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Show THE HISTORY BLAZER ATEI\' S OF UTAH'S PAST FROM THE Utah State Historical Societ~~ 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake Citv, LTT 84101 ( 801) 533- 3500 FAX ( 80' 1) 533- 3503 Sanpete Valley Has Attracted Both Ancient and Modem Move- ins WHILEW ARMLY WELCOMENDE, W COMERS TO UTAHa re fondly referred to in parts of the state as ' move- ins." Yet longtime residents know that their own ancestors were just one link in a long history of move- ins. Take Sanpete Valley. The first occupants of central Utah were probably big- game hunters of the Late Pleistocene period. Ancient butchering camps indicate they traveled in bands of 10 to 15 extended family members. They not only hunted mammoths, sloths, camels, and bison using spears with fluted arrows but also gathered wild, edible plants from the valleys and canyons. Theirs was the longest known occupation of Utah, brought to an end by the extinction of large game in the Bonneville Basin in about 8500 B. c. Next came small- game hunters of the Archaic period: semi- nomads who developed a spear launcher called the atlatl, sometimes lived in caves ( none of their huts have been discovered), and brought with them millstones and a variety of textiles. They remained 6,000 years, leaving for unknown reasons. For 1,500 years Sanpete Valley was uninhabited. About 500 A. D. the Fremont Indians arrived to found Utah's first farms and villages. One of many Fremont towns remains southeast of Ephraim. Houses and turtle- shaped adobe granaries have been uncovered and pottery and gaming pieces as well as pendants, figurines, and metates. Bison, antelope, and deer bones were thrown into garbage pits. Corn fragments indicate the Fremonts raised crops in the bottomlands and canyon mouths. Perhaps drought sent the Fremonts away after only eight centuries, or they may have been driven out by a new wave of move- ins: Ute hunter- gatherers. Some Utes acquired horses from the Spaniards and became horse- rustlers under Chief Wakara, roaming from Idaho to Mexiw and from the Colorado plains to California. In 1849 yet another set of move- ins entered Sanpete Valley. The European settlers encountered 700 Timpanogot Utes encamped near Manti with tiny groups of Sanpitch Utes scattered throughout the valley. For the Timpanogots Sanpete Valley was a second home and seasonal hunting ground. They were admired by early observers as handsome and hospitable with their life of stream and lake fishing alternating with berry, grass, and nut gathering in the Wasatch Mountains. They assembled each spring at Utah Lake for the 10- day Bear Dance at which they sang, horse- traded, gambled, wrestled, and foot- raced. But the Sanpitch were described by early fur traders as ' the most miserable human beings ( more) we have ever seen. The bareness of their country, and scarcity of game, compel them to live by separate f d e s , either in the mountains, [ or] in the plains." These Utes, according to early pioneers, ' had no guns & not a pony & no clothing nor beding save rabits skins soad together & no houses save what t6ey made out of sage & grease wood brush." Some whites were homfied to see them collect, roast, and eat grasshoppers, ants, and wasp eggs. The appearance of a stranger so alarmed the Sanpitch that they would ' in an instant.. . vanish like a shadow" into bunows and caves. ' Sometimes they [ would] venture out to offer newly born infants to whites in exchange for trifling articles." Adelia Cox Sidwell observed: ' The Saampitches were the veriest slaves to [ the] more powerful tribe of Utes who treated them very cruelly.. . ." She meant literal slavery. In 1853 Mexican slave traders made one of their periodic trips through Utah Temtory to trade with Chief Wakara. When the Mormons refused to allow Indian- probably Sanpitch- children to be traded for guns and ammunition, violence almost erupted near Manti. A compromise was reached whereby the Mormons themselves gave horses and guns for the children, who were then cared for in Mormon homes. At one time the Indians ' brought so many youngsters that nearly all the older [ white] residents in Manti had an Indian boy or girl. " Soon Timpanogots and Sanpitch alike would be displaced to the Uintah Reservation as white settlers dominated Sanpete Valley. The European occupation has so far lasted 150 years- a very brief period in the history of central Utah move- ins. Sources: Joel C. Janetski, Z k Ute of Utah Lake ( Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1991). Anthropological Papers, University of Utah No. 116; Sanpete County Commissioners, 2 7 O~ th er Forty- Niners: A Topical History of Sanpete Co., Utah, 1849- 1983 ( Salt Lake City: Western Epics, 1982). THE HISTORYB LAZERis produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more information about the Historical Society telephone 533- 3500. 951203 ( BB) |
