The "Ogden" Hot Springs that were actually in Pleasant View

THE Utah Hot Springs (also originally called Ogden Hot Springs) was actually in Pleasant View and closed in about 1970, after more than 80 years of operation.

 Native Americans had used the hot springs, probably for hundreds of years before the pioneers, in the late 1840s, came to the area.

  The 180-acre resort began in the late 1884, founded by Rason H. Slater, a “horse doctor,” who lived in Salt Lake City. He paid the U.S. Government $400 for the title to the hot springs. His motto for the resort was “The greatest cure of the West,” as he believed its hot mineral waters offered cures for pain and even disease.  (Some people called the hot spring water, “medicated fluid.” The spring waters were naturally heated to as much as 130 degrees.

  Slater also secured endorsements on the water’s health benefits from several Ogden area doctors.

  Located about 8 miles northwest of Ogden, the resort had railroad service in 1892 by the Oregon Short Line and Ogden Rapid Transit Railways, for 30 cents a trip, usually about 30 minutes long. However, at unpredictable times, herds of sheep in the area would delay trains for long periods of time.

  A fire in the early 1900s completely destroyed the original resort, but it was quickly rebuilt. On September 12, 1914, it suffered a transformer fire too.

  The resort changed ownership several times in the late 1920s, selling for $30,000 the first time and $40,000 the second time.

 

                  Old story in the Ogden Standard-Examiner on the resort's history.

By the 1930s, the resort scaled back in acreage, but offered a 40-room hotel, café, dance hall and saloon, with beer 5 cents a glass – besides the hot springs experience. Gambling for nearby horse races also centered around the resort.

  There were even bicycle races staged from downtown Ogden City to the Hot Springs, in the 1920s and 1930s. The hot springs attracted bathers from not just Utah, but Idaho and Nevada too.

  Ironically, few residents of Pleasant View or North Ogden visited the resort during its first 50 years, perhaps because of its gambling and saloon. It was outsiders who kept the resort in business.

 By the 1950s, the resort boasted both and indoor and outdoor swimming pool and the latter featured a tall slippery slide. In that later era, the resort was more of a swimming resort, than a hot springs and patrons came by automobile.

  What seemed to doom the resort were efforts by government officials to want to chlorinate the mineral waters. That liability, plus a downturn in the public wanting to use such hot pools, eventually caused the hot springs to permanently close.

                         Some of today's greenhouses on the old hot springs property.

   Soon after, the hot springs were used to heat greenhouses year-round. By the late 1990s, there were 40 or more greenhouses on the property. (However, the mineral water is so salty, that plastic pipe is used in the greenhouses, instead of metal.)

   A railroad line is still operated on the east side of the old hot springs and some of the heated waters sometimes overrun in the spring, near those tracks.

  Note that some newspaper reports of old confused this hot spring with the hot springs near the mouth of Ogden Canyon (today owned by Rainbow Gardens). Ironically, Rainbow Gardens also operated indoor and outdoor swimming pools and they closed permanently within a few years of those at the Utah Hot Springs.

 

Hot spring water sometimes overflows by the railroad tracks on the old hot springs property.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Crystal Springs used to feature music and dancing in the 1920s, besides hot pools

                             Crystal Springs patrons played water basketball in the late 1940s.

CRYSTAL SPRINGS was first discovered in 1884, at Honeyville in Box Elder County.
It is so named for the small crystals that the spring water produced in the gravel near its source. It was originally known as “Madsen Hot Spring," but the Crystal name eventually won out.
By the 1920s, Crystal Springs had become a popular area resort.
"Norm Watkins' orchestra to open at Crystal Springs" was an April 13, 1926 headline in the Box Elder County News.
The resort had a large dance hall and a nine-piece orchestra played there on April 15 of that year.
In 1926, the resort had a large swimming pool with a cement bottom, as well as its more famous hot pools. The resort had also purchased dozens of new wool bathing suits, available for rent in the upcoming season.
New land had been recently added to the resort and it now featured its own baseball diamond.
An electric car line, from Brigham City, also offered convenient access to Crystal Springs.
In 1981, the resort had added two large waterslides to its lineup. It also had a large outdoor pool, filled with cold water, in addition to its hot pools.
Today it is a popular group destination, with a focus on its hot springs.

