Santaquin, Utah
Near Provo, Utah
Santaquin's name arrived by way of a generous act and an unexpected request. In the early eighteen fifties, settlers pushing south from Payson established a community at the divide between Utah Valley and Juab Valley and called it Summit City. Their leader, Benjamin Johnson, had made friends with a local Ute chief named Guffich, who quietly warned Johnson when a raid by younger braves was being planned.
That act of protection allowed the settlement to survive. When the townspeople proposed naming the place Guffich in his honor, the chief declined. He asked instead that the settlement bear the name of his son, Santaquin.
The Ute name is thought to mean something close to woman of the mountain, or dark woman, from the Ute words for those ideas. The settlers agreed, and the name has held for more than a hundred and seventy years.
