Utah is “the Right Place” 

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Every year, on the 24th of July, Utahns celebrate their biggest holiday, Pioneer Day—commemorating the arrival of Utah’s first permanent white settlers and the opening of a new chapter in the rise of the American West.

Fireworks light the sky; civic and religious leaders render stirring patriotic orations; record amounts of watermelon and hot dogs are consumed; and Utah’s technology and business billionaires rejoice, because whatever this state had been over the passing years, now it really is “the right place.”

By July 24th, 1847, some advance parties of Mormon pioneers had already reached the Salt Lake Valley and begun preparations for the planting of crops and the construction of shelters—things that would surely be needed to survive their first winter. For them, the arduous 1,300-mile journey from Nauvoo, Illinois, and then to Winter Quarters, Nebraska, was finally over; but the hardships of inhabiting the new land were just beginning.

It wasn’t actually until July 28th that Brigham Young, deathly ill with what is believed to have been the tick-borne Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, rose from his would-be deathbed to pronounce his approval of the new home for the Latter-day Saints. With assistance, he sat up in the back seat of his friend Wilford Woodruff’s carriage at the top of Immigration Canyon, gazed upon the wide expanse where the mountains dissolved into the great valley and lake below, likely forced a tentative smile, and then uttered his most memorable words, “This is the right place; drive on.”

In retrospect, feeling exhausted and drained, he would later make the facetious, prophetic remark to a friend, “We should have waited until the interstate was completed.”

And Young, who at that moment of utterance of his most famous words, had already unfolded his Ronco Pocket Fisherman—a cool gadget he’d seen on a late-night infomercial—could hardly have known what lay in store. Though the future building site of Salt Lake City was, indeed, what his real estate broker had described as “prime, lakeside property,” the lake was toxic to fish and would never be a fisherman’s paradise.

But, voila! The brine shrimp of the Great Salt Lake were destined to become a boon to tropical fish enthusiasts—feeding the near-microscopic treats to captive populations in their home aquariums. And the famed logo of the Morton Salt girl, with her open bumbershoot—“When it rains, it pours”—would make Utah one of the greatest salt producers in the world.

Brigham’s group numbered 148. Predictably, men outnumbered the women and children, simply because strong, brawny men would be needed for the hard work ahead. The party traveled with an astounding 72 wagons, 93 horses, 52 mules, 66 oxen, 19 cows, 17 dogs and some chickens. Inevitably, a few of them were destined to become cheeseburgers, steak sandwiches, and breaded tenders somewhere along the trail.

The livestock posed little problem, opportunistically munching on the prairie grass as the wagon train plodded along. They pulled their expected share of the load, and the poultry provided melodious wake-up calls every morning, starting around 4:00 a.m.

And the kids? According to Brigham’s diary, they were insufferable. It was no small problem that they had been forbidden to take their Walkmans, Nintendos, and cell phones. Deprived of their gadgets and games, they had driven the adults nuts—with 1,300 miles of incessant broken-record irritation, they repeated over and over:

“Daddy, are we there yet? When are we gonna be there? Can we stop at a gas station? I need to go. Can we have an ice cream cone?”

The children’s verbal pummeling had certainly taken its toll on Young, yet he still feigned that smile as he spoke his most famous words—words that have become synonymous with the determination, strength, and courage required to realize a dream.

“This is the right place.” Only a moment after Brigham said it, the children were mocking and disrespectful. “If this is the right place,” they taunted, “why would we go any further?” Young, already at the end of his rope, had blurted, “Why do you have to be such little nitpickers? You knew exactly what I meant,” he growled, and pointing toward the valley and lake below, he added, “That is the right place.”

Had it not been for the 7-Eleven Slurpees, ready-to-eat Bahama Mama hot dogs, and the fortunate presence of a few well-placed Dairy Queens to break up the terrible monotony, the 148 people in Young’s party—to which he assigned the auspicious name “The Camp of Israel”—might have thrown up their hands in despair.

The reality was that, unlike the road trips of today, all those little conveniences and refreshments were missing—including the road. And you can pretty much bet your boots that, if you see a few extra green sagebrush clumps up around South Fork, Wyoming, you’ll know that some desperate little pioneer kids probably “watered” and “fertilized” them.

There are many questions left unanswered about the particulars of that first Days of ‘47 event, including the actual nature of Brigham’s illness—which some have attributed to exhaustion—from trying to keep his then-twenty wives happy. Many experts believe that alone could well have led to his untimely demise.

But there’s one thing for sure. Whatever Brigham said, whatever his reasons for trying to establish a new nation in the everlasting hills of the Rockies, and whatever elated screams arose from his Camp of Israel during the wee hours of the night, his prophetic words have proven to be spot-on.

The majority of Utahns, the millions of annual visitors who revel in the state’s phenomenal natural beauty and heavenly snow, and the people who come here for the opportunities of a great economy and job market, will all tell you, with gusto: “This, indeed, is the right place.”

The author is a retired novelist, columnist, and former Vietnam-era Army assistant public information officer. He resides in Riverton with his wife, Carol, and the beloved ashes of their mongrel dog. comments@cityweekly.net