On the afternoon of May 20, we drove from Canyonlands NP to Salt Lake City by way of U.S. 191 (including a short stretch of I-70), U.S. 6 and I-15. The reds and oranges of southern Utah were soon left behind for a more monochromatic sort of desert.
We stopped briefly in Green River, Utah (pop. a little less than 1,000), to find a bathroom and change drivers. I also spotted something unexpected in the small but green O.K. Anderson City Park.
An Athena missile casing, a relic of the nearby Green River Test Site, where the Air Force shot off 141 such missiles from 1964 to 1973, all aimed at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico (though one hit Mexico once. Oops).
“The program was developed to study missiles’ re-entry behavior and test anti-ballistic missile defenses through the simulation of the full flight dynamics of an ICBM within the confines of the U.S.,” notes the sign near Green River’s missile. Later (until 1975), the Air Force tested 61 Pershing missiles from Green River and trained U.S. and West German troops on their use at the site. Bet that was a plumb posting for the Germans.
Also in the park: a memorial to Bert Loper, whom I’d never heard of. A pioneer in whitewater river-running. Died at 79 on the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon doing exactly that.
Further north, we made a spontaneous stop in Helper, Utah. Originally a railroad junction, and supposedly named after helper engines kept there by the railroad, Helper thrived on coal mining for many years — it is, after all, in the aptly named Carbon County.
Main Street in Helper.
Mining still goes on in the county, but these days Helper seems to be evolving into an arts and tourist town, presumably having been discovered by hipsters from Salt Lake City, only 100-plus miles away. Mormon hipsters? Why not? With the way SLC is growing these days, it’s probably producing more hipsters than it needs locally, and so can export them to Utah towns with colorful histories.
But Helper isn’t going to forget mining. Not if Big John has anything to say about it.
The fiberglass miner has been standing in Helper since the 1960s. He’s in front of the Streamline Moderne municipal building, built by the WPA.
Main Street Helper has examples of both buildings renovated for our time —
— and those with that potential.
At one end of Main Street is a handsomely restored Conoco filling station.
A sign on the door says the place is listed on Airbnb, so you can stay there.
Helper is also home to the Western Mining and Railroad Museum, which was closed when we passed through town. But some of its exhibits are outdoors, on a small lot nearby: mining equipment.
Further north from Helper, at a rest stop on U.S. 6 — Tie Fork Rest Area — is one of the more elaborate historical displays I’ve ever seen at such a place.
Go for the bathroom, stay to look at the locomotive and the other displays about railroading in Spanish Fork Canyon, which unsurprising involved hauling a lot of coal.
We made it to greater SLC in time for dinner at a place specializing in Korean-style fried chicken. We had a number of inexpensive options for dinner, because we were in a college town.
Provo, that is. We took a drive around the BYU campus, a sprawling presence at the base of the Wasatch Mountains: 560 acres with more than 300 buildings. Got the barest glimpse. At that moment, finding and feasting on Korean fried chicken was the priority instead. Travel is like that sometimes.