UT - Holt Canyon: Narrative

 By Mark Henderson and Rachel Preston Prinz

Summary

The seventeen mile Old Spanish Trail landscape from the mouth of Pinto Creek at Newcastle, Utah to the southernmost extent of Mountain Meadows includes the divide between the interior draining Great Basin and the Colorado River drainage to the Pacific, which John C. Frémont (1845:270) and later observers of the “Rim of the Basin”  took considerable notice of.  This jornada, or day’s trail journey, for the first seven miles after leaving Pinto Creek passes at the toe of the wooded Pine Valley Mountains to the southeast on the margin of the Escalante Desert, before turning south up Holt Canyon.  At the mouth of Holt Canyon, travelers would encounter the Las Vegas de Santa Clara (later “Mountain Meadows”) described by Frémont as ten miles of lush valley and watersource - an important layover for eastbound travelers from New Mexico to California to “recruit” - or water, feed and/or rest - their livestock (Frémont 1845:270).  Later travelers saw the same potential for forage but also a decreasing area of meadow resulting from erosion and a dropping watertable.  Today, because of water and vegetation manipulation, Mountain Meadows might appear similar, but are further modified from what would have been observed by the last Old Spanish Trail period travelers in 1848. Representative of the landscape property type this historically documented section of the “rim of the basin” corridor of the Old Spanish Trail is nominated under the Multiple Property Documentation Form, Old Spanish Trail  AD 1821-1848, historic contexts 1 and 3, Mexican Period and the Beginning of International Trade and Commerce, 1821-1848 and The Old Spanish Trail:  The Main Route, as defined in the MPDF and in the following areas of significance: commerce, economics, exploration/settlement, social history, and transportation. 

The Holt Canyon site is the topographic and landscape feature along which the pack trail and livestock trail traversed, as documented first by Frémont in 1844 and by several others over the period of significance, ending with Orville Pratt in late 1848, just after the last herd of horses and mules were driven back to New Mexico from California.  This is also the canyon passage that Addison Pratt travelled in 1849 accompanying seven wagons of emigrants bound for California on the “Spanish Trail.” 
This topographic feature and the associated landscape is a contributing site for its association with the Old Spanish Trail which retains integrity of location, setting, feeling, and association. 

The approach and passage of a pack trail and livestock driveway through Holt Canyon from the edge of the Escalante Desert on the north to the descent into Mugatsu Creek from Mountain Meadows is a crucial segment in the Main Route alignment of the Old Spanish Trail.  Las Vegas de Santa Clara is reflective of the transition from the cool, relatively well watered and forage rich environment of the Colorado Plateau and the hot, often waterless Mojave Desert.  The importance of Mountain Meadows to “recruit” livestock having passed through the harsh Mojave or to fatten-up in preparation for the crossing is one of the more notable segments for merchants travelling between New Mexico and California. The location of trail alignments reflect decisions made by journeyman mule and horse packers and drovers that reflect the consideration of daily requirements of water, forage and rest spots for the livestock as well as food, fuel and hazard reduction (extreme heat and attack) of the “voyageurs.” Evidence of these ephemeral pack trails or livestock driveways has been altered or obliterated by massive gully erosion and later use of the corridor for sheep and cattle pasture, wagon, motor vehicle traffic and gas and electric energy transmission.

The Holt Canyon trail segment of the Old Spanish National Historical Trail is in the Basin and Range physiographic province (Thornbury 1965) and on the margins of the Wasatch and Uinta and Central Basin and Range Ecoregions (US EPA 2011).  The Virgin River is on the eastern margin of the Basin and Range system, with the Virgin Mountains marking a transition zone between the Colorado Plateau, Mojave Desert and Great Basin Desert both in physiography (Billingsley and Workman 2000:1) and biology.  This geography was important to people traversing the Spanish Trail, as coming from east in October, it meant the hardships of a month in the “hot desert” with limited forage or game animals for food and scarce water sources.  Coming from the west in the early spring, it meant the promise of adequate water supply and abundant game and forage.  

