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Show WRITER LAUDS SOUTH UTAH IN SUNSETjMGAZINE Vivid Description Given of National Na-tional Parks and Scenic Features Fea-tures of Utah's Famous Dixie The March number of Sunset Magazine contains an article headed "The Story of Utah's Dixie," by Frank J. Taylor, in which the writer gives an interesting description of the national parks and other attractions attrac-tions of southern Utah. The struggles strug-gles of the early settlers, the transformation trans-formation of the land from a sagebrush-covered desert into a garden, geology, and climate of this section are treated in the articles which is well worth reading. Excerpts from the magazine story follow: The Story of Utah's Dixie By Frank J. Taylor Utah's Dixie stretches across the southern end of the state and overlaps over-laps into Arizona, ending abruptly at the great gash, the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. A vast land of mountains, of deserts, des-erts, of forests, one glance at the map reveals the geological romance of this everlasting wilderness. There are the prismatic plains, the pink sand dimes, the vermillion cliffs, the sandstone sand-stone buttes, the marble canyons and a host . of other features equally intriguing. in-triguing. In Utah's Dixie lies three of the most colorful national parks: Zion canyon with its great red and white cliffs or thrones; Bryce canyon, with its hundreds and hundreds of pink (Continued on page 4) WRITER LAUDS SOUTH UTAH (Continued from page 1) and orange temples, suggesting some ancient city still lighted by the sun's slanting rays; and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon itself, the world's greatest chasm, defying description. Here are found also two national monuments, Cedar Breaks, a brilliantly bril-liantly colored cut in the earth's surface, sur-face, and Pipe Springs monument, where a great stream of cold water gushes from the soil of the hot, barren bar-ren desert. And bordering the North Rim of the Grand Canyon is the Kaibab national forest, greatest unbroken stand of timber in the United States. Here and there on the sides of cliffs are found the ruins of the homes of wi ancient race of prehistoric people. Pipe Springs? Thereby hangs a tale. In the early days, the Mormons Mor-mons built a stone fort around the spring to defend themselves from the Apaches. It still stands, although the Indians no longer wage war. One time two frontiersmen fell into an argument by the side of this spring and to prove his point one old-timer walked twenty paces away, took aim at the briar pipe in the outstretched hand of the other, fired through the bowl and knocked the bottom out of the pipe without damaging dam-aging its otherwise. There were marksmen in those days when a hand on the trigger meant life or death. Utah's Dixie is so called because it represented the fondest dream of the Mormon leader, Brigham Young, who visioned a great Rocky Mountain state embracing all the land drained by the Colorado, river and its tributaries. tribu-taries. This envisioned state is now sliced into six of the largest states of the Union, which indicates the magnitude of Brigham's Young's scheme. Dixie embraces a wide range of climate, cli-mate, from semi-tropic in the southern south-ern part, where the elevation is but two thousand feet, to Alpine on the plains atop the mountains. To the old Mormons this was to be a land of cotton, of oranges, of figs and other semi-tropical produce. It was a daring dream. It is doubtful doubt-ful if any one less zealous than Brigham Young would have attempted attempt-ed to turn this isolated desert into a garden. The scheme was successful only in part, and today the sand and sage is dotted with green spots, oases surrounding springs or besides streams, islands of greenery where toiling Mormons Mor-mons have reared out of the desert a score of little towns surrounded by gardens and orchards and farms. The very names of the towns suggest sug-gest the struggle between starvation and salvation engaged in by their inhabitants. There is New Harmony, Gunlock, Hurricane, Rockville, Mt. Carmel, Orderville, Cannonville, Tropic Trop-ic and St. George, the latter the hub of Dixie. For all its natural phenomena, there is no surprise of Utah's Dixie greater than its people. Isolated by mountains, moun-tains, cut off from cities by lack of transportation, until very recently at least, this region is a veritable last American frontier. A few years ago a party of railroad rail-road officials made a hazardous two-hundred-mile journey across the mountains, the desert and through the forests to see if there might be anything of Utah's Dixie of interest to outside visitors. What they found at Zion Canyon at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, at Bryce Canyon and at Cedar Ce-dar Breaks exceed their dreams. Here was the most colorfully tinted spot on earth, known only to a mere handful hand-ful of Mormons, and they too close to appreciate it fully. The Mormons, as a matter of fact, were too busy wrestling with nature for a livelihood to waste much time on natural wonders. A delicately tinted desert may be a thing of beauty, but it is just as fearful to a hungry man as plain white, burning burn-ing sand can ever be. The officials at once made plans for a series of lodges to accommodate accommo-date visitors, and placed the pressure of their influence behind a program for the construction of a chain of good roads throughout this entire region. re-gion. By the coming season, the results of their efforts will be appreciated not only by the traveler arriving by railroad, but by motorists as well. The roads are not yet paved highways, high-ways, but are excellent graveled motor mo-tor roads. A tour of the region requires at least four days, for distances are enormous en-ormous and there is much to see. From a geological point of view, Utah's Dixie is a fascinating study. Once the floor of a great inland sea, it has undergone tremendous transitions trans-itions in the change from sea bottom bot-tom to mountain top. Enormous faults in the earth's surface bear mute evidence evi-dence of these changes. It is without doubt the most spectacular spec-tacular study of erosion in the world. Great cuts in the mountain sides have left such blazes of color as Cedar Breaks and Bryce Canyon, with their myriads of silent monuments to the power of the wind and water. Zion Caiiyon, in shape resembles Yosemite valley. Its valley, its cliffs are much like those of Yosemite, only vastly more colorful and lacking of course, the movement of the waterfalls. wa-terfalls. The Great White Throne, the various temples, the Great Organ, Or-gan, the soft colors, changing with the sun's lights and the shadows, make Zion Canyon a bewitching place indeed for the explorer in Utah's Dixie. For those who like statistics with their views it is worth noting that Zion Canyon is fourteen miles long, and varies in width from a mile to only a few yards in its upper narrows. nar-rows. The Great Wihite Throne mentioned men-tioned heretofore towers more than 3000 feet above the stream at its base. Bryce Canyon is a giant amphitheater, amphi-theater, from one to two miles wide, about three miles long, and 1000 feet deep. Cedar Breaks is a series of vast amphitheaters eroded to a depth of 2000 feet, and covers about 60 square miles. The Grand Canyon itself it-self is 220 miles long, a mile deep, and some 12 miles wide in places. Through miles upon miles of pines and aspen, past meadows dotted with deer, under trees' up which scamper the white-tailed squirrels, the new road winds off to Bringt Angel Point on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Can-yon. Here the canyon rim is 1000 feet higher than on the south side. Here on the very brink of the sea of silent pastels, the visitor may sit by an enormous window and try to think of something adequate to say. But no one has succeeded in doing it yet. |