Anderson Tower Monument

Sitting innocuously next to an apartment complex, the Anderson Tower Monument remembers an attempted tourist attraction which was subverted by an ironic flaw despite being built from the same granite as the famous Mormon Temple.

Built in 1884 by entrepreneur Robert R. Anderson, the eponymously named Anderson Tower was modeled after the medieval towers of Scotland. It was Anderson’s intention to create an attraction where visitors could pay to go to the top of the tower and observe the young city. The tower was built 54 feet high and another 25 feet in diameter using granite mined from the same quarry that had previously supplied the nearby temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Unfortunately the fatal flaw in the plan would seem to be the location. Anderson built his tower atop the highest hill in the region, from the summit of which, visitors already had an impressive and unobstructed view of the Salt Lake Valley.

Due to the lack of interest in paying to ascend the redundant tower, Anderson eventually simply boarded the tower up. In the ensuing years the site was reopened, allowing visitors to climb to the top, free of charge. Unfortunately interest in the tower waned yet again and it was finally demolished in 1932.

Today the only remnant of Anderson Tower is a low-lying monument that is built out of the destroyed tower’s own granite.