The pioneers' purpose was not uncertain; having reached their destination they paused not to make experiments or preliminary tests. "This is the place," said their leader, "the very place"; and the company began at once the work of permanently establishing themselves and of preparing for the reception of other immigrant parties then on the march. Ploughs were promptly brought into action, and the soil theretofore unused to the husbandman's touch was in part torn and turned; yet so hard and resistant was it that it measured its strength with the energy of man and for the time held the victory. But the colonists were full of resource. The little stream now known as City Creek, the chief source of the city's water supply, was diverted from its course and made to flood the land chosen for the first desert garden. With its long thirst appeased, its stony heart softened, the virgin soil yielded and received the first seed sown by human agency in the Great American Desert. Thus began the system of irrigation which in its later developments has proved itself the magic wand under whose sway the desert has been conquered and the wilderness transformed into a garden of beauty.

[ EAST TEMPLE STREET, LOOKING SOUTH FROM THE TEMPLE.]

On the 28th of the same month the city was planned and its boundaries were indicated; five days later the survey of the city plat was begun under the direction of Orson Pratt. All the plans were on a scale of unlimited liberality. The streets, each eight rods in width, were made to cross at right angles, dividing the city into rectangular blocks, each of ten acres. The choicest block in point of situation was designated as the site of the prospective temple; and is now occupied by the world-famed Temple, the Tabernacle, and the less pretentious Assembly Hall. The original survey was made to include a hundred and thirty-five of these ten-acre blocks; several were chosen for public squares and parks; the remainder were to be divided into city lots for the accommodation of the thousands soon to come.

Religious devotion, the inspiring cause of this seemingly reckless scheme of colonization, demanded facilities for public worship; and, lacking chapel, synagogue, or temple, the colonists provided a leafy tabernacle. Trees were hauled from the mountains, and of these a bowery was constructed, which for a time was church, court-house, and capitol.

Having learned by experience that Indian attacks were to be expected, the settlers congregated on a single ten-acre block, which they enclosed by erecting their huts of logs and adobe along the eastern border. Each hut opened inward toward the centre of the square and was provided with a loophole on the outer side; the space between the houses and the sides of the block not occupied by habitations was protected by a continuous wall of adobe. With the increase of population additions were made to the fort; but as soon as the ruddy aborigines learned that the white invaders were their friends, the fort was abandoned, and the settlers distributed themselves over the city area.

At the time of its first settlement Utah was a part of the Mexican domain; nevertheless, the "Mormon" colonists, confident as to the destiny of their nation, patriotically raised the Stars and Stripes and took possession of the region in the name of the United States. A prominent hill, part of the Wasatch spur which bounds the present city on the northeast like a fortress wall, was chosen as the flag site; and this elevation is to-day known as Ensign Peak. From its summit, now surmounted by an enduring flag-staff of steel, the banner of freedom is thrown to the mountain breezes on public holidays and other occasions of patriotic celebration.

More colonists arrived in parties great and small; and by the spring of 1848 approximately seventeen hundred souls were encamped in the valley, more than four hundred dwellings had been erected within the confines of the old fort, and about five thousand acres of land had been brought under cultivation. In May and June, the settlers were arrayed in battle order, not against human foes but to fight the dreaded insect scourge, the Rocky Mountain crickets, which in countless hordes descended from the mountains and invaded the fields and gardens. Every member of the little community, man, woman, or child, was called into action but to little purpose. When the people had been reduced to despair they were saved by what they devoutly believed to be a special and miraculous interposition of Providence. There suddenly appeared on the western horizon a tremulous cloud which grew in magnitude as it rapidly approached, until at last it was seen to be the vanguard of an advancing army of gulls. Down swooped the white-winged deliverers, devouring the crickets with incredible voracity until but few were left alive. Since that day the gulls have been sacred in Utah. Every spring they come to follow the plough as it turns the soil for the season's seed, and so confident are they of their safety that they may be approached almost within arm's length. Added to the ruin wrought by the crickets was a further deprivation, due to drought and frosts. The harvest of 1848 was little better than a failure, and the succeeding winter and spring were seasons of extreme destitution. The people were brought to the dire necessity of gathering the wild weeds of the desert and even of boiling the raw hides in their camps for sustenance. The bulbous roots of the sego lily—now the banner-flower of the State—were dug for food; but the pangs of hunger were an experience from which none escaped. However, the following season brought a more abundant return from the soil and the prospects of the colony brightened.

In February, 1848, the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo secured by cession from Mexico to the United States the region now embraced by Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, and California. The great republic reached the Pacific, and Salt Lake City became an integral part of the United States. Up to this time, and, indeed, for a year thereafter, the governmental affairs of the new community were administered almost wholly by the Church authorities. In February, 1849, the city was divided into nineteen ecclesiastical wards, over each of which a "bishopric" presided, consisting of a bishop and his two counsellors, who combined with their purely churchly function the duties of magistrates and civil officers. They regulated the levying and disbursing of taxes, the construction of roads and bridges, and the like.[16]

JEDEDIAH M. GRANT, FIRST MAYOR OF SALT LAKE CITY.