Utah's Salty Stage: the Great Salt Lake

There's nothing like flying in or out of Salt Lake City and seeing the vast expanse of the Great Salt Lake and its barren surroundings. As the western boundary to Utah's most populous region, the lake has seen its fair share of strange events. In this episode, we dive into three of the most bizarre dramas to use the Great Salt Lake as their stage, including a grave digger, whales, and a lonely flamingo. 

Transcript

0:23

Hello. And welcome to the nifty 50 shower. This is the first episode of the first season. Naturally I am going to start with a place not as very close to home. And that is the great salt lake. I've grown up near the great salt lake it's always been a part of. The geographic psyche. I guess is what you could call that. And we've learned to deal with the smell when it's a west wind and also it's fluctuating levels. Which has been a very big part of the news in the last four to five years. With the ongoing drought, we did have a great year. From 20 2223. Which raised the lake levels. But not enough, or so the experts say, I guess we're all still at the risk of dying of a giant wind that blows up the arsenic dust when the lake dries up. But before that happens. Let's discuss some of the weird and wacky things that have used the great salt lake as the main stage. And before we do that, let's get into a little overview to situate us geographically. The great salt lake is about 17,000 years old and its current form. It is a remnant of lake Bonneville. Which. Disappeared in a catastrophic flood after the ice age. And the great salt lake exists because it is a terminal lake or an end or AIC basin. This means that there is no outflow besides the evaporation. That just occurs from solar energy. Despite not having outflow. It does have three major rivers flowing into it. The Jordan, the Weeber and the bear rivers. And they are responsible for bringing most of the water. There's not really a lot of precipitation. That you would get out in the Midwest or the east or in the Pacific Northwest. So it is fed mainly by these rivers, which are in turn fed by snow melt. We depend greatly on winter. Because of this situation, the great salt lake is two to nine times saltier than the ocean. This depends on the location. And to give you a comparison for the saltiest body of water, the dead sea. The dead sea is 9.6 times saltier than the ocean. So there are parts of the great salt lake. Where you could technically be very similar to the dead sea. In the middle east. The lake is 75 miles long and 35 miles wide. With an average depth of 14 feet. So you can already see, this is a very. Large shallow lake. The greatest depth is 34 feet. So unless. Something very bizarre happens. Nothing really is getting lost, although I'm pretty sure a lot of that stuff does. Now, despite the great salt lake being extremely salty and unusable and a lot of the same ways other lakes are. 10 million birds we'll stop over annually during migration season. From north to south or south to north. Because there are many wetlands surrounding it, particularly on the east side. Which is another bone of contention. As that part is also one of the fastest growing parts of Utah. So overall, the lake is not really enticing. People don't go. Boating on it necessarily. There are sell boats in the marina. And there was a famous resort. Saltaire but. As a general rule. It's not something that's say like the great lakes where you have beach day at the lake. No, it just. It smells gross. We've done. Field trips there and. You don't really want to go. The mud smells. The dad, critters little shrimp that live in the lake. They smell. Basically, it's just a smelly, salty lake. And in fact, one, a local author from the 1940s writing in his book, the great salt lake, he said. That it is water that is more desert than a desert. There cannot be a more apt quote for that. Because you can't drink it. You can't really use it to irrigate. It just sits there for the birds. So with all of that. A strange lake has had a lot of very strange events happen to it. And the first one that I want to talk to revolves around a man named Jean-Baptiste. Who, no one really knows where he came from. They call them Jean-Baptiste. Which is French for John the Baptist. But he might've been from Italy. No one really knows. He was a very strange character. But in the spring of 1862. Out east the states are in the midst of a civil war. Bye Anne. In Utah. There was a man, named-Moroni Clawson. He went by Roan. He was never up to any good. the stories never seemed to say that he was a great person, he was. A provocateur and the way he was always at the center of drama. In one instance, he harassed the territorial governor to the point where he was shot by the salt lake police. Just really. Really dramatic. And I think a lot of people thought At least salt lake will be quieter. And so they buried him in salt lake cemetery. No, no family came to claim him. No friends stepped up to claim him. So it was left up to the city to bury him. Eventually some months later, a brother comes from rural Utah and he asks to exhume the body. He wants to make sure it is him. And then he is going to take him back to the family plot, wherever they live. And when they zoomed him, they found him naked in the grave. Of course, this really is just. Bad. And I'll census up the word. You find your brother naked. It's a middle finger, a desecration of the body. He knew the brother was not well-liked. So he started blaming the city. Now the sheriff came forward and said, we buried him properly. This is not. Meant to say anything about your brother's life. We gave him all the respect. Now naturally that means. People are very curious then how, if he was buried. And close. How was he now naked? He hasn't been in the ground that long. The sheriff begins to investigate because now his reputation is on the line and the brothers