The following decades saw little additional growth but did bring improvements in public services. A culinary water system and a telephone system were installed in about 1914. In 1922 the Emery Stake Academy was sold to the Emery County School District and became Central High School.

Like the other communities in western Emery County, for most of its history Castle Dale has depended on an economic base of farming and livestock raising, supplemented by coal mining. The community was hard hit by the Great Depression of the 1930s, when mining unemployment and low prices for farm products combined with a devastating drought. The local bank was merged with a bank in Price, leaving Emery County without banking services. During the same period, however, the Wilberg Resort, situated in a grove of trees four miles north of town, enjoyed great success as a recreation center for Emery and Carbon counties, with several hundred people typically attending the Saturday night dances.