Mountain Meadows creek originates at an elevation of 5850 feet about 3 miles south of the Holt Canyon route segment at the “rim of the Great Basin.”  From the drainage divide, Magotsu Creek flows south through the Mountain Meadows for about two miles before dropping into a narrow canyon.  In contrast, Mountain Meadows creek running north through Holt Canyon has a relatively gentle slope dropping 500 feet in seven miles, where it opens up into the Escalante Desert basin at 5360 feet elevation.

Foreground Appearance.

The floor of Mountain Meadows creek is composed of pale reddish brown alluvial silts.  The rocks on the east side of Holt Canyon are tertiary red-brown rhyolite of the Leach Canyon Formation.  The rocks on the west side of Holt Canyon are medium dark gray basalt (Rowley and Others 2006).   

The most notable physical feature of Holt Canyon is the severe down-cutting along the course of Mountain Meadows creek.  The creek floor is now incised twenty to forty feet below the surface where it flowed when Frémont passed through in 1844.  Any trace of a packtrail is now obliterated by erosion.

Vegetation in Holt Canyon has also been altered since Frémont traveled through the area.   The canyon floor is classified as sagebrush steppe (McGinty 2009:74) dominated by bunchgrass and rabbitbrush (an indicator of livestock overutilization [USDA Forest Service 2009:25]).  Of particular interest is high value grass forage (possibly Western Wheatgrass, Pascopyrum smithii) that Heap (1854:62) noted was grown in Taos from seed obtained at Las Vegas de Santa Clara (Mountain Meadows):

The town [of Taos] is surrounded with uninclosed [sic.] fields, very fertile when irrigated, and the Taos wheat, originally obtained from the wild wheat growing spontaneously on the Santa Clara and the Rio de la Virgen, has obtained a wide reputation.

The vegetation of the canyon slopes contrasts markedly with that on the valley floor.  The westerly facing east side of the canyon is gently sloping dense mountain big sagebrush community (McGinty 2009:68) with the native grass associates mostly removed from historic livestock grazing.  In contrast, the west canyon wall is steeper and dominated by a dense pinyon (Pinus monophylla) woodland (McGinty 2009:77-78). As onthe canyon floor and eastern slope, pinyon pine has increased to a closed crown cover with little herbaceous understory which may also be a result of continuing grazing practices (Rogers 1982:136-140).

Distant Landforms. 

Visibility to the north from the Holt Canyon segment is constrained to a narrow view out the mouth of Holt Canyon, along the southern end of the Indian Peaks Range and towards the upper margin of the Escalante Desert.  The “window” out the north of Holt Canyon permits the northbound traveller to infer the broad expanse of the shrub covered Escalante Desert (with a floor elevation of about 5100 feet) and the sharp edge of the wooded mountain mass that rises to almost 8600 feet at the crest of Steamboat Mountain.

From the northern end of the Holt Canyon  segment, the broad floor of Mountain Meadows creek(5600 feet elevation) appears to rise to the foot of shrub covered Atchinson Mountain (7860 feet in elevation).

Environmental Change. 

The most obvious and important change in the landform in Holt Canyon is the vertical faced incision of the watercourse of north-flowing Mountain Meadows creek.  This arroyo channel in places exceeds thirty feet deep.  The dropping of the water table has also resulted in vegetation change since the period of 1829-1848.  What was historically observed as perrenial native grass forage is now punctuated with perched rabbitbrush shrubland with bare ground showing between the shrubs.  There are still some patches of grass-covered benches where side canyon water flow increases the moisture on the margins of the valley.   Reclamation efforts along the gas pipelines indicate the potential to increase grass cover, but without efforts to raise the arroyo channel  floor, the native perennial grass patches will continue to decline and woody species will continue to expand.   With 14 inches of annual precipitation , cheat grass is not as likely to expand dramatically.  However,  woody species will expand as a result of dropping water tables,livestock grazing and fire suppression practices (Rogers 1982:136-140).

Historical accounts during, and especially after, the period of significance - once seekers were “looking for” the “Spanish Trail – tell the story of the discovery and modification within the trail’s landscape, including accounts of geology, water resources, vegetation, and modification over time.

