Speak Your Piece: a podcast about Utah's history

The past is never truly “in the past.” It’s all around us, it informs us. It speaks to our shared and to our separate identities. “Speak Your Piece” is a podcast where contributors share their insights and discoveries about Utah's 12,000 year (plus) human story. Hosted by Brad Westwood, Senior Public Historian (Utah Dept. of Culture & Community Engagement), and co produced by Chelsey Zamir, a new episode is released every other week, sometimes more, sometimes less. SYP explores the key arguments with new and worthwhile older publications, articles or websites; or delves into a notable museum, archival collection, archaeological report; or allows a respected writer, curator or historian to speak freely, sometimes about difficult history. SYP seeks to tell a history of Utah in a way you might not heard it before., told by the people who know it best: historians, writers, curators, archaeologists, rare book dealers, archivists, librarians and more. Speak Your Piece is recorded and engineered at the Utah State Library in Salt Lake City. Jason Powers is the sound and post-production engineer. The SYP logo is a photograph entitled "Canyonlands," taken by Utah outdoor photographer Al W. Morton, circa 1955, within the Canyonlands National Park (NPS). The lone man in the image is Kent Frost, looking over a series of needle rock formations located in San Juan County, Utah. The image and rights are owned by the Utah State Historical Society.

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Speak Your Piece: a podcast about Utah's history

Todd Compton on “A Frontier Life: Jacob Hamblin, Explorer and Indian Missionary” (published 2013)

March 24, 2023 • Brad Westwood, Senior Public Historian, Utah Dept. of Culture & Community Engagement • Season 5 • Episode 8

Date: February 3, 2023 (Season 5, Episode 8: 62 minutes long). For the entire show notes and additional resources for this episode, click here. Are you interested in other episodes of Speak Your Piece? Click here. The episode was co-produced by Brad Westwood and Chelsey Zamir, with sound engineering and post-production editing by Jason T. Powers, from the Utah State Library Recording Studio.

Host Brad Westwood interviews Dr. Todd M. Compton regarding his award-winning book: A Frontier Life: Jacob Hamblin, Explorer and Indian Missionary (University of Utah Press, 2013). In this episode, Compton offers a more fully rendered story of Jacob Hamblin, beyond the long-held popular stories. Hamblin’s life was filled with constant exploration and resettling, while he survived many harrowing events; however, he was also a religious seeker, something of a mystic, combining his faith with that of the spiritual life he encountered among Native Americans. Hamblin worked and hunted, rested, recreated, and sought to speak fluently among them, developing a mutual respect and trust. Hamblin’s story starts in Tooele, then he lived for many years in Southern Utah where he aided in the settlement of Santa Clara (Washington County), then Kanab (Kane County), before he moved on to Arizona and New Mexico.

Hamblin worked among the Gosuite, Paiute, Hopi and Navajo, and hoped to convert them despite the cultural chasm between them; but equally so – and in conflict with his missionary work – Hamblin was an ardent colonizer, accepting multiple missions from Salt Lake City to identify viable lands for settlement. Compton wrestles with, then helps us understand, the many paradoxes in Hamblin’s life. Hamblin’s dogged work as an explorer and early settler would inescapably lead to the loss of traditional lifeways, and eventually to the dispossession of Native American homelands.

For the guest's bio, please click here for the full show notes plus additional resources and readings.

Do you have a question? Write askahistorian@utah.gov.