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PROTECTING UTAH’S LAW ENFORCEMENT HISTORY There are few collections in the Utah State Archives as rich and colorful as those associated with law enforcement. Through these records the escapades of both cop and criminal play out, providing dramatic snapshots of historical moments that are often tinged with high drama, emotion, and periodic violence. In 2011, Salt Lake Tribune columnist, Robert Kirby approached the Utah

The history of human activity in Utah’s Great Salt Lake Desert suggests that it is a place where the biggest of human ideas can take root. During the 1980’s this tendency took the shape of a detailed proposal to turn a section of Great Basin desert into the world’s most cutting edge science and research destination.

In September 1996, President Bill Clinton made the controversial decision to draw on powers reserved to him by the 1906 Antiquities Act, and designate 1,880,461 aces of land in southern Utah as the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. But did you know that sixty years before federal officials were pondering the designation of a similar monument that would have dwarfed the area covered by today’s Grand Staircase?

The history of the American West is shaped and defined as much by its people as it is its landscapes. Nowhere is this more clear than in the winding path taken by Highway 89 as it rises from the low Sonoran desert at the U.S./Nogales border, passes over the Grand Staircase of southern Utah, weaves north past Yellowstone and Grand Tetons, before ending in the high Rocky Mountains near Glacier National Park in Montana. Such distinctive landscapes make for a powerful history worth preserving and sharing. With this thought in mind, the Utah State Archives is proud to announce our participation with other cultural heritage organizations across Utah and Northern Arizona to launch the Highway 89 Digital Collections Project.