A Historic Tour of St. George

Near the tip of Utah’s southwest corner is the modern and bustling community of St. George. While its ample outdoor recreation, serene red rock desert landscapes, luxe destination spas and proximity to Utah’s national parks attract visitors from around the world, this city of 105,000 was founded with more agriculturally focused designs in mind. 

Under the direction of Brigham Young, leader of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, pioneers settled the town in 1861 as part of a cotton mission aimed at testing the viability of warm weather crops. While Young's plan for St. George didn’t work out, he became one of the area's first snowbirds, wintering there to escape Salt Lake City's snow.

In the short term, Young’s consistent presence fast-tracked St. George’s development. As time passed, the leader’s presence there has helped motivate subsequent generations to preserve the area’s settlement stories. Tales of these early pioneers are not all the history there is to discover in St. George, however. Walk in the footsteps of dinosaurs, trace ancient Puebloan art, wander through a silver mining ghost town — all this and more awaits in this charming Southern Utah town.

Old Pioneer Courthouse

97 E. St. George Blvd.

washcouthistory.org

Situated in the literal and figurative heart of St. George is Old Pioneer Courthouse, one of Washington County’s oldest standing buildings. Construction of this venerable building was completed in 1876, a full 20 years before Utah achieved statehood. The building served as it was originally intended for more than 90 years, and then housed the local Chamber of Commerce for the following three decades. In 1970, it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places and, in 2019, appropriately became a hub for regional historical information, headed up by the Washington County Historical Society.

While visitors can’t access the interior of the courthouse at the moment (the building is closed for a structural renovation through 2025), it remains an apt starting point for strolling the town’s pioneer past along the Historic St. George Walking Tour. Use the online map (or pop into the McQuarrie Memorial Pioneer Museum, located directly north of the courthouse, for a hard copy) to learn about the more than 27 historic points of interest. 

Stops include the home of Juanita Brooks, a nationally renowned historian who was the first to document The Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints’ involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre; the St. George Opera House; Ancestor Square; the Mormon Tabernacle; and Brigham Young’s winter home.

When you go: The Washington County Historical Society hosts events and walking tours throughout the year, more information can be found via their online calendar.

Bloomington Petroglyph Park

1460 W. Navajo Dr.

Within a quiet suburban St. George neighborhood, near the Bearclaw Poppy Trail System’s Navajo Trailhead, is a seemingly out-of-place sight: a boulder covered almost completely with rock imagery. These pictures were etched into the boulder’s face by Ancestral Puebloans, also known as Anasazi. These human forebearers lived throughout Southern Utah and the Four Corners region around 2,000 years ago. As farmers, they were likely drawn to the area now known as St. George by the three perennial water sources that converge here — Fort Pierce Wash, as well as the Virgin and Santa Clara rivers. 

Exactly what the different symbols mean is largely a mystery (Read: How to Visit Rock Imagery Sites Like an Archaeologist). What is known is that rather than being simply art, rock imagery consists of powerful cultural symbols reflecting the complex societies and religions of the Tribes that lived in this area thousands of years ago. Due to the increasing frequency of drought, the Ancestral Puebloans began to gradually abandon the area around 1300 A.D. At the same time, bands of the nomadic Paiute tribe moved in, adopting some of the Puebloans’ farming techniques. A small population of Paiute people, known as Shivwitts, continue to live in the St. George region to this day. (Read: Native Nations in Utah)

When you go: Another fantastic example of well-preserved rock imagery in the area can be reached after a short, easy hike from the Anasazi Valley Trailhead, located just west of St. George in the Santa Clara River Reserve.

Dinosaur Discovery Park

Johnson Farm, 2180 E. Riverside Dr.

utahdinosaurs.org

Open Wednesday through Monday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

To call Utah a dinosaur fossil hotbed isn’t an exaggeration. Attracted by abundant food and scant predators, dinosaurs roamed throughout the region millions of years ago during the Jurassic and Early Cretaceous periods. (The Jurassic geological period is said to have begun more than 201 million years ago and ended 145 million years ago, while the Cretaceous period began 145 million years ago and ended 66 million years ago.) 

These roaming giants, now extinct, left behind multiple fossil repositories, known as quarries, throughout the state from north to south, including St. George’s paleontological jackpot. 

In 2000, optometrist Sheldon Johnson was working on his St. George area farm and found what he immediately knew were dinosaur tracks. Soon after his discovery, Johnson and his wife, LaVerna, donated their farm to the city of St. George, and in 2005, a modern glass-and-steel museum was built over multiple sets of 200-million-year-old fossilized dinosaur footprints where Johnson discovered them in the ground.

