Jesse Knight was one of relatively few Latter-day Saint mining magnates in nineteenth century Western America

Western United States

.The Western United States, commonly referred to as the American West or simply "the West," traditionally refers to the region comprising the westernmost states of the United States. Because the U.S. expanded westward after its founding, the meaning of the West has evolved over time...

. Raised by the widow of Newel Knight

Newel Knight

Newel Knight was a close friend of Joseph Smith, Jr. and one of the first branch presidents in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints....

, Jesse's family was poor throughout his youth. As a young man, he worked as a prospector and discovered the Humbug Mine in the Tintic Mining District near Eureka

Eureka, Utah

Eureka was originally known as Ruby Hollow before it developed into a bustling mining town. Incorporated as a city in 1892, Eureka became the financial center for the Tintic Mining District, a wealthy gold and silver mining area in Utah and Juab counties. The district was organized in 1869 and by...

, Utah

Utah

Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...

 in 1896. As the Humbug proved profitable, he acquired other mines in the vicinity, including the Uncle Sam, Beck Tunnel, Iron Blossom, and Colorado mines. After making his fortune, Knight went on to found the Latter Day Saint settlement of Raymond

Raymond, Alberta

Raymond is a town in Warner County, Alberta, Canada. It is located in southern Alberta south of Lethbridge on Highway 52. Raymond is known for its annual rodeo and its large Mormon population...

, Alberta

Alberta

Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

.

Knight was born in Nauvoo

Nauvoo, Illinois

Nauvoo is a small city in Hancock County, Illinois, United States. Although the population was just 1,063 at the 2000 census, and despite being difficult to reach due to its location in a remote corner of Illinois, Nauvoo attracts large numbers of visitors for its historic importance and its...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

 to prominent Mormons

Mormons

The Mormons are a religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, a religion started by Joseph Smith during the American Second Great Awakening. A vast majority of Mormons are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints while a minority are members of other independent churches....

 Newel and Lydia Knight. When Jesse was a one-year-old, his family was forced to flee Nauvoo as Mormon pioneers under the leadership of Brigham Young

Brigham Young

Brigham Young was an American leader in the Latter Day Saint movement and a settler of the Western United States. He was the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1847 until his death in 1877, he founded Salt Lake City, and he served as the first governor of the Utah...

. Jesse's father died in Nebraska

Nebraska

Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....

 on the Mormon Trail

Mormon Trail

The Mormon Trail or Mormon Pioneer Trail is the 1,300 mile route that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints traveled from 1846 to 1868...

 in January 1847; his mother and eight siblings continued on but were not able to reach their Salt Lake Valley

Salt Lake Valley

Salt Lake Valley is a valley in Salt Lake County in the north-central portion of the U.S. state of Utah. It contains Salt Lake City and many of its suburbs, notably West Valley City, Murray, Sandy, and West Jordan; its total population is 1,029,655 as of 2010...

 destination until early 1850.

Knight is significant in Western American mining and entrepreneurial history because in several important ways he differed from the typical "robber baron

Robber baron (industrialist)

Robber baron is a pejorative term used for a powerful 19th century American businessman. By the 1890s the term was used to attack any businessman who used questionable practices to become wealthy...

" capitalists of the late-nineteenth century Gilded Age

Gilded Age

In United States history, the Gilded Age refers to the era of rapid economic and population growth in the United States during the post–Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras of the late 19th century. The term "Gilded Age" was coined by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their book The Gilded...

. His success, like theirs, depended upon the skillful acquisition and management of such business variables as claims, labor, capital, technology, and government services, and also upon the development of cost-efficient integrated enterprises, such as the Knight Investment Company. However, he also owned more patented

Patent

A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....

 mining claims in the Intermountain West

Intermountain West

The Intermountain West is a region of North America lying between the Rocky Mountains to the east and the Cascades and Sierra Nevada to the west. It is also called the Intermountain Region.- Topography :...

 than did his counterparts, and he was not inclined to engage in stock manipulation like many other mining entrepreneurs and railroad barons. Moreover, his business methods, especially when dealing with his working men, were far more paternalistic and benevolent than those of the typical big businessmen of the era. While other company town

Company town

A company town is a town or city in which much or all real estate, buildings , utilities, hospitals, small businesses such as grocery stores and gas stations, and other necessities or luxuries of life within its borders are owned by a single company...

 and mine owners often exploited their workers, Knight treated his workers very fairly in his company town of Knightsville, Utah

Knightsville, Utah

-External links:* at GhostTowns.com...

, which he equipped with a meetinghouse, amusement hall, and school instead of the usual hedonistic establishments of mining camp life.

Although Knight's philanthropy

Philanthropy

Philanthropy etymologically means "the love of humanity"—love in the sense of caring for, nourishing, developing, or enhancing; humanity in the sense of "what it is to be human," or "human potential." In modern practical terms, it is "private initiatives for public good, focusing on quality of...

 was not unique for the period, his generous gifts to Brigham Young University

Brigham Young University

Brigham Young University is a private university located in Provo, Utah. It is owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , and is the United States' largest religious university and third-largest private university.Approximately 98% of the university's 34,000 students...

