Loa, UT

Loa is Wayne County's seat, a high valley town on State Route 24 west of the Fremont River. About forty families established the settlement in 1878, and the post office followed in 1879. The name came from Mauna Loa after Franklin W. Young returned from the Hawaiian Islands and suggested the mountain's name; the word was understood as 'high, large, and powerful.' Town blocks were laid out in six-acre pieces, and Loa was formally dedicated in 1885 before incorporation in 1919. Today the courthouse, county offices, school, and old waterworks give Loa its working center, while Wayne County's red-rock country begins just beyond town.