banks of what is now known as City Creek--the mountain stream
which today furnishes Salt Lake City part of her water
supply--plows were put to work; but the hard-baked soil, never
before disturbed by the efforts of man to till, refused to yield
to the share. A dam was thrown across the stream and the
softening liquid was spread upon the flat that had been chosen
for the first fields. The planting season had already well nigh
passed, and not a day could be lost. Potatoes and other seed
were put in, and the land was again flooded. Such was the
beginning of the irrigation system, which soon became
co-extensive with the area occupied by the "Mormon" settlers, a
system which under the blessing of Providence, has proved to be
the veritable magic touch by which the desert has been made a
field of richness and a garden of beauty; a system which now
after many decades of successful trial is held up by the nation's
wise and great ones to be the one practicable method of
reclaiming our country's vast domains of arid lands. It was on
the 24th of July, 1847, that the main part of the pioneer band
entered the valley of the Great Salt Lake, and that day of the
year is observed as a legal holiday in Utah. From that time to
the present, the stream of immigration to these valleys has never
ceased.



CHAPTER IV

The dangers of the first company's migration were surpassed by
those of parties who subsequently braved the terrors of the
plains. In their enthusiasm to reach the gathering place of