Mormon Valley
Source: Bancroft
Works, Volume 31, History Of Washington, Idaho, and Montana, 1845-1889, Hubert
H. Bancroft, 1890.
The History Company, Publishers, San Francisco
The valley of Bear Lake, called Mormon Valley, a fertile plain 15 miles wide and 25 miles long, had a population, in 1885, of 4,000. By irrigating, large crops of wheat, oats, and barley, the finest potatoes in abundance, and the largest hay crop in the territory were raised, while herds of cattle and sheep covered the hillsides. The lumbering interest in this county was of importance, pine and spruce being the prevailing timber on the mountains. The manufacture of cheese was introduced, the product in 1883 being 200,000 pounds.
By cooperation the Mormon population carried on their enterprises with good results. It was by cooperation that they made the cheese factory profitable, its capacity being 900 pounds daily. There was the Paris Cooperative Institution, composed of 200 shareholders, with a capital of $23,000. It conducted a general merchandise store, boot and shoe factory, harness factory, tin-shop, and tailoring establishment, besides a planing-lathe and shingle mill. Members were not permitted to hold more than $400 worth of stock, lest the few should be benefited to the exclusion of the many. Since its establishment in 1874, in 10 years it paid $27,000 in dividends, besides expending 20,000 annually for labor. In 1882, 2,870 pairs of boots and shoes were manufactured, 900 pieces of leather tanned. $6,000 worth of planed lumber and shingles sold, and 35,000 pounds of cheese made, besides the business of the other establishments. While the results thus obtained furnished no wonder-provoking figures like mining, they secured contentment and steady prosperity, which mining too often does not.
There were several villages in Bear Lake County, namely, Paris, the county seat, Fish Haven, Ovid, Liberty, Montpelier (formerly Brigham), Preston, St Charles, Bennington, and Georgetown. The Oregon Short Line railroad was laid out on the east side of the lake, through Montpelier, Bennington. and Georgetown. The assessed valuation of Bear Lake County in 1882 was $239,940.