Oral History Program Linda Smith Interviewed by Carol Permar 14 April 2008 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Linda Smith Interviewed by Carol Permar 14 April 2008 Copyright © 2014 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in University Archives. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Smith, Linda, an oral history by Carol Permar, 14 April 2008, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: This is an oral history with Linda Smith. It is being conducted on April 14, 2008 at the library in Morgan, Utah. Linda Smith is the County Historian and this interview concerns her understanding of the City of Morgan. The interviewer is Carol Permar. CP: Why was Morgan first Settled? LS: It was settled for residence. The pioneers came in and they wanted to settle in the valley. CP: What kept Morgan going? LS: It was primarily agricultural in the beginning. It remained that way for quite some time. CP: What kind of agricultural? LS: Farming, crops, cattle, sheep. They had some dairy farming down in the Mountain Green area. In fact some other people, down on the Wasatch front (as it is called now), would bring some of their dairy herds up and graze them in the valley, in the Mountain Green area during the summer months and take them down below in the winter months. There was a dairy down there. They did have a lot of dairy's that produced milk for a long time and it was shipped out of the county. They also had a creamery, a few creameries, three of them I believe and they produced cream, butter, cheese and that was, you know, progressed along that wasn't in the very, very beginning. It was basically agricultural. A lot of sheep ranching that went on for quite some time. CP: Did they use the sheep for the meat or for the wool? LS: For the wool. 1 CP: For the wool? LS: Yes. CP: Did they process the wool here, how did they...? LS: Yes, they would have, I'm not sure what it is called. Men would go around with their shearing equipment, and they would go from different farms, and sheer them and then move on to another one. CP: So I wonder, did they sell the wool then to industries outside of Morgan then? LS: Yes. CP: Oh, ok. LS: In the early years they would card their own wool. And make their own cloth, then sew their own fabric. CP: So you said card? LS: Card, yes that is taking the wool and stringing it out so it becomes like, you know, a string and they would put it on a spinning wheel and do that and so, those that just had a few sheep could do that themselves for their own personal use. CP: Were there mink ranches? LS: The mink ranching didn't come along until, I'm not exactly sure of the date. I believe probably after the depression I believe, it actually started with fox farming and one entity started with fox and they moved into the mink and mink farming became a large industry in Morgan. CP: I noticed there are still some mink farms around today. Are they still in operation? 2 LS: They are, however, there is just a very, very small percentage due to the fact. It wasn't necessarily the price of the mink pelts that went down. Although it has occurred. It fluctuates with the years. But the animals got a disease call ADD I believe it was and it is very contagious. Once you get it in your, I guess they call them a herd, then the only way to get rid of it was to completely destroy all the mink. Pelt them all out and then go elsewhere and to out of the county and get another bunch of mink. Their brood stock and start all over again. There are a few. The ones that are left are probably the ones that never did get that disease. CP: That is pretty weird that you would have to completely move out of the area. The disease stayed here. LS: Well, and they were going out of the area to get their breed. So that they got new stock all the time, occasionally anyway. Usually if they got it in this area they wanted to get some from outside of the area. Some ranchers did pelt out all of their mink and start another group of mink for their industry. But they got it again so they just went out of the business. CP: When I think about the mink ranches I was thinking, because women don't wear mink coats anymore or hats anymore, so it was more for that so it is interesting to hear that it was due to disease rather than the lack of people wanting them. LS: The PETA group for the animal had an impact on it also. Maybe not completely, but it played a part in it. CP: Ok, then what kind of crops did they grow around here? 3 LS: In the early pioneering years the basics for survival: wheat, grains, hay. They did some metal hay that was here, and then as time progressed then came in cash crops. There was a cannery here in Morgan. Peas and cabbage for that. That was a very, very big industry. And they called them cash crops because they could get money for them right at that time. They also had sugar beets and those were shipped out of the county. There were beet dumps along the rail road tracks and taken out of the county. CP: Where is the cannery physically located? Is the building still in existence? LS: Part of it is. State Street and about one block west of the exit of the interstate. It is a large sand stone building. There is currently a small meat cutting, chetters meat, right in the front of it. The only thing that is left there now is the sand stone building that was actually used for storing the case goods. The buildings that were used in the manufacturing have been torn down. The original cannery was located across the street from that and this sandstone was one that was built later. CP: Was the cannery a big place of employment? Did a lot of people work there? LS: Yes. It employed a lot of the people. It was great for the seasonal. It ran seasonally. It employed a lot of seasonal people during the canning season. A lot of them. Christmas money. That is another thing about the mink ranching. When they would pelt, the animals would fur up, and they would pelt them out. It would usually be around November and they employed a lot of local people to do that. And that gave them their Christmas money. That's what people used for Christmas money. Also the cannery, plus there were regular people that worked there full time. It employed a lot of people in the county. It was a devastation when it closed. 