Eli McCann: Why the Mormon legend (or myth) of the ‘Lone Cedar Tree’ matters

The year is 1847. Mormon pioneers are trekking toward the deserts of the Mountain West. Their new leader, Brigham Young, is on a quest to find a new plot of Earth, far away from an unfriendly federal government. He’s modern-day Moses-ing hundreds of Latter-day Saints under the harsh summer sun.

On July 24, they emerge from a deep canyon, since named “Emigration” because of this event. Brigham looks at the bowl-shaped Salt Lake Valley in front of him, surrounded on nearly all sides by dramatic mountains. It is there he reportedly says to those close enough to hear him, “It is enough. This is the right place. Drive on.”

The mountain desert landscape varies from the green and humid climate the pioneers had abandoned. Here they find finite snow runoff water and sagebrush.

One reported standout: a large tree located just blocks from what would become the city’s center point. Legend states this was the only tree growing in the valley, and it quickly became known as the “Lone Cedar Tree.” A story would pass down that the pioneers wandered to that tree, stopped below its branches, prayed and sang hymns.

Later accounts called into question the tree’s “lone” moniker. One 1847 pioneer, John Young, wrote that when he entered the valley, he spotted “seven, wind-swept, scraggy cottonwood trees and one oak tree” not far from Lone Cedar.

Another account from September 1847, records Brigham Young cautioning settlers from cutting down trees along the creeks. In “selecting your firewood,” he said, “it will be wisdom to choose that which is dry and not suitable for timber of any kind, and we wish all the green timber and shrubbery in the city to remain as it is.”

Legend states, nonetheless, that the Lone Cedar Tree became a gathering place for the new settlers. Couples got frisky in the shade. Secret meetings by political and church leaders (the Venn diagram was a circle) happened at the tree’s base.

The tree eventually died, although no one seems to know when, including perhaps the tree’s most loyal friend, the Daughters of Utah Pioneers, which was organized in 1901 with a mission to preserve history.

A 1924 headline in the Salt Lake Telegram read: “Old Cedar Post Object of Reverence; Daughters of Pioneers Take Interest; Fence to Protect It From Vandals.”

“Seclusion and protection from an annoying world are rewards merited by old age,” the article began. “Even a tree, in its declining years, would register objection to slaps and pats or the curious and vigorous jabs from sturdy but well-meant boots could it only talk.”

The article explained that “some of the gravest secrets connected with the building of the great empire of Zion are locked up somewhere in its heart.” (The writer seemingly had a word count target he desperately needed to meet.)

A monumental crime

The dead tree was fenced and protected. In 1934, it was moved a short distance, into a center pavilion at present-day 600 East and between 300 South and 400 South in Salt Lake City.

The shriveled stump sat under a cupola. A plaque placed at the base of the tree by the DUP stated, “Over this road the pioneers of 1847 ... found growing near this site a lone cedar and paused beneath its shade. Songs were sung and prayers of gratitude were offered by those early pilgrims. Later, the cedar tree became a meeting place for the loggers going to the canyons. Children played beneath its branches. Lovers made it a trysting place. Because of its friendly influence on the lives of these early men and women, we dedicate this site to their memory.”

The monument sat largely ignored until late at night on Sept. 21, 1958, when vandals cut down most of the remainder of the tree and took it away, leaving a 20-inch stump. An outraged DUP President Kate Carter lamented how discouraging it is when “vandals come along and tear down our good work.”

Soon after the disappearance, Salt Lake Tribune Editor Art Deck received an anonymous phone call, telling him to check a Greyhound bus depot locker for the remnants of the tree. There he found a sack full of ashes — a mere ghost of the cedar.

No culprit was ever found.

Around this time, Russ Mortensen, director of the Utah Historical Society, privately mocked the attempts to preserve what he called a “historical fraud” and “a dead stump with little historical value.”

When the Deseret News published his statements on what must have been a slow news day, it set off a contentious debate among historians about the truth claims surrounding the tree.

In 1960, the remaining portion of the stump was encased in a new monument, stuck on top of a concrete pedestal and placed under the cupola. Years later, the stump disappeared, having been sawed off the monument.

A monument to the monument

The remnants of a monument once cared for still sit in the 600 East pavilion. Weeds have sprouted through bare places. Old pioneer homes that face the decaying monument are continually being crowded out by rising apartment complexes.

In 2014, while house hunting, I visited one of these homes, discovering in it an old trunk, filled with century-old newspapers. From a small window, I could gaze down the street and see the top of the structure of the Lone Cedar Tree monument.

This house, and those surrounding it, would have seen the site of the crime. They would have seen DUP members gather there, perhaps in tears, nearly 70 years ago to mourn the loss of what to them mattered.

Today, the structure is rusted, picked apart and ignored by passing vehicles. The 1934 plaque is missing, having been pried from the pedestal that once supported the rotting wood of a tree that held pioneer secrets in its heart.

Near the pedestal is another plaque, dated 1960. It explains the other plaque in a way — a monument honoring the monument. Its language comes from a place of hurt and maybe even defensiveness. It’s written by the Daughters of Utah Pioneers.

“LONE CEDAR TREE,” it states in all caps. “Although willows grew along the banks of the streams, a Lone Cedar Tree near this spot became Utah’s first famous landmark. Someone in a moment of thoughtlessness cut it down, leaving only the stump which is a part of this monument. ‘In the glory of my prime, I was the pioneer’s friend.’”

The old monument exists now perhaps less as an honor to a tree with a disputed history and more as preservation of a 20th-century battle between historians. The tree, and then the monument to the tree, and then the monument to the monument, are like us: generation replacing generation, trying to preserve the story of its forebear, however imperfectly or inaccurately.

Each new event — and subsequent updated iteration of the storytelling — seems to accept the dwindling consensus that the origin story is significant or even true, but surely that doesn’t mean we should stop trying to tell it.

Note to readers • Eli McCann is an attorney, writer and podcaster in Salt Lake City, where he lives with his husband, new child and their two naughty (yet worshipped) dogs. You can find Eli on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @EliMcCann or at his personal website, www.itjustgetsstranger.com, where he tries to keep the swearing to a minimum so as not to upset his mother.