Highway 89 to be Featured in Libray Book Event

U.S. Highway 89: The Scenic Route to Seven Western National Parks

23 October 2013 at 7 p.m.

What is your favorite Highway 89 story? Does it include a pit stop at the “Big Rock Candy Mountain?,” the annual caravan of the faithful to the Manti Pageant? How about the Peach Days Parade and Beauty Pageant in Brigham City? Come share your story with author/photographer Ann Torrence as she talks to your group about her award-winning book U.S. Highway 89: the Scenic Route to Seven Western National Parks. Traveling 15,000 miles with a camera and notebook in hand,

Torrence met rodeo queens and working cowboys, rangers and ranchers. She also came to appreciate the efforts rural leaders and especially volunteers make to build vibrant communities today and to sustain the enduring spirit of the west. Unlike its more famous sibling, Route 66, Highway 89 still functions as an important corridor through western states, including across Utah from--Garden City to Kanab. Through her penetrating narrative and projected samplings of the book’s 175 photographs, Torrence describes how the 1920s federal highway building brought rural Utah out of the mud, opened up new markets for farming communities, and led its youth away for opportunities in urban centers. Part history lesson and part retrospective down memory lane of cultural artifacts such as neon road signs, Torrence’s presentation will show you why 89 is known as “Everyone’s Hometown Highway.”
A book signing will follow.

This program is part of the Brigham City Library Book Festival* 
 

Celebrating Books, Ideas, and Imagination

October 2013

In Partnership with the Utah Humanities Council and the Utah Humanities Book Festival, a program of the Utah Center for the Book, a Library of Congress affiliate.

*This program has received funding from the Utah Humanities Council.  The Utah Humanities Council promotes understanding of diverse traditions, values, and ideas through informed public discussion.