African Americans and Salt Lake City’s West Side: Part Two

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Twenty-fiveBy Brad Westwood and Cassandra Clark The above photo was taken in 1944 by Chinese American newspaper photographer Ray King, from the Salt Lake Tribune in Salt Lake City’s segregated USO Club for Black or African Americans. This post was updated and expanded in early September 2022 and in February 2023. African Americans contributed …

The Legacy of Salt Lake City’s Pioneer Fort

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Sevenby Brad Westwood Above photo caption: Utah’s Hall of Relics, built as a small Parthenon replica. Note above the pediment is a smaller replica of Ralph Ramsey’s flying eagle sculpture (the original atop Brigham Young’s Eagle Gate). The hall, constructed of plaster and jute fiber over a wooden frame, was built for the 1897 …

African Americans and Salt Lake’s West Side: Part One

Salt Lake West Side Stores: Post Twenty-FourBy Brad Westwood and Cassandra Clark The above photograph was described by the photographer as “Wright’s Card Club, Blacks, at 313 E. 8th S. [Salt Lake City, Utah], April 27, 1945;” Ray King, photographer; Salt Lake Tribune Negative Collection, courtesy of the Utah State Historical Society. This post was updated and expanded in early …

Salt Lake City’s LGBTQ+ Communities and the Pioneer Park Neighborhood

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Thirty-Twoby Brad Westwood Although the LGBTQ+ community had many prior informal political and social gathering spots elsewhere in Salt Lake City, a number of bars and taverns located in the Pioneer Park neighborhood served as a place to gather for Salt Lake City’s emerging LGBTQ+ communities. In 1970, just one year after New York …

Introducing Salt Lake West Side Stories

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post OneBy Brad Westwood Welcome to this serialized and illustrated history of Salt Lake City’s old west side. This blog consists of over thirty posts and scores of images, all presented online to tell the story of a very unique area of downtown Salt Lake City. This series consists of short, quick-to-read segments. Expect to …

Utah’s Expanding Railroads and Salt Lake’s West Side

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Nineby Brad Westwood The completion of the world’s first transcontinental railroad in 1869 dramatically affected the social, political, economic, and cultural life of Salt Lake City (SLC), the Territory of Utah, and the American West. Transportation was one aspect that contributed to changes in the West. The railroad cut travel time from the Pacific …

Pre-European Settlement, Crossroads, and the Idea of Home

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Fourby Brad Westwood Native Americans lived in what is now Salt Lake’s west side. After Europeans began to colonize North, South, and Central America, the Great Basin became a site where many different people and nationalities claimed ownership. In this post, we will consider how the Native Americans of the Salt Lake Valley interacted …

The Old Pioneer Fort’s First and Second Years

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Sixby Brad Westwood Above photo caption: Kirk Henrichsen’s bird’s eye sketch of the Fort on the Great Salt Lake, circa 1849, extending from 300 to 400 West and 250 to 600 South. Henrichsen’s drawings included log and adobe cabins, gateways, hundreds of wagons used for cooking and sleeping (inside, under, and around), the flagpole, …

Overland Travelers, Early Visitors, and the Coming of the Railroad

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Eightby Brad Westwood Utah was never entirely isolated from the United States, Latin America, and the Pacific World. From the 1800s onward, the Great Basin was a point of intersection where people from many cultures interacted with one another in several ways. One of the most well-known events that drew people west of the …

Proposed Uses of the Park and Urban Renewal

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Sixteenby Brad Westwood Throughout the nineteenth and into the twentieth century, businesses and government entities targeted Pioneer Park for what they labeled as “public good” purposes. The park, of course, had many identities. It was the site of several public work projects, and it stood as a memorial to Utah’s Mormon (members of The …

Economic Immigrant Communities’ Impact on Salt Lake City

Salt Lake West Side Stories: Post Twenty-OneBy Brad Westwood The arrival of later economic immigrants, from across the United States and around the globe, to Utah and the Pioneer Park neighborhood, created conflicts with the Mormon Church’s (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as Mormons) all-encompassing societal ideal. This post was updated in February 2023. Salt …