10A THE OGDEN STANDARD EXAMINER OGDEN, UTAH, SUNDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 11, 1955 UTAH NEWS KNOW YOUR UTAH! Spaniards Entered This Area in 1540 (Editors Note How much do the people of Utah know about their state? To refresh their memories, the Associated Press has prepared a series of articles that tell the history of Utah from the time explorers first set foot on it until today. These articles will appear in this paper every Sunday.) By HOWARD S. BENEDICT Associated Press Writer PART I EXPLORERS AND TRAPPERS The land that is now Utah felt the tramp of the white mans feet earlier than most of the United States. Records show that a detachment of Spanish conquistadores led by Capt. Garcia Lopez de Cardenas entered Utah in 1540 when other Europeans had just begun to explore the eastern coast of the United States. Cardenas detachment was one of many sent northward by Spain after Hernando Cortez conquered Mexico in 1519 21. Cardenas moved through Arizona to the brink of the Grand Canyon and for several days his men searched futilely for a means to descend the steep canyon walls to the needed water of the Colorado River below. The conquistadores followed the Grand Canyon to a spot near the southern rim of Glen Canyon, a little northeast of the point where it crosses into Arizona from southern Utah, and thus became the first Europeans to enter Utah. CARDENAS REPORT More important, however, is not where Cardenas went, but what he reported. By his verdict the northern desert lands were damned and no expedition of any importance entered Utah for 236 years. The Escalante expedition of 1776 first gave Europeans a true idea of the Utah region. On July 29 that year, Father Silvestre Velez de Escalante and Father Francisco Antanasio Dominquez left Santa Fe, N. M., to search for a direct route to Monterey, Calif. The Franciscan priests, accompanied by a small group of Spanish soldiers and Indian guides, made their way through what is now western Colorado and turned west along the southern edge of the Uinta Mountains and entered Utah at the White River. INDIANS FRIENDLY They crossed the Green River and pushed westward along the Duchesne and Strawberry Rivers until they reached Utah Valley, where they spent three days with the friendly Yuta Indians. The Indians told Escalante of a great salt lake to the north but he wanted to continue his search for a route to Monterey and did not investigate. The Escalante party pressed south to where St. George now stands but nowhere could find word or sign of a promising route to California. So it abandoned the search and returned to Santa Fe. The Spanish showed increased interest in Utah after Father Escalante reported that villages and towns could be supported along the streams there. Several Spanish traders started operating between Santa Fe and Utah Lake and soon established a well defined route known as The Old Spanish Trail. However, Spain became tangled in international difficulties and discouraged further efforts toward colonial expansion and government. exploitation of the Utah area. SPANISH WITHDRAW Thus, it was left to Anglo American enterprise in the north to open the Utah region. Lewis and Clark returned from their trip to the Pacific in 1806 and found fur traders pushing out of St. Louis in their track. John Jacob Astor, an Englishman, was one of the first to start trapping on a large scale in the Northwest and it was four men from his company who first entered Utah from the north. The four became separated from the main Astor expedition in 1811 and wandered south until they reached Bear River in northern Utah. The success of English and American trappers in the Northwest brought hundreds of Americans West. Inevitably, many found their way to Utah. A party headed by Gen. William H. Ashley was the first large group to come into the area. In 1824 it moved into Cache Valley before heading north. The same year a party led by William Sublette wintered on the Bear River. During this stay, Jim Bridger, one of the party, made an exploration that ended in his discovery of Great Salt Lake. TRAPPERS ACTIVE Other trappers among them Etienne Provot, Peter Skene Ogden and Jedediah H. Smith also came upon the lake and word of it spread quickly. Parties descended on the lake from the north and northeast but were halted by forbidding deserts to the south and west. But trappers found a profitable beaver crop in Utah and trading posts and settlements began to sprout in the northern and central parts of the state. In the 1830s explorers started hunting for a route from Wyoming to California and Oregon. Several tried to move across Utah but always were stopped by the desert beyond Great Salt Lake. John Fremont found a route across the desert but it was not feasible for a wagon train because of a lack of water. By 1840 the Oregon Trail had been established and a route that branched from this trail and dropped into California was found. The plains filled with prairie schooners traveling west. HASTINGS PARTY One party of 80 wagons, headed by Lansford Hastings, lost its way in 1846 after leaving Wyoming and eventually wound up at Great Salt Lake. To save time Hastings decided to try the first wagon train crossing of the desert. After a disastrous trip that saw many oxen die and wagons abandoned, the party made it across. A week behind the Hastings party came the famous Donner Reed wagon train. It too lost its way and came through Utahs Emigration Canyon to Great Salt Lake. Jacob Donner and Jim Reed also decided to cross the desert because it was autumn and they wanted to reach California before winter. Their desert crossing was even more disastrous than that of the Hastings group. All persons survived, but they were scattered over the desert in the disorganized rush to get across and their delay in regrouping in Nevada was costly. They reached the Sierra Nevadas too late to cross before winter and became snowbound. Forty three of the 87 members of the party died of starvation or exposure. As the dust settled into the wagon tracks of the Donners, the first era of white association with Utah ended. Conquistadores, padres, trappers, explorers and Pacific emigrants left their mark, but the destiny of Utah lay in the hands ot a people who had never seen the land, and, who, in the winter of1846, were encamped 12,000 strong along the Iowa plains wretchedly waiting for spring. After 16 turbulent years in the Midwest, the Mormons were in flight to the Rocky Mountains. NEXT MORMON BEGIN 2 Utahns Picked for Scholarship Contest SALT LAKE CITY (UP) Two Utah students attending eastern colleges have been selected to represent the state in competition for Rhodes scholarships in the southwest division. They are Robert N. Said attending Yale University, and Gary Christianson, of Harvard University. Both are from Salt Lake City.