The first written record of travel on the Santa Clara River is that of Jedediah Smith (who called it “Corn Creek”) in early fall of1826 with about 15 men and 50 horses (Brooks 1989:38-39).  Smith’s overt purpose was to trade for and trap beaver and so the trails he travelled were purposely to explore habitats where these animals could be found.  Smith did explore the region down the Beaver River perhaps almost to the sinks of the Sevier River (Brooks 1989:53-57) he apparently never travelled to the vicinity of Mountain Meadows either from the Escalante Desert in 1826 or in 1827 up the Santa Clara (Sullivan 1992:28). Smith did not purposefully follow aboriginal trails in pursuit of fur bearing animals, though he regularly stayed over in aboriginal settlements. In the vicinity of one of these settlements on the Sevier River, Smith does encounter tracks of what Brooks (1989:51) infers was the Ewing Young trapping party which in the Spring of 1827 was making its way north from the Mojave Villages back to Taos.  However, Hafen and Hafen (1993:22) infer that these tracks were those of a party of trappers led by James Ohio Pattie.

Armijo. Though Armijo did not travel up the Santa Clara (which he calls “Rio de Las Milpas”) if at all, as far as “Las Vegas de Santa Clara (Hafen and Hafen 1993:163), there is indirect evidence that he had knowledge of its existence by using the Spanish translation of Smith’s “Corn Creek.”

Wolfskill and Yount.  In the fall of 1830 and Winter of 1831 William Wolfskill, and George Yount led a party of about twenty trappers and traders from Taos to San Bernardino and then to Los Angeles via the Mojave villages (Hafen and Hafen 1993:139-154).  The trail is not described in an itinerary, but did travel via the Little Salt Lake (where the butchered their last ox) and on to the Mojave Villages south of and beyond Mountain Meadows where Yount is credited to have been twice before (Hafen and Hafen 1993:147,151). Hafen and Hafen believe the “short-cut” via Mountain Meadows, striking “boldly west from the vicinity of modern Cedar City” was established after the Wolfskill and Yount expedition (Hafen and Hafen 1993:153).  

Frémont.  On May 12, 1844, John C. Frémont and twenty-one men (including scout Kit Carson) camped at “las Vegas de Santa Clara, which had been so long presented to us as the terminating point of the desert, and where the annual caravan from California to New Mexico halted and recruited for some weeks (Frémont 1845:270).”  Frémont describes Las Vegas de Santa Clara (Mountain Meadows) as 10 miles long and a mile wide.  This appears to be an exaggeration as the distance from where the canyon narrows in the south at Mogotsu Creek to where the canyon narrows at Holt Canyon is about 6 miles. At its widest, is one mile from woodland edge to woodland edge.  It is at Las Vegas de Santa Clara that Joseph Walker, a noted mountainman and explorer, with eight “Americans,” purposely catches up to the Frémont party, having left southern California with the annual spring caravan to New Mexico (Fremont 1845:271). Walker was apparently familiar with the Spanish Trail geography and later became familiar with Frémont’s propensity for exaggeration, embellishment and misdirection while traveling with him in a later expedition.(Gilbert 1983:198-216). 

Brewerton. In late May or early June 1847, George Brewerton,part of the detail accompanying Kit Carson, who was carrying military dispatches in advance of the annual spring caravan headed to New Mexico, camps at Las Vegas de Santa Clara, stating in part (Brewerton 1993:99):

Las Vegas de Santa Clara, to the traveler going eastward must always appear beautiful by comparison.  The noise of the running water, the large grassy meadows, from which the spot takes its name, and the green hills which circle it round – all tend to captivate the eye and please the senses of the way-worn voyageur.

Orville Pratt. On October 4th, 1848 Orville Pratt, carrying military dispatches from Santa Fe to California with an escort of 16 men and “following the Spanish Trail,” camped at “the Vegas of Santa Clara”. He gushed about the quality and abundance of water and forage, “to fatten a thousand head of horses or cattle,” but bemoans the difficulty in getting wood for fuel (Hafen and Hafen 1993:353-354).

Successor Accounts

A. Pratt.  On November 4, 1849 Addison Pratt, a guide for the Hunt emigrant wagon train wrote in his journal about camping 9 miles from where seven wagons bound for California on the Spanish Trail separated from the Flake and Rich Wagon Trains, determined to take “Walker’s Cut-off” (Hafen and Hafen 1998:80-81,117-120).

