St. Thomas, Nevada: A History Uncovered

Introduction

1 Introduction In 2002, in the midst of the worst drought in recorded history in the Colorado River system, the remains of St. Thomas, onetime town on the Muddy River, emerged from the depths of Lake Mead. This mud-caked Brigadoon drew Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist John L. Smith for a visit. After pounding over the rutted road that wound through sandy washes and slogging over a mud flat to St. Thomas, Smith reveled in standing where pioneers once stood and in seeing what the Paiutes and Shoshones saw. While surveying the scene, he asked himself a question, “Why was lowly, mudcaked St. Thomas so important, and what can we still learn from it?” His answers focus on the fragility of life and the scarcity of water in the desert . St. Thomas, for Smith, exists to provide a cautionary tale about water, since Las Vegas’s, and thus Nevada’s, economic engine ultimately runs not on dice or cards, but on water. Smith’s observations, though important, are mirrored by the scene he observed of the town emerging from the water. Much more lay hidden beneath the surface, waiting for time and determined searching to expose.1 Despite its lack of water, the southern Nevada region in which St. Thomas is located is full of history, recreation, defense industries, and cutting-edge architecture. The name Las Vegas, the biggest city in the area, carries a cachet that no other place in the world does. It is the entertainment capital of the world, a glittering jewel in the desert, a mecca for fun in the sun and in the Green Felt Jungle. The city has come to occupy a central position in popular American mythology. It is setting the pace for nationwide 2 s t. t h o m a s, n e va d a trends in city growth, demographics, immigration, consumption, work, and recreation. The history of that area then becomes important for understanding the society it birthed.2 One hundred and forty-five years ago, Las Vegas was a failed experiment . Missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints built a fort in the Las Vegas Valley in 1855, but poor relationships with the Southern Paiutes, crop failures, harsh weather, and the Utah War led to its abandonment in 1857. The political, economic, and social locus of the area was 60 miles to the east, in St. Thomas, Nevada. Located on the Muddy River, St. Thomas sat on the only significant water source for a 120-mile stretch of the Old Spanish Trail and became the main town on the Mormon supply line that stretched from the Colorado River to St. George, Utah. It was the first and most important town established in the Muddy Mission, the trailhead for mining expeditions and supply routes, and even a base of exploration for government surveys undertaken in preparation for the construction of a dam on the Colorado at Black Canyon. This book traces the history of the town, its importance in the region, its eventual demise, and its continuing significance in southern Nevada. St. Thomas lies approximately 60 miles east of Las Vegas, Nevada, on the southern end of the Moapa Valley. Surrounded by great aridity, the town site benefited from its proximity to the spring-fed Muddy River and the Virgin River. The area has little rainfall, pervasive heat in the summer, frequent wind, and dust. Its official birth date was January 8, 1865, when Thomas Sassen Smith and his party of eleven men and three women arrived at the confluence of the Muddy and Virgin Rivers and founded the town. As an incorporated town, it ceased to exist in June 1938, when it went under the waters of Lake Mead. It is now part of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. Brigham Young established the town in part to secure Mormon selfsufficiency in the production of cotton. In January 1867, Congress took one degree of longitude from Utah Territory and gave it to Nevada. An accurate survey was not completed for nearly four years, during which time Nevada, Utah, and Arizona fought over who controlled much of what is now southern Nevada. As the primary settlement in the Muddy Mission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, St. Thomas played an important role in the conflict. The affair is a prime example of boundary conflicts between states. The town was the terminus of John Wesley Powell’s 1869 expedition of the...