Otto Abels Harbach

He became one of the most famous lyricists of the Broadway stage. Music came into Otto Harbach’s life at an early age. One of his first memories was of his mother’s singing. Later, when his brothers started a small orchestra, he learned to play his father’s violin and joined them. He was born in Salt Lake City on August 18, …

Jedediah S. Smith

S. Matthew Despain and Fred R. GowansUtah History Encyclopedia, 1994 Jedediah S. Smith was a trailblazer, brigade leader, and partner in two fur-trading companies whose travels took him throughout Utah and the West. Born in 1799, he was the first American after the Astorians to cross west over the Continental Divide, rediscovering South Pass; the first to cross overland to …

Joe Hill

Gibbs M. Smith Utah History Encyclopedia, 1994 Born in Gavle, Sweden, on 7 October 1879, Joe Hill, also known as Joseph Hillstrom and Joel Hagglund, was an American labor songwriter and martyr who was executed in Salt Lake City on 19 November 1915. He immigrated to the lower east side Bowery section of New York City via Ellis Island in …

Gordon B. Hinckley

(1910-2008) Fifteenth president of the LDS church, under whose leadership the church has experienced record worldwide growth, temple construction and secular visibility as it sweeps into the 21st century.

Reed Smoot

David GesselUtah History Encyclopedia, 1994 Reed Smoot represented Utah in the United States Senate for thirty years, longer than any other Utah senator past or present. He was the first native-born Utahn to establish a national political reputation and was also the only Mormon apostle to serve in the U.S. Senate. During his senatorial career, Smoot served concurrently as a …

Jon Huntsman, Sr.

Jon M. Huntsman, Sr.is Founder and Executive Chairman of Huntsman Corporation, a global manufacturer and marketer of specialty chemicals. Forty years ago, Mr. Huntsman began a small entrepreneurial plastics packaging business. Originally known for pioneering innovations in packaging and, later, for rapid and integrated growth in petrochemicals, its operating companies today manufacture chemical products used in a wide range of …

Arthur Vivian Watkins

Patricia L. ScottUtah History Encyclopedia, 1994 Arthur V. Watkins was born in Midway, Utah, 18 December 1886. Vivian (as he was known by his family) was the first of six children born to Arthur and Adelia Gerber Watkins. Educated in Utah public schools in Midway and Vernal, he entered Brigham Young Academy prep school at age of seventeen. Three years …

John Henry Weber

S. Matthew Despain and Fred R. GowansUtah History Encyclopedia, 1994 John Henry Weber was born in 1779 in Altona near Hamburg, at that time part of Denmark. By 1807 he migrated to America to Ste. Genevieve, Missouri where he became acquainted with William Ashley and Andrew Henry. In 1822 Weber enlisted in the Ashley-Henry Fur Company which departed St. Louis …

Daniel Jackling

(1859 – 1956) The father of Utah copper mining, Jackling helped found the Utah Copper Co. in 1903. Figuring that mining would only be profitable with the open-pit method of ore recovery, he began in Bingham Canyon what was to become the world’s largest open-pit mine. Kennecott eventually bought the mine, and copper became king in Utah.

Brigham Young

Newell G. BringhurstUtah History Encyclopedia, 1994 Brigham Young was born June 1, 1801 in Whittingham, Vermont. He was the ninth of eleven children, growing up in an unsettled frontier environment characterized by frequent family moves to various communities throughout upstate New York. Despite the influences of a strict, moralistic family and being exposed to the religious fervor that characterized the …