History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

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SETTLEMENTS, SOCIETY, AND EDUCATION.
inhospitable region, the Mormons built up their settlements,
which, nevertheless, grew with a steady and
stalwart growth. As year followed year, the magic
wand of progress touched into life these barren and
sand-girt solitudes, and in their place sprang up a country
teeming with the wealth of gardens and granaries,
of mines and mills, of farms and factories. To show
how this has been accomplished, and more especially
to explain the industrial and social condition of the
people during the first years of the present decade,
will be my task in the concluding chapters of this
volume.
At the close of 1883 the population of Utah was
estimated at 178,121, of whom 92,081 were males,
86,040 females, 123,506 of native and 54,615 of
foreign birth. 2
In 1880 there were 14,550 persons
employed in agriculture, 4,149 in trade, and 10,212
miners, mechanics, and factory operatives; though
notwithstanding the industrial activity of the settlers,
the percentage of bread-winners was smaller than in
any state or territory of the union with the exception
of West Virginia, this fact being due mainly to the
large proportion of women and young children. A
noteworthy feature in the community was the small
amount of debt, crime, and pauperism, the entire
public debt, city, county, and territorial, being in 1879
only $116,251, and the number of criminals and paupers
being, as elsewhere noticed, much below .the average
throughout the United States. 3 The death-rate
for a series of years averaged about sixteen per thousand,
though for 1880 it was somewhat higher on
account of the prevalence of diphtheria. 4
2 Utah Gazetteer, 18S4, p. 300, where the population is given by counties.
In the census report for 18S0 the total population is given at 143,963, nearly
20,000 of the foreigners being English, and about 8,000 Scandinavians.
3 In 1879 there were 33 paupers and GO criminals. The number of prisoners
at the Utah penitentiary for each year, with various statistics, will be
found in the reports of the warden and directors in Utah Jour. Legist., passim.
In later years we hear little of such outi-ages as were alleged to have been
committed about the time of the Utah war.
4 In 1877-8 diphtheria was also common. See Utah Sketches, MS., 27.
Description of Iluidsville, MS., 6. For mortality in S. L. City between 1S70