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November Announcement for the Utah Westerners
DEAF, BUT NOT DUMB
OR, WHY DALE MORGAN’S WORKS WILL OUTLIVE
THOSE OF ANYONE LIVING TODAY
RICHARD L. SAUNDERS
Of those who aspire to tell stories across the sweep of the American West, only a handful create works that outlast their generation. One of those is a brilliant and complex native of Salt Lake City, who came to history in the 1930s and died an untimely death from cancer well before reaching his sixtieth birthday. In the span of two-and-a-half decades, Dale Morgan produced works that stand as unassailable foundations to the study of the early American West. The book for which he is perhaps best known, Jedediah Smith and the Opening of the West, has never been out of print since its publication in 1953.
Frenetically busy, well liked by those with whom he associated, Morgan’s career was nonetheless filled with desperation and disappointment. Deafened by illness as a teen, Morgan became of the leading regional historians of the twentieth century. Though he could not hear, his pen was not still. Eloquence flowed out in letters, in books, and in encouragement to the rankest buff in measures equal to what he afforded professional peers. Labeled as a “dilettante to history” by some, his work still outshines the careers of lesser professionals. With the experience of twenty years studying the historian and his work, Dr. Saunders will share key reasons why Morgan will remain one of the bedrock figures in later readers appreciating the West.
Richard L. Saunders earned a Ph.D. in history from the University of Memphis and also holds degrees from BrighamYoungUniversity and UtahStateUniversity. He is currently Head of Reference and professor at the University of Tennessee at Martin, Tenn. He has extensive experience in editing, book production and conservation, cataloging, and other book- and library-related activities. He has written or edited several books including Dale Morgan on the Mormons: Collected Works, 1938-1970, 2 vol. ed., (published by The Arthur H. Clark Co., 2012-2013), Printing in Deseret: Mormons, Politics, Economy, and Utah’s Incunabula 1849-1851, (published by University of Utah Press, 2003), and Eloquence from a Silent World: A Descriptive Bibliography of the Published Writings of Dale L. Morgan, (published by Caramon Press, 1990). Saunders has also written scores of articles and book chapters for a number of scholarly journals and has won several awards for his writing and other academic pursuits. He is currently at work on a biography of Dale Morgan. It is safe to say that no one alive knows as much about Morgan’s life and writings as Richard L. Saunders
Jack Tykel (1930-2013)
JACK B. TYKAL 1930-2013
I came into this world on 27 June 1930 in Chicago, IL, born to Henry F. and Mae G. (Thompson) Tykal, and I left it on 24 September 2013. I grew up in the Midwest, and attended college in Indiana, where I met an Ohio girl, Helen Gibson. She later became my wife of 59 years.
A 1952 college graduate, Uncle Sam put the arm on me for two years, of which thirteen months were spent in Korea. Army service ended, I married Helen and began a career as a banker. Seven years later, after deciding banking was not for me after all, I followed an earlier interest and became a Special Agent of the FBI. Several moves around the country saw me wind up in Salt Lake City, where I retired as Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Salt Lake City office.
Believing that one does not retire to do nothing, but to do something different, I harkened back to a near-lifelong interest in western history, and the fur trade. Over the succeeding years I had two books published on western history/fur trade, and articles in historical journals. One of my most enjoyable associations were the years I spent as a member of the Utah Westerners. Another is Cottonwood Presbyterian Church, where I’ve served in a number of capacities over the years and have enjoyed friendships with my fellow members.
I leave behind my wife, Helen, four daughters: Karen Smith (Don), Elizabeth Barnhart (Jim), Susan Wood (Steve), and Barb Tykal, and eight wonderful grandkids. Leaving them is my only regret for I’ve had a great run at life and leave with no other complaints.
There will be a Memorial Service for me at Cottonwood Presbyterian Church (1580 Vine St.) at 11:00 a.m., Saturday, October 5. Not being one for flowers, if you want to honor and remember me I suggest a donation to either The Nature Conservancy or Heifer Project, both favorites of mine.
