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Show UTAH HISTORICAL QUARTERLY BECKWITH PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, DELTA CITY LIBRARY Frank Beckwith, his daughter Athena and wife Mary Simister Beckwith. Depression and the prosperity of two world wars. Under Beckwith’s guidance, it remained a leader in the week-to-week business of helping to mold and establish public opinion; serving as a “faithful mirror of the community”; and, recording the history of Millard County through narrative and photograph.37 Frank Beckwith was much more than a banker and newspaper man, however. He was also an author, inventor, geologist, anthropologist, explorer, and, above all else, the epitome of an eternal scholar. Beckwith had a great quest for knowledge that had been encouraged by his school teacher mother, and he spent countless hours studying many subjects, including Latin and Greek, and the works of Plato, Homer, Shakespeare, Emerson, and many others. He learned the Pittman Howard method of shorthand, using an Edison phonograph with cylinders that enabled him to make recordings that he played back to help him practice. Beckwith quickly became proficient, and used the technique to take notes on his readings, interviews, and research. The breadth and depth of Beckwith’s self-taught information was astonishing—his friend Charles Kelly wrote that he “was constantly amazed at the extent of his knowledge of so many different subjects.” 38 For example, Beckwith became fascinated with the Mayan calendar, and spent hours extensively studying and trying to decipher the characters. He drew correlations between the calendar and known astronomical dates, and tried without success to have his findings published in scientific magazines.39 Religion was also an area of great interest for Beckwith. While he was a Mason as his father was before him, he was also, as noted by Kelly, “a student of all religions” whose “mind was too great to be fettered by any one dogma. His great unrealized ambition was to put on a breech-clout and live like a primitive Indian, close to nature. He felt that the Indians were more sincere in their beliefs than most white men.”40 Beckwith was also very interested in Hindu philosophy and mythology, along with other 37 George L. Bird and Frederic E. Merwin, The Press and Society: A Book of Readings (New York: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1952), 199. 38 Charles Kelly, “A Tribute to Frank Beckwith,” Millard County Chronicle, June 21, 1951. 39 Frank A. Beckwith, “Mayan Calendar,” documents in the possession of Jane Beckwith. 40 Kelly, “Tribute.” Beckwith was a member of the Wasatch Lodge No. 1 and the Tintic Lodge No. 9 Free and Accepted Masons. He first became a Mason in 1902. 178 |
