Latter-day Saints in Mesa

The city of Mesa initially began with a tiny colonizing expedition sent from Utah by leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1876. These devoted pioneers and others who followed faced an arduous trek, oppressive heat, and drought but persevered in their mandate. Two years later, Andrew S. Gibbons predicted the Salt River Valley would become the garden spot of Arizona, noting a climate well adapted to raising grapes, cotton, sugar cane, oranges, and olives. Agriculture ...