One hundred fifty years ago today — back when the state of Utah was still an undefined shadow in the corner of the Territory of Deseret, back when a battle between a Ute and a Cougar really was between a Ute and a cougar — the first issue of the Deseret News rolled off the press.
In the 15 decades since, the "paper" has been an ever-present part of the landscape, as immovable as the Great Salt Lake, as relentless as roadwork, touching untold thousands of lives and creating just as many relationships.
Rare is the Utahn who has not been impacted by one of the oldest news sources between St. Louis and Sacramento.
In a birthday tribute, a number of prominent Utahns examine their associations with the Deseret News in the paragraphs that follow. In the process, they lend illumination to the newspaper's presence — one that is as ever-changing as it is constant — and help define a personality that is now a century and a half in the making.
Few know the Deseret News with more depth than Roy Simmons, the 84-year-old chairman of Zions Bank. When Simmons was a boy of 12, he first hawked the Deseret News as a newsie on the street corners of downtown Salt Lake City.
"I can't remember not having the Deseret News in our home," says Simmons. "My wife and I have subscribed as long as we've been married, 62 years. It's the longtime association I remember when I think of the Deseret News. I've known the paper all my life."
While his association doesn't track back quite that far, former U.S. Sen. Jake Garn is nonetheless surprised at just how long it's been since he was a 14-year-old paperboy in 1946.
"Let's see," said Garn, when told the newspaper was turning 150, "that means when I was delivering papers it wasn't even yet 100."
"I delivered the Deseret News in the Yale-Harvard area of Salt Lake, near where we lived," recalled Garn, who served three terms as a senator after a term as Salt Lake mayor. "Why did I do it? My dad said I was old enough to work, and I had to bring in some money. I had a friend who tried to recruit me to a larger (morning) Tribune route, but I stuck with the Deseret News. I didn't want to get up that early."
While some have memories of delivering the news, others focus on days they were the news.
Henry Marsh, the four-time Olympian, remembers the June day in 1976 when he flew home to Salt Lake City from Eugene, Ore., after qualifying along with Brigham Young University teammate Richard George for his first U.S. Olympic team. To this day Marsh can see the headline across the page of the Deseret News: "Y's George, Marsh Olympians."
"How about that?" says Marsh, now a motivational speaker for Franklin Covey, "I remember a 25-year-old headline! Nobody else does. Well, Richard George might."
Two-term Utah Gov. Norm Bangerter remembers "Bangerter Wins" headlines in 1984 and again in 1988, but those aren't his most memorable Deseret News headlines. That honor goes to "War Ends" in 1945.
"I was 12 years old, and I can still see that paper sitting on our window seat and remember how much joy that brought to our family, with three brothers in the military at that time," says Bangerter.
Similarly, Jerold Ottley, the longtime director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir who retired this past December, doesn't rate his most memorable Deseret News article as one involving a world tour or other successes with the choir but rather an event from his youth.
Ottley was a student at Salt Lake's Granite High School in 1949 when he was interviewed by Elaine Cannon for a Deseret News article about teenage fashion. "She asked me about what I thought was the 'in' thing," remembers Ottley. "Of course that was pink sweaters and charcoal gray slacks back then. That was the first time I was ever in the paper and probably the most meaningful to my life because of what it did to boost my ego. I was really a big nerd, but when they ran my picture in the paper I didn't think I was."
KTVX news anchor Kimberly Perkins, who came to Utah from Pittsburgh in 1989, also credits the Deseret News with an ego boost. "I was this carpetbagger, coming from out of state," Perkins recalls, "and the Deseret News ran this small story with a picture that said, 'No, this isn't (KUTV anchor) Michelle King; it's KTVX's Kimberly Perkins.' I am happy to say I have been confused with Michelle ever since, and I do consider it the absolute best of compliments."
Others who have come to Utah from outside places have also quickly gotten to know its oldest newspaper. When France Davis, reverend of Salt Lake's Calvary Baptist Church, came to Utah in the early 1970s, he was surprised — pleasantly so — at the measured coverage in the Deseret News of churches not connected to the LDS Church.
"I appreciated the fair coverage of reporters like Doug Palmer and yes, it did surprise me, especially prior to 1978 when the (LDS) church still had an official position regarding people of African descent," says Rev. Davis.
