Utah – Box Elder County
WASHAKIE, UTAH
Sagwitch Timbimboo, Shoshone Chief (SUP #T)
Sponsor – Ogden Pioneer Chapter, 1963
Location – Old Washakie Townsite cemetery. North on I-15 to exit 392; left under freeway, then right (north) on frontage road to 24000 North. Then left (west) through settlement of Washakie to 8600 West 24000 North. Turn left only 50 feet, then right (west) about one-fourth mile to cemetery. Marker is in NW quadrant of cemetery, Indian section.
GPS – N 41° 56' 44.58", W 112° 14' 03.01"
Chief Sagwitch Timbimboo was born 1822 near the present site of Bear River City, Utah, and was baptized into the LDS Church August, 1875. He was one of the few survivors of the battle of the Bear River (also known as the Bear River Massacre) in January 1863. He was the grandfather of Moroni Timbimboo, who served as bishop of the LDS Washakie Ward 1939 to 1945. He died March 20, 1884.
BEAR RIVER CITY
James Bridger 1804 – 1881 (UPTLA #10)
Sponsors – Bear River Chapter of Future Farmers of America and Utah Pioneer Trails and Landmarks Association, 1932
Early western fur trapper, frontiersman, scout and guide. To settle a wager among the trappers who were making their first winter rendezvous in Cache Valley, Bridger floated alone in a bull boat down Bear River to its outlet to determine the river’s course in the late autumn or early winter of 1824, thus making the original discovery of Great Salt Lake. But believing he had discovered a salty arm of the Pacific Ocean, he halted en route at such view points as the site of this monument, to reconnoiter.
BRIGHAM CITY, UTAH
The following 20 monuments are part of a bicycle/vehicle tour and are listed in touring sequence.
- Brigham City, a Co-op Town (SUP #74)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1995
Location – Brigham Young Park, West Forest Street, Brigham City.
Under the leadership of Elder Lorenzo Snow, Brigham City was the first important Mormon community to organize cooperative activity under the system of the United Order of 1874. Approximately 30–40 industry branches were established with the aim of producing and manufacturing what they consumed and used. The Co-op operated over 15 years from 1864–1880.
- Davis Fort
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 700 North 400 West Street, Brigham City.
Soon after the first white families settled at Box Elder, a fort was built in 1851 to protect themselves from Shoshone Indian attacks. The fort, named after their leader, William Davis, consisted of a row of simple log cabins and was abandoned in the spring of 1852.
- Box Elder Fort (SUP #55)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1992
Location – 280 North 200 West (behind Lincoln Center), Brigham City.
In July 1853 Brigham Young ordered the people settled in the Brigham City vicinity to construct another fort to provide protection from the Indians. The Indian danger soon abated and a survey and a plat of the city was made in 1855 to allow settlers to move from the fort.
- Union Pacific Depot
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – West Forest Street, near RR tracks, Brigham City.
The depot, built in 1907, served thousands of train passengers, handled shipments of coal, locally grown produce, and mail. During World War II, a track was installed between the depot and Brigham City's Bushnell Military Hospital for transporting wounded servicemen and medical supplies.
- Tithing Office
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 64 South 100 West, Brigham City.
Early Church members brought goods instead of cash to contribute one-tenth of their earnings as tithing. The Brigham City Tithing Office, built in 1877, had storage rooms for perishable goods and a rock wall around the acre yard for animals received as tithing.
- Brigham City Tabernacle (Box Elder Tabernacle) (SUP #21)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1988
Location – 200 South Main Street, Brigham City.
In 1865, Brigham Young directed Elder Lorenzo Snow to build a tabernacle for conferences in the Box Elder Stake on "Sagebrush Hill." The cornerstone was laid on May 9, 1865, and President Wilford Woodruff dedicated the finished building in 1890. Later a fire gutted the tabernacle, and the reconstruction included elegant woodwork, a distinctive gothic-revival tower, and sixteen graceful pinnacles. The tabernacle was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.
- First Ward Meeting House
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 311 South 100 East Street, Brigham City.
Built in 1884-1886, the First Ward Meeting House is the oldest church still standing in Brigham City. It was made of stone, and a wooden recreation hall was later added to form a T with the main building.
- Brigham City Archway Sign
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 50 South Main Street, Brigham City.
The Brigham City Archway was built in 1928 at a cost of $2,400, most of which came from citizen donations. The finished sign measured 9 by 33 feet and was embellished with more than 350 electrical lights. The sign was replicated with newer materials in 1984.
- Box Elder Courthouse
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – Main Street – Center of town
- Old City Hall/Fire Station
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – Main Street at City Center, Brigham City.
The first city hall was built in Brigham City in 1909. The building originally housed the fire department, city offices, a jail cell in the southeast corner and “hobo apartments” in the basement. It was remodeled in 1935 and served as city hall until 1974.
- Brigham City Co-op Store
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – The corner of Main & Forest Streets (Now Wells Fargo Bank), Brigham City.
Built in 1890, the mercantile store was the last building constructed from the Brigham City Co-op. Three years after the store opened, a fire destroyed the business a year before the cooperative organization closed. First Security Bank bought the building on July 29, 1942
- Box Elder Academy of Music and Dancing
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1903
Location – 62 North Main
Built in 1903, the elegant two-story building had an upper floor for dancing and an open air pavilion on the ground floor. Brothers Christian and Peter Christensen ran the Academy and offered dance instruction and ballroom dancing. Three of Christians’s sons—William, Harold, and Lew—studied at the Academy and later became national figures in the ballet world.