                             The twin waterslides at Crystal Springs in 2006.

1890: The First Mention of a 'Swimming Pool' in Utah

Rainbow Gardens, in Ogden, had a swimming pool from the 1920s to the 1970s. This photo was taken about 1950, back when ballroom dancing was still in a popular phase.


THE very first mention in Utah newspapers mentioning "swimming pools" was in the Salt Lake Times of April 30, 1890.
"The circular bathing house, the center of it under a glass roof, is a swimming pool. Water is brought in pipes from Beck's Hot Spring," the Times article stated.
A few months earlier, in the Times of Jan, 16, 1890, reported this about the same swimming pool and unusually cold weather:
"The cold weather has not affected the water in the large swimming pool of the Natatorium. The water is 100 degrees in the pool and 120 degrees in the private baths."
-Some months later, on July 8, 1890, the Times newspaper reported on a $200,000 plan to create an even better and larger bathing house near the hot springs. 
-Mormon pioneers learned from the area's Native Americans about the hot springs north of Salt Lake City. By 1850, an official resort was located there.
-When the 20th Century arrived, a shift soon started to colder water swimming pools in Utah. By the 1920s, Lagoon Park in Farming, had a large outdoor pool. Not to say that hot springs didn't still exist -Beck Hot Springs continued until 1951. There was also a Utah Hot Spring, located near the Box Elder-Weber County line, that lasted until the late 1950s. Rainbow Gardens, at the mouth of Ogden Canyon, also had a swimming pool that remained open until 1972.
-It is also interested to note when swimming pool sanitation became a health concern in Utah.
"Take bath before swimming to be edict of measure," was a Jan. 21, 1917 headline in the Salt Lake Telegram newspaper. Later that year on July 31, a new State law took effect that required every person who wanted to enter a public swimming pool had to take a "bath" (shower).
Also, with the same bill, State Inspectors would not regularly scrutinize public pools for sanitation. In addition, any person with the contagious disease was banned from using a swimming pool.

Northern Utah once boasted 8 Hot Springs Resorts

                                                              Crystal Springs.


By Lynn Arave

 THEY used to be one of the hottest things along the Wasatch Front.
Lots has been written about the old historic Utah resorts along the shores of the Great Salt Lake, but ....
Once, hordes of swimmers and bathers enjoyed hot spring resorts too. Most of these resorts traced their roots to the pioneer era. In the first half of their 20th century heyday, there were eight such hot springs stretching from Box Elder County to Utah County and from Morgan to Wasatch counties.

                                               Camping at Crystal Springs.

The first, Beck Hot Springs, was used very soon after the Mormon pioneers arrived in the valley. In fact, it was the influx of gold-seeking 49ers in 1849 who loved the water that prompted Brigham Young to appropriate $6,000 for a public bathhouse there.
The hot springs, believed to have healing powers, were a great source of relaxation for those stopping in Salt Lake City -- the only sizable settlement between Missouri and California in 1849-50.
Rates were $1 for two to four people and $3.50 for a group of 16-24 people.
"It came to be a wonderful place for the Mormons," Utah historian Brigham Madsen said.
Today, only two hot springs resorts (both located in Box Elder County) remain -- Belmont Springs in Plymouth and Crystal Springs in Honeyville.
Why did the other six die out?
The post-World War II generation abandoned them for a new world of many diversified interests like TV, movie theaters and sporting events.
Jonathon Bronson, manager for Crystal Springs, said it has been difficult to stay open. The resort has had a lot of owners since Walt Chamberlain opened it in 1901.
"We have a loyal following," he said, referring to regular patrons who comprise some of the 200,000 people who annually visit Crystal Springs.


