J. Roderic Korns

Who was J. Roderic Korns?

J Roderic "Rod" Korns was a 20th-century editor, researcher and historian of the American west. He is best known for West from Fort Bridger: The Pioneering of the Immigrant Trails Across Utah 1846-1850, completed with the assistance of historiographer and author Dale L. Morgan. Korns is considered a productive collector of historic sources and an avid historian of western trails.

Korns participated in and was featured in a round of correspondence between historians and researchers associated with the American west. In a 1946 letter to Bernard DeVoto, Korn's friend and collaborator Dale L. Morgan related a story told by Korns.

Korns’ posthumous 1951 volume " West from Fort Bridger: The Pioneering of the Immigrant Trails Across Utah 1846-1850", first appeared as Volume XIX of the "Utah Historical Quarterly". The classic history of the opening of western trails includes primary documents relating immigrant trails including the Hastings Cutoff and the Golden Pass Road into the Salt Lake Valley, with analysis and commentary. Immigrants personal accounts, compiled from original diaries, journals, maps, and letters, recount a half-decade of historic pioneer treks. After Korns' death, Morgan went forward with the author's original plans for organization and publication. Despite his own significant research and editorial contributions, Morgan ascribed primary authorship to his late friend. The work was awarded the American Association for State and Local History's Award of Merit. Salt desert historian Charles Kelly pronounced the volume "one of the most important contributions to Utah history ever assembled". Originally produced in a limited edition, the book has been reprinted several times. A 1994 revised version includes excerpts from primary sources which had not yet been discovered or were unavailable to the original researchers.