Mormon Handcart Center

Top: looking toward the Mormon Handcart Center from Rattlesnake Pass

Others: scenes of the Mormon Handcart Center

The Mormon Handcart Center and Martin's Cove Information Center sit just to the west of Devil's Gate and Rattlesnake Pass. I didn't take the six-mile round trip hike to Martin's Cove because I didn't feel comfortable being alone on the trail, especially when the weather was threatening thunder storms. I did enjoy the visitors' center and the small pioneer museum however. This is a beautiful and peaceful setting and was another place where many people camped along the trail, not just the Martin and Willie handcart companies. It was also the location of the large Tom Sun Ranch. (The visitors' center is now housed in what was the ranch house.) The setting is much like it was when the pioneers came through here, except for the very perfectly manicured lawn in front of the visitors' center, which seemed very out of place in the setting.

One interesting family note: when I walked into the last room of the visitors' center I took a look at the binder they have with stories of everyone who died in the Martin and Willie handcart companies. There was a story about a little girl named Rhoda Oakey. Her family went on to settle in the Bear Lake Valley, where I found Oakey graves last summer. The story gives me the detail I didn't have. These were definitely relatives of Edward Ockey (despite the spelling difference) because they were baptized at the same time Edward was baptized and came from the same place in England. This gives me yet more research to do.