About this issue:
Willard Richards was a cousin of Brigham Young. He settled in Salt Lake City in 1847, and his farm was located on Main Street and South Temple. Richards was given the job to initiate a weekly publication called “The Deseret News”.
The first issue in 1850 reported on the devastating San Francisco fire that, “threatened to leave the famous city in a heap of smoking ruins.” The motto of the paper was “truth and liberty.” 160 years later the Deseret News is still a fine newspaper.
But unfortunately Richards’ famous street didn’t hold up as well as the newspaper he started. In the early 1980s the Crossroads Mall was built over the top of Richards Street and the only remaining mark indicating that this was once Richards’ land was the food court that bore his
name. Richards Street and Richards Court are being reborn in the new City Creek Center development. The land that was once Richard’s farm
is now has high-rise condominiums with views of the Temple grounds.
Mormons have always been very pragmatic business minded people and I’m sure Richards would appreciate the new retail center and the tremendous investment that Zion Securities is making in revitalizing downtown. It’s the business of the church to make Salt Lake beautiful. In Richards’ honor, Utah Stories wishes to report on “truth and liberty” with no entity too large or sacred for our scrutiny. -R. M.
