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at the confluence of the Santa Clara and the Virgin have also been known as Seldom Sop, Never Sweat, Lick Skillet and Lower Clara). By 1961, twelve famil ies were residing in the Tonaquint area in houses However, the great flood of 1862, built of willow, logs and adobe mud. starting on Christmas Day of 1861, and lasting over 40 days, caused the Virgin to rip through the bottom lands totally destorying the log cabins and willow huts of Tonaquint. THE COTTON MISSION The development of this part of Southern Utah might well have taken the same pace as most of the other Mormon colonies growing a group or two at a time were it not for the Cotton Mission program, which began on a 5m311 experimental basis but soon led to a large colonizatiuil of the area. Cotton was first produced at Santa Clara, Utah, in 1855. One of Santa Clara's settlers obtained some cotton seeds from a friend in Parowan, Utah, who brought the seeds from the South. The seeds were planted and nurtured with great care and in the Autumn of 1865, enough cotton was picked to produce thirty yards of cloth. Word of this new crop and the possibil ities that a steady supply of cotton would open up led church authorities to start thinking about establ ishing a cotton mission on the Virgin river. In 1857, a group of ten famil ies were called by the Mormon leaders to colonize Washington, a town site five miles Northwest on the Virgin river from the Bloomington area. Within this group were several Southern famil ies famil iar with the technique of raising cotton. Later in the year, these famil ies were joined by 28 others, again including several originally from the South. These efforts produced some cotton, but difficulties were incurred in learning how to effectively irregate the land and the alkali in the soil was very troublesome. J The experiences of the Santa Clara and Washington settlements at cotton raising had been encouraging but not conclusive. Cotton growing was a secondary concern to these settlers who were also struggl ing to establ ish homes. Thus, in January 1858, Brigham Young cal led a party of sixteen, led by Joseph Horne, to establish an experimental cotton farm on the Virgin river. This party had originally intended on settl ing at the junction of the Virgin and the Santa Clara (or Tonaquint as this was called by some). However, the settlers worried about the difficulty of control ling the stream for irrigating purposes, so they chose to settle over the hills in the next valley below. John D. Lee, who guided the group to the location from his home in Harmony, noted the decision to locate in an area the Horne party cal led Hebervi lie {which is now the part of Bloomington on the East of the Virgin)by the fol lowing comments: Found good land and a good place to take out the water, but the site is rather gloomy, being shut in on all sides by mountains.