Heap.  On August 4, 1853, Gwinn Harris Heap, traveling with a pack caravan, sets camp at what he identifies as the most southerly of the springs at “Mountain Meadows” (Heap 1854:97). Heap approaches the meadows from the established town of Cedar City. On an earlier cut-off from the established packtrail on the Sevier River Heap recounts (1854:89):

At our noon halt, we struck a trail which we supposed to be the old trail from Abiquiύ to California; but it has been so long disused that it is now almost obliterated.

In this case, “so long disused” is five years.  Due to better accommodations at the relatively nearby settlements at Pargonah and Cedar City, Heap does not tarry at Mountain Meadows, but he does make an interesting observation about the importance and quality of the forage there 

(Heap 1854:100):

A Pah-Utah handed me some ears of wheat, the grains of which I preserved, and he stated that it grows spontaneously near the Santa Clara.  It is from this stock that the New Mexicans have obtained the seed which they call Payute wheat, and the Mormons, Taos wheat.  It has been much improved by cultivation, and is considered the best in New Mexico and Utah.

Carvalho. On May 22 1854, Solomon Nunes Carvalho, a member of Frémont’s Fifth (final) Expedition, with twenty-three Mormon missionaries and six wagons, camps at Mountain Meadows after travelling 37 miles from Iron Springs.  Carvalho states (Kahn 2004:215):

The road now forms an elbow, and heads to the south.  We followed the course, until we came to Meadow Springs, the entrance to Las Vegas de Santa Clara, noted on Fremont’s map – distance twelve miles from noon camp [“at” Penter Creek”].

It is inferred that this camp is at the springs that were later established as the site of the Hamblin Fort and townsite, the northernmost limit of Mountain Meadow.

Mountain Meadows in 1857.  Because of historical and legal interest in the Mountain Meadows Massacre, the location of the caravan packtrail in the Mountain Meadows vicinity has been the subject of historical interest and both archival and physical research.  The location of the packtrail, distinct from the California wagon road, is key to understanding the 1859 and 1864 military investigations of the massacre site. The inference that the packtrail followed the west side of the Meadow drainage and that later wagon alignments shifted to the east side of the increasingly entrenched stream channel is supported by circumstantial evidence (Shirts and Smeath 2002:49-59). Recent identification of an intact segment of the Old Spanish Trail at the “Men’s Massacre Site” (Reed and Wallace 2010:8,16,Map,Figure 1) is not substantiated. Jacob Hamblin had established a sheep ranch in the Mountain Meadows creek in 1856 (Bradshaw 1950:119) which was the location, a mile north of the women and children’s massacre site, where seventeen children survivors were taken after the event (Bagley 2002:124,154). This site was just outside of the Hamblin Townsite.

The Southern Road. Lyman (2004) provides a detailed historical analysis of the Salt Lake to Los Angeles wagon road or “Southern Route” for emigrant and commercial purposes.  With the shift of the federal mail contracts from the southern trail to the central overland trail in 1858 (Hafen 2004), traffic on the southern trail was reduced.  Lyman states that by 1869  (2004:203):

With completion of the transcontinental railroad … emigrant and freight wagon use of the overland trail from Salt Lake City to southern California essentially came to an end.

Hamblin Townsite.  By 1866, the scattered ranches in the vicinity of Hamblin’s Ranch built a “fort” at the location of the later Hamblin Townsite which was platted in 1873 (Bradshaw 1950:119-120). Severe flooding in the 1860s caused formation of a “gulch” which dried out the “Meadows” (Bradshaw 1950:125).

The Wheeler Survey Map of 1872 illustrates a complex net of wagon roads in the vicinity of Mountain Meadows and reinforces the realignment of the major north-south freight transportation trail to the corridor between Cedar City and St. George along Ash Creek east of the Pine Valley Mountains.  Even though Jacob Hamblin’s “house” is documented to have been present in 1857 as a refuge for the children that were spared in the massacre (Brooks 1991:101), there is no notation of the settlement on the Wheeler Atlas.