“Death is a debt to Nature due That I have paid, and so must you.”
( gravestone, Deerfield, Mass.)
October Announcement for the Utah Westerners
LOOKING INWARD
LeCONTE STEWART’S DEPRESSION-ERA ART
DONNA L. POULTON AND VERN G. SWANSON
LeConte Stewart (1891-1990) is considered to be Utah’s most important landscape painter. His paintings elicit a wide range of responses from his audiences—especially those images of the Great Depression. From the sublime to the mundane, his depictions of rural and urban Utah evoke currents of emotion often described as nostalgic and melancholic. LeConte Stewart turned his attention inward during the 1930s asking questions about what went wrong with the economy while also searching for what was solid and honest in the Utah landscape. Woven throughout most of his rural landscape paintings are expressive traces of solitude and desolation, but it is important to note that they should not be confused with pessimism for a landscape that gave Stewart such inordinate pleasure. During the course of this presentation, both Donna Poulton and Vern Swanson will talk about the extraordinary content of his masterworks, the artist’s motivations, his sorrows and his joy. The paintings offer the viewer an opportunity to identify, if only momentarily, with the mind of a profoundly introspective artist who made it his life’s work to express his deepest and innermost experience.
Utah Westerner, Donna L. Poulton, is the Curator of art of Utah and the West at the University of Utah’s Museum of Fine Arts. She grew up in rural Montana and lived in Germany for twelve years where studied at the BostonUniversity extension in Stuttgart and later received her Ph.D from BrighamYoungUniversity. She has juried and curated many exhibitions and has written articles on Utah and Western Art for Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine, is the author of Reuben Kirkham: Pioneer Artist and co-author of Utah Art, Utah Artists, Painters of Utah’s Canyons and Deserts and LeConte Stewart: Masterworks. Her new book on Painters of the Tetons will be released next year for the 100-year anniversary of Teton National Park. Her new book, Mountains and High Plateaus, with co-authors Vern Swanson and Jim Poulton will be released in 2015.
Donna has taught Utah art history at the University of Utah, lectures throughout the state and has served on the boards of numerous arts organizations. She has produced commercial videos on Utah art and consulted with private art collectors and galleries.
Vern G. Swanson is a native of Oregon. He graduated from Brigham Young University (BA), University of Utah (MA), and University of London (PhD) in art history. He started his career at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., taught art history at Auburn University as an Assistant Professor and was later employed a Wasatch Bronzeworks in Lehi. Since 1980, Dr. Swanson has been the director of the Springville Museum of Art, has helped the museum’s art collection of Utah and Russian art grow and has contributed toward the construction of the new wing dedicated in 2004.
Dr. Swanson has published fourteen art history books as sole or joint author. Six of these have been in collaboration with Drs. Robert Olpin, William Seifrit, and Donna Poulton. In 2007, this third and largest book, Soviet Impressionist Painting, was released. He is currently working on four books including the long awaited book on John Hafen and “The Chiasmatic Atonement.”
September Announcement for the Utah Westerners
“YOU CAN GO TO HELL, I’M GOING TO TEXAS”
THE ALAMO AND THE TEXAS REVOLUTION IN TRUTH AND LEGEND
JAMES DONOVAN
For nearly two centuries, the last stand at the Alamo has been recognized as a defining moment in America’s history. On February 23, 1836, a Mexican army thousands of soldiers strong attacked a makeshift garrison of about two hundred Texas settlers—among them, Davy Crockett, James Bowie, and William Barret Travis—who were holed up in the abandoned mission on the outskirts of San Antonio. The Texans refused to surrender and, for almost two weeks, the immense force laid siege to the fort, bombarding its occupants with artillery fire. Then, in the predawn hours of March 6, the Mexican troops unleashed a final devastating assault. What happened next would become legend.
