victory confetti" aided the carpeting process. Dignity was flung aside. William Hohenzollern [the kaiser of Germany] was hung in effigy. ^^

Other Utah communities had their own celebrationsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;perhaps not so noisy or raucous but surely as heartfelt and joyousâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and with everyone in the streets.

The outcome was predictable; there was another outbreak of "influenzy." Seventy-one new cases 'vvere reported in Ogden alone on November 13, 153 on November 15, and 123 on November 16. The impact on Salt Lake City was propordonally greater. Clearly, health had not benefited from the celebration. As one official noted, "The epidemic is not under control." Once more health officials felt the need to insist on strict regulation: all patients must be isolated, each house with a sick patient must be placarded, masks must be worn in sick rooms and in other specified places, conductors must prevent overcrowding on streetcarsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;no more than 75 passengers at any time on large streetcars and no more than 50 on smaller ones. Health officials also established business hours for grocery stores, 8 a m . to 6:30 p.m.; department stores, 9:30 a m . to5:30 p.m.; offices, 9:00 a m . to4:30 p.m.

"Salt Lake Goes Mad and Rejoices Over Peace," in Ogden Standard, November 12, 1918.

172

Utah Historical Quarterly

No social gatherings were to be held, and no stores were to hold special sales. Funeral services were limited to thirty minutes (later reduced to fifteen minutes) with no more than three vehicles besides the hearse in a cortege. No patient was to leave a quarantined house until ten days had elapsed. Enforcement ofthe emergency ordinance was facilitated by the employment of one hundred additional deputies. Within a day one person had been arrested for violation of the order and other arrests were pending. A barber who refused to wear a mask was fined $10.^^ One long-time employee of the Hotel Utah recalled the enforcement period of wearing gauze masks. Once a few ofthe management people went into the board room and removed their masks to have a smoke. Suddenly, one of them spotted a policeman approaching.

"Jiggers, a cop!" he exclaimed, whereupon all dropped their cigarettes and hurriedly replaced their masks. By the time the inspecting policeman arrived all were properly attired.'"^ Despite some merriment and ridicule, fear ofthe disease assured public support for the restrictions. A staff m e m b e r of the Salt Lake Tribune recalled that in late November he checked out of the Fort Douglas Hospital and registered at the Hotel Utah. As O. N. Malmquist wrote, "About 10 p.m. he walked from the Hotel Utah to the Newhouse Hotel and back, a distance of eight blocks on Main Street, and saw one h u m a n being and two cats. The h u m a n being, wearing a ghosdy white mask, was a night watchmaui checking shop doors. The cats were, appropriately, blacL"^^ So many people required hospitalization that t h e j u d g e Memorial Hospital, which had closed is doors in 1915, was reopened under the management ofthe Red Cross in response to the emergency.

While the larger cities were regarded as more vulnerable, smaller towns in the state also wrestled with the disease. There was a rigid quarantine in Cedar City where no person dared appear on the street without a masL In Escalante there were 200 cases ofthe flu. Panguitch, with no cases at all since the epidemic began, did not escape; on December 19 this last holdout in the state was heavily infected. Again, the onset was predictable. A soldier who returned h o m e discovered ^^ Ogden Standard, November 22, 23, 26, 30, 1918. See also Thomas G. Alexander and James B. Allen, Mormons and Gentiles: A History of Salt Lake City (Boulder, Colo.: Pruett Publishing Co., 1984), p.

182.

The informant prefers to remain anonymous. See also Nancy Rockafellar, "'In Gauze We Trust:' PubHc Health and Spanish Influenza on the Home Front, Seattle, 191^-1919," Pacific Northwest Quarterly 11 Quly 1986): 104-13. '^SeeO.N. Malmquist, TheFirstWO Years: A History of the Salt Lake Tribune, 1871-1971 (Salt Lake City: Utah State Historical Society, 1971), p. 293.

Infiuenza Epidemic

173

later that he was infected, but in the m(?antime he had been entertained at a party at which many residents were present The epidemic quickly spread through the town.^^ An official of the U.S. Public Health Service visited Utah on November 25 to "inspect what you are doing" and to urge everyone to cooperate in stamping out the evil. By that time there had been 225 influenza deaths in Ogden and more than 500 in Salt Lake City, surely ample reason for distress if not panic. " If you could see the state of many homes where sufferers lie with none to help, you would agree that the situation is appalling," said Rev. John Edward Carver, the clergyman who made the rounds with him.^^ The very day the officer visited Salt Lake City there were 21 new cases in the German prisoner-of-war camp at Fort Douglas. ^^ Soon after Thanksgiving, the number of new cases remaining large, Ogden decided to join some other local communities (e.g.. Park City) in setting up a citywide quarandne to be enforced against communities whose health regulations were not as strict as those of Ogden; specifically, this meant Salt Lake City, which had just lifted its quarantine system. Any Ogdenite who shopped or visited in Salt Lake City had to present a health certificate before he or she could re-enter Ogden and must wear a mask or pay a fine of $5. The certificate had to be signed by a physician acdng on behalf of the Salt Lake Board of Health. The certificate read: "This is to certify that the bearer (name) was on this date and at this hour seen and examined by me and shows no trace of any acute infectious disease." Officials ofthe Bamberger and Oregon Short Line radroads were instructed that thev must not accept passengers for Ogden unless they held a certificate of clearance. ^^ Salt Lake City did not take this c;dmly. The feisty director of the State Health Department, Dr. T. B. Beatty, entrained for Ogden and convened a meeting of local physicians, elected officials, businessmen, and civic leaders to make his protest^^ Said Beatty, "I was the most damned man in Utah when we imposed the ban [on October 10], and now 1 am more heatedly damned as it is lifted." Beatty said that the wearing of masks had proven ineffectiv(^, that the city should quarandne ^^Ogden Standard, December 10, 1918. "ibid., November 25, 1918. '*A dispatch from Salt Lake City in the Idaho Fads Daily Post, November 27, 1918. ^'^Ogden Standard, December 7, 9, 1918.

Considerable treatment is given to Dr. Beatty in Ralph T. Richards, Of Medicine, Hospitals, and Doctors (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1953), esp. pp. 44-50; and Joseph R. Morrell, Utah's Health and You: A History of Utah's Public Health (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1956), pp. 88151.

174

Utah Historical Quarterly

sick persons not homes, and that the ban on travel from Salt Lake to Ogden was unfair. His Ogden hearers listened politely but skepdcally and then applauded the response ofthe Ogden mayor. The only reason Dr. Beatty had lifted the ban in Salt Lake, he said, was because business interests had put pressure on him to allow people from Ogden and the smaller towns to go to Salt Lake City to buy Christmas presents. He knew this was true because the Salt Lake Board of Health and Salt Lake County Commission had issued a statement that they opposed the State Board of Health decision to lift the Salt Lake quarandne. Since the beginning of the epidemic on October 3 Ogden had reported 3,307 cases of flu, and 203 of these had been fatal. There was a slight decline from 457 cases during the last week of November to 305 cases the first week in December, but many new cases were still reported every dayâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; 30 cases that very day and 50 the day before. People were sdll dying from the disease. So Ogden condnued the rigid enforcement of its reguladons. The group agreed they might make wearing a mask voluntary. ^^ The usual frictions arose in enforcing the regulation. Highway patrolmen turned back a number of cars without certificates to the accompaniment of considerable profanity. One man was angered almost to the fighdng stage, a patrolman reported, but no arrests were made. Passengers on the trains without certificates were told not to leave the platform in Ogden. Those driving or riding through Weber County to Idaho were, of course, permitted to pass.^^ Whatever the inconveniences to Salt Lake business interests, the Ogden decision was unquesdonably popular in the Juncdon City. Letters to the editor and newspaper editorials supported condnuadon ofthe Ogden ban.^^ The relentless continuation of the epidemic caused officials in several population centers to look to further expansion of their hospital facilities. Serious consideration was given to the construction of additional buildings in Salt Lake City, Ogden, Provo, and Logan. While those plans were being studied, Ogden officials announced that the temporary emergency hospital would be moved out ofthe basement of the First Congregational Church. On November 29 they announced their decision to set up an emergency hospital in the high school where kitchen arrangements "are so perfect" A staff of nurses was ready and cots were to be sent from Fort Douglas.^"^ At a hearing that night. ^^Ogden standard, December 9, 10, 11, 1918. ^^Ibid., December 9, 1918. ^^See, e.g., ibid., November 13, 1918. ^*Ibid., November 29, 1918.

Lnfluenza Epidemic

175

however, strong objections to the plan were registered by Dr. Edward Rich, perhaps the most prominent physician in the county. He feared "permanent contamination [of the building] endangering the lives of the students returning to school." His objections, echoed by others, caused the emergency committee to investigate other options.^^ On December 2 the Elks Club, which had acquired the abandoned Central School in Ogden in 1911, proffered the club building. By the next day Swainston and her staff were prepared co receive the 35 patients transferred from the First Congregational Church hospital; eventually they were able to handle as many as 75 patients. In Myrtle Swainston. Courtesy of Harriet Arrington. addition to Swainston, three trained nurses were provided and two male nurses were requested, one for the daytime and one for the night ^^ The difficulty of finding nurses was made clear in a news release from Winnemucca, Nevada. A Basque sheepman living on a ranch near McDermott on the Oregon line said all the members of his family were down with the flu. They needed a nurse-housekeeper. He offered $20 per day to anyone who would look after his family and found no takers; in Winnemucca he found a black woman who was available for $30 per day. Seeing no alternative, he consented to pay what she asked. "I thought it was worth $30," the woman said.^^ A reporter for the Ogden Standard described the new facility: Large spacious rooms, well lighted, clean, and bright to look upon, nurses whose every movement said, "We are here to assist your speedy recovery." A . . . set ofrooms for the convenience and welfare ofthe nursing staff, and in short, to use the phrase ofthe real estate advertisement, "every modern appHance that human nature may call for" during a time of sickness . . . . Above the door and beneath the insignia B P O E . . . there ought to be written, "Abound in hope all ye who enter here."^^.

"ibid., ^^Ibid., "ibid., ^^Ibid.,

November 20, 1918.

December 2, 1918.

December 3, 1918.

December 4, 1918.

176

Utah Historical Quarterly

Early in December there were an average of 50 new cases per day and 2 or 3 deaths in Ogden, with approximately double that number in Salt Lake City. Ogden held to its regulations; on December 6 several retail store clerks failing to wear masks were taken into city court and fined.^^ On December 14 sixteen people were arrested for having a banquet at the Stimson Cafe to celebrate the departure of a friend. The police arrived at the conclusion ofthe meal, just before the celeb rators were ready to begin a dance. Five participants escaped the police by darting out the back door.^^ As the epidemic began to slow down in mid-December 1918 state health officials learned ofthe severity ofthe virus's impact on Indian reservations in Utah and Arizona where an estimated 2,000 Navajos had died. Several family groups or tribes were decimated. On the Uintah Reservation 62 had died before the end of the year, including Chief Atchee ofthe Ute Indians. Another 20 Uncompahgre Indians had also died.^^An Office of Indian Affairs report, covering influenza among American Indians for the period October 1, 1918, to March 31, 1919, indicates how severely the epidemic affected Native Americans:^^ State Arizona Colorado New Mexico Utah Total

Population 45,707 1,222 22,005 1,704 70,638

Number of Cases 17,237 399 10,550 448 28,634

Number of Deaths 1,948 59 1,214 72 3,293

Even though many deaths were probably not reported, this summary shows a far higher morbidity and mortality rate among Indians in the Four Corners area than for the general population of the region or nation. Approximately 40 percent ofthe native population came down with the flu, and almost 12 percent of those infected died. These figures are approximately four times as high as those for large cities in the United States during the same epidemic period.

