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Show WINTER 2013 UHQ pp 4-90_UHQ Stories/pp.4-68 12/5/12 9:38 AM Page 55 AuTHOR SANPETE OOLITE LIMESTONE Spring City is the third city whose geology The Manti Temple was and history are intricately bound with the constructed of oolite limestone Sanpete stone industry. This picturesque little between 1877 and 1888. town lies in solitude at the foot of the Wasatch Plateau hidden behind white hills of oolite limestone that separate it from the rest of the Sanpete Valley. The first attempt to settle Spring City was made in 1852, but was abandoned because of Indian attacks. The community was resettled in 1859, and the 1860 U. S. Census lists no stonemasons.16 Stonemasons arrived with the Danish immigrants who arrived in the 1860s. The new arrivals wasted no time in quarrying limestone from the hills southwest of town. Homes built between 1865 and 1890 comprise over one-third of existing homes and either the rich cream-colored oolite limestone or adobe were the most common building materials. Jens Jorgen Sorensen, John Peter (Jens) Carlson, and John Bohlin were the principal stonemasons. Thirty-year-old Jens Jorgen Sorensen arrived in Spring City in 1882. A native of Stanby, Denmark, Sorensen made his mark as a stonemason on many buildings in the area including the Manti Temple, 16 Population Schedules of the Eighth Census of the United States 1860. 55 |