4 CP: It sounds like would be. It would impact a lot. Was there a chicken co-op? LS: There was. They raised a lot of eggs. Well, chickens that had the eggs. That building the co-op building is right next to the rail road tracks. You can see it as you get off the Morgan exit. They had their own truck. They did have their poultry co-op. CP: And the building is right on Commercial there? Right next to the rail road tracks? You can see it from Commercial? LS: You can see it from commercial. It is actually right between the rail road tracks and the access road. CP: Ah ya, is that building used for anything now? LS: Not to my knowledge other than storage. CP: It is such a neat historical building. It would make a cool restaurant or something. LS: It is. It would. I am not sure, the building is owned by a family here in Morgan but I am not sure if it sits on railroad property. I'm not sure exactly how that works out because the railroad does own a certain amount of property on each side of their tracks. CP: What do people in Morgan do for leisure? LS: Currently? CP: Well, we can start in the beginning. What did they do back when they first settled here and move forward. LS: Back when they first settled here there wasn't a lot of leisure time. But they did have their dancing. They would always like to dance even from the time when they came across the plains. They would stop at night and dance and sing. That was one of their 5 major entertainments. As time went on they would still do the singing and the dancing. In Morgan City they have a place they call Simmons Hall where they would put on plays and productions, locally. Then the people got together because that wasn't large enough and built an Opera house. The current facility that the Spring Chicken Inn is in. And that was a co-op that was built in 1906. They would have plays there. Course they didn't have movies at that time but eventually they did have movies in there. And it was sold to the church and they used it for different church activities, it was then sold and it became a theater that was in existence for quite some time until in the 70's when it became a restaurant. The building, the top floor when it was the opera house was also used for basketball games for the higher education before they got a basketball facility in. CP: So would the actual opera's be on the main floor then? Because I go into the restaurant and I try and figure out how it was situated. LS: Yes. CP: And so when it was an opera house the upstairs wasn't used for the opera part LS: No, it was a dance floor up on the top floor. The ceiling was open-beam; that is how they could use it for basketball. The main function was for dancing. The bottom floor was slanted for a theater with a stage on the end. They also had chicacaws that would go around from different cities and do plays and they would come to Morgan. They would use that building for their political rallies and functions also. It was just used for everything public. CP: That's interesting. What about Como Springs? How prevalent was that in the area? 6 LS: Como was a big attraction for Morgan. It began because a doctor sent the water back for its mineral purposes and they thought it would be very healthful for people. Then it was made into a resort. In the 90's it became quite a depression type era in the 90's. It was closed down for a short period of time. Then it was opened again and upgraded again periodically. It went from one large dirt bottom pool with wood sides into the three major pools. It functioned again until I believe the 80's. CP: Then it just stopped and people quit using it? LS: It wasn't that people quit using it. People were still using it, it hadn't been what, shall I say, modernized maybe kept up with the codes of the state. I'm not exactly sure of this. I think there were so many restrictions the cost effectiveness of this became a question. Then they had some sewer issues. There is no sewer treatment plant and they could not hook onto the city facilities so quite a few things that came into the equation there. CP: I know within the last couple of year someone bought the property and I thought they were going to try and get it going again and that sort of seemed to go away. It probably came into money issues. Now it looks like it is used for a camping ground. LS: People camp out there. It had a camp ground in the beginning also. It had the camping area. Many cabins were up there and people would stay for the weekends or the week. A skating rink. Then in more recent years it was converted into a bottling company for bottling the spring water. There was a cafe and a bowling alley. There was a hamburger stand. They would have kinda like your Lagoon games up there even in the early years. And they would play these games like they do down throwing ball and bean bags. They had a game they called binko or something. People can still remember winning cuipie dolls up there a lot. It had just about anything they wanted in that line. 7 CP: What were some of the earlier businesses in Morgan? I know you talked about the cannery. LS: Of course mercantile. They had their mercantile businesses. There were some millinery stores where women would make their hats. The blacksmith shops were probably the first businesses because they were essential. People had to have a blacksmith shop not only for shoeing their animals but for repairing their harnesses, they would have to repair their plows, all of their farm implements. The railroad wasn't here so what they had they had to make do with it. Also their tea kettles, they didn't throw away their tea kettles, pans, anything away. They would go to the blacksmith shop to have them repaired. From that, CP: Was the blacksmith shop located on Commercial. Was that the, when the town was first settled was that the main