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Show WINTER 2003/04 | Page 6 The West View A forum for vecidant histories, stories, and milestones including births deaths, marriages, anniversaries, graduations, etc. Fairpark’s Past Not So Different From the Present | By Beth Hoffman conflict arose between the need to welcome outside people and | ideas to the area and the desire to remain the isolated homeland One of six Community Council districts on Salt Lake City’s west side, Fairpark is defined on. all of the Church of Jesus Christ of — ‘Latter Day Saints (LDS). sides by natural and human-made The first bridge over the Jordan boundaries. The community, which also includes Guadalupe and Jackson River was built at North Temple in 1849, creating a main, west neighborhoods, bounded to the south by busy side corridor into and out on the east by the city. This bridge made pos-— the railroad tracks that run down sible: not only the expansion of North Temple, 500 West, on the north.by the | ‘Mormon settlements to the west high walls of the interstate and of the city, but created a main on the west by the Jordan River. artery for westward travelers to Because of its proximity to downtown, Fairpark was inhab- - of | pass through the city. Many miners seeking gold in California: used this bridge on ited earlier than most of the west side, and the area was included in - their way to the Sierra Nevada Mountains. To lighten their load the city’s original nineteen wards, for the arduous trek, many left although few lived west of 500 livestock, food supplies and North in the 1850s. As with many areas through- wagons behind in Salt Lake City, out Salt Lake City, Fairpark possibly saving the pioneers from. was faced with many early chal- ‘Starvation. lenges, including the competing © Likewise, the U. S. army, led by General Johnston, crossed ideals of a religious homeland versus an urban center; the battle into Salt Lake City in 1858 via the Jordan Bridge at North with Mother Nature to create Temple and paraded down Main a habitable landscape; and the Street, firmly establishing the role of national trends and politics in local development. Early in Fairpark’s development a Old white= bridge over Jordan River at North Temple; 1908. Digital Image © 2001 cal Society. Printed with permission. In Fairpark, presented the with both an Mother Nature early pioneers over abundance Utah State Histori- (whose house still stands today teenth Ward...I went at 564 West and 400 North) com- and found it half covered with water...I saw by this I was not going to be able to do anything mented when he first visited the land assigned to him by the LDS and an acute shortage of water. Church. “I did as I was told and a ‘The area was swampy, as early federal government's presence in. ae off to REE: x : settler Nelson Wheeler Sees ; the Territory. and saw it See FairparkpageS Bosnian Family Survives Horrible Ordeal for a Better Life By Erika Fiske older boys, 18 and up, who were taken away forever. ‘Adnan doesn’t wake up in the middle of the night anymore, ter- rified and drenched in sweat. The guns, bombs and minefields are a distant memory. He was just six when it all started, and that probably saved his life. It was the Adnan’s Salt Lake City neigh- | wanted to share the. country voters chose independence in- "something that can come with with their Catholic and Muslim — 1992, and Bosnia-Herzegovina’ S experiencing death and horror independence was _ officially at a young age. His story begins, neighbors. The world watched bors also remember - that time, in disbelief as miles of displaced recognized by the United States “Tt was around the year 1992. but only ‘from watching the tragedy unfold on television and refugees crossed the borders out and most foreign countries, Serb My dad came into the house and - in newspapers. It was Bosnia, around 1992, when the Serbian people decided they no longer of Bosnia, leaving behind them everything but the dusty clothes and shoes they wore. Although 70 percent of Bosnian. ‘national forces under Slobodan | said it was time for us to go. My Miloschevich carried out “ethnic mom went into the bedroom and packed some stuff and we waved cleansing” in Bosnian? territory, expelling and killing Muslims and Catholics, particularly civic, religious and intellectual leaders; _ erecting concentration camps for young men; raping women, and destroying religious buildings, libraries and museums. Seated in their living room recently on Salt Lake City’s west side, Adnan Milicevic and his mother and father, Mirsada and our grandma goodbye and headed downtown.” | | The description could be of a Sunday family outing in Salt Lake City, except that it was Prijedor, Bosnia, at a time when a quarter of the population in that village was being loaded onto trucks and taken away. oe The Milicevics heard the stories about caravans of people Asmir, gathered around albums disappearing, but staying in their full of pictures of the life they small town was not an option. Already one member of their . once had in Bosnia and the life | they’ve made for themselves in | family had been killed. Mirsada explained how. her” the United States since a U.N. relief organization brought them brother was. stopped by uniformed Serbians on a road on the here in 1998. — : Adnan, a tall, soft-spoken ‘way to their house. He and others 18-year-old brown table paper “My a poem Standing on the front porch of their Argyle Court home on Salt Lake City’s west side are the Milicevic family. From left, Mirsada, Adnan and Asmir. The. family relocated to the United States when they were driven from their home in Bosnia. Photos by Erika Fiske. with eyes, pushed some words — three typed Way Through in which he thoughtful with him were stabbed to death across the he put on pages titled War,” and and buried by the uniformed Serbs, after the Muslim names on their passports were discovered, writes, “I a neighbor came to her home in wish I never had to walk cross the minefield, holding on to my dad; Young, and scared as hell, but mostly, just sad.” The handsome young man does have a sad look about him, & Mirsada remembers the day Prijedor. “She just came in the house and said, ‘I'll take your clothes.’” The family dared not protest. Always ready to run, they lived in fear of the day uniformed © See Family page 11 |