Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been categorized as “History Main Blog”
By Doug Misner, Research & Collections Manager The Utah Division of State History has over a million photographs in our holdings with almost 300,000 digitized and accessible online. These images are found in over 1,000 unique collections that document Utah’s history from the middle of the 19th century to the …
By Jedediah Rogers It’s rare that a grove of aspen trees enjoys world renown, but this is the case for a stand known as the Pando clone on Fishlake National Forest in central Utah. Pando—Latin meaning I spread—is actually a single tree, a “forest of one” that sprouts over 40,000 …
By Greg Walz, Research Center Manager How might one analyze older photographs of Utah — downtown Salt Lake City in particular — to gain some knowledge about little moments in life as they were lived in another era? Is it even possible to ascertain such a thing with any detail …
Savanna Agardy, Utah SHPO Compliance Archaeologist World heritage is defined as cultural or natural heritage that has outstanding universal value. Universal value in heritage essentially means that world heritage belongs to everyone, as it is international in nature and citizens of the world have a right to learn from and …
By Shavauna Munster & Holly George When considering the history of illness, signpost pandemics such as the Justinianic plague, black death, and Spanish influenza often come to mind. However, intermittent waves of disease can only be expected in a species of 7.5 billion. The cultural response to bouts of infectious …
Welcome to May, and welcome to Archaeology and Historic Preservation Month! This year we’re hosting online events perfect for history-lovers of all stripes! Is archaeology your passion? Or maybe historic preservation makes your heart aflutter? Then we’ve got a great virtual line up for you! May Brown Bag Speaker Series …
By Christopher W. Merritt, Ph.D., Utah State Historic Preservation Officer It is unclear when the first human laid eyes upon the geological oddity now called “Black Rock” on the southern shores of the Great Salt Lake. But it was likely a Native American from the Paleoindian or Early Archaic period, …
By Christopher W. Merritt, Ph.D., State Historic Preservation Officer With trembles strong enough to shake “the dignity out of all judicial procedures,” [i] at Salt Lake City’s courts, the 6.6 magnitude earthquake rattled homes, businesses, and nerves from Boise, Idaho to Richfield, Utah and Rock Springs, Wyoming to Elko, Nevada. …
By Sabrina Sanders, Artifacts Collections Manager The collections held by the Utah Division of State History are as diverse as the stories of a State at the crossroads of the West. We have photographs, maps, manuscripts, architectural drawings, books, and artifacts. The objects are placed into these categories, or sub-collections, …
By Haden Griggs The This Is the Place monument in Salt Lake City commemorates and evokes the struggle nineteenth-century Latter-day Saints faced in settling a land new to them. Although specifically a reference to Utah’s first permanent Euro American settlers, the sentiment expressed by the monument’s title aptly represents …
By Christine Cooper-Rompato My forthcoming article in Utah Historical Quarterly, “Utah in the Green Book,” explores the history of hotels where African Americans could spend the night in Utah during the period of segregation. Many hotels across the U.S. were “white only” until the 1960s, and in 1936, Victor Hugo …
By Dr. Wendy Rex-Atzet, State Coordinator, Utah History Day Each year during the legislative session, the Division of State History hosts Utah History Day on the Hill at the State Capitol. At this event, History Day students fill the Capitol Rotunda with displays of their exhibits, documentaries, websites, performances and …