Dixie National Forest Historical Papers Collection

Encompassing the area of Southern Utah and the Arizona Strip, the Dixie National Forest, has a rich history. Native American tribes have inhabited the area for thousands of years. Including the Fremont and Anasazi. The most populous group for the region being the Paiute. This nation consisted of numerous clans scattered from Utah Lake and southward. One of the first white men to interact with the native tribes was Father Silvestre Veles de Escalante, who recorded his travels through Southern Utah in 1776. While searching for an overland route to California he described the local geography, and helped map what would become the Old Spanish Trail system. This system was used by the Spanish, who traded horses for Indian slaves along the route. Also becoming known as the Slave Trail. The trail was in use for many years and starting in the 1830s it became a major route for trappers, traders, gold hunters. John C. Fremont passed through the area in 1844. The name Dixie first appeared in 1851, after Mormon prophet and leader Brigham Young sent settlers to colonize and grow cotton in what is now Southern Utah. After their arrival it was affectionately called "Dixie" due to similar climate and environmental characteristics of the American South, where most of the settler came from.

The Dixie Forest Reserve was established on September 25, 1905, by the United States General Land Office. In 1906 the U.S. Forest Service assumed responsibility for the lands, and on Mary 4, 1907 Congress established it as a National Forest. It named it Dixie National Forest because the headquarters were in St. George right in the middle of "Dixie". The part continuously added to. The Sevier National Forest was added in 1922, and the Powell National Forest in 1944. Eventually the headquarters were moved to Cedar City, Utah. The current Dixie National Forest is the largest in the State of Utah. Straddling the divide between the Great Basin and Colorado River, the Dixie National Forest now occupies almost two milline acres of land and stretched about 170 miles across Southern Utah.