City and county officials in many Utah cities decided their quarantine had been effective in controlling the spread of influenza (invariably referred to, even at this date, as Spanish influenza); and with the diminution in new cases and deaths they set Thursday, December ^"â&#x20AC;˘ibid., December 6, 1918. ^"ibid., December 14, 1918. ^'ibid., December 17, 1918, January 22, 1919; Salt Lake Tribune, January 21, 30, 1919.

"Influenza Among American Indians," Public Health Reports 34 (May 9, 1919): 1008-9.

Influenza Epidemic

177

19, as the last day of their ban. Beginning December 20 in many communities, theaters, churches, and pool rooms might open. All public assemblages except dances and funerals were free of restrictions.

Because of the approach of Christmas, schools would not open until December 30.^^ The ebb in new flu cases led Ogden to close down its emergency hospital after five weeks of healing ministry. On December 20 the four patients remaining at the Elks Club influenza unit were taken to the influenza ward ofthe Dee Hospital, and Nurse Swainston returned to Salt Lake City on December 22.^"^ After slowing down during the last two weeks of December, the epidemic suddenly speeded up again in early January when, to everyone's consternation, 108 new cases of influenza were reported in Salt Lake City, 46 in Ogden, and disturbingly large numbers in communities around the state. Was it the result of people mixing during the Christmas vacadon period? Was it the removad ofthe bans, quarandnes, and strict regulations? Or was it a renewed effort of the destructive virus? Whatever the case or causes, a new wave of sickness continued for several weeks. Fortunately, it was not as virulent as the fall epidemic.

Fewer people died, and those in the 20- to 40-year age group were not as severely affected as earlier.

The new outbreak, however, caused officials to reinstitute the prohibitions against public gatherings. Most churches held no services, and many communities closed theaters, pool halls, and civic auditoriums once again. Cities were divided on the question of schools.

Where they remained open, the principals and superintendents were instructed to take forceful action to ke(^p down the epidemic by sending home students showing signs of the disease, requiring the teachers to give lessons on "what to do," insisting on immunization, and maintaining a staff doctor and/or nurse.^^ Soon after the regulations were reinstated, three northern Utah cities faced the problem of what to do about a planned celebration for the returning 145th Light Field Artillery Regiment Organized in June 1917 from units ofthe Utah National Guard, the group had trained at

^^Ogden standard, December 18, 1918. ^''ibid., December 21, 1918. Swainston served as a private nurse at a Nevada ranch for a few months, after which she went to Hawaii where sheserv'edas superintendent of the Kapiolani (Queens Maternity Hospital in Honolulu. She married Dr. Lyman Home, Utah's first trained obstetrician, in January 1923, and later served as president ofthe Utah State Nurses' Associadon. ^^Ibid., January 11, 13, 1919.

178

Utah Historical Quarterly

Fort Douglas until October 1917 when they were ordered to Camp Kearney, near San Diego, for further training. When they left Salt Lake City there was a mammoth parade downtown where they were cheered by 20,000 young people given a special dismissal from school. Finally, after chomping at the bit to get into "the thick of it," the unit crossed the Atlantic and landed in France on September 2, 1918.

At the front, though not required to engage in offensive or defensive activity, the regiment was exposed to the Spanish flu. Some 30,000 soldiers near Bordeaux were stricken and the death toll reached 200 per day. Fourteen men ofthe 145 th died. The regiment left France December 23, landed in New York onjanuary 4, and were shortly on their way to Utah.^^ Though they had served sixteen months without action as a unit, members of the regiment were universally regarded as heroes. They deserved a parade and, according to later testimony, wanted a parade.

They would be arriving at the Ogden depot in three trains at 8:00, 8:15, and 8:30 a m . onjanuary 17. On the one hand, everyone wanted to honor the returning men; on the other hand, officials and others wondered if this would be a prelude to another round of influenza Agonizing decisions had to be made.

After an emotion-packed meeting onjanuary 15, Ogden officials decided to abandon plans for a celebration.^^ A public outcry greeted this announcement The Ogden mayor also received a telegram reply from Col. William C. Webb accompanying the troops, saying how disappointed they all were. After all, he wrote, the men had been welcomed that morning (January 16) at Green River, Wyoming, where the citizens turned out, gave a band concert, and encouraged the men to roam the town. The men had not been under quarantine at any time during their journey west; they had mingled with residents of towns all along the route from New York, and not one case of flu had developed aboard the military specials.

This was enough to persuade Ogden officials, and they announced the parade would be held the next day as originally scheduled. There The regiment consisted of 1,460 officers and enlisted men from around the state under the command of Col. Richard W. Young (later brigadier general), a grandson of Brigham Young, West Point graduate, and veteran of the Spanish-American War. The chaplain was the popular B. H. Roberts, LDS church leader, orator, and active Democrat. See Louis Paul Murray, "The Life of Brigadier General Richard W. Young" (M.S. thesis. University of Utah, 1959). See the account of Chaplain Roberts in Truman G. Madsen, Defender ofthe Faitk The B.H Roberts Story (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1980), pp. 301-14. Also Noble Warrum, Utah in the World War (Salt Lake Cit\': Utah State Council of Defense, 1924), pp. 56-59; B.H. Roberts,/I Comprehensive History ofthe Church..., 6 vols. (Salt Lake City: LDS Church, 1930), 6:457-64.

Ogden Standard, January 15, 1919.

Infiuenza Epidemic

179

would be a three-mile march in formation; the men would not be dismissed. Everyone could cheer, but tight measures would be taken to patrol the entire route. There would be no speeches and no lunch except box lunches delivered to the radroad CMS. There would be no mixing with the public. But the good intentions of both the regiment and the city were not enough.

The next morning shrieking whistles and sirens announced the special trains arriving at the Ogden depot Relatives and close friends were allowed to pass through the gates to meet "their boys." (Who would deny them?) The 1,174 men and 43 officers, dressed in full battle gear, complete with a full pack and a steel helmet, lined up behind Gov. Simon Bamberger and the regimental band to stage the biggest parade in the history of Ogden. They marched from the depot up the flagdecorated 25th Street, along Washington Boulevard to 21st, back to 28th, and again down to 25th. Some 20,000 cheering Ogdenites joined in the welcome. The police prevented most ofthe crowd from gathering at the station. There was plenty of yelling at the troops, but no soldier was allowed to break ranks. All the sch oolchildren were given a half-day

i* l i J il^-^-T^-''^

Influenza threat could not keep Ogdenites from welcoming returning 145th Field Artillery in January 1919. Courtesy of Richard C. Roberts

180

Utah Historical Quarterly

holiday and were there to cheer. Four hundred women had worked into the night preparing 1,500 box lunches.^^ The troops entrained for Logan at 10:35, 10:50, and 11:05, with a speci2d car attached to the first train for the governor and his staff, the board of trustees of the college, state officials, officials of the LDS church, the entire state legislature, and delegations from the Commercial Clubs (chambers of commerce) of Salt Lake, Ogden, and Provoâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;all told, some 350 persons in addition to the regiment Everyone in Logan, all masked with "flu protectors," came to meet them. But, as the Tribune correspondent reported, "the arrival of Utah's own regiment made them remove their masks and smile and cheer."

Just as the procession turned up Main Street a huge illuminated sign flashed "Welcome Home." In addition to box lunches. Cache County citizens gave them 200 dozen doughnuts, 10 bushels of apples, 6 cases of oranges, 115 pounds of candy, 2,000 pies, 1,200 cakes, 60 gallons of coffee, and assorted cigars, cigarettes, gum, and cookies.

As the returning troops went to their demobilizing bivouac they would have seen 53 flags flying from homes in which were resting 78 cases of influenza under quarantine. Schools were still closed, and the troops were placed in quarantine until the mustering-out process was over. This did not prevent a welcoming assembly addressed by the governor, chairman of the board of trustees, president of the LDS church, mayor of Salt Lake City, Brig. Gen. Richard W. Young, and other dignitaries.^^ The process of demobdization required a week, after which the three companies (500 men) of Salt Lake Valley and central Utah veterans left Logan by train to participate in a parade in their honor in Sadt Lake City. Having been mustered out, they would parade without heavy packs and rifles.'^^ Salt Lake newspapers, fearful that the parade would be called off, announced no new cases of flu, although, as readers learned later, the city had 124 new cases and 6 deaths onjanuary 18. The Salt Lake Board of Health unalterably opposed the parade, as did the State Board of Health. Both announced as much publicly. But the night before the cancelled parade was originally scheduled to be held. Governor Bamberger, Salt Lake Mayor Mont Ferry, and Brigadier General Young held a conference smd agreed to revoke the postponement and go ahead Ibid., January 17, 1919; Salt Lake Tribune, January 17, 1919. See also Richard C. Roberts and Richard W. Sadler, Ogden, Junction City (Northridge, Calif: Windsor Pubhcadons, 1985), p. 111.

Salt Lake Tribune, January 18, 1919.

Logan Journal, January 16 to 24, 1919.

Infiuenza Epidemic

181

with the festive parade. A public reception, however, was called off Once again, officials planned the kind of parade held in Ogden, strictly controlled to prevent any mixing of watchers and soldiers. The OSL Depot (now Union Pacific Depot) was nevertheless thronged with anxious relatives and sweethearts. Many of the khaki-clad lads wore steel helmets (which they had been permitted to keep after their discharge in Logan) and placed their gas masks at alert position as an added interest The men had not marched as far as two blocks east on South Temple from the depot before the crowd, which had stood waiting for two hours, broke and rushed in to tdke a good look at the soldiers. Police were unable (or unwdling) to handle the crowd. The soldiers (actually they were now civilians) broke ranks, waved, shook hands, and mixed with everyone."^^ The joy of reunion was soon dulled by grief and apprehension.

Within a few days, as the adarmists had predicted, there was another outbreak ofthe dreaded flu, with multiplying misery and mourning.

In the meantime, however, the disease seemed to have run its course in several communities. Utah State Agricultural College reopened onjanuary 25, after three months of shutdown because ofthe flu. The Brigham Young College, also in Logan, opened a week later. At that time Logan gave up its requiiement of wearing masks. The frustrated local health board declared: "The coming of the 145th regiment, the state legislature, and the sugar manufacturers convention so demoralized the discipline in mask wearing that the police department has been unable to enforce the ordinance for the last two weeks.'"^^ The epidemic diminished in the spring of 1919, and there were virtually no cases during the summer. A few cases were reported in the fall and many hundreds during the vrinter. By the spring of 1920 the epidemic was over. Fortunately, the infections of 1919-20 were light ones and there were few deaths.

All in all, perhaps because of their large families, Utah suffered more severely firom the influenza epidemic than any other state, with the possible exception of Colorado and Pennsylvania If one takes the cases reported to the Utah State Health Department, which is certainly not complete but stdl suggests the extent ofthe affliction, the data for the period October 1, 1918, to February 1, 1920, are as follows:"^^ Salt Lake Tribune, January 25, 1919. ^^Logan Journal, January 25, February 1, 3, 1919. ^"^Salt Lake Herald, February 22, 1920.

