In an effort to preserve the past and pass on the skills and traditions of yesteryear, local members of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers held their annual Pioneer Jubilee last Saturday at the Benson Grist Mill.

The lawn in front of the grist mill was filled with colorful tents and children and adults running around in pioneer garb. Those in attendance enjoyed fiddle and guitar music during lunch, wagon rides around the mill, and browsing the wares at the different encampments.

“The very first pioneer jubilee was held in the early 1900s to commemorate the birthday of Brigham Young,” said Wendy Ricci, president of the Tooele Valley company of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers. “These celebrations went on for five days. They really knew how to party.”

Each member of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers is assigned a “camp” — a unit akin to a scout troop — and every camp belongs to an area called a company. A pioneer jubilee, like the one held in Tooele County, is only possible with the effort of a large number of camps.

Between the Tooele and Tooele Valley companies, there were more than 20 individual camps present at the event. Most of the camps — each with their own tent — sold treats, aprons, bonnets, quilts or a crafts dating from the pioneer age. A few other camps demonstrated how to churn butter, clean and spin wool, make wagon wheel rugs or wash clothes by hand.

“We’re trying to educate the generations coming up about how the pioneers lived,” Ricci said. “The skills and traditions they lived by will be lost if we don’t look back and remember, and continue to pass them along.”

The jubilee has served as a fundraiser over the past four years. Some of the proceeds are given to the Tooele Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum, located at 39 E. Vine St., while money taken in by the individual camps benefits that camp. Planning for the jubilee starts in January as the individual camps decide among themselves what they want to do to help raise money for the museum. This year, funds were earmarked to replacement the museum’s floor.

Other attractions at the jubilee included a catered lunch by Richard’s Round Up Barbecue and a chartered bus tour of historic E.T. City, which is present-day Lake Point.

“We’re the only two companies in the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers that do this kind of thing,” Ricci added. “It’s very small celebration compared with other companies around, but for us it’s a chance to reach out to those who’d like to step back into the past.”

Natalie Tripp: ntripp@tooeletranscript.com