53809. Saltair Pavilion, Great Salt Lake, Utah. Photochrom print by the Detroit Photographic Co., copyrighted 1901.

The Saltair was a family place, intended to provide a safe and wholesome atmosphere with the open supervision of LDS Church leaders. While some of the other resorts in the area were seen as "spiritually bleak," a young couple could visit Saltair without worrying about the gossip in the early days when Mormonism was more culturally conservative than it is today. Train schedules from Saltair to stations near home were well known, and so long as the boy got the girl home at a reasonable time after the train arrived, parents weren't worried -- in part because, from the moment of arriving at the station before the outing until they left the station coming home, they were usually never out of sight of trusted members of the church. More than once, a couple on the way home found themselves in the same car as their parents, who themselves had been dancing at Saltair.

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