really incensed and now people are starting to side with him. That's becoming. Much more dramatic than the sheriff had ever thought it would be, but they went to the. Cemetery groundskeeper's house who also was the grave Digger. Remember who I talked about at the beginning. Jean-Baptiste. Well guess who the grave Digger was. And they found. A bunch of boxes. And in these boxes, stacked up in his house, work clothes from over 300 dad people. Now you have to realize salt lake city at this time. Was probably a fair sized city for the Western United States. But it wasn't big. So when you have the close that 300 people were buried in that's a substantial amount. One would be, but 300 that's a lot of people. That's a lot of just the bad business. And of course this caused an instant scandal because now. Now people are realizing that the dad are not exactly safe in the cemetery. They're not being respected. A lot of people then called for a lynching of the grave Digger. This is Jean-Baptiste, he's a very shady character. However common sense prevailed. And the sheriff took him to the county jail who was placed under armed guard at all times. And the judge did not allow any bell because of the threat of violence. And after a very quick and short trial occurred. The judge wanted to give him a fate worse than death. Because. Death seems to be an easy way out. And so what he did was he decided to strand him on one of the islands of the great salt lake. There are multiple islands, the largest being antelope island, which is also a state park now. However at this time. They were privately owned. And so Fremont island is on the east side of the lake, between Promintory point. At the north side of the lake and antelope island. Which really sits in the middle. Eastern half of the lake. And it was a small island owned by the Miller brothers for cattle. The Miller brothers of course, acquiesced, and there was a small shack and they provided provisions enough for him to live. Alone very quietly. And he was given enough to survive. However, being a lake. An island and the lake full of cows. Nobody really needed to visit the cows just walked around, eating. There's no one really could go anywhere. It's an island however, six weeks later, they went out to the island and found that he had disappeared. The scandal was very fresh. The wound had not quite closed. And people are. Now mystified, how this criminal. Just up and disappeared. Often island in the middle of a lake. You can't go west. It's one of the most inhospitable parts of the continental United States. Just ask the Donner party. You can't really go east because that's where all of the people live. North is bad. South is mean you're still in the same valley. If you go south. So people were intensely curious. And the brothers upon arriving on the island found that the shack had been disassembled. One side was completely missing. One of their heifers had been skinned. So then they thought he's taken one of the sides off and he's made a sale out of leather. And just floated off the island. And that was the end of it. They never, no one really ever heard anything more about Jean-Baptiste the infamous grave Digger of salt lake city, cemetery. He just disappeared. And there were speculation that he had died because a couple of decades later. They found a skeleton with a ball and chain. But the policemen and the sheriff who stranded him on the island had said they had left him unshackled. And they all. VOSA for us li denied that they had left him with some sort of impediment. The island was impediment enough. Then there were rumors that he had maybe fled to Montana or California. Every so often after 1862 rumors would pop up of Jean-Baptiste sightings and the Western United States, but no one ever really knew. What happened? And luckily there's been no more stories of grave taking sense and Utah, at least to my knowledge. And. That's not the craziest part. I guess it's just it's disturbing because he would. Rob dead bodies of their clothes. And then he just disappeared into the night, but where did he go? Oh, what was he doing if he made it off the island? Did he change his name? Did he go back to Europe? Who knows? But Europe. Has given you Tom many interesting characters. And a specific European from the United Kingdom, a Mr. James Wickham figures prominently in our next story. On Tuesday, June 24th, 1890, very specific. The Utah Inquirer, a newspaper from Provo. RO his story about Wells in the great salt lake. This story seems to be more public than most of the other stories you hear about the great salt lake. Because a lot of people associate the salt lake with the ocean because it is saltier. And why not. And so there's always that urban legend about the Wells. Now, everybody who lives in Utah knows that there are no Wells. Otherwise we'd all be out. Watching. And we'd be making bank on. Landlock well, watch tours in the great salt lake. However, this is the first appearance of the legend in the newspaper. And the news article claimed that the story was over 15 years old. Because a Mr. James Wickham, who was quote a scientific English gentlemen, and quote, endeavor to place Wells and the great salt lake. Now, of course, I am guessing this plays up to a certain stereotype of the late 19th century of. A rich Englishman who had nothing better to do, but to put Wells in a. Very forsaken lake in the middle of the United States. His idea was to get to Australian Whales, or as they're also known Southern Wells. And put them in the lake and hopefully they would meet and have. Babies and then have a reputable population that would then serve. Industry but also then tourism and scientific reasons. And the article claimed that it took two years to capture these Wells off the coast of Australia. At which point they were shipped up to San Francisco across the Pacific ocean. And then by a specially made rail probably multiple rail cars. Over