- Grist Mill
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 200 North 400 East, Brigham City.
Built in 1856, this flour mill was the first industrial building in Brigham City. John H. Bott purchased the mill in 1890 for his stone cutting and monument company, which has continued as a family business through four generations of Botts.
- Relief Society Granary (SUP #148)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 100 North 400 East, Brigham City.
In 1876, Brigham Young requested the women of the church to store grain to feed the poor and give aid to those in need. The women gleaned the grain from the fields after the men had harvested the wheat. Harriet S. Snow, Relief Society President in Brigham City began storing wheat in the upstairs room of her home until it became too much for her to handle. Harriet requested from her husband, Lorenzo Snow, that a granary be built, and it was constructed in 1877 at this location, known then as Co-op Square. Grain was sent to San Francisco after the 1906 fire, and sold to the US Government during WW I. In 2007-2008, the Box Elder Chapter, SUP, restored the old Relief Society Granary, and offered it as a museum for the community. It was re-dedicated on December 27, 2008.
- Woolen Mill
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – 56 North 500 East Street, Brigham City.
The Brigham City Co-op woolen mill was built in 1869, and by 1877 produced $42,000 worth of wool in 44 weeks. After the co-op closed, James Baron bought the mill, renamed it Baron Woolen Mills, and operated the mill until it was sold outside the family in 1988.
- Planing Mill
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – Forest Street and 600 East, Brigham City.
James Pett built the planing mill in 1875 for the Brigham City Co-op and produced cabinetry, furniture and square nails. After the Co-op closed, John Finley Merrell bought the planing mill, and has been operated by four generations of the Merrell Family.
- Lorenzo Snow Burial Site (SUP #5)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1985
Location – Brigham City Cemetery
Lorenzo Snow joined the Church in June 1836. Captain of his wagon company, he crossed the plains and arrived in the Valley in 1848. He was called to preside over the colonization of Brigham City. He was ordained an apostle of the LDS Church in 1849, and later served as a councilor to Brigham Young. His service as President of the Church began in 1898 at age 84, and continued until his death on October 10, 1901.”
- Bushnell Hospital/Intermountain Indian School
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter
Location – Entrance at 400 East 700 South Street, Brigham City.
In 1942, Bushnell General Hospital was built in Brigham City to treat World War II wounded. The hospital closed in 1946 after 13,000 army personnel were treated. In 1950, the Bureau of Indian Affairs converted the Bushnell facility to a boarding school for Navajo children until its closure in 1984.
- Pioneer Care Center (SUP #25)
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 1989
Location – 800 South 200 West, Brigham City.
The Pioneer Care Center plaque commemorates the sacrifice, commitment, and charity of all the generations who have lived in Brigham City.
- Brigham Young’s Last Public Address (UPTLA #69)
Sponsors – Brigham City Corporation, Wards, Civic Clubs, Patriotic Organizations in Box Elder Stake, including the Utah Pioneer Trails and Landmarks Association, Aug. 19, 1937.
Location – Brigham Young Park, West Forest
Erected in honor of Brigham Young in commemoration of the outstanding service he rendered to the Intermountain west, as patriot, pioneer, colonizer, Church leader and statesman. On this plot of ground Aug. 19, 1877, he delivered his last public address when he organized the Box Elder Stake.
COLLINSTON, UTAH
Hampton Ford Crossing (SUP #C)
Sponsor – Golden Spike & Box Elder Chapters, 1957
Location – Off highway 30 near junction of highway 38, 1.3 miles from Collinston, Utah.
GPS – 41° 47′ 207″ N by 112° 06′ 340″ W.
Approximately five miles downstream from the mouth of the canyon where the Bear River enters the Bear River Valley is located a ford where Indians, trappers, and early, explorers crossed the river. As routes became better established, more and more travelers crossed the Bear River ford and by 1853 Ben Hampton and William Godbe operated the ferry to aid in the crossings. Eventually traffic became too great for the ferry and in 1859 the first bridge over the Bear River was constructed. A hotel and other buildings were built near the crossing to accommodate travelers. In 1904 the rails reached Malad and traffic through the Hampton crossing declined. The station remains one of the best preserved of all stage stops in the Old West.
HONEYVILLE, UTAH
Call’s Fort (UPTLA #22)
Sponsors – Utah Pioneer Trails and Landmarks Association and members and friends of the Call family, 1933
Location – Highway 38 south of Honeyville, Utah
This monument marks the S. E. corner of a fort built by Anson Call and associates in 1855 under direction of President Brigham Young, as protection against Indians. The fort was the most northerly outpost in Utah. It was 120 feet square, with walls 8 feet high and 3 feet thick, built of rock, part of which is in this monument. The circular stones were taken from one of the first burr flour mills built in northern Utah in 1852, owned by Omer and Homer Call. The three Call brothers were early pioneers and builders of Northern Utah.
MANTUA, UTAH
Logan to Brigham Pioneer Pony Express Mail Trail – #122
Sponsor – Box Elder Chapter, 2006
Location – Mantua town square
Brigham Young officially called Samuel Alonzo Whitney Sr. to carry the mail from Cache Valley to Box Elder County. He was friendly with the Indians, spoke their language well and they recognized him from afar because one arm was missing. Therefore, he was able to travel the mail route alone without trouble. Sam is credited with carrying the very first mail from Logan to Brigham City.