THE Great Salt Lake is one of Utah's most well-known assets. However, few seem to be aware that in 1960 the briny body of water was proposed as a national park.
Of course, that status was never awarded, but Utah Senator Frank Moss did seek it, according to the Weekly Reflex newspaper of March 24, 1960.
Moss explained in the newspaper article that he never wanted the entire lake to be a national park, just a portion of the lake's shore.
He realized even in 1960, that industrial uses were impairing the lake and that developments also threatened it. While he didn't want to restrict any of the economic value of the lake, he was open to studying fresh water bay possibilities and more.
-MORE HISTORY: "Six stranded on Antelope Island get back safely," was an Oct. 27, 1932 headline in the Weekly Reflex newspaper. The men, Nephi Ross, Earl Stoddard, Paul and Francis Fowers -- all from Hooper, plus Frank and Charles Stoddard from West Point.
The men took a motor boat from the West Point Gun Club in hopes of rescuing a boat that was beached off the edge of Antelope Island a week earlier. That task was too difficult and their food supply ran out. They spent a night on the Isle and lit a fire to show relatives they were OK.
A Utah Pacific Airways plane was chartered and flew over Antelope Island in search of the. The pilot never found them, just a herd of about 25 buffalo.
The men finally freed the boat, but a storm preventing them from leaving the island until later in the day.
-FACTS about a proposed Pineview Reservoir:
Cost: $3 million.
Shoreline: 17.5 miles
Maximum depth: 56 feet in front of the dam.
Highways to Huntsville and Eden rerouted on the sides.
Source: Ogden Standard Examiner of Sept. 28, 1934.
-THERE was an obscure development while constructing Pineview Reservoir: For more than 40 years, the Utah Power and Light Company operated a small reservoir below Wheeler Canyon and found west of the new Pineview Dam. This old reservoir had to be drained and discarded and the old highway rerouted through it.
In addition trucks with water tanks hauled fish away as the reservoir was drained.
The Standard-Examiner of Oct. 7, 1934 chronicled some of this prep work and that a Civilian Conservation Corps camp was being erected near Huntsville.
-WHEN the Utah State Prison in Sugarhouse was slated for replacement, it eventually ended up in Draper, near Point of the Mountain. Another explored possibility was Antelope Island. However, another proposal is much more obscure -- west of Bountiful, near the Great Salt Lake.
According to the Weekly Reflex newspaper of Jan. 24, 1929, Salt Lake County was pushing for the prison to be moved northwest of the Cudahy Packing Plant (near today's Cudahy Lane).
A key problem with that proposal was that the Utah State Constitution required that the prison be located in Salt Lake County. So, Davis County would have to give the land to Salt Lake County for that to have ever happened. This proposal never took place and since Davis County is by far the smallest county of the 29 in Utah, it turned out well.
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