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CHAPTER 1: migrating big game into Utah and were EARLY HISTORY probably the first humans to make use of OF THE resources in what is now the Uinta National Forest. At that time, the shore line of Lake UINTA NATIONAL FOREST Bonneville extended near or into the LANDS present day forest boundary and Paleo- Indians likely hunted mammoth and other The Uinta National Forest big game species along the shoreline and experienced widespread use before its into the Forest lands. Though no Paleo- designation as a Forest Reserve in 1897. Indian sites have been found on the Forest, From the first mammoth hunters 12,000 the remains of large Ice Age mammals in years ago to the European settlement 150 Utah Valley attest to the diversity of game years ago, the Uinta National Forest and populations in the area. the lands surrounding it have always provided people with the resources Archaic Cultures: necessary for survival. These include game Expanded Hunting and Gathering animals, wild plant foods, clean water and 6500 B.C. to A.D. 400 timber for construction. The following is a By about 6500 B.C., the climate had brief account of the people that relied on the become warmer and drier and the Forest lands prior to 1897. mammoth and other large mammals had disappeared. As a result, people took NATIVE AMERICANS AND THE advantage of a broader selection of plants UINTA NATIONAL FOREST LANDS and smaller game such as mountain sheep. Though big game species were still Paleo-Indians: The First Forest Users important, these Archaic peoples hunted 10,000 B.C. to 6500 B.C. small mammals and collected plant foods The first humans probably entered on valley floors left dry by the receding North America as early as 35,000 years ago waters of Lake Bonneville (Fagan 1991). In as they followed populations of mammoth Utah and Juab Valleys, Archaic hunter- and other big game species from the Asian gatherers were tied closely to the highly continent. By about 12,000 years ago, these abundant resources in the valley bottoms people passed through Canada and into the along the Wasatch Front. Wild raspberries, southern half of the continent. They are choke cherries, service berries and other known to us as the Paleo-Indians who plants located on Forest lands were spread rapidly throughout North America, essential foods, especially in the fall. a continent rich in diverse populations of Many big game species lived primarily in plants and animals. But this was also a the higher elevations and Archaic hunters period of climatic change in North America tracked big horn sheep, deer, elk and other and game followed changes in vegetation animals across Forest lands. Seasonal communities. As a result, the Paleo- camps were established and many Archaic Indians lived a highly mobile lifestyle, people probably spent the late summer tracking the game year-round (Kelley and months on the Uinta. Todd 1988). Paleo-Indians followed Excavations have been conducted at 3 two temporary Archaic camps on the Uinta. Late Prehistoric: American Fork Cave, in American Fork Return of the Hunter-Gatherers Canyon, contained mostly bone from big A.D. 1300 to A.D. 1800 horn sheep. This suggests that groups of By A.D. 1300, a group of people Archaic men were hunting in the canyon known as the Numic spread out across the during the fall and returning with the meat Great Basin from either southern California to family camps in the valley (Janetski or northern Mexico. In northern and 1990). This contrasts somewhat with central Utah, they replaced the Fremont. findings from Wolf Springs, a temporary The Numic continued a way of life based camp along the Wolf Creek Highway on the on hunting and gathering as the Archaic Heber Ranger District. Here entire peoples had before them. They gathered Archaic families were going into the roots, seeds and berries and hunted small mountains, for extended periods of time, to game as well as deer, mountain sheep, hunt, process hides, gather plants and make bison and other large mammals. The Utes stone tools out of locally available and Gosuites, two distinct groups of Numic quartzite. These people probably came people, settled the lands in and around the from the valleys in the Uinta Basin or along Uinta National Forest. For these people, the Wasatch Front (Reed 1994). like their Archaic predecessors, the lands of the Uinta provided resources important for Formative Culture: Utah’s First Farmers survival (Fowler and Fowler 1971). A.D. 400 to A.D. 1300 The Utes probably began calling the About A.D. 400, farming began in land around the present Uinta National the valleys along the Wasatch Front, a Forest home around A.D. 1400. They practice adopted from North American and populated areas from Utah Lake to western Mexican cultures to the south. The Colorado and from the High Uintas to Fremont, as these people are known, northern New Mexico and Arizona. The established