Public Works

Parowan was built to make things. Settled in 1851 as southern Utah's first town, it laid a wooden flume from the canyon to carry water down to the fort, and along that waterline it strung a row of workshops the settlers called the Public Works. Here stood a tannery and a pottery, a cabinet shop, a blacksmith, a gun and machine shop, a saddle-and-harness maker, a shoe shop, and a factory turning out wooden tubs and buckets. Inside the fort a burr grist mill ground the wheat. For a frontier village, it was nearly a small manufacturing town.

What the plaque says

At Parowan, a pioneer industrial center was settled in 1851. Water for manufacturing and industry was carried by wooden flume from the canyon to the fort. Along this water line industries were established known as the Public Works. Among these were cabinet shop, tannery, gun and machine shop, blacksmith shop, wooden tub and bucket factory, pottery factory, saddle and harness shop and shoe shop. Located inside the fort was a grist burr mill. Monument erected on grist mill site.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Brian Head — 10 mi
  Utah's highest town — a ski-and-bike base camp at the top of Parowan Canyon
• Parowan Gap Petroglyphs — 10 mi
  An ancient rock art gallery hidden in a desert canyon
• Panguitch Lake — 13 mi
  A Blue Ribbon trout lake at 8,400 feet on the Patchwork Parkway
• Cedar Breaks National Monument — 14 mi
  A 2,000-foot-deep amphitheater of vivid orange and red rock

More markers nearby

• First School & Council House in Iron County — steps away
• John C. Fremont — steps away
• Pioneer Sundial — steps away
• Pioneer Rock Church — steps away