"The Stump" -- North Ogden's artesian well that flows with history

By Lynn Arave

  
This artesian well at the top of Washington Boulevard, east of Lee's Marketplace and north of McDonald's Restaurant at 2650 North, is flowing out of a "tree" stump, thanks to a restoration project by the City Council and a local Boy Scout.
   Clarence Barker drilled the artesian well in 1930 for irrigation water. Then, in the summer of 1931, "The Stump" came along. Joe Ballif — who had a hamburger stand near the well at 2620 N. 390 East and who was already using some of the water for his business — decided to capitalize on the refreshing liquid.
   Ballif obtained a cottonwood tree stump from Frank Campbell's front yard, 2594 N. 400 East (where First Security Bank is now), to spruce up the well. However, this wasn't just any tree. It was what was left of the original and lone tree standing in the area when pioneers arrived in North Ogden during the 1850s. The upper part of the tree had been destroyed by lightning, and Ballif salvaged the stump. It took four horses to haul it to the well a short distance away.
   Dewey Lakey, a traveling craftsman, was called in and he cut and chiseled the stump so it could contain a fountain and a yellow light bulb. The water began flowing through the stump, and a nearby sign stated, "Good water, isn't it? Try our hamburgers," as an advertisement for Ballif's food outlet.
   In later years, the tree stump deteriorated and much of it rotted away. Ballif's stand also went out of business. A steel ring and concrete were added, probably in the 1960s, to shore up the stump — though this meant it lost its treelike appearance.

   The well had developed the strange nickname of "Frogwater" by the 1950s.
According to Charles "Chick" Hislop, former Weber State University track and cross country coach, that name took hold in the mid-1950s, back when there was an actual tree stump where the artesian well water emerged from. Hislop said he and college kids often frequented the well. Back then it was a swamp all over the area, as well as a lot of noisy frogs around. Hislop recalled during an interview in 2017 about the well's nickname that as most enjoyed the mineral taste of the water, one college girl didn't and said "I'm not drinking that frogwater."
The name took hold.
The well was a landmark throughout Weber County. In fact, Coach Chick Hislop started having his athletes run to the fountain, exactly 10 miles from WSU, beginning in about 1969 for some of their "overdistance" training sessions. The runners could always count on having a refreshing drink of water at the "Frogwater" run's end.
Hislop said by then the stump had rotted away and there was cement around the fountain.
He had also directed his prep runners in the mid-1960s run to the fountain when earlier he had been a coach at Ben Lomond High School today, the distance being 5 miles from school to fountain. 

The "Frogwater" "Stump" as it appeared in the mid-1970s -- a crumbling concrete mass.



However, the establishment of Acres Market (forerunner to today's grocery store there) in 1999 meant the fountain would be removed. Marc M. Sutherland decided to create a plaque on the well's history as his Eagle Scout project. With historical interest stirred, the City Council became involved and had a 10-foot-high fiberglass replica of the tree stump made and placed near the original well. It was dedicated on May 20, 2000 in a special ceremony attended by some 200 people.
   Now the new "Stump" boasts two drinking fountains on its south side and a large flowing pipe on its north face. Gallon bottles can be filled up in seconds.

   "It's better than tap water," North Ogden resident Mike Barrow said as he filled up more than a dozen jugs of the water. "My whole family drinks it. I guess I should bring some larger jugs."
   Barrow said the water has been tested for quality and is better than the city of North Ogden's culinary water, though not bottled water sold in stores.,
   Thirsty kids on bikes or skateboards regularly stop at the fountain for drinks too. State Sen. Robert Montgomery, R-North Ogden, said at the fountain's dedication he recalls stopping there frequently as a child for a cold drink, too. Area residents regularly fill up jugs of water here and it is free.

There's even a nearby Veteran's Park, benches and mini park in the area now. North Ogden City even has a Christmas Santa house on the site.

(-Written by Lynn Arave and originally published in the Deseret News.)

Salt Lake City has it own artesian well counterpart to this, located at the southwest corner of 800 South and 500 East, water flowing  24/7 and free too. You just drive up on the south side of 800 South heading east and park and get out and fill up your containers. Below are photos of the Salt Lake public well .... water trickles down from a decorative arch.

The Kit Carson Cross – A pre-Mormon relic in the Great Salt Lake

By Lynn Arave

PERHAPS the most legendary of pre-Mormon Pioneer artifacts in the Ogden area is the famous Kit Carson Cross on lonely Fremont Island in the Great Salt Lake.

Only about six inches long, this landmark dates back to Sept. 9, 1843 when frontier explorer Kit Carson carved it on solid rock while his frontier colleague, John C. Fremont, surveyed the area.

                                                               Fremont Island.

Fremont had dubbed the isle "Disappointment Island" for its barren nature, lack of game and water. Carson was apparently so bored that he chiseled a cross there. Writings of the exploration prove Carson made that cross.

                    The black rock where the Cross is located.

However, Carson’s biography states that he had converted to Catholicism from being a Protestant some years before his Fremont Island trek and so his cross could also possibly be viewed as somewhat of a Catholic symbol or relic – predating Mormonism,  that would become the area’s dominant religious less than five years later.

                                       John C. Fremont

Explorers Fremont and Carson, plus two other men followed the Weber River and used an "India rubber" boat of that day to float to the island that is directly west of present day Hooper. They hoped it was a paradise in the desert.  However, after making surveys, they left in disappointment. The only excitement came shortly after they left the island. They were threatened by an incoming thunderstorm and felt they had to frantically row for their lives to get off the wind-whipped Great Salt Lake.

The cross is found at the north end of Fremont Island on what is known as Castle Rock, the isle’s high point, rising some 800 feet above the average elevation of the GSL.

Unusual black rocks dominate this area and one of them contains the cross, seemingly small compared to these large rock monoliths. Other than a few metal lightning rods in the area, a deterrent to lightning-caused fires, this portion of Fremont Island has likely changed little in the 173 years since the cross was carved there.

Some 4 ½ years after Fremont/Carson and party were the first known white men to visit the Island, Mormon pioneers set foot on the isle on April 22, 1848. They named it "Castle Island," for the throne-like top on its north end (today’s Castle Rock).

Howard Stansbury, a U.S. government surveyor, came to Fremont Island in the summer of 1850. He officially named it after Fremont. However, in 1859 and for some years after, the Island was also known as “Miller’s Island,” when Dan Miller and Henry W. Jacob of Farmington had 153 sheep grazing there.

Brigham Young also exiled a Salt Lake City grave robber, Jean Baptiste, on Fremont Island in the spring of 1862. He was never seen again, but that is another tale for another day.

In addition, Salt Lake Probate Judge U. J. Wenner and his young family lived on Fremont Island for about four years. From 1886-1891. Wenner had tuberculosis and it was hoped the sea-like climate would temper his illness. However, he died on Fremont and was buried there. Later, his wife’s ashes were also buried nearby. (This occupation too is a separate story.)

Many Native America relics (arrowheads, tools and bowls) have been found on Fremont, indicating ancient inhabitation there.

Fremont Island is the long, thin-looking island, with a flat plateau on its north end, which is located directly west of Hooper.

The island also has a large segment that juts out to west, long enough to land an airplane on, though this segment is not visible along the Wasatch Front.

Note: Fremont Island is now owned by the State of Utah, after more than 150 years of various private owners.

                 Looking north across the length of Fremont Island.

(-Written by Lynn Arave and originally published in 2016 in the Ogden Standard-Examiner.)