182

Utah Historical Quarterly

Toted cases reported Number of deaths reported

1918-1919 72,573 2,607

1919-1920 19,226 308

Total 1918-1920 91,799 2,915

In making this report, state health commissioner T.B. Beatty expressed his belief that there had been no fewer than 130,000 cases in the state in 1918-19 and that the above figures, based on reported cases, grossly understated the true impact ofthe disease. Not quite 4 percent of those who came down with the disease in 1918-19 died. Not quite 2 percent died in 1919-20. In Salt Lake City the percentage of deaths approximated 6 percent in 1918-19 and 4 percent in 1919-20.

The U.S. Public Health Service, to which Utah was one of thirtyfour "registration states," gave the following summary ofthe cases and deaths from influenza-pneumonia by years, as foUows:'^'^ Utah population, 1920 Deaths from Influenza and Pneumonia, October 1 to December 31,1918 Deaths, January 1 to June 30, 1919 Deaths, July 1 to December 31,1919 Deaths, 1920

449,396 1,800 1,044 162 574

The Utah State Department of Health prepared a more accurate summary in 1941.*^ Year 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921

Cases of Influenza-Pneumonia 766 834 44,900 30,352 33,361 1,598

Deaths 293 257 2,282 Inc. 1,170 547

To this day medicad historians are not certain why the epidemic of 1918-19 took place, why it was so deadly, why it ended, or where it went But the lives of many Utahns were affected—many lost parents, brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts. And some still alive—and I am one of them—just barely survived this virsd holocaust

Bureau of Census, Mortality Statistics, 1919 (Washington, D . C : Government Prindng Office, 1921), pp. 28-31; and Bureau of Census, Mortality Rates, 7970-792(7 (Washington, D . C : Government Prindng Office, 1923), pp. 63-68. ''^Utah State Department of Health, Division of Communicable Disease Control, Morbidity and Mortality Report, Communicable Diseases, 1941.

Moab, Utah, about the time ofthe infiuenza epidemic USHS collections.

The Influenza Epidemic of 1918: A Cultural Response

BY ROBERT S. MCPHERSON

A s 1918 DREW TO A CLOSE, THE BLOODY ANNALS OF World War I bccame a part of history and a prelude to the fiope for peace. Another enemy, however, stalked the living, spreading death throughout the world.

Even in countries that were technologically advanced in health care, such as the United States, the disease Imown as Spanish influenza took its toll, kilhng over 21,000 Americans in the last week of October.^ Spread primarily through the respiratory system, the sickness leaped Dr. McPherson teaches history at the College; of Eastern Utah, San J u a n Center, and is a m e m b e r ofthe Advisory Board of Editors of Utah Historical (^larterly. A version of this article appeared in Blue Mountain Shadows, spring 1988.

'Joseph E. Persico, "The Great Swine Flu Epidemic of 1918," American Heritage 27 (June 1976): 28.

184

Utah Historical Quarterly

from person to person, from community to community, and from region to region, infecting the masses with an often nonlethal but invariably difficult illness that affected them for as long as a month.

The purpose of this article is to compare reactions to the influenza epidemic of 1918-19 in a limited geographical area-southeastern Utahâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and to show how differing cultural responses influenced the severity of the disease. This region is ideal for anedysis because of its diversity, ranging from Euro-American to Native American and from scientific medicine to folk remedies, animistic divination, and ceremonial practices. What emerges is a better understanding ofthe cultural values that pervaded the societies found in the Four Corners area at that time.

The origin of Spanish influenza is still not clear. Despite its name, this strain most likely started in the United States and spread to Europe.

The first cases of sickness were reported at Fort Riley, Kansas, where dust and smoke from burning manure infected soldiers, over 1,100 of whom became sick with forty-six actually dying. ^ Later, some ofthe troops training at Fort Riley deployed to Europe for service in the war and with them traveled the influenza virus. ^ It spread rapidly, first to the soldiers fighting on both sides ofthe war and then to the civilian masses who welcomed them home.

Rural as well as metropolitan areas suffered from the disease, and the West was no exception. Moab, Utah, first reported an outbreak of influenza on October 18, 1918, when three cases appeared in the J. P. Miller family."^ The town reacted immediately. Fearing the effects ofthe disease then sweeping the nadon. Dr. J. W. Williams, Moab's health officer, ordered the closing of schools, churches, and other places of public gathering. The community fully supported his actions, especially the children, half of whom were withdrawn from school as soon as the disease's presence was reported.

The State Board of Health next went to work, oudining precautions to be taken and publishing them in the Grand Valley Times of Moab. Most of these instructions were common knowledge, such as having plenty of bed rest, eating healthy food, and seeking a doctor's care; other practices were more innovative. For instance, the Board of Health encouraged people to keep a bedroom window open at all times, to "take medicine to open the bowels freely," and to wear a gauze mask that covered the 'ibid. ^William H. NcNeil, Plagues and People (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday Press, 1976), p. 289. ''"Influenza Breaks Out in Moab," Grand Valley Times, October 18, 1918, p. 1.

Infiuenza: A Cultural Response

185

nose and mouth when entering a sickroom.^ How many people complied with these instructions is noi: known. Within a week's time the ban on public gatherings in Moab was lifted because no more cases of influenza had appeared. In Monticello, however, fifty-five mdes to the south, the first two incidents of the disease were reported.^ Moab's respite from influenza was short-lived. By November 1 newspaper headlines splashed warnings ofthe "alarming" spread ofthe disease aind reported two deaths from it in M^oab and two in Monticello. The disease attacked sixty miners in Sego, a coal camp near Moab, while at least six new cases were reported within city limits.

Dr. Williams and the city council took prompt action again, posting guards on the outskirts of town to stop visitors and direct them to the local hotel where they were quai^antined for four days, examined by the doctor, and released if they showed no sign of illness. Failure to comply with these regulations could result in a misdemeanor charge and a fine of up to $100. Williams and the city council prohibited all public gatherings in Moab and applauded the many citizens who wore gauze masks outside of their homes. ^ Normal activities in rural Moab ceased. The election process in Grand County became more difficult as campaigning for political office stopped. The drafting of soldiers for the fln^d phase ofthe war slowed down; and because the flu was raging in the cantonments in northern Utah, the seventeen men already qualified for service were held in Moab until the epidemic abated. When district attorney Knox Patterson became ill, cases before the district court for San Juan and Grand counties were postponed.^ Moab sheriff W. J. Bliss and marshal Abe Day enforced the new local law on wearing masks and prevented attempts of people to gather in large numbers. Even funeral services were not held because of the quarantine.

Still the epidemic raged. Particularly hard hit were occupations that required people to work in large numbers at close quarters. Sego reported 100 flu cases, while everyone was sick in bed at a uranium camp on Polar Mesa. In Monticello the Mexican population was the hardest hit, with 40 cases of influenza..^ A prominent livestock owner, Ed Taylor, who had accompanied his large herd of sheep to market ^Ibid. .v, ''"No Further Cases of Influenza Make Appearance in Moab," Grand Valley Times, October 25, 1918, p. 1. '"Influenza Spreading at Alarming Rate," Grand Valley Times, November 1, 1918, p. 1. **Ibid.; "Court Postponed on Account of Influenza," Grand Valley limes, November 1, 1918, p. 1. '"Flu Epidemic on Decline," Grand Valley Time::, N o v e m b e r s , 1918, p. 1.

186

Utah Historical Quarterly

"back East," apparently contracted the disease there. While returning home he stopped at Grand Junction, Colorado, where he sickened and died.^° Thus, ordinary business practices also opened the doors to affliction.

Late in November the citizens of Moab started to congratulate themselves on beating the contagion. The disease appeared to have run its course with no new cases reported. The satelhte mining communities seemed ready to start back into production. The doctor lifted the quarantine in Moab and school and public gatherings resumed. The control of visitors continued in effect, however. With the Christmas season, peace and good will replaced the fear ofthe previous month.

Yet it was during the Christmas gatherings that a new onslaught of influenza got its start By January 3, 1919, banner headhnes again proclaimed 100 cases of influenza in Moab. A week later the number had jumped to 250. Cold, wet weather encouraged incubation ofthe disease, causing it to soar again to epidemic proportions.

Dr. Williams telegraphed for assistance, receiving another doctor from the State Board of Health and two nurses from Colorado. After again suspending any type of public meeting, Wdliams set about establishing a fifty-bed hospital in the high school for the seriously afflicted. Two nurses operated the facility, while the physicians handled the vaccinations. Although the doctors claimed the serum was "an almost infallible preventive," the various strains of influenza proved too versatde to be brought under control. ^ ^ The type of vaccine used is not known; several varieties were available at the time, including a mixture of organisms from influenza patients, diphtheria antitoxins, and antitetanus and antimeningitis serums. ^^ Immunity was seldom achieved. One report stated, "A number of people who had the disease a month ago are again stricken, indicating that no one is immune . . . ."^^ During the first bout with influenza late in 1918 a strict external quarantine had sealed Moab off from the outside world. By early January the Times could report that "Travel to and from Moab is in no way restricted, so far as local authorities are concerned. People from the outside will be free to come here and transact their business. The neighboring towns, however, have indicated that they will establish

"Influenza Claims Prominent Stockman," Grand Valley Times, November 22, 1918, p. 1. ""Influenza Raging in Moab," Grand Valley 7i!?n^5, January 3, 1919, p. 1.

Persico, "The Great Swine Flu Epidemic," p. 82.

"Influenza Raging in Moab."

Infiuenza: A Cultural Response

187

Dr. J. W. Williams with his son who had returned from World War I and other family members Courtesy ofEddah Shields.

stringent quarantine against people coming from or passing through Moab." '^ These changes were at least in part due to the large number of sick in Moab; Dr. Wdliams estimated that two-thirds ofthe town, or about 500 people, were by then afflicted. ^^ Other interesting sidelights to the epidemic were the curesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; advertised and unadvertisedâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;used to fight the malady. Whiskey was one ofthe most desirable, ten gallons of which Williams ordered from state sources. Because Utah was already dry and the Eighteenth Amendment, requiring national prohibition, was in the process of ratification, legal sources of alcohol Avere disappearing. The assistant physician. Dr. C. Clark, was supposed to bring ten gadlons to Moab with him and deliver it to the sheriff, who would in turn dispense it under doctor's orders, thus circumventing a state law forbidding shipment of alcohol The whiskey was not released t;o Dr. Clark, however, prompting another flurry of letters from the concerned citizens of Moab. Statements such as". .. ship whiskey. Have eleven down with flu," and"Have two chddren and wife in bed. Come through if possible," were attached to a petition signed by "every businessman, county and town officers and the Baptist minister." Acting in Gov. Simon Bamberger's absence, '^bid.

15a 250 Cases of Influenza Develop during Week," Grand Valley Times, January 10, 1919, p. 1.

