--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Anderson, Edward H. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 12 number: 12 published: 1909-10 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Edward H. Anderson, "Events and Comments," *Improvement Era* 12, no. 12 (October 1909): 1002–1008.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera12012unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera12012unse start_page: 1002 end_page: 1008 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1909-10) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera12012unse publication_year: 1909 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1909, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Events and Comments EVENTS AND COMMENTS, BY EDWARD* H. ANDERSON. Aaron D. Thatcher, — A brother of Moses Thatcher, died in Logan, Utah, September 8, 1909; he'was born in Springfield, 111., April 25, 1836, and was a pio- neer of 1847. He was a pioneer of Cache Valley, where he settled in 1859. He filled three missions, crossed the plains for emigrants three times, served in the Echo canyon war, and assisted in many Indian troubles. In business he was as hard a worker as in Church affairs, and was considered by all who knew him an affectionate father and a big-hearted man. Peach Day at Brigham.— The annual peach day was observed at Brigham City, August 15. It is estimated that five thousand visitors from a distance par- took of the hospitality of the good people of Brigham that day, besides another five thousand from settlements immediately surrounding. A program of exercises, games, sports and pastimes was enjoyed. Peaches were given away without stint, and a little box of samples given to each visitor on the train "to take home." The brass band met the visitors, and with peaches, melons and social cheer, it was altogether a happy event. Maxim's Noiseless Gun.— In the early part of January last a demonstration was made in New York before some fifty invited guests to prove that the "Silencer" actually does what is claimed for it. The "Silencer" may be attached to any rifle by a simple process, and so make the discharge practically noiseless. It is a bit of steel tubing six inches long, lined with a series of ten pierced disks> so arranged that "while there is a passage for the bullet when discharged, the gases of the powder, which make the noise, by their explosion in the air, when coming out of the muzzle, are caught and discharged, so gradually, that no sound results." The "Silencer" may be attached to any gun by being screwed on the end of the barrel, beyond the sight. Used in an army with smokeless powder, a battle will not only be smokeless, but noiseless as well. Its power to increase the effectiveness and horrors of war is so great that the inventor thinks it will go far toward its prevention. John C. Sandberg. —John C, Sandberg died at his home in Superior Ward Salt Lake City, on the 28th of July, 1909. He was born in Scone, Sweden, EVENTS AND COMMENTS. 1003 November 14, 1837, and embraced the gospel August 21, 1865. He spent a num- ber of years as a missionary in his native land after he joined the Church, being traveling elder in Scone conference, and acting as president of the Gottenborg conference during that period. He came to Utah in 1875, and ten years later returned to his native land on a second mission, serving as president of the Got- tenborg conference. While he was here he began the publication of Nordstjarnan, the Swedish organ of the Latter-day day Saints, which is still published. He was one of the leading members of the Church from that land, a man of splendid faith, fearless and zealous in the cause of God, of a jovial nature, which made him loved by all the young people, He was naturally open-hearted and liberal in all his dealings with his fellow men. He was buried on the first of August, and six brethren who bad acted as editors at various times of the paper which he founded, acted as pall- bearers. The Discovery of the North Pole— With the suddenness of a sensation' Dr. Frederick A. Cook, a physician of Brooklyn, announced in early September that he had discovered the North pole. He returned from the Arctic regions by the Danish steamer Hans Egede, and had telegraphed from Lerwick that h e reached the North pole April 21, 1908. He started north in the summer of 1907, being fitted ouc by John R. Bradley of New York. He went in a fishing schooner of one hundred and eleven (111) tons, equipped with a gasoline engine. His an- nouncement of the discovery of the Pole was so surprising that at first it was re- ceived with some incredulity, and in some places was considered a hoax, but his bearing under the severe examination by the news reporters at Copenhagen, where he landed, rather turned the tide of public opinion in his favor. He was re- ceived in the Danish capital with wild enthusiasm, and given a succession of feasts as a compensation for his long period of starvation and loneliness. He was warmly