In 1845, Miles Goodyear founded a settlement at Fort Buenaventura,
located near the confluence of the Weber and Ogden Rivers. The area was
renamed Ogden in 1851 by Mormon Church president Brigham Young after
Peter Skene Ogden, a Hudson's Bay Company fur trapper. Ogden prospered
as an agricultural town and then thrived with the arrival of the
railroads, when the growing community, often referred to as Junction
City, became a major railroad hub. Union Station became a well-known
landmark surrounded by rowdy gambling houses and brothels as well as
ethnically diverse residential neighborhoods. Since 1889, Ogden has also
been an important center of higher education, and it is now home to
Weber State University. World War II brought Ogden into the modern era
as a transportation and military center with the establishment of Hill
Air Field, Defense Depot Ogden, and the Naval Supply Depot.