This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
What is believed to be one of the West's largest land transactions ever went down in central Utah recently when undisclosed buyers paid $57 million for control of 490,000 mostly agricultural acres around Cove Fort.
The deal includes the title to private ranch lands and 4,000 head of cattle, as well as grazing allotments on adjacent or nearby state trust lands and public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management and Fishlake National Forest west of the Pavant Range, according to broker Matt Harmon of the Farm and Ranch Group.
"This purchase represented the only opportunity to acquire such a vast tract of deeded and leased land in the entire state, and constitutes a true legacy ranch," he said.
He was not at liberty to identify the two buyers. One acquired the 5,300 irrigated acres, and a Utah livestock operator acquired the rest, he said. The land will continue to be used as it has for the past couple decades. It includes a premier elk hunting unit.
Most of the land is in Millard County, and includes the northeast part of Beaver County and creeps into the western ends of Piute and Sevier counties.
The deal might not rival the Louisiana Purchase in size, but the sale price dwarfs the $15 million President Thomas Jefferson paid the French back in 1803 for the territory stretching from New Orleans to the Pacific Northwest. And Harmon couldn't think of one that involved more land, as far as private deals go,
"We are reticent to say it's the largest because there might be larger transactions we don't know about," Harmon said.