Local Wagon Roads.  The General Land Office plats of 1882 and 1914 for Township 37N Range16 West of the Salt Lake Meridian illustrate sequential realighnment of the transportation network in the vicinity of Mountain Meadow. The 1882 map shows the wagon road on the east side of “Mountain Meadow” from NE quarter of section 15, about 1 mile south of “Holt’s,” for about 3 miles south of the cultivated pasture and spring at “Hamblin.”  No watercourse channel is illustrated in the meadow south of the spring at Hamblin, though a wagon road is illustrated on both sides of the pasture entering Hamblin from the south.  Modena  was an important transfer point for freighting to St. George from the Salt Lake Trail on the Union Pacific Railroad as early as 1899 (Myrick 1992:626) and the 1914 GLO Plat illustrates that this may still have been the case in 1914.

Telephone Lines.  On the 1914 GLO Plat a telephone line is illustrated east of the wagon road between Holt’s Ranch and Hamblin. 

The only known description of the general composition and appearance of the Mexican trading caravans by an American observer is that of Brewerton (1993:56-62) in 1847, who described  an eastbound livestock drive (not a westbound frieght mule caravan) as “grotesque in the extreme”.  This description is consistent with the general composition (200 horse-mounted Mexicans and 60 ‘Amercanos’ with additional freight mules) and scheduling of the caravans (leaving New Mexico in October with woven goods arriving at Los Angeles two and a half months later, and returning from California with upwards of 2,000 head of horses departing in April) reported in 1841 (Hafen and Hafen 1993:187).  More than 250 mounted men and double the number of pack mules is bound to produce at least a temporary strain on water, forage,and even with low-impact camping practices will leave some footprint at the locations of overnight camps.  The compaction produced by the loaded pack animals, with 100-250 pound loads on the outgoing pack trail, and more than twice the number of animals (albeit faster moving with fewer loaded) in the return livestock herd, would have lasted only a day per year, and may not have produced any long-term scars. Over a period of years, there may have been loss of vegetation and soil with repeated use as documented at other OST nominated sites.

The Pinto Creek to Mountain Meadows “jornada” appears to be located  between two different Southern Paiute communities: one focused on the wild resources of the Escalante Desert and the other focused on horticultural subsistence along the Santa Clara River. 

It is uncertain when the commercial caravans started to use the Las Vegas de Santa Clara as a main “recruiting” stop for livestock, but Frémont would have us believe this was a longstanding stay-over point by 1844.  It is entirely possible that this location was a destination for horse and mule herds being driven east after the Mojave Desert crossing.  Because it is not known when, before 1844, this trail was used for  commercial westbound traffic, there are no specific individuals associated with the location before or after Frémont in the period between 1829 and 1848.

The Old Spanish Trail trail segment between Pinto Creek and the south end of Mountain Meadows is approximately 17 miles in length.  Frémont’s account in May 1844 is particularly vague about the alignment on leaving his encampment at Mountain Meadows with latitude 37° 28’ 28” (Frémont 1845:270)which would place the camp at the extreme southern end of the valley in the vicinity of Dan Sill Hill.  

There are no purposely constructed trail structures that historical accounts can associate with the Mexican period commercial use (1829-1848) on this or any portion of the “Old Spanish Trail,” except perhaps some enhanced steps carved into the Arizona and Utah slickrock Canyon Country on the Armijo route.  The packtrail and livestock driveway functions of Mexican period commercial use left so little imprint on the landscape that alignments surviving from that period are only discernable because of subsequent packtrail, livestock driveway (including cattle, sheep and goats) and particularly freight and emigrant wagon use of the corridor.  However, the way these surviving alignments, though altered by subsequent use, lie on the landscape reflects distinctive design considerations of the expedition “captain,” “guides” (Marcy 1859), packers ,and drovers.  Though there are few period accounts of the “Old Spanish Trail,” (which was neither considered old nor “Spanish” during the period of significance), each period and later account indicates that daily travel objectives and routes were a result of coordination between journeymen specialists and their apprentices, depending on previous experience, expert guides, and daily and seasonal weather and encounters with indigenous societies.  Adjustments of the trail alignment could be radical - based on changing conditions, seasonal variation, and experience of the specialists in the caravan.  The braided and eroded trails in the corridor, rather than a constructed transportation structure (with embankments, ditches, bridges and retaining walls), become the vernacular “site” of the trail alignment.  

