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Early History in Southern Utah
Some of the earliest inhabitants of the southern Utah region were members of the Native American Virgin River Anasazi tribe, one of the first basket-maker cultures, who emerged around 500 A.D. Traces of their presence can still be seen in the cliff drawings and archeological sites that sprinkle the region. The Cohonina tribes also settled in the Grand Canyon area, and other Indian cultures followed soon after, including the Paiutes, Cerbat, and the Navajo. The Anasazi are said to have mysteriously abandoned their villages in the 1200s, but archeologists have traced the tribe to modern pueblo tribes in Arizona and New Mexico. It was the Paiutes who met the first explorers and settlers as they began to enter the region.
In 1540, the Spanish conquistador Francisco Vasquez de Coronado crossed through the region in his search for the legendary Cibola, a mythical city of gold. He never found the golden city he sought, and over the next 200 years it was only these unsuccessful excursions by Spanish conquistadors that disturbed Native American settlement. No other attempts to conquer the Southwest were forged until missionaries entered the region almost two centuries later. In 1765, Spanish explorer Juan Maria Antonio Rivera and his European expedition arrived at the Colorado River near present-day Moab. A few years later, in 1776, the Dominguez-Escalante Party, a group led by two Spanish Catholic priests, arrived in the region looking for a route to the California coast.
Southern Utah in the 1800s
In the early 1800s, fur trappers and government survey parties flowed into the region.
During the time period, the area around present-day Moab served as the crossing point on the Colorado River along the Old Spanish Trail, a historic trade route that connected Sante Fe with Los Angeles, passing through the entire southern portion of Utah into Nevada. The southern Utah region was considered Mexican territory up until the Mexican-American War in 1848, when it became part of the United States. As settlers and their livestock continued to enter the region, the natural wildlife became so depleted that the Paiutes tribes had to abandon their old lifestyle, as they were dependent on wild seeds, agriculture, and hunting.
Throughout the 1850s, experimental farms were established throughout the southwestern part of Utah, surrounding the St. George area, by Brigham Young, the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS). The area was first settled around that time by Mormon farmers sent south from the Salt Lake City area by Young as part of the LDS cotton mission. After the Civil War started in 1861, Young hoped to grow cotton in the area. The cotton was not able to compete with market rates however, and cotton farming was eventually abandoned.
Other pioneer endeavors from the 1870s to the early 1900s included attempts to produce silk, molasses, dried fruit, grapes, and wine, crops considered conducive to the warmer climate. Some were produced for export to northern states. Though silk production did not add to the material prosperity of the city, the mulberry trees planted to feed the silk worms can still be found in St. George. The wine industry grew in this period, as did mining in nearby areas, but demand for wine decreased as the mining industry weakened. The Mormon Church completed its third temple in 1877 in St. George, and the area still hosts the largest Mormon population in the United States.
The Arizona Strip saw its first settlers in the 1880s, as many staked mining claims and were attracted to the area for its rich mineral sources. The Mormon community also settled soon after in the Grand Canyon area.
A trading post and fort built by the Mormons in Moab was abandoned after repeated Indian attacks, but a permanent settlement was established in the area in 1878, its residents relying primarily on agriculture and eventually mining to sustain themselves. The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad was constructed in 1883 in the eastern part of the region, shifting trades routes away from Moab.
Southern Utah in the 1900s
With the establishment of Grand Canyon National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, and Zion National Park, the region became known for its natural assets and scenic beauty, becoming a well-known tourist destination. During the Great Depression, cotton farming and copper mining suffered in Arizona, but tourism started to become an important industry in the Grand Canyon area during the 1920s and 1930s.
At the end of World War II, the residents of the southern Utah region purposefully stayed out of the post-war national focus in order to preserve the purity and isolation of Mormon culture, which dominated the region. In 1945, the region was generally disconnected from the rest of the United States, both physically and socially.
The town of Colorado City, located along the border with Utah in the Arizona Strip, was founded in 1913 as Short Creek by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), a breakaway sect of the Salt lake City-based LDS. The town served as a hub for members of the Church who hoped to perpetuate the practice of polygamy, which the mainstream Church had abandoned 20 years earlier or so. In 1953, the Arizona governor sent in police to raid the settlement to deal with the polygamists, but this resulted in a long legal battle and public relations nightmare, so a hands-off attitude toward the town was practiced in the years following what became known as the "Short Creek raid."
In the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, the construction of the Interstate highways system made the region's southern scenic areas and National Parks more accessible to outside visitors, encouraging urban development. Growth was especially significant in the 1970s, as transportation and urbanization continued to consume wilderness areas.
Since the 1950s and continuing until the present day, numerous movies have been filmed in the region, using the striking beauty of Arches and Canyonlands National Parks as backdrops to films like "Rio Grande" (1950), the well-known "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" (1988), "Thelma and Louise" (1990), "City Slickers II" (1994), and " Mission Impossible II" (2000).
This tourism culture has continued till today, fueling the region and fostering growth in bordering towns like St. George and Moab, which serve as gateways to the sprawling National Park districts. The region also hosts various retirement communities, as northern Utah's residents have escaped the brutal winter clutches of the Salt Lake City area for the warmer natural scenery of southern Utah. The past 20 years have brought rapid growth to the region in form of industries, tourism, and retirement communities.
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