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Dateline
9000 B.C. Desert Gatherers wander the region now called Utah.
50 B.C.-A.D. 1300 The ancestral Puebloans (or Anasazi) establish thriving communities in the Four Corners Area.
1776 Spanish friars lead an expedition to explore the region now called Utah.
1801 Brigham Young is born in New England.
1824 Scout Jim Bridger becomes the first white man to see the Great Salt Lake.
1847 Brigham Young leads Mormon pioneers into the Salt Lake Valley.
1848 The United States wins the Utah region from Mexico.
1849 Mormons establish the provisional state of Deseret and adopt a constitution, but their request for statehood is denied.
1850 The U.S. Congress creates the Utah territory.
1860-61 Pony Express riders cross Utah on their 2,000-mile, 10-day route between St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California.
1861 Telegraph lines are joined at Salt Lake City, creating transcontinental telegraph service and putting an end to the need for the Pony Express.
1869 Railroad tracks laid from the east and west coasts are joined at Promontory, Utah, creating the first transcontinental railroad.
1877 Brigham Young dies after a brief illness.
1882 The U.S. Congress outlaws polygamy.
1890 Church president Wilford Woodruff issues a manifesto advising Mormons that the practice of polygamy is no longer acceptable.
1893 Mormon Temple is dedicated in Salt Lake City.
1896 Utah becomes the 45th state in the Union.
1896 Utahn Martha Hughes Cannon becomes the first female U.S. Senator.
1900 Hundreds are killed in a mine explosion in Scofield, Utah.
1904 Polygamy is formally prohibited by the church.
1913 Strawberry River Reservoir, the state's first large reclamation project, is completed by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
1919 Zion National Park is created.
1926 Commercial airlines start operating in Utah.
1934 Utah ratifies prohibition repeal amendment and passes stringent state liquor laws.
1940 Wendover Air Force Base is established.
1950 Mabel Young Sanborn, 87, the last of Brigham Young's 56 children, dies of natural causes. She was his 54th child.
1952 Uranium is discovered near Moab.
1964 Glen Canyon Dam and the Flaming Gorge Dam are completed, ensuring water supplies and creating scenic recreation areas. Canyonlands National Park is established.
1971 Capitol Reef, a national monument since 1937, becomes a national park. Arches, a national monument since 1938, is expanded and made a national park.
1977 Gary Gilmore, convicted of the murders of two Utahns, is executed by firing squad following a media circus that garnered international attention. It's the first execution in the United States in 10 years, following the Supreme Court's reinstatement of the death penalty.
1978 LDS Church announces a revelation saying priesthood is now open to worthy men of any race, reversing a policy that had excluded blacks from leadership roles in the church.
1982 Worldwide membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints exceeds 5 million.
1985 U.S. Sen. Jake Garn of Utah takes off in the space shuttle Discovery to become the first senator to fly in space.
1995 Utah is chosen to host the 2002 Winter Olympic Games.
1995 More than 600 inches -- that's 50 feet -- of snow during the season keeps the lifts running at Snowbird, in Little Cottonwood Canyon east of Salt Lake City, through the Fourth of July -- the latest lift-served skiing ever in Utah.
1996 By executive order, U.S. President Bill Clinton creates the 1.9-million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which is hailed by environmentalists but condemned by Utah Senator Orrin Hatch and other opponents as "the mother of all land-grabs."
1997 Worldwide membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reaches 10 million.
1998 Polygamous offshoots of the LDS Church become the center of media attention when a 16-year-old girl accuses her father of beating her when she tried to escape from a polygamous marriage as the 15th wife of her 33-year-old uncle.
1998 Scandal clouds the excitement of planning the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City when rumors erupt of payoffs to International Olympics Committee members.
1998 Arches National Park gains 3,000 acres along its northeast boundary.
1999 A rare tornado strikes downtown Salt Lake City, killing one person, injuring dozens more, and leaving more than $150 million worth of damage.
1999 The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints puts much of its genealogical data on the Internet; its website (www.lds.org) is deluged, causing an overload that leaves it shut down for 6 hours.
2000 About 85,000 acres of land was returned to the Ute Indian tribe by the federal government. Since 1916, the land had been under U.S. Naval control as an oil shale reserve in case of military need. This action affords the Utes control of access to hunting areas and cultural sites.
2002 A Roman Catholic census of U.S. religious groups finds that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is growing at the fastest rate of any religion in the United States.
2003 Southern Utah's Lake Powell, a major destination for boaters and anglers, is at its lowest level in 30 years dues to below-average precipitation and rules that require a prescribed amount of water to be released to downstream users.
Note: This information was accurate when it was published, but can change without
notice. Please be sure to confirm all rates and details directly with the companies in question before
planning your trip.
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