At about the same time Davis came to town, Texas oilman Dick Bass arrived in Utah to launch his ski resort at Snowbird. Says Bass, "The thing that's always impressed me about the Deseret News is the balance. They avoid sensationalism and contention. Those are the two main elements people in the media tend to resort to, and they are elements that play to the unspoken but eighth and deadliest sin. What is the eighth and deadliest sin? That's the evil man looks for and suspects of his fellow man."
Not that the Deseret News has made fans and friends of everyone during the past 150 years. There were those who, when solicited for this article, reserved their remarks to "no comment," among them the actor Wilford Brimley and NAACP director Jeanetta Williams.
For some, the Deseret News evokes personal memories of staff writers and publishers.
Former Salt Lake mayor and current director of the University of Utah's Hinckley Institute Ted Wilson is one of many who still associate the Deseret News with former publisher Wendell Ashton, a man whose community activism was always co-mingling with his publishing duties.
"When I was mayor, I got a call from Wendell to meet him for breakfast at the Alta Club," remembers Wilson. "It was about budget time in the city, and I thought Wendell wanted to meet me there with his editorial board to discuss the city budget.
"But when I got to the Alta Club, Wendell was alone. He asked if the city could spare another $50,000. My mind raced. Was the Deseret News in some kind of financial trouble? It was not like any enterprise of the Mormon Church to be begging public funds. So I ventured to Wendell, 'I don't think such a contribution to the News would be appropriate!'
"Wendell got a gigantic smile on his face. 'No,' he said, 'not for the Deseret News, for the Utah Symphony.' That's the way it is in Salt Lake City. People often do good in more than one place at a time. And the Deseret News and Wendell Ashton have done more than their share."
For state legislator Jackie Biskupski, the Deseret News is personalized by political reporter Jerry Spangler's Deseret News necktie. "He was wearing it at the Capitol one day and I said, 'I like that tie, can I have it?' " says Biskupski. "He said, 'Yeah,' and took it off his neck and gave it to me."
Poet and writer Emma Lou Thayne has made friends over the years of dozens of Deseret News staff writers. "It's that personal connection that really adds to my relationship with the paper," she says. "It's not just the quality of the writing, but I know the quality of the people."
When former middleweight boxing champion Gene Fullmer thinks of the Deseret News, he thinks of publicizing fights — and not just his own. "Over the years, we've used the Deseret News so much to get the word out about boxing," says Fullmer, president of Rocky Mountain Golden Gloves.
Former first lady Norma Matheson has a similar take. When her late husband, Scott Matheson, was governor, Norma's favorite causes were in the areas of senior services and human recourses. "The Deseret News did a great job covering those areas," she says. "They aren't always the most exciting and dramatic, but boy they're important."
For skiing legend Junior Bounous, the Deseret News will always be synonymous with skiing. Bounous was an instructor in many of the earliest Deseret News Ski Schools, both in Salt Lake County and Utah County. "Who knows how many skiers were touched by that?" says Bounous of a ski school that is still running 52 seasons later. "The impact is huge, just unbelievable. That's how a lot of people learned to ski. It was free and just a great thing."
And for Fred Adams, the celebrated director of the Tony-winning Utah Shakespearean Festival in Cedar City, the Deseret News will always be synonymous with saving his theater. Thirty years ago, when the festival was sputtering and a new building was needed, Adams turned to then Deseret News music critic Harold Lundstrom, who wrote a moving article about the festival's need for funds. Two days later, two significant donations poured in, one from Mrs. Will Barnard and another from Mr. and Mrs. O.C. Tanner, who said, "We'll build your building for you."
"The power that has been wielded in the arts community in this state by the Deseret News is unmatched," says Adams. "And I'd like people to know that Harold Lundstrom single-handedly kept the Utah Shakespearean Festival alive."
Thomas S. Monson, first counselor in the First Presidency of the LDS Church, calls it "a newspaper with a heart." President Monson openly admits a bias, but it is an educated bias, developed over the past 52 years of associating with the Deseret News, first as an advertising executive in 1948, then as a commercial printing executive, then an Newspaper Agency Corp. executive, vice chairman of the board and chairman of the board for 19 years from 1977 through 1996.
"There's a dignity among the staff of the Deseret News and a loyalty to one another," says President Monson. "There's always been a spirit of cooperation, a sharing of joy as well as sorrow. It's a family spirit, brought about through a love of the newspaper and what it has stood for throughout the years."
As of today, those years add up to 150. Exactly.
E-MAIL: benson@desnews.com