; 88

Utah Historical Quarterly

Harden Bennion, the secretary of state, relented and sent a special courier to Moab with two gallons ofthe illegal brew.^^ Commercial sales of medication skyrocketed. Advertisements warned: "Druggists!! Please Note Vick's VapoRub Oversold Due to Present Epidemic . . . Last Week's Orders called for One and Three Quarter Million Jars—Today s Orders Alone Number 932,459 Jars." ^ ^ The firm was stepping up production in an effort to meet the unprecedented demand. Another product. Dr. Kilmer's Swamp-Root was advertised as healing the kidneys after an attack of grip . . . . A Trial will convince anyone who may be in need of i t " Eatonic, on the other hand, supposedly helped "Milhons [who] are now suffering from the after effects ofthe deadly flu... by giving attention to the stomach— that is removing acidity and toxic poisons . . . ."^^ The Moab Board of Headth offered a different kind of advice by warning that "Two or three days lost from work or business has a distinct advantage over paying the undertaker." The health announcement concluded by stating, "The Creator provided all the oxygen necessary in the fresh air, therefore, don't shut this out of your home and then in case of sickness pay good money for a tank of oxygen . . . ."^^ Byjanuary 17 the epidemic in Moab was starting to abate. Reports for that week indicated only five new cases of flu, and many of those previously afflicted were on the mend. Dr. Williams estimated that a total of 250 people in the town had not contracted the disease, in comparison to "the great majority ofthe people of Moab [who] have already had the disease."^^ The townspeople heaped praise upon Doctors Wdliams and Clark for their round-the-clock efforts, while the doctors lauded the work of the nurses in the temporary high school hospital and the serum made available for vaccinations. The hospital proved to be the most expensive ofthe community's efforts, costing almost $1,700 for less than a month's operation during which only ten very critical cases were handled. ^^ In summarizing the city of Moab's experience, one finds an organized, orderly approach to combating the effects of influenza Two """Influenza Raging in Moab"; "Troubles Had in Getting Whiskey for Influenza," Grand Valley Times, January 10, 1919, p. 3. '^Advertisement, Grand Valley Times, November 15, 1918, p. 4. '^Advertisement, Grand Valley Times, January 2)1, 1919, p. 4. '^"Influenza-Play Safe," Grand Valley Times, January 10, 1919, p. 4. ^°"Flu Situation Much Improved," Grand Valley Times, January 17, 1919, p. 2; "Epidemic Has Been Stamped Out in Moab," Grand Valley Times, January 24, 1919, p. 1. ^'ibid; "Flu Hospital Expense Totals Nearly $1700," Grand Valley 7i!m^.j, January 31, 1919, p. 1.

Infiuenza: A Cultural Response

189

Grayson Co-op in Blanding.

USHS collections

doctors, two nurses, and an active Board of Health combined in an effective program of quarantine, vaccination, hospitalization, home he^dth care, and informational services. Cooperation proved to be the rule and not the exception, the end result being that fewer than a dozen people died during the combined November and January outbreaks.

Byjanuary 31 the Moab Board of Health could lift its ban on public gatherings and allow normal town life to resume.

Smaller communities to the south, such as Monticello and Blanding, lacked the organization and the medical care avadable in Moab. Nevertheless, their small size and overwhelmingly Mormon population fostered cooperation of a different nature and helped many to survive. For instance, when the owner of the Grayson Co-op in Blanding became sick, customers stopped by his home, got the key, opened the store, and took what they needed with a promise to pay later.^^ Although most ofthe town was afflicted at one time or another with the disease, some men and women made a daily practice of helping their neighbors. The men hauled wood, fed livestock, and performed heavier chores, while the womenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;including knowledgeable midwivesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;cared for the sick and helped in the home.^^ Professional ^^Margie Lyman interviewed by Helen Shumway on April 11, 1986, tape in possession of Shumway. ^^Ibid.; Mae Black interviewed by Janet Wilco>: onjuly 15, 1987, San J u a n County Historical Society, pp. 3-4; Ray Redd interviewed byjody Bailey onjuly 16, 1987, San J u a n County Historical Society, pp. 5-6.

190

Utah Historical Quarterly

medical help was limited to infrequent visits from the doctor in Moab.

To speed his travel to Monticello town members met him approximately halfway with afresh team of horses.^'* No doctor visited Blanding during the epidemic.

As in Moab, public meetings and schools came to a halt in many outlying areas, but some activities had to continue. One woman who lived in the community of Dove Creek, Colorado, just over the Utah border, ran a combination store and post office in 1918 while her husband was in the Cortez hospital with typhoid fever. She remembered how she " saw them bringing in [ to the hospital] big, husky, young men. They were bringing them in delirious and maybe in an hour or two they'd be d e a d . . . . One fellow came and stayed overnight The next day or two later, he was dead."^^ For some ofthe sick, folk remedies served an important function in the healing process. Beyond bed rest and warm food, a common treatment was to apply mustard plasters to the patient's chest to provide heat^^ Qiainine helped to break the fever, hot packs and warm olive oil relieved the pain of earaches, and wild sage boiled in water and sweetenedwithhoneyloosened a congested chest One man, ill with the flu in a lonely campsite, doctored himself back to health by eating a big gob of pine pitch.-'' The folk repertoire also included preventive measures such as eating wild garlic and hanging a bag of asafetida around the neck. This latter substance is an offensive smelling resinous material extracted from the roots of sever^d kinds of plants. One survivor ofthe ordeal of wearing asafetida swore that" It's the stinkingest stuff. . . ever . . . but it makes a good coyote bait"^^ Unfortunately, no statistics exist for the effects of influenza in these outlying areas since there was no newspaper, no doctor, and no official organization to record the number of patients. A general impression gathered from oral interviews is that most families in these communities were afflicted, some more seriously than others, and that the mortality rate was higher than in Moab.

Of all the peoples in the Four Corners area the Native Americans, especially the Navajos, seemed to suffer the most Oral tradition has Redd interview, p. 6. ^^Pearl Butt interviewed bvjody Bailey onjuly 2, 1987, San Juan Countv Historical Society, pp. 1-2. '"ibid., p. 9. ' Lyman interview, p. 4; Black interview, p. 7; Seraphine Frost interviewed by Deniane Gutke onjuly 6, 1987, San Juan County Historical Society, p. 2; Rusty Musselman interviewed by Robert S. McPherson o n j u l y 6, 1987, San J u a n County Historical Society, p. 2. 'ÂŤIbid.

Infiuenza: A Cultural Response

191

kept alive the trauma that accompanied the disease. Although much of what was done to prevent it may appear to an outsider as ineffective, the main response to the disease for Navajos was a religious one. To them much of life and its accompanying problems carry supernatural significance that must by dealt with in both the spiritual and the physical realms of this world. The result is a practical, logical approach to disease prevention and cure according to traditional beliefs.

Events do notjust happen. Omens appear beforehand but may not be recognized as such until after the fact So it was with the influenza epidemic. On June 8, 1918, a solar eclipse occurred, presaging misfortune. The sun, an important Navajo deity, hid his light from his people because of his anger and so warned that a catastrophe would soon take place.^^ During the summer and fall, dawns and sunsets had pronounced reddish hues that bathed the landscape in an ominous red.

The tips of pinyon and juniper trees scarted to die, a sign indicating that sickness was in the area and would be visiting humans. Some Navajos had bad dreams portending disaster. Some informants indicated that the Holy Beings (gods) sent the disease in order to make room for a growing population of young people; still others suggested that poison gas or the smoke and fumes from artillery rounds fired in World Wai' I somehow infected the people.^° But whatever the reason for the epidemic, the Navajos were ill prepared for the ensuing sickness.

Because their reservation is spread over a large geographical area, with many access routes and a mobile population, it is difficult to identify the actual entry ofthe epidemic. For instance, Louisa Wetherill (AsdzaaiiTs'osi or "Slim Woman"), the wife ofJohn Wetherill, a trader in Kayenta, Arizona, told of visiting many Navajo homes in southern Utah and northern Arizona to solicit sheep for the war effort As she traveled from hogan to hogan she became increasingly tired and suffered from severe headaches which later proved to be symptoms of the flu. She noted that the first death from this disease was in the area of Black Mesa, not far from where she had been visiting. Within a week her Navajo host was also dead, and by the time she arrived back at her trading p)ost her front yard was filled with stricken Navajos. The Indians

'^GladysA. Keic\\ax6.,NavahoReligion, A Study of Symbolism ['Pnnccx.on, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 19; Ada Black interviewed by Bertha Parrish on June 18, 1987, San Juan County Historical Society, pp. 1-2. ^^Blackinterview, pp. 1-2; Rose Begay interviewed by Bertha Parrish onjune 17, 1987, Sanjuan County Historical Society, p. 3; TaUis Holliday intei"viewed by author, November 3, 1987, tape in possession of author; Fred Yazzie interviewed by author on November 5, 1987, tape in possession of author.

192

Utah Historical Quarterly

reacted by destroying the dwelling where a death occurred, and "Soon all over the reservation, smoke was rising from the hogans of the dead."^^ Louisa Wetherill may not have been the first to introduce the disease, but she was most likely an unwitting transmitter of it Other examples indicate how the disease spread. A Yeibichai ceremony was held in late October in Blue Canyon, approximately eighteen miles east of Tuba City. Many ofthe people who gathered for the performance contracted the disease but showed no symptoms for a week or two after. Navajos in the Monument Valley area claimed to have contracted the disease from Paiutes and Utes as they moved from Navajo Mountain to Allen Canyon and the area around Blanding.^^ Navajo miners returning to the reservation from the Silverton and Durango, Colorado, areas were infected as they passed through various towns, unwittingly spreading the disease along the northeastern boundary of Navajo lands. The first reported case occurred at the Shiprock Boarding School during the week of October 6. A letter to the commissioner of Indian Affairs noted that "About one week prior to its advent on the agency, the towns to the east, north, and south had . . . their first cases, and in varying degrees of intensity, but these are all located at such distances and with such slow means of communication, that the disease here spread as rapidly as the news."^^ The effects of influenza among the Navajos were deadly. Some of the best eyewitness accounts come from traders living on or near the reservation. These men and women were known and trusted by their Indian clients who came to them for assistance in this time of dire need.

Ken and Hdda Faunce ran the Covered Water trading post in northern Arizona Near their establishment large groves of pinyon trees bore a heavy crop of nuts which attracted many Navajos to the harvest Exposed to cold temperatures and driving rains, the unsuspecting infected victims attempted to collect nuts until they were quickly overcome by the disease. Whole families died by their wagons, vainly seeking shelter from the storms and relief from the flu.^'^ Frances Gillmor and Louisa Wade Wetherill, Traders to the Navahos (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1953), pp. 222-24. ^'Scott C. Russell, "The Navajo and the 1918 Pandemic," Health and Disease in the Prehistoric Southwest (Tempe: Arizona State University, 1985), p. 385; Yazzie interview.

L. L Gulp to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, "Report on the Influenza Epidemic at the San J u a n Indian Agency," March 1, 1919, p. 2, Letters Receivea by Office of Indian Affairs, New Mexico, 1919, National Archieves, Washington, D.C. ^*HildaFaunce,Z)ei^rt 11^5/^ (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1928), pp. 296-97; Albert B. Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," Proceedings ofthe Indian Academy of Science 29 (Fort Wayne, Ind., 1921), p. 246; Gillmor and Wetherill, Traders to the Navahos, p. 227.

193

Infiuenza: A Cultural Response

Medical help in the hogan consisted of wise use of herbs and help from the medicine man. Courtesy of San Juan County Historical Commission

Even those who remained at home were often deprived of their warm winter hogans, abandoning them once a person had died inside.

The belief that the spirit ofthe deceased remained in the vicinity where the death occurred in order to haunt the living because of loneliness created a fear that drove the survivors into temporary brush shelters that provided ineffective protection from the cold and rain.^^ The results were inevitable. Influenza raged across the landscape, destroying entire families at a time. One eyewitness rejDorted that whole famihes were wiped out, leaving their flocks wandering over the hills at the mercy ofthe wolves. Several related families living together all died but one small boy who was found herding the combined flocks of sheep. . . . A Piute woman died on their reservation north ofthe San Juan River.

Fleeing from the place ofthe dead, the husband and five children crossed the river into the Navajo country with their sheep where they died one by

^^Yaunce, Desert Wife, p. 297; GiUmor and Wetherill, Traders to the Navahos, pp. 226-28; Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," pp. 246-47.

