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Bingham Fort area of Ogden gets marker highlighting local history

By Tim Vandenack - | Nov 3, 2023
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Tammy Creeger, right, and her husband, Rick Creeger, stand near a new monument at the corner of Second Street and Wall Avenue on Oct. 24, 2023. It offers some of the history of the neighborhood — Ogden's oldest, historians say. Tammy Creeger has been active in efforts to preserve local history.
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One of the plaques on a new monument at the northwest corner of Second Street and Wall Avenue, photographed Oct. 24, 2023. The monument offers some of the history of the neighborhood — Ogden's oldest, historians say.
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One of the plaques on a new monument at the northwest corner of Second Street and Wall Avenue, photographed Oct. 24, 2023. The monument offers some of the history of the neighborhood — Ogden's oldest, historians say.
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One of the plaques on a new monument at the northwest corner of Second Street and Wall Avenue, photographed Oct. 24, 2023. The monument offers some of the history of the neighborhood — Ogden's oldest, historians say.

OGDEN — The old Bingham Fort area in northern Ogden now has a marker noting some of its colorful history, including the relationship between the Shoshone Indians and the original immigrant settlers.

The area along Second Street on either side of Wall Avenue — focus of moves going back to 2021 to highlight the area’s roots — is the oldest neighborhood of what is now Ogden, local historians say.

“This has been a long time in the making,” said Tammy Creeger, who lives in the neighborhood and has been active in efforts to preserve the original homes built by settlers, some dating to the 1860s. The installation of the monument was completed late last month while a formal ceremony to publicly recognize it will be held next spring.

Moves to build townhomes in the area off Second and Wall were the focus of sharp back and forth in 2021 between developer Shawn Strong and proponents of preserving the local history. About 30 townhomes ultimately took shape off the northwest corner of the two streets, but city officials rebuffed a proposal to build 43 more west of that and the marker was installed in response to local history buffs’ outcries about the development.

“The aim and the goal was to highlight the history of the area and its uniqueness and its relationship to the Shoshones,” said Sabrina Lee, president of the Weber County Heritage Foundation. The foundation has also pushed for preservation of the neighborhood.

Creeger, part of the contingent that clamored against the development at Second and Wall, said Strong, the townhome developer, installed the monument, covering the cost. The effort, she and Lee said, was required in an agreement he reached with the local residents over the controversy.

“We designed it to showcase not only the past but the present and the future,” Creeger said. Lee said the foundation helped come up with the language on the marker, passing the information on to the developer, who oversaw its development.

The monument notes the long history of settlement in the area around Second and Wall going back to the time of the Fremont Indians more than 1,000 years ago. “Around the year 800, Fremont Indians began building towns of pit houses, and Weber County was densely populated. Large burial mounds still stand here, but the eventual disappearance of the Fremont remains a mystery,” reads the monument, which features three plaques.

It notes that members of the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation later lived and traveled through the area and that Chief Little Soldier claimed what is now Weber County in the mid-1800s. Part of Second Street west of Wall Avenue received the honorary designation Chief Little Soldier Way in 2021.

The monument further notes the arrival of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the mid-1800s and other immigrants. Bingham Fort ultimately took shape in the area as a means of protecting the religious newcomers, but they and the local Indigenous population coexisted in relative harmony.

“People peacefully came together here, and still do,” it reads.

History boosters, aided by the foundation, have also installed signs outside some of the older, historic homes in the area offering snippets of information about them.

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