Harper is a

ghost town A ghost town, deserted city, extinct town, or abandoned city is an abandoned settlement, usually one that contains substantial visible remaining buildings and infrastructure such as roads. A town often becomes a ghost town because the economi ...

located in Ninemile Canyon (at the mouth of Argyle Canyon) in

Carbon Carbon () is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol C and atomic number 6. It is nonmetallic and tetravalence, tetravalent—meaning that its atoms are able to form up to four covalent bonds due to its valence shell exhibiting 4 ...

and Duchesne counties in

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

, United States. This

stagecoach A stagecoach (also: stage coach, stage, road coach, ) is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by ...

town came into existence in 1886. The nearest inhabited town is

Wellington Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the third-largest city in New Zealand (second largest in the North Island ...

. The remaining buildings are located mostly on private property and permission must be granted before accessing them.

History

Alfred Lund came from Nephi in the spring of 1885 with his cattle and was the first homesteader in Argyle Canyon. Mr. Lund's first home, a log cabin, stands in ruins on the south side of the creek. Tom Taylor also homesteaded this ground before the Army built the road through to Fort Duchesne and the

Uintah Basin The Uinta Basin (also known as the Uintah Basin) is a Physiographic regions of the world, physiographic section of the larger Colorado Plateaus province, which in turn is part of the larger Intermontane Plateaus physiographic division. It is als ...

in 1886.A Brief History of Carbon County by the Teachers, Pupils, and Patrons of Carbon District. Lamont Poulter 1930 In the 1890s, the government was freighting to Fort Duchesne over a road which passed through Nine Mile Canyon. This road is the lowest in elevation of any road between

Price A price is the (usually not negative) quantity of payment or compensation expected, required, or given by one party to another in return for goods or services. In some situations, especially when the product is a service rather than a ph ...

and the Uintah Basin. During the years 1888 to 1895 there were 600 soldiers at Fort Duchesne who hauled their supplies over this route. As nothing of any consequence was raised at the Post everything had to be shipped in: hay, grain, and other produce. Ed Lee purchased Taylor's homestead and it became known as "Lee Station", a stagecoach stop. A large barn housed the recuperating horses for the stage line and was noted for having a "real" sink. The army installed steel telegraph poles in the Canyon around 1886, that were

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...

surplus. This telegraph line became the telephone line into the Basin in 1907 and remained until 1917. The poles have since served a local line until the 1990s.The Pioneer Saga of the Nine Mile Road, H. Bert Jenson. Published by The Ink Spot (1993). According to government maps in the 1890s the name of the settlement is "Nine Mile", but some traditional accounts called it "Minnie-Maud", named for two girls who lived there. A creek that feeds Nine Mile Canyon is still called Minnie Maud. When the post office was established the town was named Harper. The greatest number of votes ever cast in the voting precinct was 72 in 1900. Starting sometime before 1895, residents of Nine Mile Canyon struggled to keep a school district going. The first school house, built of logs by residents, sat in the mouth of Argyle Canyon. Until 1916 there were two schools, one in Carbon County and one in the Duchesne district. From 1916 to 1924, one school was maintained. This was closed for good in 1931 and moved to Wellington in the 1930s; it later burned. Today, only a few structures remain, including the old stagecoach stop and some other log dwellings. The two-story Harper Hotel burned to the ground in the late 1980s or early 1990s; only the stone foundation remains now. Most of the town site is on private property, so permission is required to explore the area.

References

External links

Harper
at UTGenWeb Ghost Town Stories {{authority control Ghost towns in Utah Ghost towns in Carbon County, Utah Ghost towns in Duchesne County, Utah Populated places established in 1885

History

See also

References

External links