Our special guest speaker, James Donovan, bestselling author of The Blood of Heroes: The 13-Day Struggle for the Alamo—and the Sacrifice that Forged a Nation, will share with us some of the insights gleaned while researching and writing the book as well as the process of its creation. He will discuss why family traditions can’t be trusted, why there are always new facts to find, and how they are found. He will develop some of the more interesting characters in the story and little-known facts about the Big Three: Travis, Bowie, and Crockett. Donovan will clarify what these men were fighting for as well as the two great controversies of the battle: how Davy died and the line in the sand that Travis did or didn’t draw.
Jim Donovan has worn many hats in the publishing business. After graduating from the University of Texas, he began his career in publishing in an Austin bookstore in 1981. He eventually moved to Dallas to become a buyer for a bookstore chain. Later he was a book editor at Taylor Publishing and advanced to the position of senior editor before leaving in 1993 to start his own literary agency. He has sold hundreds of books for dozens of writers to numerous well-known national publishing houses.
Donovan is the author of several books, including A Terrible Glory: Custer and the Little Bighorn—the Last Great Battle of the American West, which spent several weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. It has been called “the last word on the Last Stand.” His most recent book is The Blood of Heroes, which was released last May. The Houston Chronicle called it “the best book on the battle of the Alamo,” and the Dallas Morning News reviewer hailed it as “probably the best nonfiction I have ever read about Texas—history told in a way that reads like fiction.”
July Announcement for the Utah Westerners
ANCIENT PAINTERS OF THE COLORADO PLATEAU
DAVID SUCEC
The Archaic Period (ca. 6000 BCE-ca. CE 300) in Utah and on the Colorado Plateau is certainly the Golden Period of prehistoric rock art. Among the rock art styles, regardless of time periods, the Barrier Canyon style is recognized, certainly among scholars, as Utah’s premier style and is one of the two major Archaic styles of painting in America. No other prehistoric American rock art style matches the time depth, the number of sites, variations, and the vastness of its territory (about 400 x 150 miles from the St. George area north to the Vernal area and from the Castle Dale, Utah region east to the Grand Junction, Colorado area).
David Sucec’s presentation will offer the findings of two decades (1991-2013) of BCS (Barrier Canyon Style) Project work, drawing on more than 370 sites, and will propose a description and analysis of the style. He will also touch on the Barrier Canyon’s relationship to some other Utah rock art styles.
David Sucec, Director of the BCS Project, holds an MA in Art and has studied extensively in Art History and Archaeology at the University of Utah and elsewhere. He is an independent scholar, visual artist, curator, and teacher and has lectured and taught widely in his field. He is co-author (with Leslie Kelen) of Sacred Images: A Vision of Native American Rock Art, published by Gibbs Smith in 1996.
May Announcement for the Utah Westerners
SOUTHEASTERN UTAH HISTORY
ROY WEBB
Noted western river runner, expedition guide, and historian, Roy Webb, will discuss the many and varied aspects of the history of that corner of Utah that has, in the words of one guidebook, “largely remained outside (LDS) church control.” From the mysterious Native Americans of a thousand years ago, to the first Spanish explorers, the failed Elk Mountain Mission, the coming of the cowboys, the Hole-in-the-Rock expedition and the Mormon settlement of Bluff, uranium, the movie industry, and modern tourism.
Roy, whom one organization called “perhaps the foremost historian of western rivers in the world today,” has generously volunteered to be the guide and local expert on our field trip at the end of this month. He brings an unequalled expertise and vast knowledge on not just the rivers of the area we’ll be seeing, but on the whole region of country.
Roy D. Webb, earned both a B. A. and M. S. in history from the University of Utah. He has worked in the Marriott Library at that university since 1981, serving since 1994 as the Multimedia Archivist in Special Collections. He is the author of several books, mainly on river history, including If We Had a Boat: Green River Explorers, Adventurers, and Runners and The Lost Canyons of the Green River: the Story Before Flaming Gorge Dam, both published by the University of Utah Press. He has also written scores of articles, given many lectures and papers, and has been the curator of numerous exhibits on Utah, western rivers, and regional history. Roy is no armchair historian and writer; for many years he ran and then led expeditions on several rivers including the Green, Colorado, and San Juan. He has written extensively, based not only on meticulous research, but firsthand experience as well.