194

Utah Historical Quarterly one along the trail. Only one little boy survived and he is so small that he is unable to give his parents' name.^^

Louisa Wetherill reported a constant flow of Navajos at her trading post seeking help with burials. Although it took two weeks for her husband to recover from his bout with the flu, both she and John spent considerable time burying the dead and nursing the living. He estimated that by December 6, in Kayenta alone, he had interred over 100 Navajos.^^ Hilda Faunce helped a woman who requested a wooden box in which to bury her child. Although this was against traditional practices, the bereaved mother explained that her son had gone away to school in California and had watched the buriad of some Navajos, after which no building was destroyed or deserted. " H e had not noticed any ill luck had followed such buri2ds; therefore, he thought... perhaps the b o x . . . kept the gods from being angry because the buildings were not burned."^^ In most instances, white traders dug holes for a final resting place, burned the deserted hogan with the dead inside, or simply closed the doors after shoveling dirt on the deceased. One government stockman riding the range in April 1919 buried two influenza victims who had died in their hogan the previous fall. Another man remembered parties of white volunteers from Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah going into the remote canyons of the reservation to bury the dead.^^ Thus geographical isolation and traditional beliefs combined to make suffering and death a lonely experience for the afflicted.

The Navajo response to this catastrophe came in two formsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; spiritual and physical. To them the roots of the epidemic lay in the spiritual realm, and so successful prevention and treatment would be found in religious practices. The Navajos used two types of ceremonies to cure patients, the Blessing Way (Hozhooji) and the Evil Way (Hochxoo'ji). The former is a ritual that encourages beauty, health, and harmony to surround a person, while the latter protects a patient by fending off evil in a variety of forms. The ultimate aim of both ceremonies is to protect a person from harm and provide prayers acceptable to the Holy Beings, who in turn give the necessary help."^^ Medicine men ^^Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," p. 246. ^'"Navajo Indians Are Dying by Hundreds," Grand Valley Times, December 6, 1918, p. 1. ^*Faunce, Desert Wife, pp. 299-300. ^'Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," p. 274; Ray Hunt interviewed byjanet Wilcox on July 20, 1987, Sanjuan County Historical Society, p. 15. * Yazzie interview; Holliday interview.

Influenza: A Cultural Response

195

were kept busy traveling about to perform ceremonies for the sick; how many cases ofthe disease were spread through these unwitting vectors and the close contact required in the rituals will never be known, but in the mind ofthe Navajos these healers saved many lives and performed a valuable service comparable to the work of the doctors in Moab.

Prayers, not vaccine, held the cure.

In the isolated northern part of the reservation some famdies improvised when they could not obtain the services of a medicine man.

One Navajo man remembered: In those first days when the rains were cold and the Deneh [Dine' or "The People"] were sick and died everywhere, two of my boys had the very hot bodies and could not get up. I went for a medicine man, and another, and another, many of them, but they were sick themselves or were singing the chants for others who had the sickness. All ofthe two days I rode but could find no one to go to my hogan to save my boys. At home I found the women and all ofthe other children, nine altogether, were very, very sick too . . . . I rode away again, seeking a m<?dicine man. Where the cedar trees grow thick on the hill that stops suddenly I got off my horse to pray. I prayed to several Deneh gods that know me; then I knew I must be the doctor for my family and I took berries from the cedar trees and gathered plants here and there. It was slow work in the rain, but there were those nine sick ones in my hogan.

The plants and the berries I boiled with water in the coffeepots and gave each of my family a drink. I sang one ofthe songs for healing and gave another a drink. So I timed the doses un til the medicine was gone, and I . . . got more plants and made medicine and the sick ones drank.

There were days when no one came to my hogan. I did not sleep but sang the prayers and gave the medicine until all. . . was well.

Although there were a multitude of protective symbols invoked through formal ceremonies, two objects served as primary means to ward off the disease. Arrowheads and fire pokers embodied protective values that were repeated often in Navajo mythology and religious beliefs. The arrowheads, for instance, were first used long ago by the Anasazi to kill enemies and protect their people; similar reasoning led the Navajos to use these projectde points in ceremonies as protective devices to ward off the disease that was killing them. The arrowheads served as "a shield to the patient and those who are involved in the ceremony . . . and the things that are not seen just go back where they come from.'"^^ The points may be left in the hogan for up to four days following the ceremony. *'Faunce, Desert Wife, pp. 301-2. ^^Yazzie interview.

196

Utah Historical Quarterly

The fire poker, another important symbol of protection, delineated a line across which evil and sickness could not pass. This concept barkens back to physical warfare, geographical boundaries, and sanctified territory; but during the flu epidemic the hogan was the major spiritual realm demanding protection. Used both in ceremonies and as a general talisman, the poker represented "Forked lightning, rainstreamer, and zigzag and straight lightning, symbols that prevent the enemy [evil] from crossing.'"^^ One woman reported.

At night my father would lean a wood fire poker against the north side of the hogan. He would sit up and tell us, "Sleep my children, but do not go on the north side ofthe hogan. If you want to go outside, go out on this side only." He would pray all through the night. What prayers he prayed I do not know. No illness came over us, not even a headache.^'^

The poker also had prayers said over it, adding to the already potent association of fire and its role in protecting and serving the home. At the conclusion ofthe Evil Way ceremony, the medicine man took four fire pokers from the ritual to the east and, with plants and other materials, placed them in a tree. If they remained secure for a month or two, then the participants knew that the offering of prayers and chants was accepted by the Holy Beings."^^ So vital were these prayers and protective devices, it is believed by some Navajos today, that those who did not have them were the ones who died."*^ Dreams, as omens, continued to play an important role during the sickness. One Navajo thanked Louisa Wetherill for visiting him in his hogan while he was dl. After telling him she had not seen him, he assured her that she had come in a dream and said that he must not die.

The man firmly believed her spirit made the visit Another trader was told by a patron that he had almost died but, "When I got to the other side, I saw my brothers. They came to get me. They were sdl riding horses. But I had no horse, because there was no one left to kill my horse. I couldn't join them without a horse. So I came back."^'' A similar problem occurred one early winter morning when a man appeared at the Wetherills' trading post, asking for a gun to kill a horse. â&#x20AC;˘^^Reichard, Navaho Religion, pp. 545-46, 581. ^''Pearl Phillips interviewed by Bertha Parrish onjune 17, 1987, Sanjuan County Historical Society, p. 3; also Begay interview, p. 2.

Yazzie interview.

Ibid.; Holliday interview; Begay interview, p. 3.

Gillmor and Wetherill, pp. 226-27; Willow Roberts, Stokes Carson: Twentieth Century Trading on the Navajo Reservation (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1987), p. 26.

Influenza: A Cultural Response

197

He explained, "Two days ago my little boy was buried... but they killed no horse for him to ride. Already he has nearly completed the second circle on foot, and he is only seven years old. He will be tired now. Lend me a gun that I may kill a horse.'"^^ His request was granted.

Although the major emphasis in combatting the disease was religious, the Navajos also employed a number of physical cures. Sweat baths provided both physical cleansing and spiritual preparation for ceremonies. People crowded into a small hogan-like structure and baked in the intense temperatures created by heated rocks. Because influenza is primarily a respiratory disease, the crowded sweat bath, like the ceremonies, encouraged its spread.

The Navajos also used bitter herbal remedies made from boded sagebrush and juniper to wash the body and for cleansing internally.

Sagebrush tea helped sooth sore throats, while juniper pitch mixed with a special kind of sand and plastered on the outside of the throat forced pus from the infected areas."^^ Another medicine given to patients came from thejuice of Arizonajimson [datura], which caused the pulse to quicken and the padent to be delirious. One person who tookjimson as a cure had a recorded pulse of 240.^° Physical treatments also included either fasting for ceremonies or eating for satiety. Extremes in either case could prove fatal.

At o n e place on the reservation, during the plague, meat balls the size of one's t h u m b were forced down the patients who were too weak and sick to eat until no m o r e could be forced down them. T h e stomach of an influenza vicdrn at another place, who had been a b a n d o n e d and partly eaten by the wolves, was seen to contain about a quart of corn which had probably been boiled before it was forced down him. Such padents usually . . . died.^'

This report also mentioned that a massage and series of contordons were also part of some treatments: "As the disease usually terminated in pneumonia and consequently the lungs became 'tight,' the medicine man jumped on the chest to loosen up the lungs." Thus, in many instances, the "cure" was as painful as the affliction.

Utes and Paiutes living in the Four Corners region were also affected by the disease, but apparently not to the same extent as the Navajos. The Ute agent, headquartered at Towaoc outside Cortez, Colorado, reported a populadon of 300 Indians on his reserve. Many of "Gillmor and Wetherill, Traders to the Navahos, pp. 225-26. ^^HoUiday interview; Yazzie interview; Begay interview, p. 4. ^°Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," p. 247. ^'Ibid.

198

Utah Historical Quarterly

them traveled off their lands and so had ample opportunity to contract the disease. But by December 27 there had been only a few deaths because the Utes had "yielded readily to medical treatment [which was not nearly as available to the Navajos], and seemed to suffer much less than their Indian neighbors."^^ A possible explanation is that, in addition to medical help, the curing practices ofthe Utes did not stress congregating in order to perform ceremonies. In fact, "When the flu was bad, most ofthe Indians left the agency. . . ."^^ The Utes did not escape the effects of influenza entirely, however.

Like the Navajos, they fled from their tepees when someone died inside and thus fell prey to the elements and the disease. Many of them had trouble understanding how white men could get sick, take medicine, and get better, while the Indians took the same medicine and died.

Apparently by the end ofthe epidemic, white doctors lacked easy access to the Utes who suggested "maybeso medicine given Indian was coyote bait [poison]."^'^ Mistrustful, some Utes ran from their camps to hide when a white man approached, fearing he might be a doctor. By February 22, 1919, the epidemic had subsided.^^ The end of the epidemic on the northern part of the Navajo Reservation raised the question of how many deaths had occurred.

Because ofthe lack of records, a definitive answer cannot be given and even an esdmate is difficult to obtain. One trader, John L. Oliver of Mexican Hat, suggested that at least 3,000 Indians had succumbed to the disease on the reservation.^^ The Walketon Independent and the Indian School Journal both reported that 2,000 Navajos in the southern part of the reservation had died, a figure considered too high by some, based on a total tribal population estimated at between 31,390 and 35,000.^^ The northern and western agencies, extending from Shiprock to Tuba City, had population estimates that ranged between 6,500 and 8,000, with a suspected 75 percent incidence of influenza and a death rate of between 8.75 and 15 percent The overall tribal population showed a 5.5 percent decrease between the 1918 and 1919 agency figures.^^ The agency schools provide a far more accurate picture of the effects of the disease on the children, but their living conditions and "The Influenza among the Utes," Mancos Times Tribune, December 27, 1918, p. 1.

"Superstitious Utes," Mancos Times Tribune, December 13, 1918, p. 1, 3.

Ibid.; "Influenza Very Bad among Indians," Mancos Times Tribune, December 13, 1918, p. 1, 3.

"Hearings on Indian Estates," Mancos Times Tribune, February 21, 1919, p. 1. ^^"3,000 Navajos Succumb to Flu, Says Indian Trader," Grand Valley Times, January 3, 1919, p. 1.

"Russell, "The Navajo," p. 382; Reagan, "The Influenza and the Navajo," p. 243. ^ Russell, "The Navajo," p. 382; Gulp to Commissioner, p. 2.

