Not far from Lyman is the county seat of Loa. Loa was named after Mauna Loa, a volcano in Hawaii, by Franklin Young. Franklin Young served a mission in Hawaii and was impressed by the volcano there.
The town sign is on top of a hill northwest of the town. Here is what looks like from the sign.
A short distance from Bicknell is the town of Lyman. It is one more small Utah farming community. It was named after LDS apostle Francis Marion Lyman. As you can see, I look really excited to be here on the edge of town.
Sometimes, these little towns fool you. Just as you think you have found the only town sign, you find another bigger one. We almost missed this one, but John made a quick turn and stop. It is hard to skip a bigger sign. We had to dodge sprinklers to get this picture.
The town of Bicknell lies just west of Torrey. It was originally called Thurber after an early settler. In 1916, Thomas Bicknell, a wealthy educator and historian from Providence, Rhode Island, offered a library of 1,000 books to any town that would name itself after him. The townspeople of Thurber took him up on his offer and changed their town's name to Bicknell. The people of Bicknell, however, only received 500 books because another Utah town also took up Thomas Bicknell's offer. The town of Grayson changed its name to Blanding, Bicknell's wife's maiden name, and they received the other half of the library. That must have seemed an easy way to start a library.
