For those familiar with Layton, Utah, the City’s most unusual road name is Gentile Street. Like most people -- even most historians-- they believe it was so named because some non-Mormons (“Gentiles”) lived on that street when it was only a west Layton road.
However, I’ve come to believe it was the waystation for travelers on the connecting Bluff Road emigration trail, where its name came from, because that is where the only non-Mormons in the early community were, as they operated the station. (The early residents who lived on west Gentile Street were actually LDS Church members, but simply inactive, or called “Jack Mormons” back in the day.)
Notwithstanding the name’s origin, it is not a unique feature, as over the weekend I found another “Gentile” street, this one in southeast Idaho. This road is near the Bear River, in Thatcher, Idaho (west of Niter and southwest of Grace.) Where did this “Gentile Valley” road name come from? Grace, Idaho, and today’s Gem Valley, was settled by non-Mormons in 1865 and after Brigham Young sent church members to settle there in the 1870s, tensions grew. The Bear River became a boundary of sorts then. If you were Mormon, you were supposed to live on the east side of the Bear River; and non-Mormons the west side. In those days, the Grace valley was called the "Gentile Valley." It was not renamed Gem Valley until the early 20th Century, when religious tensions finally eased.
And, then there’s nearby Soda Springs, about 11 miles away and northeast of Grace. But, where is the actual Soda Spring? I mean, the Soda water springs? There's a Hooper Springs, north of town, but no Soda. Is it the geyser in town? No. Soda Springs, a spring, is now located under Alexander reservoir, which backs up the Bear River. Also, "Soda Springs" was not that water source's original name either. "Beer Springs" was what trappers first called it. Mormon settlers obviously changed the name later.
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