• • • HARDSCRABBLE At one time there were nine saw mills up Hardscrabble. Hundreds of thousands of feet of lumber were produced in Hardscrabble Canyon. The logs were brought off the side of the mountain with ox teams to the mills. Some were run by steam and some by water power. There were also two shingle mills. The logs were chopped down with an ax or felled with a two man saw. The first saw mill was brought over the mountains with pack horses by the Porter brothers. They set their saw mills up at the mouth of Beaver Canyon. Some of the lumber was haul over the mountain, into Bountiful. About 1870, an eastern man, William Farrell, brought a steam saw mill into the Weber Valley, also ten expert mill men and a large number of oxen. They camped in Richville that spring. His mill was set up at the fork in the head of Hardscrabble and named Farrow after him. The cutting and hauling of the timber furnished employment for most of the men in Porterville and Richville. After using this mill for about a year Mr. Farrell sold it and brought in a larger one, a 60 inch saw, with which he was able to cut a great deal more lumber. Hundreds of thousands of feet oflumber were produced there. His camp supplies he brought directly from the East. Fruits and finer provisions were brought here by him at one time. He had a lumber yard at Richville - where the Stanley Rose property now is - which was the largest that has ever been in Morgan County. Mr. Farrell married a daughter of Billa Dickson. Then next was the Standish mill. It was located on the west fork of Farrell Canyon. The work here was mostly sawing ties. About six hundred feet down the canyon there was another saw mill named Holdman's. It was run by water power and sawed a great many shingles as well as ties for the railroad. The came Billa Dickson's mill, which furnished shingles and lumber of all kinds. It was situated about 200 yards down the canyon from Farrell' s canyon. His mill was powered by water. Below him was a saw mill that belonged to Sam Brough who also sawed shingles and ties. Further down the canyon was the Joseph Taylor saw mill. Jake Authur had a water-powered mill at the mouth of Authur's Canyon . The last mill in Hardscrabble was owned by Bert and George Turner. After two years • • • they sold it to Joe Carpenter. He moved it to what is called the Black Grove. It was later taken out of the canyon and moved into the lower valley. The water mills ran night and day because they could get more power in the night than during the day time. Charcoal was produced in the same canyon. This was shipped to the mines at Bingham for smelting purposes. The lumber business brought a great deal of wealth to the people. Mines were also operated in Hardscrabble. One of the mines was operated by Gren Porter and Joe Carpenter. tAfi 11,awi Mortenson also worked with them. As a young lad Roy Mortenson was sent to the mine at night on horse back to tell Joe Carpenter that his father had died. The horse got away and Roy continued to the mine walking the rest of the way. Exhausted he slept until the men returned from the mine. Joe walked out of the canyon even though he was tired from mining for so many hours. He said if a young boy could walk to the cabin in the dark, that he could walk out. They had what was called the Iron Mine Hill. They hauled quite a lot or ore out of Hardscrabble by team and wagon and sleighs. It was loaded on train cars in Morgan. Some ofit was shipped to the cement plant in Devil' s Slide. Some was shipped down to the smelters below Salt Lake. It didn't seem to pay off so they didn' t mine long. Daniel Norchy operated a mine. He and his family lived there. He packed all the groceries to supply his family for a year from Morgan to Hardscrabble. He mined there for several years, but he never had any paying ore out of it. Finally he quit and left. The seven Fowler Brothers came to Hardscrabble and set up a mine and were going to smelter ore there but it fell through. They sold a lot of stock to finance it but it never payed off very well. John Porter and Joe Carpenter had a mine. They drove a shaft down into the canyon. They were about two hundred feet down. They had good paying ore, but the water came into it so bad they had to abolish it. ********************************************