Also, the camping resort as well as the waterslide have helped Crystal survive.
Britany Holmgren, manager of Belmont Springs, believes rising insurance and liability rates have been the main reason for resorts closing.
"We have such a problem with people breaking in to skinny dip," she said.
With one pool 35 feet deep, liability is a key issue there.
Besides escalating insurance premiums, upkeep is also high for hot springs resorts. Piping wears out quickly from the mineral water.
Holmgren agrees that better indoor plumbing and more home hot tubs hurt the business of hot springs resorts. So did the belief by many that the mineral water didn't really have healing powers after all.
She said now there's a revival going on and many are coming to Belmont who believe again that the water has some healing properties.
Holmgren attributes the survival of Belmont to a diversification.
Today, it is a haven for scuba divers who use its 90- to 100-degree pools in all but the hottest of summer months. Raising lobsters is also another profitable sidelight for Belmont.
In fact, the scuba diving and lobster raising make more money for the resort than the hot pools do. Belmont also has a nine-hole golf course and camping and RV hookups.
Two of the historic hot springs resorts, Rainbow Gardens in Ogden and the Homestead (formerly Schneitter's Hot Pots) in Midway, have modified themselves dramatically to stay viable.
For example, Rainbow is into hot gifts now, rather than hot water. The late owner, Robert King, of Rainbow Gardens once said the resort was losing money in the late 1960s and closed its indoor and outdoor pools. Today, the former indoor pool is terraced into part of the Rainbow Gardens gift shop.
King's not sure why people stopped coming but said perhaps it was all the competing interests.
(There is still a primitive hot springs just east of Rainbow Gardens, at the mouth of Ogden Canyon, on the south side. However, this hot springs is on private property and its use is discouraged.)
The Homestead actually rediscovered some of its hot spring beginnings in the past few years with warm water scuba diving. The Homestead also has golfing and lodging as its primary focus.
The Utah Hot Springs (also called Ogden Hot Springs) in Pleasant View closed in about 1970. That place had an indoor and outdoor pool. The outdoor pool had a great slippery slide too.
(Greenhouse operations replaced the hot springs pools there.)
Wasatch Warm Springs/Beck Springs in Salt Lake City hasn't been used for swimming since 1976 and at one time housed the Children's Museum of Utah.
Como Springs in Morgan shut down in 1985 after a 1980 fire, 1983 flood damage and decreasing profits made it too costly to maintain. Saratoga, on the shores of Utah Lake, ceased operations in the early 1990s.
There's also Lava Hot Springs, Idaho, some three hours north of Salt Lake City, that still thrives as a hot springs resort town. But it, too, has had its ups and downs and had to change with the times to survive. It added an Olympic-size outdoor pool in 1972 and broadened its focus to other activities, like miniriver running.
Today, Utahns prefer the waterslide type atmosphere, too. This is evident by Lagoon-a-Beach at Lagoon, Cherry Hills resort in Fruit Heights, Raging Waters in Salt Lake and Seven Peaks Water Park in Provo.
Indeed, Crystal Springs opened a water slide in 1981 and has the state's only year-round slide.

                                       Twin water slides at Crystal Springs.



-Why do these eight hot springs exist in northern Utah?
Paul Jewell, associate professor of geology and geophysics at the University of Utah, said the Great Basin is an area where the crust of the Earth is being stretched. That makes the crust thinner and means the mantle of the Earth, a warm layer, is closer to the surface.
Water circulates through the crust of the Earth and is heated at these shallow depths. With some good natural plumbing, these hot springs are usually associated with breaks along segments of the Wasatch Fault.
It is also worth noting there are a few other, lesser-known hot springs in northern Utah. For example, "Stinky Springs" is located near Thiokol, west of Brigham City. It was never developed commercially, and vandals have now destroyed its makeshift facilities.
Cache Valley also used to have Loganna in Logan. However, by the early 1980s, this waterslide/swimming resort was sold to accommodate a housing project.


SOURCES: "Utah A Guide to the State," by Ward J. Roylance; and Digitalnewspapers.org


(-Adapted from a Sept. 12, 1999 Deseret News article by Lynn Arave.)

-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