FamilySearch Wiki:WikiProject Utah Tasks County History

Return to Utah Wiki Project Main Page

Task Description
Add information to the History area, located under Quick Facts on each county page.

Where to find the information
Several sites are loaded with information about the history of Utah's counties. For this task, however, we will use only Wikipedia as the resource. (Otherwise, this task will mushroom out of proportion at the expense of completing other tasks.)

Information in Wikipedia can be used without copyright issues in FamilySearch Research Wiki.

To use Wikipedia, simply do a Google search for the name of the county and select the Wikipedia article.

Before you begin your timeline, copy the following paragraph and paste it to the county page:

Unless otherwise noted, the events below were gleaned from Wikipedia.

A History in Timeline format

 * See Timeline Example below.

Putting the history in Timeline format has many advantages. It is easy for users to scan to the years that affected their ancestors. Timeline format makes it easy for writers to insert events they just learned about between years already in the timeline.


 * Please keep event descriptions very short. The computer screen is not like reading a book or an article in a magazine.

How complete does the timeline have to be? In reality, it may never be "complete." Consider focussing on the first 25-30 years or so and only very major events after that.

Whatever you add will be a great improvement on what is there now.

Please include events that affected the record-keeping, such as:


 * Settlement and migration into or out of the county. This can include an influx of settlers from specific countries, such as Scandinavians, or religious groups.
 * County formation and boundary changes. (This is given elsewhere for each county, but should also be in the timeline, since it is a great summary of major events over the years.)
 * County buildings where officers created and stored the records. What did they use before a courthouse was built?
 * Fires, floods, and other natural disasters that destroyed the records or changed where they were stored.
 * Crop damage or mining incidents that led to booms, busts, and ghost settlements.
 * Whatever you find that is interesting and will help users know what affected migrations, records, and record-keeping.

Books and Internet Sites for County History If you find an internet site or a book you want to tell people about, please place them under Local Histories, which appears further down on the county page under the Resources heading.

An Interesting fact
Although you start by filling out a timeline history, you will likely find a fact or event that is unique to the county and interesting to users.


 * For example, "Hole the Rock, the hideout of the famous gang of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, is in this county."
 * If you added an example like this, users would benefit if you included a link to the Internet for Hole in the Rock, Butch Cassidy, and Sundance Kid.

Timeline Example:
The timeline needs to be to the point and easy to scan (by users) and to insert events (by writers). Therefore, please use a bulleted list, put the date in bold (Year first), and type a brief description of the event, such as:


 * 1849 October The first Mormon settlers arrived in (add name of town or area)
 * 1850 (name of county) was established as an original county in Utah Territory. It included the entire area west to the California border, which is now in Nevada.
 * 1852 85 families lived in the areas of (add names of places)
 * 18__ Nevada Territory was formed, decreasing the size of this county.
 * 18__ The first courthouse was built.


 * (NOTE: The above timeline is fictitious and given as a formatting example only.)

(Add this later when real examples exist:) For examples, see {___ or ___ county}.

Assignment Chart
Volunteers are needed to check all 29 counties, adding items as appropriate. Please place four tildes ( ~ ) in the "Volunteer" column next to the counties you choose for this assignment. This will automatically give your username and the date you signed up.

Beaver — Grand Counties


Iron — San Juan Counties
