History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

SALT LAKE CITY. 681
though unpaved and without sidewalks, were lined
with cotton-wood and locust trees, acacias, and poplars.
Most of the private houses were still of wood or
adobe, some few only being of stone, and none
pretentious as to architecture; but nearly all were
surrounded
trees were
with gardens in which fruit and shade
plentiful. Many of them were of the
same pattern, barn-shaped, with wings and tiny casements,
for
Mormons.
glass was not yet manufactured by the
A few of the better class were built on a
foundation of sandstone, and somewhat in the shape
of a bungalow, with trellised verandas, and low flat
roofs supported by pillars. Those of the poor were
small hut-like buildings, most of them one-storied,
and some with several entrances. At this date the
entire city, except on its southern side, was enclosed
by a wall some ten or twelve feet high, with semibastions
placed at half musket-range, and pierced here
and there with gateways. 22
In driving through the suburbs the visitor would
find the thoroughfares in bad condition, dusty in summer,
and in winter filled with viscid mud. On either
side were posts and rails, which, as the heart of the
city was approached, gave way to neat fences of
palings. On Main Street were the abodes of some
of the leading Mormon dignitaries and the stores of
prominent gentile merchants. On the eastern side,
nearly opposite the post-office, and next door to a
small structure that served for bath-house and bakery,
stood the principal hostelry, the Salt Lake House, a
large pent-roofed building, in front of which wT as a veranda
supported by painted posts, and a sign-board
swinging from a tall flag-staff. Here fair accommoda-
22 Woodruff's Journal, MS.; Richards' Hist. Incidents of Utah, MS., 28-9;
Wells' Narr., MS., 60; C'handless, Visit to S. L., 153; Sloan's Utah Gazetteer,
25. The wall was built in 1S53. Chandless remarks that for defensive
purposes it would be useless, as any one could climb it with ease. Burton,
City of the Saints, 245, states that it was built as a defence against Indians,
though gentiles said that it was constructed only because the people wanted
work. It was of mud mixed with hay and gravel; in 1860 it had already begun
to crumble, and in 1883 there were few traces of it remaining.