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The First State Arts Agency in the Country
Utah was the first state in the nation to establish state arts support!
In 1965, Congress established the National Endowment for the Arts to support arts organizations and artists throughout the nation. Part of its mandate was to give funds to any…
The Great White Palace: African American Segregation in Utah
The old Hotel Utah has a storied history of hospitality that is shadowed by the racial prejudice common throughout Utah right into the 1960s.Located on South Temple and Main Street in downtown Salt Lake City, the venerated Hotel Utah was known in its…
The Ku Klux Klan
The presence of the Ku Klux Klan was not just limited to the southern United States. In fact, the KKK had grown enough to march through the streets of Salt Lake City in the early 1920s.In 1922, a small crowd of hooded and caped Ku Klux Klansmen…
The United Order of Orderville
The United Order of Orderville, a Utopian living experiment, thrived for a decade in southern Utah.When people hear the term “communal living,” what often comes to mind is a group of hippies, not a group of 19th Century Mormons. However, the…
There’s Fluoride in the Water!
Public health campaigns have long sparked fears of government overreach. In the mid-twentieth century, for example, dentists lobbied to add fluoride to Utah’s water supply to support tooth health. Learn more about the decades-long public uproar.
In…
Utah Rejects the White Elephant
The United States federal government controls about 65% of land in Utah. The goal of maintaining these lands for public use tends to polarize Utahns. But there was a time when Utah leaders were not averse to federal regulation of public lands.…
Utah Votes for Bryan
Voters from Utah went crazy for Democratic presidential hopeful William Jennings Bryan in the election 1896.When it comes to politics, these days national news outlets list Utah as among the reddest of the Red States. But it wasn't always so.…
Utah Watermasters
Utah’s limited water supply needs to be closely monitored! But this is nothing new. In Utah’s settler communities, the local watermaster was a vital figure, although not always the most popular one.
Utah’s irrigation system of canals, ditches,…
Utah’s Expensive Flooding Quick-Fix: The 1987 Bangerter Pumps
Out in Utah’s West Desert is a massive $60 million infrastructure project that hasn’t been used in over thirty years. Can you guess what it is and why it was made?
In the 1980’s, a flooding Great Salt Lake threatened transportation, industry,…
Utah’s Folk Music Revival
The 1960s were a time of upheaval, ushering in changes in politics, music, and society. Utah was not immune to the growing political consciousness of the youth movement, and nowhere was that more obvious than in Utah's folk music revival.
In January…
Wastelanding
When you think of Utah's desert lands, do you picture a pristine wilderness or an arid waste? How we treat this landscape depends on the value that we assign to it.
Before Moab was a world famous tourist destination, it was a mining town. In the…
We Can “Build a Dam Anywhere”: Survival of the Central Utah Project
The Central Utah Project – which is still under construction – began with plenty of optimism and ambition. But politics and the inherent difficulty of moving mountains nearly sank the project. Learn how it survived.
The Central Utah Project –…
Women Hold the Line in Carbon County
When Carbon County coal miners from the National Miners Union went on strike in 1933, their wives, sisters, and daughters were right there beside them. These women proved to be formidable adversaries in the fight for workers’ rights.
Women have…
Women in Utah Politics
The early political history of Utah women began with the 1870 law that gave women the right to vote.With all of the attention on Hillary Clinton’s historic campaign for President, it might be interesting to take a look at the history of women’s…
Women's Suffrage & Consititutional Convention
Utah women won the right to vote not once, but twice. Women's Suffrage – that is, the right of women to vote – was won twice in Utah. In 1871, national suffrage leaders Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony visited the Utah Territory to…