Early Utah History: Difference between revisions

Utah which ranks as the tenth state in the United States of America as to its size, is located between 37 and 42 degrees north latitude and 109 and 114 degrees west longitude and comprises an area of about 84,000 square miles. The main altitude of the state is 6,100 feet above sea level. Utah is bounded on the north by [[Idaho]] and [[Wyoming]], on the east by [[Colorado]], on the south by [[Arizona]], and on the west by [[Nevada]]. The country is crossed mostly from the north to south by mountains ranges, the principle one being the Wasatch Mountains (with peaks towering from 7,000 to 15,000 feet in height), which might be termed the backbone of the state. This variation in attitude and consequent climate conditions permits the cultivation of a large variety of vegetables and cereals.  

Agriculture and cattle raising are largely carried on, and in the Great Basin area large sections of apparently irreclaimable desert have responded generously to irrigation. In the north central part of the state is the Great Salt Lake—the Dead Sea of America—a body of salt water, 80 miles long by 30 miles wide, remnant of the gigantic Lake Bonneville of the prehistoric days.