Now, visitors to the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site Museum can walk in climate-controlled comfort along multiple sets of dino and ancient mammal footprints. The museum also includes interpretive displays of dino skin impressions, dino swim tracks, a rare sitting impression of a large meat-eater and many fossilized remains of fish and plants. Smaller children love the museum’s outdoor playground area, furnished with several life-size dinosaur replicas, shaded picnic tables and a Walk Through Time exhibit.

When you go: Hump Day is for kids at the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Museum. Crafts, story time, games and more are held at the museum each Wednesday from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Check out the museum’s calendar for details.  

Silver Reef Museum and Ghost Town

1903 Wells Fargo Road, Silver Reef

silverreef.org

435-879-2254

Open Monday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The discovery of silver in the 1800s fueled boom-and-bust development of mountain towns throughout the American West. But only in Silver Reef, once known as Bonanza City (located 30 miles north of St. George), was silver found in sandstone. Silver Reef's population blossomed to 2,000 in 1879, making it the county's largest town. But by 1884, most mines were exhausted, and all but a few hardy souls abandoned the town for greener pastures.

Thankfully, Silver Reef’s rough-and-tumble past has been preserved and is celebrated at the Silver Reef Museum & Ghost Town, housed in its historic Wells Fargo Express Stop Building, circa 1877. Museum exhibits include the Brass Rail Bar, a mercantile and the original safe where silver alloy was kept while awaiting stagecoach transport to St. George. In the basement, if you visit on a Saturday, you can tour a replica of a silver mine. 

Outside the museum, visitors can stroll a walking trail down what was once the  town’s old Main Street past the recreated Silver Reef Jail and the site of the Elk Horn Saloon. Walking trail guides are available inside the museum or, after hours, in a box just outside the museum main entrance.

When you go: In 1933, 200 men from around the country converged on Leeds, a town located adjacent to Silver Reef, as part of the Civilian Conservation Corps. They built the Oak Grove campground and roads from Leeds to St. George. The well-preserved remnants of the corps’ once-bustling camp are located at 96 Mulberry Street in Leeds. For details, visit wchs.org.  

Mountain Meadows Monument

Milepost 31, Utah State Highway 18

Thirty miles north of St. George is a bucolic valley lending stark contrast to the events that occurred there more than 150 years ago. On Sept. 11, 1857, a militia made up of pioneers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began a week-long siege and eventual slaughter of 121 men, women and children passing through the area via wagon train from Arkansas to California. What is now known as the Mountain Meadows Massacre remains one of the worst mass killings in American history. The site is now dedicated to the memory of the victims, and in 2011, was also designated as a National Historic Landmark. 

This quiet place for contemplation includes two markers: a granite memorial engraved with the names of the victims and 17 survivors, which is installed on the hill overlooking the site; also in the valley, a conical cairn, similar to the one erected by the U.S. Army two years after the massacre occurred. 

A short interpretive trail, furnished with 20 markers telling the story of the massacre victims and 17 child survivors, winds between the two markers. Visit the Mountain Meadows Monument Foundation website to learn more.

When you go: Near the Mountain Meadows Monument is the Pine Valley Chapel, built 1868 by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is the longest continuously open church in Utah. Services are held on Sundays at 10 a.m. and are open to the public. 

Hurricane Valley’s Heritage Park and Pioneer Museum

35 W. State St., Hurricane

435-635-7153

Monday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

First things first: the unlikely name of this quaint town northeast of St. George is said to have been bestowed upon it well before its official incorporation in 1912. In the 1860s, as early Mormon leader Erastus Snow passed through the area, a wind gust tore the cover off his buggy. Snow reportedly said: “Well, that was a hurricane. We’ll name this the Hurricane Hill.” 

The story told by the Hurricane Valley Heritage Park & Museum begins with the pioneers who came to settle the area after Snow’s fateful visit, whom, like those who settled the St. George, were sent to grow cotton by LDS Church President Brigham Young. Outside the museum, visitors can check out an authentic and impeccably maintained covered wagon, pioneer-era farming implements. Plaques recount the story of the pioneers’ plucky and determined ingenuity in getting water seven miles overland from the Virgin River to the Hurricane Bench.

Inside is where you’ll find this museum’s eccentric claims to fame: a piece of wedding cake from 1907 and a slab of bacon dating to 1945. The cake, stored within a case just inside the museum’s main entrance, came from Emily Wood and Joe Scow’s wedding, donated to the museum by the couple’s granddaughter in 1990. The museum’s pioneer kitchen is where you’ll find the famous slab of bacon, which after being stored in a local family’s drying shed and forgotten for decades, was rediscovered and donated to the museum in 1996.

When you go: Although it’s almost certain Erastus Snow used the traditional pronunciation of Hurricane following the buggy-top incident, locals refer to their town with this time-adjusted pronunciation: Her-ah-kun.