area? LS: No. When the town was first settled it was over in the south Morgan area. And that was going to be the business district. That is where the first school was, the first courthouse, the first church building. This was going to be the center of town. There were two blacksmith shops three actually on this side of town. Then when the railroad came through there was a difficulty in crossing the river. Bridges, they used boats for quite some time. They even have people drown while trying to cross the river. Shoemakers when they started having some business over there had to wade across and when the railroad came through it was hard to get supplies over back across the river to South Morgan so they moved their businesses over on Commercial Street where they were next to the railroad and the blacksmith shop. The main blacksmith shop moved over there also. 8 CP: When you consider South Morgan what area are you talking about? LS: South Morgan would be on the west side of the river. North Morgan would have been on the opposite side. Morgan is not set up correctly with the compass north, south, east and west. The streets are not so it is a little skiwampus. CP: Morgan is still the same general area? You're not talking about Porterville then? LS: No. Morgan City basically. Morgan City incorporates the whole north Morgan and south Morgan. CP: Oh ok. Was there like a JC Penney's here at one time? LS: Yes there was. What we had first was a ZCMI and they had their con wagon and machine company which brought the farm wagon in with the farm industry type implement of it. The ZCMI was located over on Commercial Street. Then when they quit operations up here the building was occupied by JC Penney's It was actually the Golden Rule is what they called it then JC Penney it was the same company. CP: That's interesting I didn't realize that JC Penney had a former name. I just thought that they started out as JC Penney. LS: Well they could of. I'm not sure about their history. I just know that in Morgan it had the Golden Rule on it. And then they changed it to JC Penney and it was said to of been the very same business. CP: So how has Commercial Street changed over the years? LS: It's gone from probably boom to bust. There is very little. If you've been over there, there are very few businesses there. They struggle because of the traffic flow. The parking was always an issue on Commercial Street because it is just on one side. They did take 9 out the railroad parkway to make it both sides but by then there just wasn't space for expansion. I think in more recent years the first thing to change was the main grocery store. CP: That used to be on Commercial— Jubilee— and they moved? LS: Originally a Williams store and it went down through the Williams family and evolved in different things. Then it was sold. Then it was purchased by Roger Terry and it became Roger's Food and he is the one that opened the new store on State Street. Then he sold it out and it has become Jubilee. CP: That probably really impacted Commercial Street a lot when the grocery store moved. LS: It did and there were two grocery stores on Commercial Street where the JC Penney’s was became a grocery store. At one time Morgan had the three there was the Williams store, Hamuals as it became. In south Morgan there was the Earls grocery store. So you could get just about anything you wanted in the line of groceries from those three stores. Now we just have the one. CP: What building was JC Penney's physically located in? LS: It's a vacant lot on Commercial Street. CP: So it got torn down? LS: Yes. CP: Is it in the same area as the drug store? That same area? LS: The drug store is actually in the same building as the drug store was in the beginning. It's just down the street from the drug store. Heading northwest corner of Commercial 10 Street and I believe 125 north. That vacant corner there. It also had a meat market there on the corner that was originally part of the JC Penney. It was a tall building two story and it later housed a post office. CP: So I wonder why they tore the building down. LS: It fell into disrepair. They were old, old buildings and not kept up and it became a hazard. It was more cost effective to build new than to restore and I believe that when they tore it down they thought they had someone who was going to purchase the property and build another building there but that fell through. CP: What about the surrounding towns, Porterville, Cryoden, Milton? What is Morgan's relationship to these other towns? LS: They are all part of the county. In the early settlement every small community had their school and then as time went on then each community probably went through their log school then one room brick school then a two room school. In 1936 they consolidated. The first consolidated elementary school in the state was built here in Morgan City so it pulled everyone into the city. That would have been the nucleus because from there the high school was built in Morgan City and the middle school. Just recently all the schools have been centrally located here. And not they are going to build they are in the process of building an elementary school in Mountain Green. So it is a city nucleus. CP: The little one schools in the surrounding areas are they still in existence? LS: No. They were sold to individuals and many of them were used for homes for quite some time and they were taken down and new homes built. The two room one's when the consolidation took place the buildings were sold to the LDS church and were sold to 11 them for one dollar except for the Richfield school. They closed the Richfield school down prior to 1936 and the LDS church paid $100 for that one. They thought they were kind of mistreated and waited two years and got it for a dollar. CP: On the phone you had mentioned the Devils Slide area. What can you tell me about this? LS: Can I go back? There is one school building still in existence. A rock school up in Round Valley. It's a shell right now but the new developers, we are working with them to