Utah Heritage Foundation

Do you like cycling?  Love old barns?  Want to know why there’s an angel on this barn?  Planning is underway for the Mormon Pioneer National Heritage Area Bicycle Barnstorming tour June 2012.

The purpose of the event is to update and extend a barn guide done in conjunction with the national Barn Again! program in 1998.  Photos and text will be posted to a Facebook page on the fly to create a dynamic barn guide that will be made into a smartphone app and a printable PDF.

United States Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has proclaimed August 7-13, 2011 as National Farmers Market Week.

In honor of these efforts, please shop at your local Farmer’s Market this week. Heritage Area markets are located in Logan, Providence, Paradise and Richmond in Utah and Soda Springs and Montpelier in Idaho. See attached market and small farm listings. 

Every day this summer, communities are converging to celebrate a simple miracle: farmers, as stewards of rural America, coming together to share a harvest that’s feeding local families.  The result? More viable regional economies; increased access to fresh, nutritious food; and stronger social networks that help keep communities strong.  

Parowan is a “can do” community proud to be known as the Mother Town of Southern Utah.  It was settled in 1851, the first Mormon colonial village in the southern part of the Utah territory, and boasts an abundance of historic buildings from the pioneer era, as-well-as a fair share of interesting 20^th century architecture, including a unique Prairie Style Mormon church (left).

Volunteers were out in force early on Saturday, August 6, 2011 to help with the inaugural Yankee Meadow Half Marathon.  Racers were bused to the start at the Yankee Meadow Reservoir.  Besides spectacular mountain and red rock canyon scenery, the race course went past Parowan’s historic cemetery with its beautifully-constructed WPA rock wall, and took runners on a two-mile plus loop past historic buildings in the heart of town before finishing at the Iron County Fairgrounds.



Mayor Donald Landes presented goody bags to the top three runners in each age group that included two books promoting Parowan’s heritage, Images of Parowan’s Past and Heritage Cookbook III, which is illustrated with photos of Parowan’s historic buildings.

The race expo was another stroke of marketing genius, featuring local businesses rather than the usual entourage of oustide running gear vendors.  Parowan is definitely winning the race to promote its economy and its heritage with the inaugural Yankee Meadows Half Marathon. 

A fabulous new brochure has been produced by the Bear River Heritage Area Alliance to take you on a tour of traditional farms, ranches, and historic structures in a seven county area of Northern Utah and Southern Idaho centered on the Cache Valley.  There's also a list of county fairs, roadside vendors, and other local celebrations in the brochure.  Interestingly, they've also included a list of abandoned buildings.  Really I see the buildings on this list as potential opportunities for redevelopment utilizing some fabulous buildings that have a history in the region's agricultural history.

View the tour brochure   here (1.29 Mb) .

If you like Prairie Home Companion, Garrison Keillor's venerable homespun show that is long on tradition and dry wit, then this new, locally produced show may be for you.  Story Road Utah is the ambitious attempt to tell Utah's story through music, traditional poetry and prose, and the art of storytelling.  Naturally there is a thread of Utah's heritage through most of the material.  The show is produced for and with a live audience for broadcast at a later date.

Two articles in three days have highlighted UPHA’s “Story Road Utah” which will begin its summer series at the Murray Amphitheatre (495 Ea. 5300 So.) this Saturday, June 11^th at 8 p.m. Tickets are $8 for adults and $6 for seniors and children.

The Murray episode features host Marvin Payne and house band Enoch Train plus the Days of ’47 Royalty (Courtney Curtis, Ashley Kearl, Megan Howell), storytellers Holly Robinson and Wendy DeMann, and guest performers Jenessa Butters, who sings the part of a Native American mother, and Sarah Coon, singing the part of her child.

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Historic Park City Alliance recently held a photo contest in Old Town, an area that is larger listed on the National Register of Historic Places.  You might think that taking photos that demonstrate the history, sense of community, and that this historic town might have to offer would be easy.  But not so.  The 26 entries received show the range of how this community supports preservation through it's historic buildings and legacy-type events.

Check out the entries here.

For decades running, the Hotel Utah provided the finest accommodations in Salt Lake City.  It has been a preferred location for historic President’s visits, weddings and family celebrations, home to LDS Church general authorities, and meetings in the restaurants.

Never having been in the hotel (since I moved here in 1998), I never saw it firsthand but I can get the sense of its historic spaces still.  I get the sense that this is one of those places in Utah that many people have a very strong association with and passionate feelings for.  When I talk about the building with people, the most frequent comment I hear back is how beautiful the china place-settings were.  The next most common seems to be a remark about the beehive cupola located on the roof.

A new website has been launched that documents the history of the hotel as well as the rehabilitation and adaptive use conversion of the building to offices in 1987, now known as the Joseph Smith Memorial Building.  The site also features historic photos of the building through the years. 

Communities that value their historic resources have effective Historic Preservation Commissions (HPCs).  Leeds, Utah, is one of those places.  Guided by Vision Dixie principles and leadership from the HPC, the town included a meaningful historic preservation element in their recent general plan update.  They followed that with a Reconnaissance Level Survey (RLS) to get a current baseline inventory of historic resources in their jurisdiction.  Then they took the logical next step, reviewing and revising their historic preservation ordinance to align it with the vision in their updated general plan and the RLS results.

With advice from the HPC, the town is using the information collected in the RLS to set goals and priorities for rehabbing, maintaining and using publicly-owned historic properties to benefit the community and is encouraging and assisting owners of privately held historic properties, including homeowners, to do the same.  (Right, Sarah Ann and William Stirling House, built 1876.)  Leading by example, the town is taking advantage of the opportunity to literally capitalize on their historic resources in a very tangible way by promoting heritage tourism to the Wells Fargo Silver Reef Museum and capturing visitor attention and dollars by acting as a gateway to the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area at the rehabilitated Orson B. Adams House in nearby Harrisburg. 

The Leeds Historic Preservation Commission serves not only as an advisory body to the town council, but is doubly effective as a Certified Local Government (CLG) and a National Trust Forum member with access to CLG matching grants from the Utah State Historic Preservation Office and eligibility for matching grants from the Utah Preservation Initiatives Fund (UPIF), administered by the Mountains/ Plains Office of the National Trust for Historic preservation.  The town has used its CLG grants to fund restoration work at the National Register-listed Leeds CCC Camp, to purchase and install interpretive markers, and to fund its Reconnaissance Level Survey.  UPIF grants could pay for feasibility studies to rehab historic buildings like the Leeds Tithing Office (left) through a public-private partnership with its owner, or to prepare a preservation management plan for the Wells Fargo Museum and Silver Reef historic district.

Preservation moratorium proposed at the local level

Senate Bill 243, Historic Areas or Sites Amendment, was released with text on Monday, February 7, 2011.  In brief, the bill proposes a year-long moratorium on designations, expenditures, and development agreements that involve historic structures at the city and county level beginning on May 10, 2011.  Utah Heritage Foundation believes that this bill has the ability to stop or seriously curtail preservation activities statewide at the local level - just at the time when policies are needed that encourage economic development through historic preservation and boost our economy.

Senate Bill 243 - Historic Areas or Sites Amendment