Spanish Fork, Utah County, is located about sixty miles
south of Salt Lake City, and is built upon three
distinct alluvial fans formed by the Spanish Fork River. It received
its name from the fact that Catholic Fathers Dominguez
and Escalante entered Utah Valley along the Spanish Fork River in
September 1776 on their exploratory journey.
Enoch Reece took
up about four hundred acres of land in the Spanish Fork River bottoms
area in 1850 and was the first man to locate a home there. He was soon
followed by other settlers, including John Holt, John H. Reed, and William
Pace.
During the fall
of 1854, a fort, called Fort Saint Luke, was built on the present site
of Spanish Fork. This was occupied by nineteen families from the settlement
of Palmyra, about three miles west. The fort was built as protection
from the Indians. In 1855 the territorial
legislature granted the city of Spanish Fork a charter and boundaries
were established. After Palmyra was abandoned in 1856 and its citizens,
numbering about four hundred, moved to Spanish Fork, the charter was
amended to also include that area.