Highway 89 today goes down from Sardine Summit to Dry Lake.
“The primary
highway leading north through the Cache Valley to Idaho is at present a summer
road, so far as through traffic is concerned , for the reason that the 10-mile
section between Mantua and Wellsville is closed by winter snow,” an article in
the January 1924 issue of Utah Highways Magazine stated.
“As a result
the fertile and populous Cache Valley is virtually isolated, as far as travel
by the highway is concerned, from the rest of the state, for approximately four
months of the year. Interstate travel between Utah and points both is confined
to the railroads during the winter months,” the magazine article, written by
engineer K.C. Wright, concluded.
However,
that seasonal isolation, which had existed for almost 70 years, finally ended
in the summer of 1924 when a $200,000 new highway was constructed.
The road was
completed by Sept. 9 of that year. Much of the new road was truly new and
didn’t follow the former alignment.
For example,
from Mantua to the Sardine Summit, a new dugway was cut out of the mountain
with a maximum grade of six percent. At 24-feet wide, the new highway had ample
passing room too.
Previously,
the direct “pioneer route” by way of Dry Lake had been used to reach
Wellsville. (Ironically, that’s also today’s highway route.)
That steep
route, through what is officially named Wellsville Canyon (originally named
“New Canyon”), suffered from 20-30-foot-high snow drifts, 10 to 20 percent
grades, and wet clay soils at the bottom of the canyon.
In the new 1924 alignment (that existed until about 1960), the highway curved northeast and winded through Sardine Canyon (the original version) and into Cache Valley. (Sections of the old road are still visible today from Highway 89, looking northeast shortly after Sardine Summit.)
“Sardine
Canyon was finally chosen as the route of the new highway because it seemed to
present the most feasible location for an all-year road,” an Aug. 15, 1924
story in the Box Elder News stated.
“Canyon road
is nearly finished; Highway of crushed rock between Wellsville and Mantua, one
of the best earth roads in the state,” was that story’s headline.
During the
winter of 1924-25, a 10-ton caterpillar truck with a snowplow attached was used
to clear snow on the new highway, a combination of gravel and rock.
In 1927, a
combination of gravel and oil was used on the highway. The road was eventually
paved and did work well in winter, until modern road building and snow removal
came along in the 1950s.
However, the
terrible winter of 1948-49 meant the road was closed for a full month during
January of 1949.
By the mid-1950s, plans were made to streamline the highway, now a popular scenic highway to Bear Lake and even Yellowstone National Park. In 1960, the revised road opened with its current alignment, abandoning the true “Sardine Canyon” and heading directly to Wellsville from the summit north of Mantua.
Technically,
it is Box Elder Canyon from Brigham City to Mantua. Then, it is Wellsville
Canyon from Mantua to Wellsville, though the old Sardine Canyon name is today
affixed to the entire mountain road between Brigham City and Cache Valley.
The “why”
the name “Sardine” for a canyon that’s not narrow is another story for another
day.
(-Originally published on-line and in print on Dec. 18-19, 2014 by Lynn Arave in the Ogden Standard-Examiner.)
-NOTE: The author, Lynn Arave, is available to speak to groups, clubs, classes or other organizations about Utah history at no charge. He can be contacted by email at: lynnarave@comcast.net
