Salt Lake County is located in the U.S. state of Utah. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 1,185,238, making it the most populous county in Utah. Its county seat and largest city is Salt Lake City, the state capital. The county was created in 1850. Salt Lake County is the 37th most populated county in the United States and is one of four counties in the Rocky Mountains to make it into the top 100. (Others being Denver County and El Paso County, Colorado and Clark County, Nevada.) Salt Lake County has been the only county of the first class in Utah – under the Utah Code (Title 17, Chapter 50, Part 5) is a county with a population of 700,000 or greater. Although, Utah County directly to the south has recently reached this threshold.
Salt Lake County occupies the Salt Lake Valley, as well as parts of the surrounding mountains, the Oquirrh Mountains to the west and the Wasatch Range to the east (essentially the entire Jordan River watershed north of the Traverse Mountains). In addition, the northwestern section of the county includes part of the Great Salt Lake. The county is noted for its ski resorts; Salt Lake City hosted the 2002 Winter Olympics. Salt Lake County is the central county of the Salt Lake City metropolitan area. Sustained drought in Utah has more recently strained Salt Lake County's water security and has caused the Great Salt Lake level to drop to record low levels.
History
This area was occupied for thousands of years by cultures of indigenous peoples.
19th century
The future Salt Lake County area was settled by European Americans in 1847 when Mormon pioneers of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints fled religious persecution in the East. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley after descending what settlers later called Emigration Canyon. Brigham Young, their leader, declared "This is the place" after seeing the valley. Compared to eastern regions, it seemed arid and unpromising to some of the migrants. Settlers used irrigation to develop agriculture and the flourishing, self-sufficient city known then as Great Salt Lake City. Thousands of Mormons joined them in the next several decades.
Settlers buried thirty-six Native Americans in one grave after an outbreak of measles occurred during the winter of 1847.
The initial territorial settlement was in Great Salt Lake City proper, but Brigham Young desired to secure a substantial population base across the then-uninhabited Great Basin, so he soon asked members to resettle farther out from the central point. They declared themselves a state (State of Deseret) in hopes of gaining admittance to the Union, and to assure the nascent state would grow uniformly, they named an as-yet-unbuilt settlement in mid-state as the state's capital (Fillmore).
The county was officially organized on January 31, 1850, with slightly more than 11,000 residents recorded. In 1850, 26 slaves were counted in Salt Lake County. In 1852, the territorial legislature passed the Act in Relation to Service and the Act for the relief of Indian Slaves and Prisoners formally legalizing slavery in the territory.
Due to Utah Territory's conflicts with the federal government, the federal surveyor abandoned his post in 1857, two years after he arrived. The surveyor's duty was to officially plat the territory in order to bring the area onto the market, to make homesteading possible. The intermediate years between 1857 and 1869 passed with no federal surveyors, the LDS Pioneers completed plats, deeds, and surveys of the county in order to homestead and collect taxes. Since the deeds and titles handed out during the twelve-year period were not federally recognized homestead certificates, the Utah Territory agreed to reconcile the unrecognized deeds and titles in order to fold the Utah Territory into the federal homestead system, calling them (instead of homestead certificates) Land Title Certificates. The process to adjudicate the certificates took place over several years in 1871–1873, through the county Probate Court, overseen by judge Elias Smith. Settlers were required to file land claims, make declaratory statements, attend their adjudication hearings, provide testimony if counter claims on a parcel of land were filed, and wait for final judgement from the probate judge, who issued a final Land Title Certificate which declared a person the rightful owner. These certificates are retroactive backwards to 1852.