The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1899-10-19
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: THE PASSING OF SALT lake !
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Great Salt lake. the dead sea of the
new world, is rapidly disappearing. The
biologists say that it may last another
century, but not longer than that.
Where the silver sheet of mysterious
water now stretches viii be left only a
valley Of glistening salt with ruins of
long abandoned wharfs and hotels
around its edges.
James Il. Talmage, professor Of geol-
ogy, University Of Utah, says:
Irrigation, by diverting the volume
of its four tributary rivers has sealed
the fate of Great Salt lake. Each year
its waters are growing more acrid. Ev-
cry year it grows perceptibly smaller
Thirty years ago the lake was eighty
miles long. Today it is barely seventy
miles in length. There are geological
evidences on the rocks that the lake has
within the last two decades had a
width of forty miles. Now that width
is only twenty-five miles. AT some
points the shore line has reached five
miles in less than five years. In the
natural course of geological events it
may be expected that in another hun
dred years there will be but bed of
salt where Great Salt lake has been"
Great Salt lake is in the northern
part Of Utah. Salt Lake City is seven
teen miles south of it. The lake stretch
IS between two spurs of the Rocky
mountains. There is twenty-five per
cent Of salt in its waters and it is con-
stantly growing more salt
Several explorers claimed the honor
Of its discovery The French baron,
La Hontan, the first Of these, never
saw Great Salt lake, but he wrote that
the Comanche Indians told him of the
bitter water" where the sun set. Es-
calante. the Spanish fIiar, gave the
7cra If ho 10 lya in
176 The lake occupies many leagues
and it's waters are Injurious and eX-
tremely salt. He who vets his BODY
with the water Immediately feels itch
ing on the wet part" wrote the good
friar in his diary.
James Bridger and Skeen ogden, two
trappers. later claimed the honor of
the discovery. In 1882 CAPTAIN Bonnie
Willie came upon the lake. He imme-
diately christened it Lake Bonneville
and at once gave his name o the great
prehistoric sea, it's parent. 1t was
Brigham Young who. after a plunge
into it. called ii Great Salt lake, a
name it win bear TO its approaching
and certain end
1t is an Indian tradition-and there
are geological theories that agree with
it-that Great Salt lake is the mere
fragment Of a great pi'imeval sea, eX- |
tending from the Rocky mountains to
the Sierra Nevada range. Skeletons of
marine animals of prehistoric times |
found among the al1ali plains of what |
was one the Great American desert, |
bear this out Earthquakes swallowed |
a portion Of this sea, and evaporation |
removed all but the remaining frag !
ment say the geOlogist.
The Mormon pioneers found a bar |
rem. frowning desert at the foot of |
the WaSatch mountains. They liter
ally made il bloom as the rose, but in |
order TO do so they dug a network of |
irrigation canals and bitches that de-
Elected the four rivers from their course
to Great Salt lake into the fields of
Utah. The fields blossomed and flour
ished and Great Salt lake shrunk and
dwindled and lost it's substance to the
upper airs.
The record of the decline of Great
Salt lake is written upon it's mountains. \
Time was-and biologists point TO the
handwriting on the rocks to prove this
that the lake overtopped these noun
tains. Now it lies sluggish at their
feet. The different shore lines Of the
past stand out as distinctly and as
evenly as if a surveyors line had been
run along the face Of the ridges.
Biologists believe that the inland sea
was once a fresh water lake. The the
DRY is that Utah lake and Bear lake.
fresh water bodies DOth, were once part
of il and that they were separated
from it bv some CONFUSION of nature.
The geological theory is that it did not
take the lake long to become intensely
saline after it was locked in. For its
eXpanse it was shallow even then. not
more than 100 feet deep at its deepest
place, probably not that The maxi
mum depth today is sixty feet and the
average is less than half that.
AT some points one can wade one
and one-half miles from the shore with
cut getting beyond knee depth. There
are salt deposits twenty miles from the
shore showing that the shore line at Z
not very recent years extended to that =
point The height of the lake. 1000 feet
above sea level. aids the work Of evap-
lration and the steady, pathetic, hope
eSS shrinkage of the Great Salt lake. J
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