Research and fieldwork for this National Register nomination have led to the conclusion that while the trails historic landscape is largely intact, and in fact helps to explain just what the impact of extensive trail use is on the environment, intact remnants of a period pack trail structure are unlike;y to have survived. Extensive erosion has created deep gullies and dropped the water table causing the road networks in the drainage to move farther and farther to the margins of the valley.  

There are 10 resources identified within the Holt Canyon Route Segment boundaries: 1 contributing site and 4 non-contributing sites and 5 non-contributing structures.  The linear structures observed in the Holt Canyon segment all seem to postdate 1848 and are as described:

1.   Mountain Meadows creek.  Mountain Meadows creek is incised between 20 and 30 feet below the former surface.  On the south end of the property the gully is about 200 feet across and presses against the east side of the valley. Proceeding north about 0.5 miles in the center of the property, the gully crosses the toe of the canyon wall to the west side, where it continues for another 0.5 miles to the north property boundary, where the canyon constricts and the entire floor is active drainage.

The eroding gully has likely consumed any remaining period packtrail structure, if it ever existed as more than an ephemeral braided trail.  Livestock herding traffic would have been dispersed through the valley floor, forther eroding any chance of finding an intact packtrail trace.  As in other cases where the packtrail alignment was later used as a wagon road, the subsequent use damaged the vegetation in the fine sediments and started a cycle of downcutting in the wheeled vehicle ruts.  There is therefore no trail remnant in the Holt Canyon segment attributable to  and contributing to the significance of the property.  The gully does providean idea of how the traffic would have concentrated in the landscape for commercial pack animal and livestock herding during the period of significance.

2.   Non-Contributing structure at the west side wheeled vehicle alignments.  Pfertsh (2010) identifies a wheeled vehicle alignment on the west side of Mountain Meadows creek (42WS5464) which he identifies as a “variant of the Salt Lake to Los Angeles Wagon Road.”   This travelway, about eight feet wide, is believed to be a recent automobile trail, which in some sections has a berm on each side suggesting it was recently (last seveveral decades) created with a mechanical blade to “skim vegetation” for access along the west terrace above the gully. This alignment, inferred to be linked to recent livestock and forest harvesting, does not contribute to the significance of the Holt Canyon trail segment property. .

3.   Non-Contributing structure at the east side wheeled vehicle alignment.  Pfertsh (2010) identifies a wheeled vehicle alignment on the east margin of Mountain Meadows creek (42WS5473) and attributes it as the Salt Lake to Los Angeles Wagon Road.  This wheeled vehicle alignment has a braided or parallel trail alignment and is likely the road and parallel telephone line shown on the 1914 GLO Plat for Township 37S, Range 16W.  This alignment was probably used well into the 20th century, until the Dixie National Forest Road 10 was constructed further upslope on the east margin of the valley.

This road structure is part of the complex evolution of travelways in the Mountain Meadows creek drainage.  While it may contribute to the significance of National Register properties of other time periods and historical themes, it does not contribute to the Holt Canyon segment of the Old Spanish Trail.

4.   Non-Contributing structure at the fence alignment.  Pfertsh (2010) identifies a dry laid basalt rock alignment and off-set wheeled vehicle alignment at the toe of the west canyon wall and upper margin of the Meadow Valley Creek drainage as a segment of the “Old Spanish Trail (42WS2528).  Observation of the segments of rock wall with periodic upright posts and wire grown into pinyon pine trees, indicate that it was the base of the alignment of a now mostly removed fence.  The perpendicular rubble alignments illustrated in Pfertsh’s report are probably locations of smaller enclosures typical of sheep pasture enclosures.  The extent of the rock wall to the north in Section 23 is consistent with demarcation of the northwest corner of the boundary of the pasture around Hamblin Spring in the 1882 GLO Plat. This rock and post alignment is thought to be related to late 19th Century livestock operations associated with the community of Hamblin.  This structure does not contribute to the significance of the Old Spanish packtrail and livestock driveway.

