On Saturday, about 400 of Lunt's descendants gathered on Main Street in front of City Hall to honor the founder and unveil a bronze statue of his likeness.

Janet Seegmiller, a professor at Southern Utah University and author of History of Iron County, described Lunt as a selfless man born the 13th of 14 children into a landowning family in Cheshire England in 1824.

Three months after converting to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Lunt made the journey to Salt Lake City, arriving in 1850 shortly after turning 26 years old.

Seegmiller said because he was educated, he was appointed secretary to church official George A. Smith, who was in charge of settling what became Iron County, named after the metal discovered in the surrounding hills.

After helping with the settlement of Parowan, Lunt was sent with the settlers 15 miles south to start the town and iron mining operations. He kept extensive journals of his experiences, said Seegmiller.

Those journals were on display at a reunion of the descendants held Saturday at SUU. Members of the public danced to big band music Saturday night at the Cedar City Birthday Ball.

After arriving in Utah wearing a silk hat and dressed in expensive clothes, Lunt later returned to England on an LDS mission wearing buckskin clothes, moccasins and a coat made from a wife's skirt.

In between his arrival in Utah and return to his native country, Seegmiller said, Lunt learned to handle oxen teams, dig ditches and farm, and he lived in a dugout. Before his death in 1902, Lunt served as Cedar City's mayor and in leadership roles in the LDS Church.

Also honored during Saturday's ceremony were York Jones and his wife, Evelyn, who wrote and published Biography of Henry Lunt in 1996. Jones described his ancestor as an "English gentleman" who married four women with whom he had 26 children.

"He hoped his first child would be a boy, so when it was a girl, [Lunt] named her Henrietta," said Jones.

Mayor Gerald Sherratt, said the Lunt statue is the first of at least 10 statues of early settlers planned to stand on Main Street.

The statue of Lunt, created by artist Jerry Anderson, was unveiled by a group of his youngest descendants, after remarks by Lunt's great-great-grandson, Paul Lunt.

"Thank you, Grandpa, for leading the way and showing us how to travel in this life," said Paul Lunt. "We love you."

mhavnes@sltrib.com