Truth. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1901-1908, 1908-07-04

When the young in the first enthusiasm of
his youth starts out to make his fortune he is
prone to look afar and to seek the fruition of his
hopes in land to which distance lends enchant-
ment Often he is unmindfu of the wonderful
opportunities that lie waiting at the very TIRES
hold of his home and accepts as matter of
course the bountiful gifts of this great west that
has been richly endowed in its latent re-
The earlier homes of men were in the
valleys of the world.
AS the rude beginning of civilization began
to till the soil the river courses followed.
These offered the fewest obstacles. The farmers
could not hew their way in the thick forests and
the rivers provided both water and food After
ward the valleys were occupied by choice, be-
there rich and exhaustless soils So
that in India, in China, in Egypt, in England
and the newer lands of America the drift of life
has been first along the alluvial lands which Dor
der great rivers and the centers of agriculture
(the one industry which sustans cities and I'M
derlies organized society have always been in
the great valleys. They are the natural homes
of men, and the pressure of population today will
not long suffer habitable water to lie
titled.
The valley of Pahvant is one of the great val
leys of this state. Here is the great sea valley of
Utah, and there is the valley of the Nie-that
is ancient; this is modern. Thebes, with its beau
tfu temples and monuments representing Egypt
in the zenith of her power, built in the upper
valley of the Nile. That is sown with forgotten
generation, this is virgin soil still gay with
flowers of its youth. There the old and the new
civilization meet and the regeneration of the
country through its agriculture is begun Here
the methods of today wait to renew the wealth
and increase the population of valley that will
one day be as productive as the valley of the Nile
and will maintain within its boundaries in latter
day comfort as dense a population.
Utah, corruption of the word "Eutaw" and
the name of an Indian tribe, is one of the great
states carved out of the territory ceded by Mex
leo in lS4S. The accumulated deposit of the
waters had built up a soil of marvellous fertility
and inexhaustible depth but only the stunted
vegetation of the desert appeared to gladden. its
bosom. A treeless, barren waste, it remained the
terror OF the traveller and the foe of civilization
in one of the valleys, They began to construct
bitches to divert the waters of the mountain
streams on to the barren land Thus began irri-
CATION in the ancient bed of Lake Bonneville To
day this region is the glory of the earth. The
irrigated valleys of Utah among the show
sights OF the state. The region included in the
present boundaries of Utah was known in the
early days by the name of "Deseret" and the old
town of Fillmore, in Willard county was the first
capital of this territory. Many years ago Brigham
Young standing on the stone steps of the old
would one day become the granary of Utah and
comfortable homes would be builded in those
sagebrush plains where the coyote then roamed
unmolested The rapid development of the later
years is proving how true was that prophecy
Oasis in this beautiful valley, surrounded bv
$4,000 acres of arabic land trimmed by the snow
capped Pahvant mountains, is $40 miles south of
Salt Lake, on the main line of the Salt Lake
route over which the paatial "Los Angeles Lin
tied" runs daily. The valley is divided by the
Sewer river which has the largest drainage area
of any. stream in the state, and at this point
flows through the largest tract of arabic land in
Utah.
The early settlers constructed canals planted
trees and titled the soil, transforming what once
the Arabs would call their Garden of Allah"
(the deserD, into an oasis in fact and resting
place for the weary traveller between the lone
stretches of arid country lying to the north and
south. These hardy pioneers have been well re-
paid for their early privations, for by the aid of