No objects dating to the period of significance have been documented in the Holt Canyon district boundaries, nor have any constructed features, such as cobble alignments, fire rings or rock cairns been located that can be tied to the period of significance.

There is no evidence of imported materials in the use or construction of the trail.  Apparently, not even the muleshoes and horseshoes regularly connected to later-period draught animal and wheeled vehicle travelways were being regularly used during the Old Spanish Trail period of1829-1848.  No imported objects have been documented on  any segments of the Old Spanish Trail that can be directly  associated to that use of the corridor in the 19-year long period of significance, though attribution to the “Mexican” or “Spanish” Periods can be ascertained. The materials that the “arrieros” (muleteers) and “yegueros” (mule and horse drovers) used and worked were those materials occurring naturally within the environment and which could be easily manipulated.  Durable trade goods were infrequently exchanged with the native peoples by the commercial venturers along the Old Spanish Trail. Because of the inability to replace items on the frontier, any that were lost were likely to have been retrieved, those that were truly lost likely vanished under thousands of hoof and foot prints. The likelihood of finding those on thousands of miles of trail is limited.

Contributing site Integrity: Integrity of the Holt Canyon Trail Segment.  The 1 mile long, 0.75 mile wide parallelogram composing the Holt Canyon trail landscape, contains no identifiable trail segments that demonstrably reflect pack trail structure contributing to the 1829-1848 period of significance.  However, the landscape of this historically documented section of the “rim of the basin” corridor of the Old Spanish Trail does allow visitors to “vicariously experience” a period-style setting as stipulated by the National Trails Act .  The Holt Canyon route segment site and associated landscape retain integrity of location, setting, feeling and association as described in period historical accounts (especially, Fremont [1848], Orville Pratt [1848]).

Location. 

The Holt Canyon section north of the Hamblin townsite is an intact Old Spanish Trail landscape that historical documents indicate was used as a commercial pack trail and livestock driveway between New Mexico and California during the designated period of significance of 1829 to 1848. It is now used primarily for local forest traffic and a major regional gas pipeline and electricity transmission corridor.

Setting. 

Landform, color and texture are somewhat altered from what would have been observed from the back of a mule or horse in 1829-1848.  Erosion in Mountain Meadows creek has resulted in an impressive gully twenty to thirty feet deep and 200 feet wide in the location where pack animals and livestock herds were driven during the Old Spanish Trail caravan days.  This gully does not visually dominate the scene from the point of view of a pedestrian looking at the landscape.  But for a pedestrian travelling across the drainage it forms a substantial obstacle that would not have existed in the second quarter of the 19th Century.  It also demonstrates the effects of such use over time.

Vegetation has also been qualitatively altered by the expansion of woody shrubs (sagebrush, rabbitbrush) and trees (pinyon pine) which have increased in density at the expense of the wet and dry meadow grasses on the now elevated creek margins.  

These alterations of the geomorphology and vegetation do not prevent the visitor from appreciating the landform and vegetation that would have existed during the Spanish trail period.  The roadway, reclaimed vegetation and contours of the gas pipeline corridor and transmission lines do not so alter the setting that the historic appearance cannot be visualized.

Association.  

Holt Canyon and its relationship to Mountain Meadows is integrally associated with the use of the commercial pack trail from New Mexico to California in fall and the return to New Mexico in spring with herds of horses and mules, as was established in 1844 when Fremont mapped and documented the use of the trail.

Feeling. 

Even though the Holt Canyon trail segment is within view and earshot of current energy transmission facilities, the overall landscape retains the general character of the historic landscape through which the mule freighters and  livestock driveway merchants passed, with near distance views.   The low volume of traffic on unobtrusive forest roads and the lack of noise and screening of utilities preserves the feeling of Holt Canyon as it would have appeared during its use by the New Mexican merchants on the Spanish Trail.

Summary of Site. 

