Selling a State to the Nation

Abstract

After gaining statehood in 1896, Utah struggled to overcome perceptions of its un-Americanness. Mormons (members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) made up the majority of the population and held most political offices, and the practice of polygamy and the threat of theocracy from the dominant religion fueled perceptions that Utah was an outsider in the Union. The national park movement provided a means for the state to promote its landscape as a contribution to the country and to prove its worth to America. Journalism associated with the designation of Zion National Park (1919) shows how Utah's reporters used landscape to fuel a booster press in a struggle to bridge the chasm that separated the state from the rest of the country. Much like the nation used the early national parks as a means of establishing national identity, Utah's press used the parks to establish the state's Americanness.