Lehi (Utah)

Utah County

49-44320

Lehi is a city in Utah County in the U.S. state of Utah with 48 993 inhabitants in 2009. It is situated on 1391 m altitude in the Utah Valley on the north shore of Utah Lake and belongs to a history as an agricultural settlement today than suburban agglomeration of the Provo / Orem metropolitan region.

History

The entire Utah Valley was originally home range of the eponymous Ute Indians. The first white settlers were Mormon pioneers, who on behalf of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ( Mormons) should open up the Utah Valley agriculturally 1850. The group settled on the north shore of the lake, called their settlement in 1851 Evansville, according to David Evans, a local bishop of the Church. Evans was also already applied for recognition of the settlement as a local authority two years after the settlement of 1852. At the same time the name was changed to a prophet of the Book of Mormon in Lehi. The city was thus the sixth subdivision in Utah Territory, which later became the U.S. state of Utah emerged.

1858 benefited the economy of the city from the settlement of the Mormon militia called the Utah Expeditionary Force in neighboring Camp Floyd. The camp at that time constituted the largest military installation in North America and was a hand built against the Indians of the region and on the other hand should protect the interests of the Mormons against the United States. The location on the north shore of Utah Lake and near its outflow Jordan River in the direction of Great Salt Lake was responsible for ensuring that both the first overland stagecoach routes, the Pony Express in 1860, and the first transcontinental telegraph by Lehi went.

The economic base of the city was agriculture. While the eastern shore of Utah Lake in the Wasatch Mountains got sufficient irrigation for growing more demanding crops such as orchards, Lehi had to get on the one hand by irrigation through the partially derived American Fork River, on the other hand put the farmers on less irrigation Needing crops, particularly sugar beet. A flour mill was opened in 1856, in the 1890s the first sugar factory in the region was built in Lehi, which again brought an economic boom for the city with it.

Lehi today

Since the 1990s, Lehi converts with awesome speed of the agrarian settlement to a suburb of the economic centers, in particular, of Provo, about 20 km to the south, and Salt Lake City, 35 km to the north. Had the city in 1990, 8500 inhabitants, there were already 19,000 in 2000 and 2009, 48 993 inhabitants. The agricultural land be built in residential areas with single family homes, about 90 % of all housing units in the city are single family detached. Unlike the settlements on the eastern shore of the lake with its location among the mountains, the people of Lehi are somewhat economically. Below the average of Utah County The median income per household is $ 53,000 compared to $ 56,000 for Utah County

Lehi is in north-south direction developed by the Interstate Highway 15 opens in the urban area of the parallel U.S. Highway 89.