South Jordan Settlement

South Jordan began with one stubborn blacksmith. Alexander Beckstead, a Canadian who'd already helped dig the first ditch that powered Gardner's mill upriver, moved his family down the Jordan in 1859 and carved a dugout into the west bluff to live in. The valley floor was level and farmable — if you could get water to it. So Beckstead and his neighbors dug the two-and-a-half-mile Beckstead Ditch, which still runs today, watering city parks and a golf course. The town he started is now Daybreak, a master-planned suburb; the ditch is older than all of it.

What the plaque says

No. 383 ERECTED 1972 SOUTH JORDAN SETTLEMENT IN 1859 GEORGE A. SMITH SOLD HIS MEXICAN LAND GRANT TO ALEXANDER BECKSTEAD WHO, WITH OTHERS, SETTLED 1/2 MILE TO THE SOUTH. THEY DUG A FIVE MILE DITCH FROM JORDAN RIVER, IN OPERATION SINCE COMPLETED IN 1863. ADOBE COMMUNITY HOUSE BUILT. 1864, JOHN WINWARD, FIRST SCHOOLTEACHER. IN 1865 L.D.S. BRANCH ORGANIZED, JAMES WOODS, PRES., SUCCEEDED BY WM. A. BILLS, 1867, WHO BECAME BISHOP IN 1877. LATER, ON THIS SITE, A 30 X 46 FT. GRANITE-ADOBE CHAPEL WAS ERECTED ALSO USED FOR SCHOOL AND RECREATION. FAR SOUTH COUNTY

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• International Peace Gardens — 11 mi
  A hidden garden where 28 countries are represented in miniature
• Lehi Roller Mills — 12 mi
  The flour mill from the movie Footloose
• Bingham Canyon Mine — 12 mi
  The largest man-made excavation on Earth
• Gilgal Sculpture Garden — 13 mi
  A surreal and eccentric sculpture garden hidden in a residential neighborhood

More markers nearby

• Hope Rising - To Lift a Nation 9/11 Memorial — 1.6 mi
• Utah Freedom Memorial — 1.6 mi
• Utah Freedom Memorial Battlefield Cross — 1.6 mi
• Neff Station and Halfway House (2) Markers — 1.6 mi