Utah Pioneers

July 24 is Utah's State holiday.  We celebrate the day that the pioneers came to the valley and Brigham Young their leader and prophet said, "this is the place."  Thousands of pioneers came across the plains. They came from the East coast of the United States and from Europe.


When I was a kid, I thought that they all road in a wagon but I was wrong, only the driver was on the wagon and the rest walked. I have 17 pioneers who came west which includes husbands, wives and children (they all had different stories).

Andrew Allen

Andrew Allen was born in New Hampshire in 1782. He married Eunice Miner in Vermont; they had 10 children. They migrated to New York State. Andrew and his family joined the Mormons and moved to Ohio. Because Andrew had been in the War of 1812, he was given a land grant where he settled in Iowa.  


He could never make up his mind whether he wanted to go to the Great Salt Lake Valley.  When several of his children came in wagons from Ohio, he refused to go with them and he stayed in Iowa.  He told his wife, "I wish to hell you would just leave and I never want to hear of Utah or the Mormons again." She packed her clothes, threw them in her son's wagon and walked to Utah.  


He remarried a much younger woman and had one more child. He died in Iowa and his previous wife died in Utah.