April Announcement for the Utah Westerners
THE WESTERN EXPEDITIONS OF
NATHANIIEL WYETH, 1832-1836
JIM HARDEE
Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth is not numbered among America’s greatest heroes. The successful Boston ice merchant is considered a failure in the fur trade, yet Wyeth was a practical businessman with an adventurous Yankee spirit that led him twice across the continent and back, in 1832 and again in 1834, prior to the development of reliable maps or emigrant trails. Wyeth’s contributions to westward expansion have been largely overlooked by historians. Historian and author, Jim Hardee’s newest book, Obstinate Hope, is part one of a two-part examination of the life of Nathaniel J. Wyeth.
Jim’s talk will begin with a look at Wyeth’s pre-fur trade life including his heritage, operation of the family’s Fresh Pond Hotel, and his early career in the ice industry. The bulk of the presentation will detail Wyeth’s first expedition to the West (1832-1833), using his letters and journals as its base. The narrative follows Wyeth on his trip to the fur trade rendezvous in Pierre’s Hole, on to the Pacific Northwest, and then back to the East Coast. Wyeth’s journal entries will be accompanied by commentary, providing insight into Wyeth’s experiences. Hardee’s telling of Nathaniel Wyeth’s story is supplemented with information from the journals and letters of other people who were with him for all or part of the trip. His commentary also compares what Wyeth encountered in the West with events and occurrences from other trapper diaries.
Jim Hardee is the editor of the Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal, published by the Sublette County Historical Society and the Museum of the Mountain Man in Pinedale, Wyoming. Jim is the author of Pierre’s Hole: The Fur Trade History of Teton Valley, Idaho. Not confined to works in print, Hardee has also provided commentary in television documentaries, including “Taming the Wild West: The Legend of Jedediah Smith,” produced by The History Channel in 2005. Jim is also the director of the FurTradeResearchCenter and is a presenter for many conferences and symposiums. He has published numerous articles on various fur trade topics, and lives in Pierre’s Hole, Idaho.
March Announcement for the Utah Westerners
“THE MODERN MORMON KINGDOM:”
FRANK J. CANNON’S NATIONAL CAMPAIGN
AGAINST MORMONISM, 1910-1918
KENNETH L. CANNON II
The story of Frank J. Cannon, up to the time he published Under the Prophet in Utah: The National Menace of a Political Priestcraft as a book in 1911, is well known by Utah history buffs. Frank was the talented son of George Q. Cannon, prominent Mormon Church, political, and business leader. Controversy surrounded Frank from an early age—he was first jailed for leading a group of Cannon sons and cousins in mugging federal prosecutor, William Dickson, who had reportedly treated one of George Q.’s wives impolitely. Frank was a binge drinker with a penchant for visiting prostitutes while under the influence and even fathered an illegitimate son. And yet, the LDS Church’s First Presidency still utilized Frank’s extraordinary abilities by having him serve as their agent in political and financial matters for most of the 1890s. He was elected as one of Utah’s first two U. S. Senators, but was not re-elected amid controversy over his opposition to the Dingley tariff bill and changing political parties. After his father’s death in 1901, Frank’s festering feud with Church president, Joseph F. Smith, erupted into full-scale war. Cannon attacked Smith from the editorial pages of the Salt Lake Tribune and Smith had Cannon excommunicated from the Mormon Church in early 1905.
Sometime after moving to Denver, Cannon became managing editor of the Rocky Mountain News. While there, he met Harvey J. O’Higgins, a talented New York muckraker, and the two collaborated on Under the Prophet in Utah. This launched Frank into a successful career as a Chataqua and Lyceum lecturer during which he frightened well over a million Americans with stories of the evils of the Mormons and their Prophet in his lecture entitled “The Modern Mormon Kingdom.” He was certainly the most eloquent and likely the most effective anti-Mormon agitator in LDSChurch history. It is this portion of Frank Cannon’s colorful life that Ken Cannon will discuss.