received by the King of Denmark, and by the Danish scientists who ex- pressed their belief in his story. While being dined in Tivoli and garlanded with pink roses, word was received that Commander Robert E. Peary had returned, and had discovered the North Pole on April 6, 1909. It was thus doubly discovered by Americans. This was on the 6th of September, and the news was received from Indian Harbor, Labrador. Dr. Cook expressed his gratification at Peary's triumph, and his confidence that his own statement'would now receive corrobora- of his tion. Dr. Cook cabled to the New York Herald, the first full account be discovery, which account is very interesting, but being copyrighted cannot stood upon a part of the globe from which used here. His sensations as he it was possible by a step to go from one side of the globe to the opposite side; from mid- day to midnight; and where east and west had vanished, and where it was south in every direction, are referred to. How he stood in an endless field of a dead world of ice, may purple snows, without land, without life, surrounded by the mind. Commander Peary notified his wife that he had well be conjured in This was his eighth expedi- succeeded in nailing the Stars and Stripes to the Pole. Pole. For twenty- three years he has diligently searched tion, in search of the for the goal which he now declares he has reached. He left New York on the 1004 IMPROVEMENT ERA. present expedition on July 6, 1908, on the steamer Roosevelt. His official declar- ation of his discovery of the Pole will be looked forward to with great anticipa- tion. Already there is a rivalry between the two discoverers, and some words which are very unpleasant have been said by friends on both sides regarding the other. In any event, however, the United States may claim the honor of discover, ing the goal which for many ages the civilized nations of the earth had up to this time struggled for in vain. Curiosities of Southern Utah. —Mrs. F. M. Stanley upon whose father's farm is located the Salt Wash Arch, noticed in the July number, forwards the Era a corrected description of the arch, stating that it is seventeen miles north of Rock Settee, Dry Creek, near the Salt Wash Arch. Moab on Dry Creek, and twenty-five miles from Thomson's Springs, and may be plainly seen from her father's ranch.On the north side of the arch is a high wall of solid rock, with a large opening or window in the side of the wall. The arch is about sixty feet inside from the floor or base to the top, and is thirty feet across on the inside. The foundation on which the arch appears to stand is about ten feet in diameter. The best way to reach the arch is from Thomson's Springs to the ranch of Mr. J. W. Wolf, her father. Mr. Wolf is a war veteran and was eighty-one years old last January, hale and hearty. He was wounded by a bullet in his right leg. The accompanying picture was taken by Mrs. Stanley while EVENTS AND COMMENTS. 1005 standing under the arch. It represents the "rock settee." The surroundings give a good idea of the appearance of the country thereabout. The writer further states that near her father's ranch are some very beautiful and queer hiero- glyphics, and a rock resembling an Indian squaw. The "rock settee" is located in the bottom of Dry Creek. Tabernacle Choir at the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition.— On Satur- day, Aug. 21, 450 people, the Tabernacle choir and some of their friends, in elegant Pullman sleepers left Salt Lake City for the Seattle Exposition. This company was joined by another car full of people at Ogden. At La Grande, Ore., a con- cert was held; and a grand reception to the Tabernacle choir was given at Port- land. On Thursday the great choir and its friends arrived at Seattle where they met the kindliest reception. An unpleasant incident occurred, however, on Sat- urday, which prevented the choir from singing at the eisteddfod. They were told that they would have to pay seventy-five cents each for admission to hear themselves sing, and if they did not pay, they could not sing, to which the choir replied that they would not sing, and to which decision every Utah person present agreed. The unpleasantness was in no wise with the exposition officials, but only with the eisteddfod committee. The Exposition management treated the Utah people royally, and on Sunday night the climax of the visit occurred when, in connection with Ellery's Italian Band, the choir gave a grand concert was filled with perhaps 20,000 people. in the amphitheatre which Before the concert began every seat was taken. The choir was greeted with roars of shouts and applause as they presented their musical compositions. The "Soldiers Chorus" was especially well received, and three-fourths of the vast multitude stood while they sang. At the close of the concert, the choir struck up the "Star Spangled Banner, " and as the crowd neither dispersed or ceased their ova- tion, they sang "America," and following that selection, "How Can I Bear To Leave