Utah visit - First Friday

Utah visit - First Friday

The first Friday in Utah was focused on the Friday afternoon class of local historian Steve Taylor. Annette and Larry are nearing the end of two years of attending Steve's weekly classes on history of the local Wayne County, Utah, area. This area is sparsely populated, but very typical of early, outlying Mormon settlement areas. Steve's ancestors were among the earliest settlers in the area. Born in the Fremont area, Steve went off to earn his PhD in mathematical physics and a successful career, but his heart was always in his home community. So, retirement brought him back to Fremont, where he has built a beautiful home that overlooks the valley where the community is located. He conducts his classes in his home, in front of the plate glass windows overlooking the valley. It is a marvelous experience.

Here is Steve, before his lecture. I didn't want to distract him, once he got started on his stories for the day. I'm certainly glad. The one hour plus went by far too quickly as it was.

There were 13 persons in the class this week, fairly typical, mostly regulars.

Ages ranged from early 50s to mid-90s...

Steve always has books about his lecture available to share, before, during and after class. Here he is pulling an agenda for someone who missed class the prior week. Steve is very well organized!  ;-)

The lecture this week was on John C. Fremont and especially his fifth and final expedition that came through this valley, below, known now as Rabbit Valley. The expedition had a campsite in a grove of cottonwood trees southwest of Steve's house. Besides given excellent background on explorer, John C. Fremont, known as the Great Pathfinder, Steve provided very interesting details of the route of the expedition coming into the valley that had been shrouded in mystery until the last few years when new discoveries have lent credence to some certainty, now, of the route they took along the San Rafael Swell, and across Cathedral Valley following an old Indian trail into Rabbit Valley. They made camp in January 1854.

Tomorrow, on Saturday, we will join several members of the Old Spanish Trail Association at the Campsite. We will have metal detectors and will be searching for artifacts of that historic visit - with permission of the current land owners, of course.

The lecture and discussions were accompanied by an unexpected thunderstorm and some decent rainfall which the area had not had in quite a spell. We headed on south to the town of Loa, on Highway 24, to the Tusconos Pizza establishment for our main meal of the day. Larry ran an errand in town while we waited for our pizza.

 And the, the sky opened up again, and the sleet started coming down! Here is the Jeep - he is waiting to get out until it slowed down a little.

Pizza was great - a bit excessive, of course, but really good going down! By the time we got back to our mountain top in Teasdale, there had been no weather, at all. However, now, a couple of hours later, we have been having steady rainfall for a long time! Larry says first 'real' rain this year so far. Just have Bill and Nancy show up and the weather changes. Never fails.

So, we are doing what we do best. Working at our four workstations - I posted this on Facebook and hour or so ago, and have about 20 comments already!!  ;-)

Lite salads for supper...  ;-)