Christmas Meadows

December 24, 2014

Christmasmeadow

Photographer: Ray Boren
Summary Author: Ray Boren

Northeastern Utah’s Christmas Meadows, nestled along the placid meanders of Bear River’s Stillwater Fork, lie in a glaciated valley in the Uinta Mountains. The picturesque setting is backed by majestic ridges, cliff-lined cirques and jagged summits, carved by glaciers thousands of years ago during a series of Pleistocene ice ages.

While Christmas Meadows might summon wintry visions of glistening snowfields and naturally flocked pines, the beautiful spot apparently didn't get its name from the holiday. Instead, it remembers a certain Mr. Christmas, a prospector from California who lived there for seven years, long ago, according to the book “Utah Place Names” by John W. Van Cott. The rare surname itself does, however, have a tie to the Christian celebration: Genealogists say that during the Middle Ages, notably in England, those born on Christmas Day were sometimes given that baptismal name, carried forth anciently with such variant spellings as Cristemasse, Crystmasse  and, ultimately, Christmas. Photo taken on October 6, 2009.

Photo details: Camera Model: NIKON D3200; Lens: AF-S DX VR Zoom-Nikkor 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G; Focal Length: 18mm (35mm equivalent: 27mm); Aperture: f/11.0; Exposure Time: 0.0020 s (1/500); ISO equiv: 400; Software: iPhoto 9.5.1.