Eagle Gate spans the history of Salt Lake

Many Salt Lake City motorists drive under a historic monument every day, likely without giving much thought to it.

Eagle Gate, which is at State Street and South Temple, has changed many times during its 146 years of existence.

As the entrance to Brigham Young's estate at the mouth of City Creek Canyon, it is located near where the pioneers homesteaded that first summer in 1847.

Consistent with his New England heritage, President Young fenced and gated the land for privacy and also for protection from City Creek flooding. It was designed by architect Truman O. Angell and Hiram B. Clawson.

The original eagle was carved by Ralph Ramsey and William Spring from five laminated wooden blocks and used an actual eagle that had been found in City Creek Canyon as its model. The monument weighed 500 pounds, had 16-foot-wide outstretched wings and rested upon curved wooden arches that used 9-foot-high cobblestone bases as their anchor. The eagle sat on a beehive and a star mount.

Large wooden gates closed the 22-foot-wide opening of the original Eagle Gate at night. Young had the Beehive House, Lion House, private offices, a flower garden, school, barns, sheds, greeneries, orchards and vegetable gardens in his yard. For many years, the gate not only marked the entrance to Young's property but also to City Creek Canyon, as the highway was then the canyon toll road, not State Street.

Fourteen years after Young's death in 1891, the gates were removed and the street was widened to two lanes. Soon after, electric streetcars began traveling the area and a greater height was needed to accommodate the overhead wires.

The eagle was then sent back East to be covered with a layer of copper, and new supports resting on stone pillars were added. The gate was also widened in a new design by architect J. Don Carlos Young.

It was remodeled another three times during the next 60 years and eventually became just wide enough for four lanes of traffic, but there was no extra room.

On April 18, 1960, a truck severely damaged Eagle Gate. The eagle and beehive were removed later that day. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which owned them, eventually gave the eagle and beehive to the Daughters of Utah Pioneers because the wooden portions had deteriorated and could not be remounted again. They are in the DUP museum today at 300 N. Main.