 (an interest he shared with his wife, Amanda) earned him the reputation as the "patron saint" of BYU. He also gave freely to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to many church-related projects. Furthermore, his comfortable but unostentatious home in Provo, Utah

Provo, Utah

Provo is the third largest city in the U.S. state of Utah, located about south of Salt Lake City along the Wasatch Front. Provo is the county seat of Utah County and lies between the cities of Orem to the north and Springville to the south...

, did not rival the extravagantly garish mansion

Mansion

A mansion is a very large dwelling house. U.S. real estate brokers define a mansion as a dwelling of over . A traditional European mansion was defined as a house which contained a ballroom and tens of bedrooms...

s built by big businessmen from San Francisco's Nob Hill to New York

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

's Fifth Avenue

Fifth Avenue (Manhattan)

Fifth Avenue is a major thoroughfare in the center of the borough of Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. The section of Fifth Avenue that crosses Midtown Manhattan, especially that between 49th Street and 60th Street, is lined with prestigious shops and is consistently ranked among...

. Nor did he seek high political office like mining kings George Hearst

George Hearst

George Hearst was a wealthy American businessman and United States Senator, and the father of newspaperman William Randolph Hearst.-Early life and education:...

, James Fair

James Graham Fair

James Graham Fair was the overnight millionaire part-owner of the Comstock Lode, a United States Senator and a colorful real estate and railroad speculator.-Early life:...

, William Sharon

William Sharon

William Sharon was a United States Senator from Nevada who profited from the Comstock Lode.-Early life:Sharon was born in Smithfield, Ohio, January 9, 1821, the son of William Sharon and Susan Kirk. He attended Ohio University. After studying law in St. Louis, Missouri, he was admitted to the bar...

, John P. Jones

John P. Jones

John Percival Jones was an American politician who served for 30 years as a Republican United States Senator from Nevada. He made a fortune in silver mining and was a co-founder of the town of Santa Monica, California....

, Nathaniel Hill

Nathaniel P. Hill

Nathaniel Peter Hill was a United States Senator from Colorado.-Biography:Born in Montgomery, Orange County, New York, at the Nathaniel Hill Brick House . He married Alice Hale of Providence, Rhode Island, on July 26, 1860...

, Jerome B. Chaffee

Jerome B. Chaffee

Jerome Bonaparte Chaffee was an entrepreneur and United States Senator from Colorado. Chaffee County, Colorado is named after him.-Biography:...

, Horace Tabor, William Clark

William Andrews Clark

William Andrews Clark, Sr. was an American politician and entrepreneur, involved with mining, banking, and railroads.-Biography:...

, or Utah's Thomas Kearns

Thomas Kearns

Thomas Kearns was a mining, banking, railroad and newspaper magnate. He was elected United States Senator from Utah from 1901 to 1905.- Immigration and mining :...

—all of whom served in the "millionaire's club" of the United States Senate

United States Senate

The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

.

Knight was known by the moniker "Uncle Jesse" during his lifetime due to his image as rich but giving uncle. In his writing, he expressed a belief that his money was for the purpose of doing good and building up his church; he regarded the matter as a "trusted stewardship." As he once said, "The earth is the Lord's bank, and no man has a right to take money out of that bank and use it extravagantly upon himself." Although he strayed from the LDS Church in his early years and briefly affiliated with the anti-Mormon

Anti-Mormon

Anti-Mormonism is discrimination, persecution, hostility or prejudice directed at members of the Latter Day Saint movement, particularly The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...

 Liberal Party

Liberal Party (Utah)

The Liberal Party, like the People's Party, flourished in Utah Territory as a local political party in the latter half of the 19th century—before Democrats and Republicans established themselves in Utah in the early 1890s....

 in Utah, he was a devout member for most of his life and helped to save the LDS Church from financial ruin incurred from legal battles with the federal government over control of the Utah territory and issues such as polygamy

Polygamy

Polygamy is a marriage which includes more than two partners...

.

After making his fortune in mining, Knight went on to develop settlement and industry in what is today southern Alberta

Alberta

Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

. In 1901, Knight purchased 30,000 acres (120 km²) of land in Canada's Northwest Territories

Northwest Territories

The Northwest Territories is a federal territory of Canada.Located in northern Canada, the territory borders Canada's two other territories, Yukon to the west and Nunavut to the east, and three provinces: British Columbia to the southwest, and Alberta and Saskatchewan to the south...

 for $2.50 per acre. On this property he established a ranch; Knight later went on to acquire another 226,000 acres (915 km²) of land near his ranch and established a town built around irrigation farming

Irrigation

Irrigation may be defined as the science of artificial application of water to the land or soil. It is used to assist in the growing of agricultural crops, maintenance of landscapes, and revegetation of disturbed soils in dry areas and during periods of inadequate rainfall...

 of sugar beets, which were then processed in a local sugar

Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline carbohydrates, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose, characterized by a sweet flavor.Sucrose in its refined form primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet...

 factory that Knight built. The settlement was named Raymond in honor of his son, Raymond Knight. Within five years, over 1,500 Latter-day Saints—mostly from Utah—had immigrated to Raymond. The town incorporated in 1903, and today Knight is honored as the founder of Raymond, Alberta

Raymond, Alberta

Raymond is a town in Warner County, Alberta, Canada. It is located in southern Alberta south of Lethbridge on Highway 52. Raymond is known for its annual rodeo and its large Mormon population...

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