Pioneer Day

At seven in the morning on Friday, July 24, 2026, the Spring City fire station began serving breakfast, as it does each Pioneer Day, under its own billing: “Best Fireman’s breakfast in the county!” Service ran until nine. The 5K run and one-mile walk started at the same hour, with medals for first and second place. At ten the Pioneer Parade came down Main Street. Families entered floats on the 2026 theme, “Pioneer Spirit, Pioneer Strong,” and cash prizes went to the first-, second-, and third-place entries. Pioneer Day Coordinator Anne Osborne told the Sanpete Messenger that the town chose the theme by community vote from several proposals.

After the parade the day moved to City Park. Midway games, inflatables, balloon art, and face painting ran from 11:30 to 1:30. At 12:30 the community barbecue served pulled pork sandwiches or hot dogs, chips, and cookies for a suggested donation of $2.00 a person, and a group called Legacy played at the City Bowery. At 1:30 the winners of the parade, the baking contest, the chalk contest, and the two history contests were announced. At two, children dug for coins in the sand. A cornhole tournament with food trucks followed at 4:30, and at seven “Spring City’s Talent” closed the day with cash prizes for the winners. Whether there are fireworks depends on the fire restriction page of the city website.

Clues at the post office

The 24th is the high point of a week. The city’s schedule gave the 2026 dates as July 19 through 27, and the Messenger gave them as July 18 through 26. The Friends of Historic Spring City listed the Pioneer Day events as running from the morning of July 24 to the afternoon of July 25. On the evening of July 20 the town brought lawn chairs to the park for the Saga of Spring City and an ice cream social, and the Citizen of the Year was named there. Family Game Night filled the park on July 21, and “David” was shown outdoors at dusk, with chairs, blankets, popcorn, and treats brought from home. July 22 brought a children’s baking contest and Chalk the Walk at City Park. Drawing on the theme “250th of America” ran from nine to three, with judging at 4:15. JD Fox played a street dance from eight to eleven on July 23. On July 26 the Old Time Gospel Music Revival gathered at the park at seven.

Two contests sent people out into the town. The Historical Scavenger Hunt posted a new clue each morning from July 18 through July 22 at the Spring City post office and on the city’s Facebook page. Each clue highlighted some part of Spring City’s history, and the winner received $400. The Itty-Bitty Spring City Photo Contest posted close-up photographs of places in town for entrants to identify. The city’s rules from an earlier year say the pictures were all taken along 4th and 5th North between Main Street and 400 East and could be seen from the street. Entries went that year to Cynthia DeGrey, and the rules urged families to “take an enjoyable walk around Historic Spring City and see how many pictures you can identify.”

Osborne was coordinating the celebration for the first time in 2026. She told the Messenger she took the role on short notice and kept the schedule largely as it had been in past years.

Two years in one week

That schedule had already taken shape by 2021, when the town returned to normal events after a year lost to COVID-19. Spring City Mayor Cynthia DeGrey said the town was marking 125 years of Utah statehood with a grant from Thrive125. “We’ve packed in two years’ worth of celebrating into one week,” DeGrey said. The week opened with the ice cream social and the Saga of Spring City, which the Messenger described as a presentation on the history of the city and the state. A treasure hunt followed clues posted each morning on Facebook, for a $250 prize donated by SecurityNational Mortgage Company. That year the park showed “Luca,” and JD Fox played the street dance on Main Street. There was also a three-on-three basketball tournament. After the parade Fiddle Express gave a concert, and local performers competed in “Spring City’s Got Talent.” Because of drought and worry over water for fighting fires, the city skipped its fireworks show that year and adopted Sanpete County’s Stage Two Fire Restrictions. The Old Time Gospel Music Revival closed the week on Sunday evening, as it did again in 2026.

A program in the Ward Chapel, 1931

The holiday marks the arrival of the first company of Latter-day Saint pioneers in the Salt Lake Valley between July 21 and 24, 1847. According to the Utah Historical Society, the settlers first celebrated it on July 24, 1849, with celebratory gunfire, music, patriotic speeches, and a reading of the Declaration of Independence. An afternoon meal was shared with local Native Americans and with gold miners passing through on their way to California.

The Mt. Pleasant Pyramid of July 31, 1931, recorded how Spring City kept the day that year. At ten in the morning a program was held in the Ward Chapel, with Reed H. Allred in charge. A double quartet sang, and Fred Allred gave “My Pioneer Great Grandfather.” Miss Marie Jensen spoke on the first white people in Utah. Mrs. Caroline Brough spoke on the Utah of 1847, and a Miss Baxter on the Utah of 1931. The congregation sang “Come, Come Ye Saints,” Allred and Bishop James F. Ellis gave talks, and the Bunnell Brothers sang as a trio. Among the pioneers present were Heming Hansen, 82, and Mrs. Sarah Ann Justesen, 89. The paper named Bishop Samuel Allred and his wife as the town’s two oldest residents. It also noted that Mrs. Ellen Major was one of the first two girls who helped clear Main Street of brush, and that her father had been killed by Indians there. Sports followed in the afternoon on the school campus, and there was a free dance at the Victory Hall. The same column reported a special fast and prayer meeting that Sunday, attended by 65 people, where a prayer was offered asking for rain.

The Allred Settlement on Canal Creek

James Allred was born in North Carolina in 1784. He arrived in Utah in the fall of 1851, and Brigham Young advised him to go to Sanpete and “select a place for settlement where he could locate with his numerous posterity and kindred and preside over them.” On March 22, 1852, Allred and others explored along Canal Creek. Four days later he came back with several of his sons and began the settlement. The first house was a log cabin on the east side of Main Street near 500 South. About twelve families spent the winter of 1852 in what was called “Canal” or the “Allred Settlement.”

Open warfare broke out in July 1853. Settlers dragged their log cabins together and filled the gaps with rock walls, and they finished a fort on July 28 on the block that now holds the LDS chapel. Raids drove them back to Manti on July 31. William Black, James T. Ellis, and the Allreds re-established the town in 1859 with Brigham Young’s approval. Danish converts settled the north end, which became known as “Little Denmark.” Treaties came in 1869, the town was incorporated in 1870, and the railroad arrived in 1890. Today the whole town is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. One of the springs that gave Spring City its name can still be seen north of the service station, piped from the center of Main Street.