Influenza: A Cultural Response

199

access to medical attention were far different from those found in the rough canyon country of southern Utah and northern New Mexico and Arizona For instance, in the Shiprock Agency School 200 of the 225 pupils were sick and 18 died, giving a mortality rate of 9 percent All 81 students at the Toadalena Boarding School contracted the disease and 10 died, for a mortality rate of 12 percent At the Tuba City Boarding School 138 students were sick but only 2 died, for a mortality rate of 1.5 percent^^ The higher death rates seemed to be in direct proportion to the amount and type of care rend(^red the sicL As an illustration, Toadalena had the highest mort^dity rate though it had the smallest student population. The principal neglected to meet the needs of the sick students and was chastised following a special investigation.^^ But deaths among the vast majority of Navajos living at large were never investigated.

In summarizing the effects of the influenza epidemic on the various populations in the Four Corners region, one sees the importance of cultural beliefs, social practices, and economic patterns. For instance, the people of Moab viewed the epidemic in terms of a respiratory ailment that could be avoided by limiting contact with others, by following contemporary medical practices, and by leaving the major decisions to medical professionals. Newspapers advertised cures, the Board of Health organized a hospital, and outside aid in the form of nurses, vaccines, and commercial products became part ofthe health care scheme. Even the legal system joined the fray by passing laws and requiring the sheriff, marshal, and volunteer citizens to enforce them.

All of this was done in a rural town with a small population.

The even smaller communities of Monticello and Blanding, on the other hand, had a limited access to professional care. Their predominantly Mormon populations, turned inward for succor. Cooperation and help were of greater necessity and the burden of health care and farming chores rested squarely on those men and women who felt compassion and were not afflicted. Home remedies and self-doctoring eased the suffering of many and were generally aligned (though not in every case) with an understanding ofthe physical disease and how it was spread. There is no indication that religious practices intensified; indeed, organized religious services came to a halt For the Navajos an entirely different response was necessary because the epidemic lay in the realm of religion and spirituality. ^^Ibid.; Reagan, " T h e Influenza and the Na\'ajo," p. 245.

Gulp to Commissioner, pp. 7-9.

200

Utah Historical Quarterly

Forewarned by omens, the Navajo reaction was immediate, intense, and culturally defined. The disease, like other dlnesses, was personified and attacked on a spiritual level, with familiar objects connodng intense symbolic meanings as part of the preventive and curative practices.

From the Euro-American point of view, many of the ceremonies derived from the "darkest superstition," as the newspapers ofthe day proclaimed, but to the Navajos they were the first line of defense, comparable to the doctors in Moab and the home remedies in Blanding and Monticello. Superstition is always the other man's religion, and so it was for the outsider viewing Navajo practices.

Influenza appears to have been far more traumatic for the Navajo population than the white populadon for a number of reasons. First, the isolation of Navajo dwellings, because of a dependence on a livestock economy, did not afford the same type of community support found in Moab, Mondcello, and Blanding, or even in the boarding schools.

Often the sick had no choice but to perform their necessary labors, often in bad weather, which weakened their resistance to the disease. Second, the means of transmittal was not understood, and so the disease spread rapidly and was actually encouraged by ceremonial practices. The Utes, on the other hand, seemed not to have suffered as much as the Navajos because their general reaction was to get away from others, decreasing chances for infection. Once a death occurred, however, both the Utes and Navajos compounded the problem by leaving their secure winter homes and exposing themselves to the elements. Third, the physical remedies were, by white standards, only marginally successful in alleviating the victim's suffering. Many ofthe practices were based on the principles of "like begets like," "opposites cure," "the bitterer the better." All of these concepts are common in the religious magic and shamanism of many nonindustrialized cultures. To the Navajos, they were effective cures and, when coupled with the ceremonies, completed a logical system of defense. In fact, those who lacked prayers, chants, and herbal remedies were the ones most often believed to have died.

By March 1919 the number of Americans killed by influenza exceeded half a mdlion.^^ The trauma of this catastrophe took years to get over; for Navajos the event also became a landmark in the tribal memory. Yet, at at time when much of humanity suffered, the experiences of individual men and women offered the greatest understanding beyond cold stadstics; the responses of each individual to the epidemic were ded to the culture within which they were made.

'Persico, "The Great Swine Flu Epidemic," p. 84.

In Memoriam: Juanita Brooks, 1898-1989 Juanita Brooks, 1963.

January 15, 1898, Juanita Leavitt Pulsipher Brooks was based solidly in nineteenthcentury M o r m o n faith values of God's and Mormonism's roles in mankind's history.

Seemingly frail and fragile at birthi, Juanita's body would prove to be as durable as desert mesquite below M o r m o n Mesa. Keen of mind, she absorbed knowledge sponge-like from lore and legends, from records and books. Her life would epitomize family values of honesty, excellence, duty, and work, hard work. Her brilliant mind would tire several years before her body was ready to "give u p . " She died August 26, 1989, age 91 years.

Special teachers, books, and select people educated her to worlds with horizons reaching beyond the limited confines of Virgin Valley.

Juanita proved an apt and superior student at Dixie Academy, at Brigham Young University, and eventually at Columbia University.

Historians Uncle LeRoy Hafen, Nels Anderson, and Dale Morgan inspired, encouraged, and disciplined her as a historian. Herself an excellent teacher, Juanita would later receive three honorary doctoral degreesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;Utah State University (1964), College of Southern Utah (1969), and University of Utah (1973).

She was fiercely loyal to her family and to her extended families.

She assisted many of them with educations, with missions, with weddings, birthdays, and celebration:* wherever. She worked hard to write family histories of grandfather Dudley Leavitt, of George Brooks, Wdl's father, of Will Brooks, and finally her own autobiography. She left her families a remarkable historical record.

B O R N IN BUNKERVILLE, NEVADA, OF PIONEER PARENTS ON

202

Utah Historical Quarterly

Juanita's commitment to Mormonism was deep and challenging.

Married to Ernest Pulsipher October 10, 1919, in the St George Temple, she struggled through the faith-faded promises that his cancercaused death imposed upon her. Nevertheless, she condnued active in church posidons as teacher. Relief Society president, and finally as historian. In the latter role she saw church loyalty in her quest for historical truth, "which truth only was good enough for her Church."

Her biographer Levi Peterson writes: "Because of her, the collective mind of Mormonism is more liberal and more at peace with itself than it otherwise might be."

Further, Juanita feared church excommunicadon particularly for the consequences of such actions on her chddren and family. Carefully she protected them from public controversy and from her own most private doubts. The latter burden she carried alone.

Her writings oi Mountain Meadows Massacre, John Doyle Lee, Emma Lee, and Jacob Hamblin, as well as the edidng of the journals of John D. Lee, Hosea Stout, and Martha Spence Heywood, were all efforts to sadsfy her quest for historic facts and to help set the record straight It was her way of helping fellow Saints "get understanding."

Juanita sensed the tragedy of Mormon pioneer life generally and Dixie pioneer life pardcularly. She idendfied with those progeny whose families had borne the stigma of past sins, unfairly, as she believed the Lee family had, because ofthe Mountain Meadows Massacre. Hers are some of the richest regional writings in Utah history.

Of watershed importance to the life of this remarkable woman was her marriage to Will Brooks May 25, 1933. Somehow Will anchored Juanita and gave her support and confidence sufficient that she could mother his four, her one, and their four chddren, an incredibly challenging parendng role. At the same time, she was coflecting pioneer journads and records for the Huntington Library; she was writing and editing, traveling night buses to California and Salt Lake City, teaching and lecturing. Her ability to work and work and work puts one in awe.

After Will's stroke in 1968, his health began to decline. He died in 1970, and with him went some of Juanita She discovered after his death Will's poem "Proud Little Woman" which expressed his love and admiration. Shewas not easily consoled. In late November 1970 Juanita experienced a "vision" of Will in which "she saw him and he saw her."

She concluded resolutely with " If I do my best I think he will be pleased with it"

Juanita Brooks

203

Juanita's most productive years were over. She struggled with a history of thejews of Utah and Idaho. Family and friends reached out to help. They tried to sustain her with lo\e, with care, and with honors. She was made a Fellow of the Utah State? Historical Society in 1962. She served on the Board of State History during 1949-60 and 1965-77. In 1963 she accepted an appointment to the board ofthe Utah Folklore Society; in 1972 she was made a Fellow of the Utah Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. She was entered into the Beehive Hall of Fame in 1985.

Her several books and articles of this period depended on generous editing and support from colleagues and editors. In 1982 her own autobiography, Quicksand and Cactus, v/as published, a fitting climax to a truly remarkable career. Juanita was one of Utah's and Mormonism's foremost historians. Her impact is immeasurable because of both the quantity of her work and the superior quality of much of it It is all there for us to see, to read, and to "get understanding" from. Thank you, Juanita Brooks.

In memoriam one is tempted to see her life in tragic metaphor.

Juanita found meaning in doing; she: served with truly heroic energy.

She saw tragedy in her subjects' lives; she offered their progeny, the Mormon church, and all of us a c;atharsis through her informed, sympathetic writings, lecturing, and teaching. She could not be as generous with herself Too soon after Will's death she seemed too tired to continue her prodigious production. Juanita's remarkable mind would, in time, no longer handle all of the chadlenges and confusion that a relentless and courageous quest for " truth" and "understanding" had brought to her, or to anyone who daTes take that journey. Nor could Juanita simply be satisfied just being Juanita, Wdl's "Excellent Woman," where she could enjoy the kudos her life and labors had brought her and the love of friends and family.

Juanita could not believe in her own inherent worth, as others believed in her. That was her tragic flaw. For her to be worthwhile, she must continue "to do" the best she could. Perhaps we can see her retreat into senility as her way of resolving her own internal conflicts. How tragic that she could not claim fully \h(t fruits of her outstanding life; but then, perhaps her own life was her final statement to all of us. We say goodbye with deepest respect

MELVIN T. SMITH

wm

Book Reviews

lAAAAAAAAi

Excavations of the Donner-Reed Wagons: Historic Archaeology along the Hastings Cutoff. By BRUCE R. HAWKINS and DAVID B. MADSEN.

(Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press,

1990. xiv+ 172 pp. $19.95.)

Before the state of Utah pumped water out of a rising Great Salt Lake to flood a stretch of the California Trail, the antiquities section ofthe Division of State History moved in 1986 to save the remains of the Donner-Reed party wagons on the salt desert between the lake and the Nevada lineâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and none too soon. Over the years amateur "expeditions" and other souvenir hunters had already heavily plundered these important historic locations on the Hasting Cutoff Even so, researchers discovered a trove of artifacts at five sites on the salt flats between Cedar Mountains, just west of Delle, and Pilot Springs, some fifteen miles north of Wendover, before the waters of Newfoundland Basin covered them up. Professionally excavated, the remains provide a wealth of information on the doomed company of eighty-seven men, women, and children that lost nearly half its members to exposure, starvation, and cannibalism at Donner Lake in the Sierra Nevada.

Among other things, the work of archaeologists Bruce R. Hawkins and David B. Madsen, now offered by the University of Utah Press, confirms that the unfortunate pairty enjoyed a level of affluence unknown to most emigrants of that time. It casts doubt on later reports that wagons and even gold were

buried in the strand of crusted Scdt and mud. And it shows that James Reed's wagon, the Pioneer Palace, was a traveling hotel, indeed, with wheels ten inches wide and more than seven feet apart, compared with two inches and five feet for convendonal trail vehicles.

Given the traffic over the crossing before it was discontinued in 1851, the authors admit they cannot prove beyond a doubt that the collection they uncovered belonged to the DonnerReed party. But the evidence they present exceeds their claim of consistency "with the interpretation" that it did. It also demonstrates convincingly the worth of archaeology in setting the written record straight and in understanding the values of these western wayfarers.

