The community has always been a good place to live and raise a family, but it also has always been a hard place to make a living. As the large farm families grew, there was neither sufficient land nor water to let them stay and take advantage of the agricultural lifestyle. Several families left the area to find a better situation in Oregon, Arizona, or Canada. By the late 1890s the problem had grown, and the Mapleton farm families were getting frustrated at what they considered a lack of concern from the Springville City Council about their problems (roads, ditches, canals, and water rights).

By 3 September 1901 a petition by Aaron Johnson, Jr., son of the first Mormon leader of Springville, and 110 other Mapleton adults, requested permission from Utah County for the right to organize a town. It was granted; and the first Mapleton town board reads like a Who's Who of important bench leaders: John R. Bromley was president, and the trustees were John H. Lee, Christian W. Houtz, John Tuckett, and Richard Mendenhall, who was later replaced by William T. Tew.