preserve that and they have something in mind for that development so that hopefully we can preserve that one room school building up there. CP: Where is that again? LS: In Round Valley. CP: Where is that? LS: You follow the road, 100 south up and go behind Como and follow that road up to Round Valley where the golf course is. CP: It is called Round Valley back there? LS: Yes. And you can't miss it. It is right by their parking lot. It was built in the 1860's. It's really a nice building and we are glad that they will preserve it. Now, I'm sorry what was your other question? CP: No, that's ok. On the phone you had mentioned the Devils Slide area. LS: They had the cement plant up there and when they built the cement plant, of course that is what approximately eight miles from Morgan City, and for people to work they built 12 the only planned city in Morgan. The housing for the laborers because they couldn't get to and from work. The roads and the automobiles, they were using mainly a lot of horse and buggies still back then. So they built this city for their employees to live in and it had everything that they needed. It had their club house, grocery store, their pharmacy, their doctor's office, a small hospital. All of their n needs were met. And there were quite a few Japanese people that worked for them and they had a facility built especially for the Japanese that had bath houses for the Japanese employees. Devils Slide has employees many people from Morgan and Summit County for years and they are one of our biggest employers. CP: Was it like a ghost town? LS: Yes, in recent years, I can't give you the year right now, as people moved out of the city because the roads became more improved and with better transportation they didn't have to stay on those homes. The homes became outdated and as time went on people were building more luxurious homes elsewhere so they started to move out into the different areas. As this happened they tore the homes down and now there are no homes left. I believe there is just a garage unit left up there they've got a crushing equipment up there at the side of the town. The plant has evolved through the years and what was the original plant no longer looks like that of course it is all new buildings and facilities. The plant is located across Weber River not even a mile from where the town was. CP: On a personal note how long have you lived in Morgan? LS: I moved to Morgan when I was four years old and lived here until I was probably eleven and then from eleven to sixteen I was back and forth from Morgan and Ogden a few 13 times and then from sixteen on I have lived here the rest of my life. I am sixty so that is quite a while. CP: So you've seen quite a bit of changes over the years. LS: I have. CP: A lot more development, a lot more people moving in. LS: We have gone from being an agricultural community to a bedroom community. More people work on the Wasatch front than have agricultural here. The two biggest employers are the Devils Slide plant and Browning arms probably. There are a few farmers and ranchers that do that for a sole income and they have another job. We do have a few businesses like the drug store, a cafe, supermarket but people live mainly outside of town. We have a lot of development going in. Housing. CP: It's unique to not really have a big employer here. So many people do travel to Ogden to work. We don't have a big hospital here. If you have an emergency here you have to go to Ogden. LS: We have one clinic. We had a clinic in Mountain Green. They tried it but the Mountain Green area is so close to Ogden that people would just get on the road It was very modern and up-to-date. A very nice facility but people just didn't use it. They wanted to go to Ogden. If they went to Ogden they could do other shopping and things there. Had they built that clinic in Morgan I am sure they would have had no problem with it because it was several years later when they built the clinic in Morgan and it is still in existence. Prior to that we had a doctor in Devils Slide and he not only took care of the cement plant employees he took care of the people from Summit County would come 14 down. North Summit, Coalville and the Morgan residence. A lot would went up there we had another doctor right here in Morgan County. CP: Ok. That is most of the questions that I had. Is there anything that you would like to add or say that I missed? LS: I think you've pretty well covered it in a nutshell. I think that Morgan is a very nice community. It is a nice place to live, it is changing. I think that's kinda hard for some people to accept. The change is happening so rapidly. I think that is what makes it more difficult. The density of some of the housing is affecting the people. CP: More farmers are selling their land. LS: They can't make a living. I think it is as the older generation dies off then the younger kids can't see the profit in keeping the land. They want to sell it to get the money, and the ones that have tried to make a living they just really can't. You have to go somewhere else to work. I can see both sides of it. I'm not opposed to development, I think it’s nice but we need to control it so it doesn't go ramped and ruin the quality of life of everyone that lives here. CP: It is such a nice community here. You want to be the last one's here and lock the door and not let anyone else in. LS: I don't think the people that have been living here for years and years feel that way quite often it is the people that are coming in, that have come in in the last twenty years, they feel that way, or ten years you'll have them say that. It's just kinda different CP: Ok. Well thank you very much for allowing me to interview you and taking the time. LS: You're welcome. 15 CP: I appreciate it. LS: I would like to add that this is a summary of Morgan County. For more details anyone can come to the Historical society which is located in the library. Our hours of operation are Mon - Fri 12:00 to 5:00. We also have a web site: www.morganhistoricalsociety.com 16