Even after 150 years of looting, a comparison of Donner-Reed artifacts from the salt desert sites with remains found at Donner Lake strongly suggests that members of the party favored tobacco pipes and jewelry over such useful possessions as dishes, tools, harnesses, and ammunition. The latter items were found on the salt flats because party members threw them out first This volume also features a superb chapter on the California Trial and Hastings Cutoff by Utah historian Gary Topping that may be the best analydcal

Book Reviews and Notices overview yet to appear. Topping challenges some long-held misconceptions, including charges by some noted hi.storians that Lansford Hastings, for personal glory or gain, deliberately misled innocents to their death and the claim that Reed abandoned his twostory "palace" on the salt flats.

It includes, as well, a chapter on the Howard Stansbury expedition of 184950 by Brigham D. Madsen which throws some new light on the 1846 emigration over the shortcut south of Great Salt Lake. Balancing such early eyewitness reports are scientific analyses of personal artifacts and animal bones by Ann Hanniball and M. Elizabeth Manion.

Not the least of the information provided is a detailed look at previous salt desert diggings and what happened

205 to the artifacts these "expeditions" managed to loot. This survey shows that the most secure place over the years has been Grantsville, Utah, where the city's Donner-Reed Memorial Museum now houses some of the choicest relics. On the other hand, artifacts given to the University of Utah from earlier excavations have unaccountably disappeared.

This work should stimulate future research and writing rather than serve as the last word. It is an original and valuable contribution to the story of one of America's most famous disasters and the California Trail's most challenging cutoff DAVID L. BIGLER

Utah Crossroads, Oregon-California Trails Association

Historical Atlas ofthe American West By WARREN A. BECK and University of Oklahoma Press, 1989. 198 pp. $29.95.)

This is the third historical atlas prepared by Beck and Haase. It was preceded by Historical Atlas of California and Historical Atlas of New Mexico, both

published by the University of Oklahoma Press in 1985. A historical atlas is a welcome addition to scholarly literature. It permits the authors to cover significant breadth in topics and still display voluminous detail on maps.

Maps also communicate visuzil images of the earth's surface that cannot be transmitted by narrative alone. The spatial relationships and interconnections between places, events, and natural features become visible and part of the readers' mental images.

Maps also have their limitations.

The cartographer is subject to the tyranny of space. The question of what topics to cover, amount of data to include on each map, and how to

YNEZ D. HAASE.

(Norman:

display it so that it can be read and interpreted without difficulty is a challenge indeed. That challenge is much greater when the maps are restricted to black-and-white reproduction. Beck and Haase have met those challenges with only modest success.

The book is not divided into chapters, although it could have been and would have benefited from such an organizing scheme. Instead there are 78 separate topics covered on 78 pages of maps with explanatory narrative on the opposite page. Each map page with accompanying text is a complete unit and may be unrelated to the preceding or following topics. The narrative, of necessity, is brief, highly generalized, and meant to enhance, explain, and/or highlight some of the detail found on the accompanying map. The topics include the natural setting, flora, fauna.

206 Native American tribal regions, European exploradons, domestic livestock trails, overland trade routes, territorial expansion, railroads, Indian/white military encounters, Mexican land grants, some agricultural crops, minercil resources, catastrophic natural events, military installadons, JapaneseAmerican internment camps in World War II, and Wodd War II POW camps.

My reaction to the book is mixed. It does bring together in one volume a great deal of spatial data, much of which is not readily available elsewhere. I was pardcularly pleased to see the maps on the Mexican land grants; the Indian lands, cultures, and military encounters with whites; the batdes of the Civil War; territorial expansion; the Japanese-American internment camps; and the Wodd War II POW camps.

I also found the book disappointing and frustrating. To begin with, it is laid out backwards. Since this is basically a book of maps, if the authors were going to adhere to two-page format for all topics, the maps should have been on the right hand page facing the reader, with the narrative on the left. Actually the book would be more attractive if there were more variation in map scales and more variation in layout. The large-scale maps of the Batde of Little Big Horn and the Mexican land grants in Texas serve as examples of what can be done by changing the scale. In a number of cases the mapped data are limited to a small part of the West There is no need to show the complete western U.S. when the condor and the sea otter are restricted to the West Coast.

One also wonders why the maps of native flora are restricted to trees, since other types of vegetadon (grasses, sagebrush, greasewood, mesquite, and shadscale) cover more ofthe American

Utah Historical Quarterly West One larger-scale map that included the major plant communities, shown with various zip-a-tone patterns, where the reader could see adjoining vegetation communities, would be more revealing than four small-scale maps with nothing but a few lines and a one-word title on each map. Several other maps are confusing because of inadequate or missing legends, e.g., passenger pigeons, whooping crane, elk, mule deer, and grizzly. For a blackand-white map, most of the exploration maps show too many routes on each one. There are only so many patterns one can make with dots and dashes. The reader needs a magnifying glass to figure out who went where.

The agricultural maps showing some enclosed regions with no other legend than a simple tideâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;apples and plums, wheat, cattle, potatoes, and so onâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;are virtually useless. If they are intended to mean that in those areas not enclosed, that particular crop or domestic animal is not produced, then the maps are completely erroneous. That would mean that most of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and all of Nevada and Utah produce no cattle. Utahns may also be surprised to learn that they produce no wheat, barley, corn, potatoes, apples, plums, hogs, or chickens.

Dot distribution maps indicating numbers of animals or acres of crops would be a much more accurate and effective method of showing the distribution of agricultural products.

One also wonders why there are no maps showing population distribution or the development of urbanization.

Those topics seem to be vital to the development of accurate images of western history.

Several maps have significant errors.

The deciduous scrub oak in Nevada,

Book Reviews and Notices Utah, and Colorado is not normally mapped as chaparral. Chaparral described in the accompanying narrative refers to evergreen shrub forms and should be restricted to the Mediterranean climatic region of California and neighboring Mexico. The map of barriers to the West identifies the Great Plains, Rocky Mountains, Sierra Nevada, and four desert regions as barriers to the West. It ignores the Cascade Range and the canyons of the Colorado Plateau. Yet the DominguezEscalante expedition and the Old Spanish Trail went north to avoid the canyon lands and then southwest through the deserts. The canyon lands were a greater barrier than the deserts. The map showing European setdement between 1835 and 1850 shows settled

207 areas only in Texas, New Mexico, and California. Yet significant settlement occurred in the Willamette Valley of Oregon in the 1840s, and the Mormons setded the Salt Lake Valley in 1847.

In summary, Historical Atlas of the American West falls far short of its potential. It gives the appearance of having been put together too fast, with too little research and not enough attention given to map design and accuracy. A little more care in the preparation ofthe maps, the addition of lightly screened shaded relief background on many maps, a judicious use of photographs, and a richer text could have made this a truly memorable volume.

WAYNE L. WAHLQUIST

Weber State College

Preserving Different Pasts: The American National Monuments. By HAL ROTHMAN. (Urbana and Chicago: University of lUinois Press, 1989. xxii + 257 pp. $29.95.)

Hardly anyone today would dispute the importance of national monuments, especially in the states created from the territory taken from Mexico in 1848.

Hal Rothman has provided an excellent historical treatment ofthe passage ofthe Antiquities Act of 1906 and ofthe implementation ofthe act's provisions.

The book emphasizes administration through the New Deal, with a final chapter sketching the period since the 1940s. At the same time, Rothman has given us a case of special pleading for the role of the National Park Service (NPS) while underrating the activities of citizens of the American West and of the other agencies that administered national monuments such as the Forest Service (USES) and the War Department (WD).

As Rothman shows, the Antiquities Act had its origin in the attempts of scientists and others to end the destruc-

tion of archaeological resources in the American West. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries various anthropological and congressional interests made proposals for the preservation of prehistoric sites from devastation by pot hunters and developers.

Edgar L. Hewett, a New Mexico scientist and university president, drafted the Antiquites Act and Iowa Congressman John F. Lacey and Colorado Senator Thomas Patterson introduced the bill that finally passed in 1906.

Even before 1906 various presidents had designated sites by executive action, and passage of the Antiquities Act allowed the General Land Office (GLO) to "convert previously withdrawn places into national monuments" (p. 55).

Until the creadon ofthe NPS in 1916 the monuments fell under the jurisdicdon of either the GLO, the USFS, or

208 the WD. In 1916 the president transferred all GLO monuments to the newly created NPS. Until an executive order in 1933 gave the NPS jurisdiction over all monuments, the USFS or WD administered the others.

At first, all three agencies tended to neglect the monuments. Since tourism was "the raison d'etre for the national parks," the much smaller and less attractive monuments remained "inaccessible and undeveloped" and generally "unsuitable for extensive visitation" (p. 89). The NPS did designate Frank Pinkley as superintendent ofthe monuments in the Southwest, but during the 1920s it appropriated little money for management of the sites.

Finally, dunng the 1930s the NPS became sole custodian of the monuments, and Congress appropriated money for their management. As part of the attempt to deal with the depression the federal government provided funds for development and administration.

Although Rothman does an excellent job of interpreting the outstanding, if often inadequately funded work of the NPS, his failure to understand the role ofthe USFS and the attitudes ofthe people of the West leads him into interpretations that put the good guys (NPS and easterners) against the bad guys (USFS and westerners).

In spite of the fact that the USFS administered sixteen national monuments until their transfer to the NPS in 1933, Rothmcin relied entirely on secondary sources to interpret this management. The books he cited are fine studies, but none of them considers the USFS administration of national monuments in detail. Thus, where Rothman spent considerable time in the unpublished records of the NPS, he failed to consult even readily available

Utah Historical Quarterly primary sources such as UC Berkeley's oral history interview with Leon F. Kneipp or Frank A. Waugh's recreational reports.

This oversight led him to misunderstand the role of the USFS in administering national monuments. Rothman asserts that "The Forest Service worked to develop commercial uses of natural resources and to aid timber interests and local stockmen." In fact, following World War I the USFS was already inaugurating multiple-use management, including the development of wilderness and primitive areas and promotion of recreation. Ironically, Rothman noted that chief forester Henry Graves ordered an inventory of recreational uses and that the Forest Service began the creation of wilderness areas during the 1920s, but Rothman failed to understand the significance of these developments (p. 141).

As the sources he failed to consult show, the Forest Service tried to promote tourist use of the national forests and monuments just as the Park Service did and suffered from the same problems, generally caused by lack of funds.

Like the NPS the USFS used much of the CCC money available during the 1930s for recreation and rehabilitation, and it has continued such uses to the present The administration of such facilities as the Sawtooth National Recreation Area and Minnetonka Cave and its role in development of such archaeological finds as the Fremont sites in Utah give us every right to expect that, had the USFS had money for administration, in the absence of the 1933 transfer, the USFS would have been as good a steward and interpreter of the national monuments as the NPS. In addition, Rothman suffers from the syndrome identified by David M.

209

Book Reviews and Notices Emmons in "Social Myth and Social Reality," Montana: The Magazine of Westem History 39 (Autumn 1989): 2-9. For Rothman, if something is individualistic or destructive it is western, if not, it is something else. Thus, Rothman tends to make blanket generalizations about western opposition to the preservation of natural resources and scientific study ofthe past (pp. 10, 13, 16, 17). When, however, westerners were involved in the creation of national monuments, in the preservation of resources, or in scientific activities he cites them by name rather than pointing out that they were westerners and that their progressive views represented significant western opinion.

