Improvement Era, November 1928

Improvement Era Vol. XXXII NOVEMBER, 1928 No. 1 The Pioneers and Southern Utah By J. R Kennard IN a way it has never done before, the world is taking note of a valiant service, a service rendered long years ago but only now, at last, rewarded. Men who would dare hell-heat or Arctic cold, men broad- brained and broad-shouldered for the task, large-hearted and clear- eyed men stayed and fought it out. They could not know that acclaim would be theirs, they did not care; theirs was a devotion of heart and life to God. They toiled for a principle, they built for genera- tions yet unborn. And now only a few are left to hear the meed of praise that rightfully belongs to every soul of them. On the recent tour of the southern Utah parks, to the north rim of the Grand Canyon, conducted by the Union Pacific Railroad Company, formally to open the magnificent lodge built there on the very brink of the mighty gorge, the dominant note was veneration for the "Mormon" pioneers who settled the country all 'round about. The party numbered two hundred or more, made up of capitalists, captains of industry, railroad presidents and executives, governors, senators, congressmen, mayors of large cities, presidents of chambers of commerce, heads of government bureaus, a picked coterie, a class of men who wield influence in the very course of hu- man society, men whose power is unquestioned in what this country shall do and think, in what shall be the verdict of America in any given premise. And along in the party, too, were fortunate scribes, newspaper men, invited to perform the pleasant task of telling the world what took place and to record their impressions. The spot-news side of the story has been taken care of. We have told the world that the trip was made, that the lodge was dedi- cated, that the Kaibab trail from the rim to the river was ceremoni- ously put into commission, that a surprise was sprung in the creation of Bryce Canyon National Park, that the mile-long tunnel out of Zion Canyon was holed through, that every man of the party arrived safely back and that it. was a wonderful trip. We have, naturally, enthused a bit in the telling, imbuing our accounts with the lure of the desert, the majesty of the forest, the grandeur of the cliffs, the tang of the mountains, but yet there remains the genius