Thee?" In speaking of the visit of the choir to the Exposition, Evan Stephens, in an account given in the Deseret Neivs, says: "Am I satisfied? I cannot be otherwise. A nicer, more faithful lot of singers never sang together than my two hundred proved to be. Not one absentee at any concert during the trip (only by permis- sion, when we had no room for them.) Soloists and chorus members did every- thing reasonable, and within their power, to make my labors as conductor, and the one in charge of the artistic side of the tour, successful and pleasant. I have nothing but love and gratitude to them, one and all." and our state was The trip was a delightful outing for many Utah people, greatly in evidence at the grand fair on the 26th which was Utah day. am home Edward Henry Harriman.— "I have come home to get well; I Harriman. the to rest for a while. " These were among the sentences uttered by States some days before his Napoleon of Railroads, as he entered the United in Germany. He died at his un- death, after a three- months medical treatment 1909. He was born at finished palatial home in Arden, New York, Sept. 9, and was the son of a poor Hempstead, Long Island, New York, February 25, 1848, 1006 IMPROVEMEM ERA. minister whose salary amounted to as little as $200 per annum. Harriman quit school when he was 14 years old, and entered a broker's office. His school repu- tation w»9 : the worst boy and the smartest of his class. During the first year of his service in the office of the broker he earned $5 per week, and this amount, mark you, he turned over to his father to keep the family. Harriman was a boy's man. He unbent to children, and when a man loves children, he can not be al' bad, and was at the head of a boys' combined gymnasium club and debating so- ciety for more than 25 years. At his home he frequently loaded his automobile with little ones and took them for a spin about the countryside. Here, in the country, he was as God made him; but when doing business in the great city, he was as Wall street made him. Harriman was a great constructive genius. He took the Union Pacific Railway, just after the western boom of 1890, when it was run down and bankrupt, and going over the line saw its possibilities. Then with courage and energy he spent millions in making it safe and straight from Omaha to Ogden. Later he bridged the Great Salt Lake and so erected a monu- ment in Utah to his daring, unequalled in this or any other land. His achievements at the Salton sea are fresh in the memory of all. Though a New York man, with great grasp of things he saw America from the western viewpoint, as well as from the eastern; and had such faith in the west that he clearly beheld its pos- sibilities for empire building, and threw his wonderful energies to meet the match- less growth that has practically only begun. His railroads were not only made fit to meet the demands of this growth, but were improved and made instruments therein. Whatever may be said of his methods of thinking in millions, dealing in systems, and his audacity to plan and execute great undertakings, on small capital, his mighty work on the Pacific empire, on land and sea, will continue to fire the imagination and command respect. He is said to have controlled 18,000 miles of railroad, enough to run six lines across the continent, that employed 80,000 men; and he directed .54,000 miles of steamship lines. One could go from New York to Hongkong without leaving the Harriman system and return nearly all the way by another route on his lines also. It would take a page to enumerate his directorships, and he generally controlled whatever he touched, illustrating the good business principle never to take stock in any concern that you can not con- trol or have a strong influence in its management. He owned 35,000 acres near Arden overlooking Tuxedo Park, and it was here he was building a great castle> unequaled in America, where he hoped to spend his last days, when death came to frustrate his still unfinished plans.He was buried at Arden on Sept. 16, and for one minute at a certain time on that day every railroad train on his vast system stood still in his honor. The Deseret News building where the Oregon Short Line officers are located, was draped in black. This road was a leading factor in making him the greatest railway power this country has ever known. For his wonderful ability, displayed as a builder and organizer, and not for the hundred million dollars he amassed, and left to his wife, history will long remember him. Moses Thatcher.— On Saturday, August 21, 1909, Hon. Moses Thatcher died at his home in Logan City, Utah. He was born in Sangamon county, Illinois EVENTS AND COMMENTS. 