A"cabin of dreams," built before Brigham Young and the pioneers came to what is now Utah, was rededicated here July 22, after a two-year restoration project.
The Miles Goodyear cabin, located on the Ogden Temple block, was rededicated in a prayer offered by Olene Walker, lieutenant governor of Utah, at ceremonies conducted by the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, Ogden Chapter, which sponsored the restoration project. Among those attending the rededication was Mayor Glenn Mecham of Ogden.Miles Goodyear was a fur trapper born in Hamden, Conn., in 1817. He built the cabin in 1845, and it became part of Fort Buenaventura, a supply post he established near the Ogden and Weber rivers. Goodyear's claim comprised about 300 square miles: all of present-day Weber County and most of present-day Davis County in northern Utah.
After the arrival of Brigham Young and the pioneers in 1847, President Young sent Captain James Brown of the Mormon Battalion to negotiate a purchase of the fort and property. In November 1848, Captain Brown obtained the deed to the property for about $1,950.
Thus, the cabin is significant as the only surviving structure from the fur-trapping period and later as the home of a Latter-day Saint settler who paved the way for the Mormon expansion north of the Salt Lake Valley.
Speaking at the service was W. Dee Halverson, a historic preservationist who spearheaded the project and a member of the Wasatch 3rd Ward, Salt Lake Wasatch Stake.
"Believe it or not, this humble cabin is a cabin of dreams," Brother Halverson said, "first for Miles Goodyear."
As a young orphan and indentured servant in Connecticut, Goodyear dreamed of a home in some beautiful valley of the Rocky Mountains, far from the scene of his servitude, Brother Halverson recounted.
In pursuit of the dream, he said, Goodyear learned the fur trapping trade, and in 1839 married Pomona, the daughter of a Ute Indian chief. They had two children. The family lived for a time in the cabin before establishing Fort Buenaventura.
"This cabin represents a dream for Captain James Brown as well," Brother Halverson said. "He wanted to be colonizer, and for a time, this area was known as Brownsville, from Brown's Fort [the name he gave to the former Fort Buenaventura]. He accomplished that dream within a year. Other colonists joined the Brown family to establish Brownsville, and they successfully raised wheat, corn, cabbage, potatoes and even watermelons with the seeds that the Mormon Battalion brought from California. They milked about 25 cows and were the first Mormons to produce cheese in this area."
"But things didn't stop with the Brown family; next the cabin became the dream of Amos P. Stone," he said. Amos Stone used it as a residence and later as a blacksmith shop.
"He made a significant contribution to a growing Ogden area in providing much needed blacksmithing services," Brother Halverson said. "That was his dream, and he left a little bit of his legacy on these logs."
The cabin next became a dream, he said, for Amos Stone's daughter, Minerva P. Stone Shaw. She obtained the cabin in 1890, planted geraniums around it, and began gathering relics and storing them in the cabin. In 1928, she deeded it to the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers as a historic landmark.
Brother Halverson said that 61 years ago this week, July 24, 1934, on the same site where the cabin now stands, a monument was unveiled by Sister Shaw's daughter, Elizabeth D. Shaw Stewart. Presiding on that occasion was Elder George Albert Smith.
Significantly, Sister Stewart was present this time to unveil the monument again with a new plaque added, giving information about the cabin and its recent restoration.
Brother Halverson said the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers chapter was the next group to have a dream about the cabin "and its meaning for the heritage of our state and of this community and our families."
