EVIDENCES OF MOUNDS IN UTAH

Wow, and I thought all this stuff was confined to the midwest.....

"Deseret News-Oct. 5, 1876...From brother Amasa Potter, of Payson: In connection with my report of last summer, I send you a few facts that we have developed concerning the excavationing of the ancient mounds in the Payson farming feild. We have become convinced that it must have been a race of people that were more enlightened in the arts of sciences of civilization than the present race of indians which we find inhabiting North America. We found in one deposit a comb that had been used for combing the hair, and also a spoon, in good shape, made of stone; also a set of marbles, just such as are made now-a-days. We found moulds made of clay, just such as are used in the foundries at the present day. They are of different shape for moulding various kinds of iron implements, but there is no kind of iron to be found now, but there are spots of rust where it has decayed. We found some pieces of cedar wood, that had not all decayed. The heart was left yet, and it shows that the people had edge tools, because the wood was cut smooth."

"L.D.S. Millennial Star, May 9, 1871...A curious relic of the past had been ploughed up near the mounds in the vicinity of Spanish Fork. It is a piece of metal, seemingly copper, about one and 3/4 by one and 3/8 inches, on one side of which is engraved the figure of a man in priestly robes, with a censer in his hand; an alter on which the fire is kindled; a tree, probably emblematical of the tree of life, and above the tree a representation of the sun. When found the metal was encrusted with rust, but this was carefully removed, and the engraving remains clear and distinct as if recently done."

My question is what happened to these relic's? Were all these mounds destroyed? Why didn't those early pioneers preserve these structures? And, who were the builders of these mounds?