1007 February 2, 1842. His childhood was spent in Nauvoo during the troubles be- tween the Latter-day Saints and the mobs in that city and surroundings. With his father, Hezekiah Thatcher, he crossed the plains in 1847. They did not set. tie in Utah, but went to California during the rush for gold in the days of 1849. The family settled in Yolo county, California, where they engaged in cattle- raising and in searching for the precious metal. His father kept an eating house in a small mining camp, and through the influence of some "Mormon" elders he was baptized into the Church in 1856, and in the year following was ordained an elder and sent out to preach through the mining districts in the vicinity of Auburn. was about this time that Johnston's army came to Utah, and all the It Saints were called home. The Thatchers, with others, set out for Utah, Moses and his four brothers with them. The brothers joined the Utah militia, and Moses served as night-guard on the special police force of Salt Lake. In the win- ter of 1860, he joined his father who came out from California in the meantime to his sons in Utah, and became a pioneer of Cache valley, where Moses lived al- most continuously the remainder of his life. In 1861 he attended the University of Deseret, now Utah, and in the summer of that year married Miss Lettie Farr, a niece of the late Lorin Farr, the first mayor of Ogden. From 1861 until recent years he was identified with the religious and political history of the community, being a zealous worker for the Church. He was ordained a Seventy by President Brigham Young in 1861. In the protection of the settlements of Cache from Indians, heserved as a "minute man" in the company of Captain Thomas E. Ricks, and when later the county was organized into the Cache Military district he be- came a captain of a company of fifty cavalrymen, and afterward served on the staffs of Colonel Ricks and General Hyde. He served a short time as an employee in a mercantile house in Salt Lake, but soon returned to Logan and became asso- ciated with his father in the mercantile business under the firm name of Thatcher & Son. He went to Salt Lake City in 1862 to learn telegraphy, but shortly there- after was sent to Europe on a mission. After two years he returned and re- entered the mercantile business in Logan, and became manager of the co-op. insti- tution there, which was afterwards merged with Z. CM I., becoming the Logan branch, of which Moses Thatcher continued manager until 1879. which com- In 1870 he was elected a director of the Utah Northern Railway pany built the road from Ogden to Logan. He later became superintendent of For ten years the line, and while acting in that capacity built lines into Idaln. and later he represented Cache and Rich Counties in the Tenitorial Legislature laboring diligently to secure the admission of our advocated statehood for Utah, In 1895-6 he took an active part in Democratic politics, state into the Union- United States Senator. being at that time the choice of his party in convention for and the Quorum of At about this time a difference of opinion arose between him and at the April Conference, in 1896, the Twelve, on politics and other affairs, a member of his quorum to which he had been selected he was not sustained as In the fall of the same and ordained April 9, 1879, by President John Taylor. for United States Senator from Utah but was defeated; but year he was candidate 1008 IMPRO VEMENT ERA . again tendered the nomination by a majority of the legislature, in 1898, which he declined to accept. Since that time he had not been active in public life. His health has been poor and he devoted his entire time to his business interests in Logan where he was president of the Thatcher Brothers Bank and the Utah Farmers Loan Associ- ation, and president and manager of the Thatcher Milling and Elevator Company. When the Cache Valley Stake of the Church was organized, in 1877, he was chosen president of the stake and held that position and the confidence of the people until in 1879, when he was chosen a member of the Quorum of Twelve. While a member of that Quorum he pioneered the first party of ''Mormon" mis- sionaries into the republic of Mexico where, under his leadership, prominent colonies have been established, and continued until the present. In all he made twenty-three visits to Mexico during the seventeen years that he acted in the quorum of the Apostles, traveling on an average of 18,000 miles a year. Moses Thatcher was dearly beloved by the people of Cache valley and gener- ally respected and admired throughout Utah and the intermountain country. He acted for many years as assistant superintendent in the General Superintendency of the Y. M. M. I. A. He possessed marked talent as a writer and speaker. His writings on "Confidence" and "Mexico and the Mexicans" which appeared in the early volumes of the Contributor are fine examples of his ability to produce good literature. His action in accepting the decision of his brethren, by which he re- tained his membership in the Church but was dropped from all activity in the priest- hood, goes far to prove that he dearly valued that membership; for, while he ac- cepted the decision, it is evident he was never reconciled to it. Exteriorj of a Cliffy Dwelling, near^Grayson, San Juan Co., Utah.