CHAPTER 1 Settling of Morgan The beautiful Morgan Valley, which originally was called the Weber Valley, lies in the northeastern part of the State of Utah where it is hemmed in by the Wasatch Mountains on the west and spurs of the Unitah Mountains on the east. The Weber River flows in a westerly direction through the central portion of the Valley, and Cottonwood and Lost creeks are the principal tributaries to the Weber from the north and East Canyon Creek from the south. The Valley is somewhat irregular in shape and covers an area of more than six hundred square miles. Early Mormon Settlers The Valley was first explored during the winter of 1824 by fur trappers working under General William H. Ashley. The Weber River receives its name from a member of the Ashley-Henry fur trapping company named John Weber. Twenty-rwo years later Lansford W. Hastings, and the emigrant company he was leading, passed through the Valley in early summer on their way to California. They were followed in late summer by the Donner-Reed party. A year later the Latter-day Saints, under the direction of President Brigham Young, traveled through the east end of what is now Morgan County, arriving in the Salt Lake Valley in July 1847. Three months later, on 6 October 1847, Thomas Jefferson Thurston arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in thejedediah M. Grant Company. In 1848 Thomas was called by Brigham Young to help explore Cache Valley. Later he settled with his family in Centerville, where he began to farm eighty acres of ground.1 While getting timber from the steep mountains above his home in Centerville, Thomas saw for the first time the beautiful Morgan Valley, which reminded him of his former home in Ohio. It was early summer, and from a distance the Valley looked well-watered and well-wooded. Determined to explore the Valley, he talked until he got two of his friends, William Porter and J. B. Nobel, to go with him. Together they crossed over the mountaintops and spent three days exploring the Valley and its resources. "They found the valley well-watered with lots of timber on its streams which were all well stocked with fish, the country covered with grass, and deer and fowl and game in abundance, 1 Thomas Jefferson Thurston was born 12 February 1805 in Fletcher, Vermont, and died 4 May 1885 < George, Utah.