The Lady in the Ore Bucket

 

Product Description

An excellent book covering the history and settlement of the Tri-Canyon area of the Wasatch Mountains, by Charles L. Keller.

* Publisher: University of Utah Press
* Pub. Date: May 2001
* ISBN-13: 9780874806779
* Sales Rank: 626,355
* 416pp

Synopsis

"When the first company of Mormon settlers arrived in the Great Salt Lake Valley in July 1847, it was immediately apparent that their survival depended on what resources they found in the mountains surrounding them. The Great Basin soil was baked hard by the sun and yielded to the plow with great difficulty. And as pioneer William Clayton noted, surveying the valley floor, "Timber is evidently lacking." But within a week of arrival, a small dam had been constructed to channel irrigation water to crops, parties had been dispatched to explore the nearby canyons for trees suitable for lumber, and names had been attached to several dozen features of the landscape including peaks, creeks, and canyons." "These place names, as well as the physical traces and artifacts that persist in three Wasatch canyons - Mill Creek, Big Cottonwood, and Little Cottonwood - tantalize with what they suggest, but do not tell, about the history of settlement and development in the canyons. Charles Keller has extracted a wealth of information to create The Lady in the Ore Bucket, a fascinating history of the lumber, mining, and hydropower industries built from the rich natural resources of the canyons. With more than six dozen photographs and maps, the book is alive with details concerning the personalities, politics, pacts, and peregrinations of local leaders from white settlement in 1847 through the early 1900s. It will delight any reader with an interest in the magnificent canyons that open into the modern Wasatch Front."--BOOK JACKET.

Features

A retired engineer and avocational historian based in Salt Lake City, Keller examines the resource-finding efforts of the Mormon settlers who arrived in the Great Salt Valley in July 1847. Focusing on the three valleys in the surrounding mountains, he traces the history of the lumber, mining, and hydropower industries there from the settlement to the early 1900s. He includes 13 detailed modern topographical maps as well as a battery of contemporary photographs, drawings, and street plans. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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