Pioneer Memorial Museum

Daughters of Utah Pioneers Museum
300 N Main St, Salt Lake City, UT
FREE Admission!
Hours can be found on their website

If you are looking for authentic, historical items relating to early Utah pioneer history, the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum located at 300 N Main Street just West of the Utah State Capitol is the place to go! With five stories of artifacts, the Pioneer Museum will keep you fascinated for hours!

Because photography of any kind is prohibited in the entire museum, I do not have many pictures to show you, but can tell you a little bit about what I found inside.

If you can imagine going into your great great grandmother’s attic, and finding many treasures of early Utah life, this is what it’s like at the Pioneer Memorial Museum, but much more!

Some of the items on display include:

• The wooden leg of John Rowe Moyle, who walked from Alpine to Salt Lake City weekly, with a wooden leg, to work on the Salt Lake City Temple. He was the one who carved “Holiness To The Lord” on the East side of the temple. Learn more about him in this short video.
• The carriage that Brigham Young was riding in when he entered the Salt Lake valley.
• Hair Art: This was very popular back in the early days of Utah. Pioneers would take strands of their hair to make necklaces, pins, bracelets and other items. Many would frame it and hang it on their wall.
• A collection of items from early Utah theater history.
• A collection of pioneer dolls
• Much, much more!

One of our favorite parts of the museum is the Carriage House. There you can see wagons, carriages, handcarts and more!

I have been looking for my 3x Great Grandmother’s handcart for some time. She was in the Martin Handcart Company, and was 16 years old when she came to Utah with the ill-fated group of pioneers. She had her handcart on display in her front yard in Heber for some time, and after her death the family said that it was “donated to the church”. This was my first place to search for it, and even though it was not here, they were able to search her name in their database and guide me towards a photo of her hanging in their north hall. They also gave me references of more places to look for her handcart.

If you have pioneer ancestors, and want to see if any of their belongings are at this museum, they have a history department that can search by name. You can find more information about accessing this information on their website.