HISTORIC MARKER
In 1826, a bull-boat was used by four men attempting to navigate the circumference of the Great Salt Lake beginning at the mouth of the Weber River. During this journey, they discovered that the lake had no outlet. While many trappers claimed credit for “discovering” the Great Salt Lake, it is widely accepted that Etienne Provost, French-Canadian fur trader and participant in the encounter at 1825 Mountain Green, and Jim Bridger, a trapper floating down the Bear Weber River, were the first to enter the region two years prior to the first circumnavigation.
Provost likely also discovered the Weber River in his travels and descended it to the lake. Provost joined William Ashley, head of the American Rocky Mountain Fur Company, at the annual Green River rendezvous. When Ashley departed for St. Louis in the fall, his trapping crew made their winter quarters at the mouths of the Weber and Bear rivers alongside Shoshone bands.
In the following years, other mountain men, explorers, and trappers attempted a similar boat journey with some success. Their tub-like crafts, formed by stretching buffalo hide over a willow wood frame, could convey heavy loads of furs or men through even the shallowest of streams and were used extensively in the western fur trade. While visiting Goodyear in 1845, Fremont and Carson decided to take an India rubber boat to Fremont Island where Carson carved a cross.
These explorers likely traveled past the inlets to creeks flowing through what is now known as the area surrounding Kaysville and Fruit Heights. The Blood family witnessed the remains of trappers’ huts upon first entering west Kaysville. Phillips or Sandy Creek, Holmes Creek and Haight Creek were the original names for the first three streams of water south of the Weber River to run out of the mountains to the Great Salt Lake. All three were named after the earliest settlers, and of the three Haight carried the largest amount of water. Trappers exploring the Great Salt Lake while looking for inlets that might contain fur-bearing animals would have seen these sources as having possible resources for their use.
Sources
- Blood, Henry Hooper. History of Kay’s Ward. (date 1912?)
- The painting, Circumnavigating the Great Salt Lake created by Dale W. Bryner and commissioned for the nation’s bicentennial, is owned by the Weber State Storytelling Festival and shown by permission.