scattered farmsteads and small Utes that occupied the lands of the Uinta villages in the valleys and on the benches are known as the Timpanogots (or Utah around Forest lands. They cultivated corn, Valley Utes) and the Uintah Utes. beans and squash, but continued to rely on The Timpanogots inhabited Utah wild plants and game as well (Madsen Valley, north central Utah, and frequented 1979). The Fremont continued to utilize areas as far east as the Strawberry Valley resources in the higher elevations but region. Their territory was defined on the probably spent less time on Forest lands north by the Traverse Mountains that than their predecessors. Around A.D. separate Utah and Salt Lake Valleys, and 1300, the weather became colder and drier areas north of that boundary were used by which made the cultivation of corn very Shoshone peoples. At the time of the first unreliable. The Fremont people abandoned European contact, Ute villages were located their villages and moved out of the area or on the rivers on the east side of Utah adopted hunting and gathering as their Valley. The people fished in Utah Lake, ancestors had done (Janetski 1991). used marsh plants and animals and hunted for small game, deer, elk and bison in the valley. Timpanogots used the present 4 Forest lands to hunt deer, elk, bear and The Uintah Utes occupied the Uinta mountain sheep and gather wild Basin of northeastern Utah, but they ranged strawberries, raspberries, service berries, as far west as the Wasatch Front. Because choke cherries and black berries. Most of of this, they probably had a close the food gathering that took place on Forest relationship with the Timpanogots. One of lands probably occurred late in the summer the journal entries of the Dominguez- when temperatures were warm and upland Escalante expedition noted that the Utes berries were ripe (Janetski 1991). frequented Strawberry Valley: “The guide The name Timpanogots translates as told us that in it [Strawberry Valley] there rock (tumpi-), water mouth or canyon had dwelt a portion of Lagunas [Utes], who (panogos) people (ots), perhaps referring to depended on the said river’s fishing for a rocky canyon, like Provo Canyon, from their more regular sustenance and who had which a river flows (Steward 1938). The moved out for fear of the Comanche, who Timpanogots have also been referred to as were starting their incursions through this the Timpa-nuu-cii which translates to mouth part of the sierra...” (Warner 1976:50). (tipana) people (nucci) (Smith 1974). The name Uintah is derived from U- Early explorers suggested that the Utah int-a-nu-kwints, which is the Ute name for Valley Utes named themselves after Lake the Uinta River (Fowler and Fowler Timpanogos (Utah Lake). 1971:178). Venita Taveaponts, a Ute linguist, states that the word Uinta, which is derived from the Ute word Yoov-we-tueh, means pine tree or pine forest. The Uintah Utes called themselves the Pag-wa-nu-chi, the Water-edge People (Calloway et al. 1986). The Gosuite people inhabited the regions around Rush Valley, Skull Valley and adjacent areas, including lands within the present boundaries of the Vernon Management Area of the Wasatch-Cache National Forest which is managed by the Uinta National Forest. More widely distributed resources prevented the formation of large groups in any single area. Therefore, the Gosuites hunted and gathered in small bands of twenty-five to thirty people and lived in small, temporary camps. In the winter, several bands might combine into villages located in sheltered areas where water and wood were Ute home in the Uinta Basin, 1873. National available. One of these areas was the north Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian end of Rush Valley, along Vernon Creek. Institution. These people lived on a diet of plants, 5 roots, berries, pine nuts, seeds and greens. sagebrush stretches, now through This diet was supplemented by game low, narrow valleys of very soft dirt species that included rabbits, birds, and many small holes in which, mountain sheep, deer, bear and elk. Prior because they lay hidden in the to contact with the Mormon settlers, the undergrowth, the mounts kept Gosuites had little contact with their Ute sinking and stumbling at every and Paiute neighbors to the south and east, instant. Then we went down to a though they did associate with the Western medium-sized river [Trout Creek] in Shoshonis of Nevada (Allen and Warner which good trout breed in 1971). abundance, two of which Joaquin the Laquna killed with arrows and EUROPEAN AND AMERICAN caught, and each one must have EXPLORATION weighed more than two pounds. This river runs to the southeast The Escalante-Dominguez Expedition along a very pleasant valley with The first documented European good pasturages, many springs, and explorations into Forest lands occurred in beautiful groves of not very tall or 1776.

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