Salt Lake City

Sitting at the foot of the rugged Wasatch Mountains and extending to the south shore of the Great Salt Lake, Salt Lake City has some of the best scenery in the country. The interface between city and nature draws residents and visitors alike to the Salt Lake Valley. There are few other places where you can enjoy urban pleasures and, within 20 minutes, hike a mountain trail or rest by a rushing stream.

The city is emerging as a prominent economic center in the Rocky Mountains. Since 2001 the number of people living in the Salt Lake Valley has climbed from 720,000 to more than 1 million. As a reflection of this growth, a dynamic skyline has sprouted, along with ever-widening rings of suburbia. Smog occasionally bedevils the town, and some crime exists, but Salt Lake is working hard to remain a small, personable city.

Brigham Young led the first party of Mormon pioneers to the Salt Lake Valley in 1847. The valley appealed to him because, at the time, it was under the control of Mexico rather than the U.S. government, which the Mormons blamed for much of their persecution. Also, the area had few permanent settlements and an adequate supply of water and building materials, and it offered a protected location, with the high Wasatch Mountains on the east side and a vast desert to the west. Still, on July 24, 1847, when Young gazed across the vast and somewhat desolate valley and reportedly announced "This is the right place," it would have been understandable if his followers had some mixed feelings. They saw no familiar green forests or lush grasslands, only a dry valley and a salty lake.

Within hours of arriving, Young and his followers began planting crops and diverting water for irrigation. They would build homes later; their existence depended on being able to harvest crops before winter. Within days Young drew up plans for Salt Lake City, which was to be the hub of the Mormon's promised land, a vast empire stretching from the Rocky Mountains to the southern California coast. Although the area that eventually became the state of Utah was much smaller than Young originally planned, Salt Lake City became much grander than anything he could have imagined. Missionaries throughout Scandinavia and the British Isles converted thousands who flocked to the city from around the world to live near their church president—who is also a living prophet according to Mormon doctrine—and to worship in their newly built temple.

In the 1860s, income from railroads and mines created a wealthy class of industrialists who built mansions near downtown and whose businesses brought thousands of workers—mainly from Europe and most of whom were not Mormon—to Utah Territory. By the time Utah became a state in 1896, Salt Lake had become a diverse and thriving city. Although the majority of the city was Mormon, it claimed a healthy mix of Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish citizens.

Today the city is an important western center for business, medicine, education, and culture. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), as the Mormon faith is officially called, still has its headquarters in Temple Square. Several high-rise hotels mark the skyline, restaurants serve up a whole world of tastes, fashionable retail enclaves are appearing all around town, and nightlife is hopping. Increased commitment to the arts from the public and private sectors has created a cultural scene as prodigious as you'd expect in a city twice Salt Lake's size. When it comes to sports, the community takes great pride in its NBA team, the Utah Jazz. And of course, no one can forget the hundreds of volunteers who gathered together to help Salt Lake City host the 2002 Olympic Winter Games.

Near Salt Lake City, Antelope Island has superb hiking, mountain biking, and wildlife watching. American history buffs might choose to travel one of the best-preserved sections of the original Pony Express Trail, the 133-mi section through the desert of west-central Utah.

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