Utah Westerner, Ken Cannon, a Salt Lake City attorney with three degrees from BYU, served for several years as Adjunct Faculty at BYU and is currently in a similar position at the University of Utah’s law school. He is the author of numerous scholarly articles (including some which won awards) published in a variety of academic journals including the Utah Historical Quarterly, BYU Studies, Journal of Mormon History, and Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. Several have focused on Frank J. Cannon and other members of the Cannon family. One, which bears the same title as that of this presentation, appeared in the Journal of Mormon History in 2011.
February Announcement for the Utah Westerners
J. C. PENNEY AND HIS MANY UTAH CONNECTIONS
LINDA THATCHER
Friday, May 9, 1969 was proclaimed “J. C. Penney Day” by Utah’s governor, Calvin R. Rampton. Penney was “not just passing through;” he had established and maintained his Utah connections for the past sixty years. After graduating from high school, James Cash Penney worked in a dry goods store in Hamilton, Missouri, but moved to Colorado in 1897 for health reasons. He became involved with the Golden Rule Mercantile Company and within a decade he had acquired ownership of the company. In 1909 he moved to Salt Lake City to set up a corporate headquarters and lived there for six years before relocating to New York. In 1913, all his stores were consolidated under the J. C. Penney banner.
Utah Westerner, Linda Thatcher, will discuss Penney’s family, including his first wife, Berta A. Hess, who is buried in Salt Lake’s Mt. Olivet Cemetery and his second wife, Mary H. Kimball, who was born in Salt Lake City. She will also illustrate his community involvement; for example, he was a member of Wasatch Lodge #1 of the Free and Accepted Masons of Utah and often participated in their meetings. Thatcher will also talk about the larger J. C. Penney Company, which incorporated in Utah, and the opening of Penney stores throughout Utah and the role they played in the local communities.
Linda Thatcher earned a Bachelor of Science and master’s degree from Utah State University as well as a master’s from BYU in Library Science. She worked for Utah State History from 1975 to 2007 as the Collection Manager. She has written several articles and co-edited two books: Differing Visions: Dissenters in Mormon History and Women in Utah History: Paradigm or Paradox? Since retiring from the Historical Society, she served as the co-director of a private history organization for three years and is currently a volunteer at the Utah State Archives. She became interested in J. C. Penney (an Avenues resident) when she was writing a monthly historical article for the Avenues Newsletter.
January Announcement for the Utah Westerners
WHEN UTAH WAS A DIFFERENT KIND OF RED STATE:
SOME OBSERVATIONS ON A RADICAL PAST
JOHN McCORMICK and JOHN SILLITO
In their recently published book, A History of Utah Radicalism: Startling, Socialistic, and Decidedly Revolutionary, (published by Utah State University Press, winner of the Utah State Historical Society’s Best Book Award in 2012), McCormick and Sillito explore Utah radicalism since the late 19th century, focusing on those movements on the Left “that have challenged the fundamental principles on which society has been established and have offered alternative visions of how to live and organize life.” Especially important is the Socialist Party of America which sunk deep roots in Utah, electing over 100 men and women to office in the early 20th century, and gaining significant support among various segments of the Utah population. McCormick and Sillito will discuss this little-known but fascinating story they think is worth a closer look.
John S. McCormick earned a Ph.D. in intellectual history from the University of Iowa. He is currently dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at Salt Lake Community College. He has published numerous books and articles in a number of areas, including political history, urban history, and historic preservation. His books include The Gathering Place: An Illustrated History of Salt Lake City and A World We Thought We Knew: Readings in Utah History (with John Sillito).
Utah Westerner, John R. Sillito is Emeritus Professor of Libraries at Weber State University and currently teaches in Weber’s History Department. He is currently a member of the board of editors of the Utah Historical Quarterly. Sillito has degrees in history and political science from the University of Utah. He is the editor of History’s Apprentice: The Diaries of B. H. Roberts, 1880-9, which won the MHA Best Documentary Award in 2004. Sillito’s writings have appeared in several journals including the Utah Historical Quarterly, Sunstone, and Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought.
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