the Sierra Nevada's through Nevada and then to salt lake city. And then they were released near the mouth of the bear river. Which here's the first problem? The bear river. Empties into the great salt lake near Willard and Brigham city It's the Northeast side of the lake. It's still very shallow and near the mouth of the river itself is about three to five feet deep. So you can imagine a. A Southern whale. Sitting there in three feet of water. They're not tiny. And Southern Wells in particular. While not being the largest. There. Pretty hefty. Currently there's about 13,000 of them in the world. But you can't miss them because they're 50 to 60 feet long. 10 to 13 feet tall and 17 to 21 feet wide. So just imagine. It's a big animal. It would not fit in the bear river would die because it would be out of the water, obviously. But Mr. James Wycombe thought of everything. So when, after he released them, They had put a wire enclosure around a certain part of the lake. And to keep these Wells. There, and I guess forced them to meet, to watch them. I don't know. What James Wickham wanted to do. However, within a few minutes of being released into this wire enclosure, they busted right through it and went out into the open lake. And it seems like James Wickham was of the mentality of that was fun. And the Wells were supposedly free in the great salt lake for all time. There were sightings. People said that they had made it successfully. Now had children. And the. The newspaper article ended with this quote saying, quote, the scheme is a surprising and complete success. And Mr. Wickham has earned the things of mankind. And quote. Just, you have to pause for dramatic effect or to exhale and think through this because. Bizarre. It's just very bizarre. Now the rumor. Everybody probably got a great laugh out of it because obviously it's not real. But it's come up fairly often. one of the local newspapers that does write news. Has run. Articles on debunking the claim. Or talking about the story. And the last big time. It reappeared was in 2019. Because there was an exhibit called trans continental people, places impact. In downtown salt lake. And a company luminaria. Posted or presented a series of photos. Of Wells in the great salt lake and they were. Just got to be all. Very vintage. And looking like they had been taken in the late 19th century. That sparked a new. Fervor about the Wells and the great salt lake story. However, anything in the lake. It will most likely die except brain Trump and birds. Yeah. The reasons that it smells. However, this last story also involves an animal. Named a pink Floyd who was a Flamingo. This score is more recent. It occurred in. The late 1980s and up until the mid two thousands. So a lot of people might still remember this. Pink Floyd was a Chilean Flamingo. Native to the Southern half of south America. And they're about four feet tall. And. They had experienced a precipitous decline in native wild population. And certain characteristics of the birds. Meant that they made. Great birds. Great flamingos to keep And. aviaries or zoos. And so the Tracy aviary here in salt lake city. Had how did Shalane Flamingo. However. They did not clip its wings due to what they called And oversight and so this Flamingo was able to escape and he did. So he would winter in Utah. And he would eat the brain shrimp. That are very prolific in the great salt lake. Then he would leave and summer in Eastern Idaho or Southern Montana, just straight north of Utah. He became a local. Legend and the real sense, because he would come, he would go, he was very bright for being pink. So he stood out from the normally. Very neutral and maybe drab landscape of the great salt lake. And he even got a support group called friends for Floyd created on his behalf. This group. Wanted to buy and release more flamingos on the great salt lake. This was in 2003 and they pointed to pink Floyd as the prime example. He had lived for by this point. About 15 years. On the lake and he didn't seem to have had anything bad happen. And so they thought we buy more and release more into the wild one pink Floyd. Won't be lonely. And two, we can then have a thriving population of Chilean flamingos in Utah. This first proposal. sAd that. Every state should donate a Flamingo. I think that's rather presumptuous. Delaware. Rhode Island, please buy us a Flamingo. You can name it. Obviously this proposal failed the state of Utah didn't even really get behind it. But in 2004, just one year later. They came up with a different proposal. And this time they said they would raise$50,000 for 25 flamingos, expensive birds. That roughly translates into today's money for about$3,200 a bird. So if you have cash laying around, I'm sure. Friends for Floyd. Would love to hear from you. The state declined to. Add that to their budget discussions. And Tracy aviary commented that it was irresponsible. Which you just get a bunch of birds and then just release them into the great salt lake. What have been very interesting, a possibly great, phenomenal waste of money. And probably a disaster for the birds. Bad PR for friends for Floyd. And There haven't been any proposal sense. Because the last official sighting of the Flamingo was in 2005. And the last unofficial sighting was in 2010. So no one really knows if pink Floyd died or not. By now it is presumed. It's been a very long time, but no one knew where he went. No one knew. If he was happy on the lake. But a lot of people wanted to get Floyd, some friends, some pink feathery friends from south America. Those are the, probably the three greatest or not the three greatest, the three strangest stories about the salt lake. And I'm sure there's lots of them. However, if you want to have. A monster. Much in the same way as Lochness, you'll have to go to bear lake for that one. The salt lake is just too shallow. And we're all still waiting for the Wells anyway.