Abraham O. Smoot had just finished a nine-year stint as Salt Lake City mayor when Brigham Young called him on a mission.
According to local legend, Smoot had a choice between two places: Provo or hell.
"I would sooner go to hell than to Provo," Smoot replied. Young sent Smoot to Provo anyway, and folks in Salt Lake City have been making fun of Happy Valley ever since.
"When you're living down there, you're not aware of the prejudice people have against it, that people make fun of it," says Dani Eyer, a Salt Lake attorney who lived in Provo and Orem for 15 years. "There are people who wouldn't go down there for any reason."
From Point of the Mountain north, Provo is widely perceived as provincial — a backwater town full of Pollyanna types — while Orem is dismissed as a small bedroom community of little consequence.
But those perceptions, for the most part, are outdated. Those who venture past Draper will find two increasingly cosmopolitan and unified cities that are the beating heart of a rapidly growing county.
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Those who have lived here for decades say their county is inching toward a population of 350,000 for a reason: The pristine valley that rests in the shade of Mount Timpanogos is far more heaven than hell.
When A.O. Smoot arrived in Provo, Orem's State Street was nothing more than a dusty bench full of sagebrush and weeds.
Brigham Young later said the barren bench would "become a beautiful garden spot . . . of delicious fruit and vegetables" and the miles of farmland between Provo and Pleasant Grove would "become one solid city."
Prophecy or prediction, Young's vision has become a reality. Provo and Orem have melded so seamlessly together that most people, even politicians, don't know where one begins and the other ends.
For the most part, the locals don't care where the boundaries lie. The two cities are much more similar than they are different.
Both are predominately white, both have a large population of college students and both share a culture that is shaped by the influence of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The percentage of Provo and Orem residents who are LDS may be close to that of Utah County, which is 88 percent.
"Salt Lake City is the headquarters of the LDS Church, but I think Provo and Orem would be considered the heart of the church," Provo spokesman Mike Mower said.
For some, the church's heavy influence is off-putting. Eyer, who is now the state director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said living in such a homogenous area was often stifling.
She said she opened a bookstore to meet people cut from a different mold.
"I get a little annoyed with people in Salt Lake County who think there's not an interesting person in Utah County," Eyer said. "There's something good to be found everywhere. It's just harder to find in some places than in others."
The Rev. Dean Jackson, who has presided over the Rock Canyon Assembly of God in Provo for the past 12 years, says many of the perceptions about Provo and Orem are overblown.
"I've found the community to be extremely accepting and open," the Rev. Jackson said. "Sometimes people here are nice to the point of going overboard."
When the Rev. Jackson's church was recently vandalized, members of the LDS Church were among the first volunteers to arrive and help clean up.
"There's that Happy Valley stereotype that Provo and Orem are one big Mormon utopia, but I have friends who certainly don't fit that stereotype," says Jeremy Harmon, a newspaper editor at the University of Utah.
The conservative values of Provo and Orem may be scorned by outsiders, but they are the primary reason others choose to live here.
Orem Mayor Jerry Washburn says his city is consistently ranked one of the safest in America because it is an old-fashioned place where residents still look out for one another.
"Orem seems like a small town. It's a really close-knit community," says Megan Brady, a senior at Orem High.
Outgoing BYU president Merrill Bateman describes Provo in a similar way:
"This is a very friendly community with neighbors who reach out to one another on a daily basis. . . . We appreciate that people here strive to maintain a clean, safe environment."
The most noticeable difference between the two towns lies in their appearance. Provo's pioneer homes, its tree-lined streets and the stately brick buildings that frame its downtown give the city a historic flavor. Provo leaders have made preserving this heritage a top priority for years.
Orem, on the other hand, is a relatively new community (it was formed in 1919) with few historical landmarks. Its main thoroughfare, State Street, has been derided as one of the ugliest streets in America.
"It seems as if Orem has gone out of their way to remove every tree and widen every street and add every strip mall conceivable," Eyer says. "They are more economically driven."
Until 30 or so years ago, Orem was a farm town known for its fruit orchards. Utah County Commissioner Gary Herbert remembers riding his bicycle from south Orem to downtown Provo as a boy, passing nothing but open fields.
By the mid-1970s, Orem was in the midst of transformation. Open space, progressive planning and a pro-business attitude among city leaders resulted in the opening of University Mall in 1973.
"That was the single most significant change in the history of Orem. It was an absolute turning point," says Steve Densley, director of the Provo/Orem Chamber of Commerce. "Orem emerged as the commercial center of Utah County."
University Mall now sits at the busiest intersection in Utah County, and at the center of what Densley calls "the largest downtown in America." Costco, Wal-Mart and several large car dealerships give Orem a sales-tax revenue substantially higher than that of any other city in the county, including Provo.
Provo now has two malls of its own, but Orem remains the destination point for the valley's shoppers.
"Provo has always been the big city, the county seat, the queen bee," Herbert said. "But that's changing, and that's hard for some in Provo to take. Orem is really coming into its own."
Much of the money Orem has generated through sales-tax revenue has been used to widen streets, plant trees and expand parks in an effort to beautify a city some say has no character. Last month, the city opened a 55-acre park that includes eight soccer fields and five baseball or softball fields.
"I don't think it's really fair to say Orem doesn't have tradition or history, because it is a new community," Washburn said. "The population and the neighborhoods are all new, and that makes it different."
How you feel about Provo and Orem probably depends upon which side of Point of the Mountain you live. A.O. Smoot may have become a hero to legions of Ute fans when he requested hell over Provo, but most folks in Salt Lake City probably don't equate Provo with purgatory.
Even Eyer has fond memories of Utah Valley — from flying over its rugged mountains to sitting on her porch at 4 a.m. in irrigation boots.
"For those of us who have trouble with the politics of Utah County, we get a lot of mileage out of the landscape," Eyer says.
The fact is, many Salt Lake City residents don't think of Provo or Orem at all.
Densley said as recently as 1982, Orem wasn't even on some state maps.
"It was really frustrating that Salt Lake would ignore us like that, because I think by that time we were the fourth-largest city in the state," Densley said.
Densley says over the years there has been some talk of combining Provo and Orem into one city. If that ever happened, "Porem," as it may be called, would have a larger population than any other city in the state. Densley says that would bring more business to the area, and the state Legislature would be quicker to address needs here.
Provo Councilman Stan Lockhart says it's an idea worth discussing.
"They're both great communities with great people. There aren't many better cities in the state of Utah," Herbert said.
E-mail: jhyde@desnews.com