In fact, people such as Edgar Hewett (New Mexico), Binger Hermon (Oregon), W. A. Richards (Wyoming), Reed Smoot (Utah), and Thomas Patterson

(Colorado) who favored national monuments and scientific research represented the views of some westerners just as fully as did those who secured legislation restricting the president from creating national forests by executive order in certain specific western states (not "in western states" p. 48) or who favored the livestock and timber interests exclusively.

This said, however, Rothman's book is an excellent study ofthe administration of national monuments by the NPS. It provides considerable information on internal problems and difficulties as well as on the public face of such administration. Readers interested in the work ofthe NPS will do well to consult this booL THOMAS G ALEXANDER

Brigham Young University

Exiles in a Land ofLiberty: Mormons in America, 1830-1846. By KENNETH H .

Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989. xii + 284 pp. $32.50.)

In a work heavily dependent upon secondary sources, Kenneth Winn, resident historian ofthe Missouri Historical Society, has written a study of early Mormonism that seems in part a critique of my doctoral dissertation at the University of Chicago in 1968.

Winn contends that both the Mormons and anti-Mormons in Joseph Smith's day drew upon the szime republican ideals such as thrift, self-reliance, military vigilance, the rights of private property, and regard for the commonwealth in criticizing their opponents.

Winn seems to imply that their dissimilarities grew out of their placing different emphases on the same tradition. But this is an idea that he does not develop consistently and that creates problems for his entire booL He ends up contending that the Mormons be-

WINN.

(Chapel

came disillusioned with republicanism by 1844 and became theocratic. This brought on the most violent reaction to their movement While there is some considerable truth in much of what Winn argues here, what is correct does not seem to be entirely original. But he deserves credit for identifying some ofthe thinking of the Saints and gentiles as republican. I just wish he had been more careful in his handling ofthe term. He is right that there was much in the Book of Mormon that would appeal to people with republican values, but one of the difficulties he has is that he lumps together American thinking from the Puritans to thejacksonians and labels it all republican. While he places great emphasis upon what might be called the social theory of some Americans, he

210 ignores important aspects of their political theory. Bernard Bailyn makes it clear that the American founding fathers drew heavily upon English liberal Whig ideology in opposing a concentration of power in the hands of one or a few overly powerful rulers.

They feared too the union of church and state. These were republican principles that the Mormons seemed to violate almost from the first and that got them into trouble. Winn ignores this.

There appear to be some contradictions in his argument He indicates that the Book of Mormon is essentially republican (p. 1). Yet he also says that the Mormon scripture criticized the world Joseph Smith grew up in (p. 17) and that it was a veiled critique of Jacksonian America (p. 20). Since he holds that the Jacksonians were repubhcans (p. 3), it would seem that the Book of Mormon criticized some ofthe aspects of republicanism it was supposed to advocate. This needs to be explored. Winn says that the Book of Mormon people were democratic. To support this he quotes Mosiah where the prophet said that it is not common that a majority ofthe people wiU desire what is not right He argues that the people were sovereign and that they had the final say in choosing their leaders. But he ignores the fact that the Nephite law was God-given, that fathers followed sons in the judgeships, and that there was very little toleration of dissent even in "republican " times.

Realizing that there are problems here, Winn says further on that the political state in the Book of Mormon was not "formally a republic but a theocracy" (p. 23). Exactly so, but this poses a problem for his argument It might be better to acknowledge that there was considerable ambivalence in Mormon thinking from the first But I would

Utah Historical Quarterly maintain that the Book of Mormon was more theocratic than democratic and that theocratic inclinations were very strong in Mormonism very early.

TO a considerable extent Winn follows my dissertation in describing the increasing Mormon alienation from existing governments. He is right that by 1844 the Saints were at odds with the democratic process in Illinois. Actually, disillusionment with the national government developed after Joseph Smith returned from his visit to Martin Van Buren in 1840. But there is criticism of lawyers and judges in the Book of Mormon and a strong desire to warn the American nation of 1830 that its fate may be that of the Nephites if the people do not repent and accept godly rule. As early as 1834 the Saints became active in local politics and consolidated their vote to gain political power. A consistent, systematic effort afterward to gain the balance of power in county, state, and national governments culminated withjoseph Smith's attempt to win the U.S. presidency in 1844. To fail to give adequate attention to this persistent quest for the rule of the Saints under a prophet and the degree to which it governed LDS political activity is to miss much of the continuity of Mormon history in this period. And it fails to consider effectively how this effort brought forth a rather standard reaction from non-Mormons who, for republican reasons, opposed such a quest even to the point of violence. To begin his book with a discussion ofwhat the Saints and gentiles had in common seems to me to be a false start when what made the difference was Mormon theocratic intentions that were not really republican.

MARVIN S. HILL

Brigham Young University

Book Reviews and Notices

211

Buffalo Bill and His Wild West: A Pictorial Biography. By JOSEPH G. ROSA and ROBIN MAY. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1989. xii -\- 243 pp. Cloth, $27.50; paper, $14.95.)

William R "Buffalo Bill" Cody is one ofthe American West's most enduring characters. Almost single-handedly he created a public image of manly heroics on the western scene, and his immensely popular Wild West Shows introduced cowboys, Indians, bison, marksmen (and women), and other fast-fading frontier characters to an international audience. Bolstered by writers like Charles King and Owen Wister and such painters as Remington and Russell, this image ofthe Euro-American conquest of the West prevails.

While historians will forever fine-tune their interpretations of this past, the images spawned by Buffalo Bill remain foremost in the public's eye.

In the century since his time. Bill Cody has not suffered from a lack of biographers. He penned his own autobiography for openers, which was later embellished considerably and often by his Wild West Show publicists. More recently, Don Russell's The Lives and Legends of Buffalo Bill (1960) and Nellie Snyder Yost's Buffalo Bill: His Family, Friends, Failures, and Fortunes (1979) sorted fact and fancy in works that penetrate the complexities of this great scout and showman. To this short list one should add Buffalo Bill and His Wild West: A Pictorial Biography.

Rosa and May, well regarded English historians ofthe American West, set out to produce an appropriately illustrated biography as a "tribute to a man who was so much more than a western myth," and for the most part they succeed. Cody's story is broken into logical chronological episodes, and, while not intended to supplant or even equal Russell or Yost, is adequate

despite several slips. Moses Milner, for instance, was murdered at Camp Robinson, not Fort Robinson (p.34); Springfield breechloading weapons coere appropriately known as needle guns (pp. 37, 39); it was the duty ofthe Northwest Mounted Police to maintain order on the Candian prairies but not to return Sitting Bull and his people to the United States (p.91); itisD. F. Barry, not Berrie(p. 153), and October 31, 1893, not 1892 (p. 160); and is it Biff or Fred Garlow in the incomplete photo caption on p. 220.^ The use, twice, of the word "braves" instead of men or warriors is regrettable too. But these modest shortcomings are well balanced by a particularly useful account of Cody and his Wild West Show in England based on original and largely untapped British sources.

The obvious strength of this biography is the 154 illustrations that augment the narrative. We see Cody mature from a precocious young whip to a genuine scout and hunter, then to the greatest showman of his age. Even in his final years one notes a sparkle and warmth in Cody's eyes that belie his ofttimes misunderstood pubfic persona.

Photos of Cody's peers, family, and Wild West Show round out this biography. All are well chosen, and to the credit ofthe University Press of Kansas well reproduced, many full-page size.

Buffalo Bill and His Wild West is a significant contribution to the literature on Cody and the imagery of the American West, and it deserves the widest possible circulation.

PAUL L. HEDREN

National Park Service

Utah Historical Quarterly

212

Zane Grey. By CARLTON JACKSON. (Rev. ed.; Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1989. xiv+ 173 pp.)

The main revision in this updated edition of Jackson's 1973 study is the addition of a chapter that considers newly published Grey works and recent interpretive literature. Otherwise, the book is still primarily plot summaries of what Jackson considers to be Grey's major novels and stories.

The Pacific Northwest: An Interpretive History. By

CARLOS A.

SCHWANTES.

(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989. xxi + 427 pp. Cloth, $32.95.)

The common factor that unifies the states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho as a region, Schwantes claims, is their status as a hinterlandâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a sparsely populated area with most inhabitants clustered in a few urban centers and exploited by the East for its raw materials. Few residents of other parts ofthe West will accept those characteristics as unique to the Pacific Northwest Nevertheless, this is a well written and stimulating survey of Pacific Northwest history. It gives special attention to the roles of women and minorities and to currently popular issues such as environmental concerns.

Studded with sidebars exploring incidental subjects of interest, and featur-

ing special profiles of outstanding and yet characteristic personalities at the beginning of each chronological section, the book is obviously oriented to the classroom. It also shares with Earl Pomeroy's twenty-year-old The Pacific Slope a major interest in the twentieth century and will probably supplant Pomeroy as a college text

The Indian Traders. By FRANK MCNITT.

(Reprinted.; Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989. xx-h393 pp. paper, $14.95.)

Although there has been a recent proliferation of Navajo traders' biographies and stories, McNitt's work still remains the classic overview of trading posts in the Southwest The majority of the text centers on the posts of New Mexico and Arizona during the 1800s and early 1900s, chronicling the activities of such notables as Thomas Keams, Lorenzo Hubbell, and the Wetherill brothers. Of particular interest to Utah historians are the chapters on the San Juan Valley, Jacob Hamblin and John D. Lee, and the posts of the Four Corners region. McNitt skillfully weaves history with anthropology as he discusses the evolution of this barter system and its impact on the Native Americans' economy. This book belongs on the shelf of both the professional and the layman interested in Navajo history and trading posts.

UTAH STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY Department of Community and Economic Development Division of State History BOARD OF STATE HISTORY DEAN L MAY, Salt Lake City, 1990 Chairman MARILYN CONOVER BARKER, Salt Lake City, 1993

Vice-chairman MAX J. EVANS, Salt Lake City Secretary DOUGLAS D . ALDER, SL George, 1993 THOMAS G . ALEXANDER, Provo, 1990

LEONARD J. ARRINGTON, Salt Lake City, 1993 BOYD A. BLACKNER, Salt Lake City, 1993 J. E L D O N DORMAN, Price, 1990

H U G H C . GARNER, Salt Lake City, 1993 AMY ALLEN PRICE, Salt Lake City, 1993 SUNNY REDD, Monticello, 1990 JERRY WYLIE, Ogden, 1993

ADMINISTRATION MAX J. EvAHS, Director WILSON G . MARTIN, Associate Director

PATRICIA SMiTH-MANSFiELD,/lijiiton< Director STANFORD J. LAYTON, Managing Editor DAVID B. MADSEN, State Archaeologist

T h e Utah State Historical Society was organized in 1897 by public-spirited Utahns to collect, preserve, and publish Utah and related history. Today, u n d e r state sponsorship, the Society fulfills its obligations by publishing the Utah Historical Quarterly and other nistoriccd materials: collecting Historic Utah artifacts; locating, documenting, and preserving historic and prehistoric buildings and sites; and maintaining a specialized research library. Donations and gifts to the Society's programs, museum, or its library are encouraged. Tor only through such means can it live up to its responsibility of preserving the record of Utah's past This publication has been funded with the assistance of a matcning grant-in-aid from the Department ofthe Interior, NationalPark Service, under provisions of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 as amended.

This program receives finaincial assistance for identification and preservation of historic properties under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Section 504 ofthe Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The U.S. Department ofthe Interior prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, or handicap in its federally assisted programs. If you believe you have been discriminated against in any program, activity, or facility as described above, or ifyou desire further information, please write to: Office of Equd Opportunity, U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington, D.C. 20240.