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Show 276* Utah Historical Quarterly to Spring City. The finished rock granary door still contains calculations figured for a variety of transactions. The Jens P. Carlson home remains an excellent example of a stonemason's craftsmanship. The decision to build such a home resulted from Jake Johnson's addition. It seems that Johnson had hired a Salt Lake firm to design and build his new home. Once construction was underway Carlson was appalled at the quality of the workmanship, and he told Jake that he would show him how a stone house should be built. Carlson, a man of meager means, had little time to spend in constructing his own home. In early years he labored on the Manti Temple and later on the Spring City chapel and many of the town's rock buildings. For a time he worked in Salt Lake during the summer and on this home in the winter months. He quarried most of the rock himself. The stones were dressed with a chisel and rubbed together to achieve a smooth finish. Filings from the rocks were mixed with lime to form the one-eighth of an inch mortar used to bind the dressed limestone. In some places Carlson had to splice the stone; however, the joints can be detected only if one is told where to look. Interior walls are also of stone, further augmenting the feeling that this home was erected with great care. Carlson died before the structure's completion, and a carpenter was hired to roof the building. Like the Orson Hyde home, the Carlson residence is built over a spring. 38 While the Freeman Allred and Marinus Mortensen homes do not fit into any particular classification, they do have some attributes worth noting. The Freeman Allred home is a one-story structure of cross-gable construction, built in 1912 of painted sand-rolled brick. The house itself possesses no unique characteristics, except that it is the only structure in Spring City that sits diagonally on its lot. As residents tell the story, Freeman Allred was a surveyor who claimed that Spring City was not laid out to the true compass points. To underscore his assertion, he positioned his home in such a fashion as to indicate the true cardinal points. 39 Marinus Mortensen's home illustrates the existence of a concern that contributed greatly to the building of Spring City. The siding used on the Mortensen home was planed by Ole Peterson at his planing mill. The mill, which furnished a wide variety of building materials, was driven by an overshot water wheel and turned out siding, sheeting, and shingles as well as grinding wheat and oats for hog feed. A particular style of fence 38 Discussion with Clifford F. McKinney, date unknown; interviews with Delone Carlson, March 13, 1974, and Erma N. Carlson, March 4, 1974. 39 H.S. Schofield interview, March 13, 1974. |
