Mormon settlement techniques of the Salt Lake Valley
[2] The saints began building in Kirtland, Ohio, and parts of Missouri, such as Jackson County and Far West, then moved their headquarters to Nauvoo, Illinois.
[5] Proselyting efforts to gain more followers and bring them to Zion played a critical role in the immigration to Utah, which provided manpower for settlement.
[8] Young thought that isolation and demand for hard work would be character building for his people and that the Salt Lake Valley possessed the ideal qualities.
[23][24] The Intermountain West was "drier and colder" and "less accessible", making the geographical differences from the Mississippi River Valley, their former home, quite profound.
The church leaders' assessment of the area was "based on the reports of trappers, explorers, and erstwhile immigrant recruiters trying to attract settlers to the Oregon or California territories".
[3] Lansford Hastings said that the area "offers inducements to no civilized people, sufficient to justify an expectation of permanent settlements", but John Fremont's more favorable report inspired the church leaders to select the Salt Lake Valley as their destination.
[3] The group arrived late in the season, which necessitated a rush to plant crops such as potatoes and corn to meet their needs for the coming winter and provide seeds for the following spring.
[23] Jim Bridger had told the newcomers that nothing would ever grow in the Salt Lake Valley, mainly because the ground was so hard.
[27] The settlers survived the first ten years of settlement, which including harsh winds, rains, snows, frosts, and insect pests.
A fence was built, encompassing the city center, in order to provide protection from Indians and the cold winter winds.
[30] Shortly after the pioneers' arrival, Perrigrine Sessions was sent by Young to explore the area just north of Salt Lake City.
While the Saints did offer some food to help compensate, continual encroachment on their land caused conflict that led to some violence between the two groups.
[32] Around the same time that the Saints began to settle the Salt Lake Valley, word had spread throughout the United States that gold had been discovered in California.
On their journey west, a fair number of these people detoured from the popular path and went through Salt Lake City.
The city was still being established, only having about 6,000 residents, and the people had barely survived two disastrous harvests due to drought, frost, and cricket infestation.
[33] The 1849 Gold Rush brought economic development to the valley and established patterns for future travel to the west coast.
When the planning of the Transcontinental Railroad was laid out, experts chose the route through the valley, which helped make Salt Lake City a base for later mercantile and exploration efforts.
[33] Settlement in the Salt Lake Valley followed Young's modified version of Smith's "City of Zion".
The plat provided for neighborhood structure (wards), modern zoning (separation of incompatible uses), and land use regulations (residences set back from the street with a fine, well-maintained garden, or grove in the front yard)."
The Salt Lake Valley was founded first upon an agrarian system and later combined with non-agrarian techniques by way of manufacturing and the use of the railroad.
[40] Infant industry occurred within the home level when Brigham Young stated: Artisans and mechanics dropped into their chosen trade, including those that ground grain, sawed timber, blacksmithing, carpentering, and shoe making.
Young admonished his people to add their labor power to the Transcontinental Railroad lines, which would meet at Promontory Point.
Hon Farr, the Mayor of Ogden, in a speech, voiced his joy: "Hail to the great highway of the nations, Utah bids you welcome!