The alignments in Holt Canyon that have been proferred as remnants of the packtrail and livestock driveway are likely the result of uses subsequent to the 1829-1848 time period.  Any trace of the braided trails has probably been totally obliterated by the 20-30 feet deep and 200 feet wide gully in which Mountain Meadows creek is now entrenched .  It is unlikely that a braided pack trail used once a year for 500-1000 animals in a pack caravan, or 1500 to 5000 head of mules and horses would be detectible on these loose silty and loamy meadow surfaces even if the erosion had not occured. Taken as a whole, the site constitutes a contributing intact Old Spanish Trail historic landscape which contributes to the National Register of Historic Places.

Except for the gully entrenchment of Mountain Meadows creek, the landforms of the Holt Canyon site appear much as they did during the period of use (1829-1848).  The dominant foreground view does have noticeable transmission line structures visible at some points on the eastern skyline, but there are major sections of the viewshed where no modern intrusions are noticeable. The vegetation reclamation and re-contouring on the gas pipelines make these corridors substantially un-noticeable and blend in line, form and color with the less altered topography and vegetation.  Distant landforms visible through both ends of the canon are not altered by major construction, resource extraction or settlement activities.  

The woody vegetation, dominated by sagebrush and rabbitbrush, with remnant patches of grass in the valley floor and dense woodland dominated by pinyon pine on the west canyon flank are not what would have been observed by packers and drovers passing through Las Vegas de Santa Clara in the second quarter of the 19th Century. Period accounts indicate that grass and forbs were abundant and fuelwood hard to obtain.  These changes belong to a common theme of meadows turned to livestock pastures throughout the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin.

Despite these alterations in line, form and color, the Holt Canyon landscape is still evocative of the 1829-1848 period of use, and current management practices are making headway to further reclaim historic watersheds and restore native vegetation densities and distributions.

The most obvious alteration in the Holt Canyon landscape is the gully downcutting stemming from wheeled vehicle traffic cutting through grassland turf in the mid 19th century.  Storms in the late 1800’s turned ruts into gullies and wiped out springs and wet meadows.  The small community of Hamblin just south of the Holt Canyon property, was abandoned as a result, and now is not detectable in the viewshed.  Wagon roads and telephone lines in place in the early 20th Century have been abandoned and are only detectable if one is looking for them. 

Overstocking of cattle (USDA Forest Service 2009:25) continues to favor the increased density of woody plants and soil loss from the remaining patches of grasses.  

There is threat to the integrity of the site by wildfire due to the closed crown pinyon woodland on the west side of Holt Canyon.

Demand for outdoor recreational in the Dixie National Forest has increased dramatically with population growth. Use of motorized vehicles off of designated travelways is now restricted. 

The biggest impact to the Holt Canyon landscape is the designation of the drainage as a “utility corridor” (USDA Forest Service 1986:II-54).  The Intermountain Power Project 500 kV transmission line with large steel lattice towers has been in place for twenty-five years.  The Kern River Gas pipeline has been in place for over 15 years, and the UNEV Gas Pipeline has just been placed in the corridor.  A decision is pending which may place the Sigurd to Red Butte 345 kV electric transmission line either 1500 feet east or west of the existing transmission lines (USDI BLM 2011).  Placement on the west side of the existing transmission lines may create considerable visual impacts on the natural appearing west flandk of Holt Canyon.

Air quality and noise in Holt Canyon viewshed and soundscape are relatively unchanged from the historic conditions.  Noise is noticeable during authorized construction projects, but is short term.  Unless recreational use increases dramatically, vehicle noise and dust are only rarely a distraction from the historic setting . 

The Holt Canyon trail segment as defined here can be placed as a “retracement route” of the  “Main Route” or “Northern Branch” of the Old Spanish National Historic Trail (Hill 1921, Hafen & Hafen 1993, Auerbach 1941, Steiner 1999, Lyman 2002, Crampton and Masdsen 1994). Historians, Crampton and Madsen (1994), Steiner (1999), Lyman and Reese (2002) and Lyman (2004) have conducted on site reconnaissance of trail traces on this section of the Old Spanish Trail, but have not included formal recording of the archeological evidence.   Formal archeological investigations to identify physical evidence of trail alignments have been conducted under the direction of the USDI Bureau of Land Management and US Forest Service for utility projects and have most recently been accomplished for the UNEV Project by Pfertsh (2010) who also summarizes previous surveys.