Most likely pioneers didn't find desolate, barren valley

Jackson said on Sept. 9, 1847, Brigham Young cautioned the Saints before he left to return to Winter Quarters that in "selecting your firewood, it will be wisdom to choose that which is dry and not suitable for timber of any kind, and we wish all the green timber and shrubbery in the city to remain as it is . . ."

Henry Bigler noted in his diary in October of 1848 that he commenced building a house. "I began to make preparations to build me a house on a city lot . . . situated in a very nice part of the city on City Creek, a nice little grove of Box-Elder and Cottonwood on it."

Thomas Bullock, clerk of the Mormon pioneer camp, wrote that the valley was "dotted in three or four places with Timber."

"A valley of about 20 eight miles wide lay before us the most of it covered with good gras and various outher vegatables. but timber was handey," is what Levi Jackman, a member of the original Mormon pioneer group to enter the Salt Lake Valley, wrote (with imperfect spelling) about his first impression.

There was enough water in the Salt Lake Valley of 1847 — even in mid-summer — that the first recorded pioneer death was from drowning, not from thirst. Milton H. Therkill, a 3-year-old boy, fell in City Creek and drowned on Aug. 11, 1847.

Jackson believes when the leaders and members of the pioneer companies of 1847 talked about the lack of timber, they were apparently comparing it to the Midwest and also recognizing that it would be a challenge since their homes had been built primarily of wood, and wood was the primary fuel source. Within a few days of arrival they found lumber in the mountains adequate for their needs.

---

E-mail: lynn@desnews.com