Newsletter of the Utah History Fair, vol. XIII no. 1, September 2003

2004 Theme: Exploration, Encounter, Exchange in History

In honor of the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark expedition, this year’s Utah History
Fair theme is “Exploration, Encounter, Exchange in History.” It deals with humanity’s journey into the unknown and the various encounters and interchanges that result. The theme can be interpreted broadly including geographic and scientific exploration, encounters with new cultures or technologies, and the exchange of ideas or commerce. One or more elements of the theme may be addressed. A list and discussion of national and international topics can be found in National History Day’s 2004 Curriculum Guide (www.nationalhistoryday.org ).

Though students may pick a topic from any era or place, they should not overlook the
many opportunities in state and local history. Utah’s distinct heritage offers fascinating
examples of explorers and exploration, white/Indian or Mormon/non-Mormon encounters, and the rich exchange of ideas, culture, and goods among diverse peoples.

Mountain men, Mormons, Catholic priests, and Army surveyors all explored what is now
Utah. Among them were fathers Dominguez and Escalante, Jedediah Smith, John C. Fremont, Jacob Hamblin, and John Wesley Powell. These explorers experienced high adventure while making significant contributions to knowledge. They encountered new people, lands, plants, minerals, fossils, and animals.

Not all encounters were positive. Though Utah’s pioneers thought it better to feed
Indians than to fight them, Utah’s settlement led to tragic encounters like the Bear River
Massacre and the Blackhawk War. Encounters between Utah’s Mormons and the Federal
Government, such as the 1857 Utah War and the Polygamy Raids, also kept the territory in turmoil throughout the last half of the 1800s. During World War II, Japanese-Americans
encountered stinging racism when they were held at the Topaz internment camp.

As people and cultures collided, there was a rich exchange of things and ideas. Indians
exchanged furs and hides with white traders for manufactured goods. Later, mountain men built trading posts to supply travelers on the emigrant trails, and Utah pioneers did a brisk business with forty-niners on their way to California. The completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 finally put Utah in touch with the world. Successive waves of new immigrants shared their cultures and traditions.

The theme should guide students in all aspects of their entry’s development. It should be
reflected in their choice of topic, their research, and in their presentation. Remember that a
successful entry is more than just a description of events, it presents facts and arguments that lead to a set of historical conclusions.

Utah Topics: Exploration, Encounter, Exchange in History

Explorers
Dominguez and Escalante
Howard Stansbury
John Wesley Powell
Jacob Hamblin
John W. Gunnison
John C. Fremont
Clarence King
Jedediah Smith
Peter Skene Ogden

Exchange
Fort Bridger
Miles Goodyear: Indian Trader
LDS Indian Missions
Corinne and the Montana Trail
Forty-niners in Utah
The Old Spanish Trail
The Mormon Corridor
The Treaty of Box Elder
Controlling Trade: Utah’s Cooperative
Movement

Encounters
The Fur Trade Rendezvous
The Utah War
Mormons and the Transcontinental Railroad
The Polygamy Raid: Federal Authority and
the LDS Church
The Bear River Massacre
Utah Welcomes the World: The 2002
Winter Olympics
19th Century Protestant Missions in Utah
The Mountain Meadows Massacre
The March of the Mormon Battalion
The Blackhawk War
City of the Saints: Sir Richard Burton
Among the Mormons
Chinese Railroad Workers in Utah
Japanese Internment
Iosepa

I could but esteem this moment of departure as
among the most happy of my life.

Meriwether Lewis

Curriculum Guides and Workshops Available!!!

The 2004 National History Day curriculum guide is now available online
( www.nationalhistoryday.org ) and in print. Free printed copies can be obtained from the Utah History Fair office. The guide has a theme discussion, a topic list, lesson plans, and information on digital primary sources at the National Archives website.

This is also the time to arrange workshops for teachers and classroom presentations. If
your school is new to the program and needs help, call or email Mike Johnson for a 90 minute afterschool workshop on program basics. It can be taken for university credit. Classroom presentations are also available throughout the fall. These sessions introduce the fair process and suggest topics for research. They are a great way of getting students off to an enthusiastic start.

Selected Bibliography

Arrington, Leonard. Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-Day Saints,
1830-1900. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1966.

Bain, David H. Empire Express: Building the First Transcontinental Railroad. New York:
Viking, 1999.

Bigler, David L. and Will Bagley, ed. Army of Israel: Mormon Battalion Narratives. Spokane, WA: Arthur H. Clark Co., 2000.

Brooks, Juanita. The Mountain Meadows Massacre. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1962.

Burton, Richard F. The City of the Saints and Across the Rocky Mountains to California.
Reprint. Niwot, CO: University of Colorado Press, 1990.

DeVoto, Bernard. The Course of Empire. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1980.

Goetzman, William. Exploration and Empire: The Explorer and Scientist in the Winning of the American West. New York: Alfred A. Knopf Co., 1966.

Gowans, Fred R. Rocky Mountain Rendezvous: A History of the Fur Trade Rendezvous, 1825-1840. Layton, UT: Peregrine Smith Books, 1985.

Gowans, Fred R. and Eugene Campbell. Fort Bridger: Island in the Wilderness. Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 1975.

Jackson, Donald and Mary Lee Spence. The Explorations of John C. Fremont. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1970.

Madsen, Brigham D. Corinne: The Gentile Capital of Utah. Salt Lake City: Utah State
Historical Society, 1980.

Madsen, Brigham D. The Shoshoni Frontier and the Bear River Massacre. Salt Lake City:
University of Utah Press, 1995.

Powell, John Wesley. Exploration of the Colorado River and its Canyons. Reprint. New York: Penguin books, 1997.

Stansbury, Howard. Exploration of the Valley of the Great Salt Lake. Reprint. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988.

Taylor, Sandra C. Jewel of the Desert: Japanese American Internment at Topaz. Berkely:
University of California Press, 1993.

Calendar

Sept.-Dec. workshops available
Feb. 1 entry forms due
Feb. 10 research papers due
Mar.-Ap. regional fairs
mid-April State Fair
June National History Day

www.nationalhistoryday.org
www.usu.edu/~utahfair/histfair.html

History is a guide to navigation in perilous
times.

David McCullough