This town's history has run the full gamut from trading fort to bustling metropolitan railway hub, through neglected rough and tumble stopover to high adventure attraction.

And this is the guy for whom the town is named. A brigade leader of the Hudson's Bay Company, Peter Skene Ogden, trapped here in the Weber Valley.
We're here because Ogden is the closest sizable city to the Golden Spike location at Promontory Summit, Utah, where the First Transcontinental Railroad was joined in 1869. On May, 10th, we will be in Promontory for the 150th anniversary of this amazing historical event.
Historically speaking, Ogden was known as a major passenger railroad junction owing to its location along major east–west and north–south routes, prompting the local chamber of commerce to adopt the motto, "You can't get anywhere without coming to Ogden." Railroad passengers traveling west to San Francisco from the eastern United States typically passed through Ogden (and not through the larger Salt Lake City to the south which made Brigham Young unhappy, it turns out).
 

Entire books have been written about the people, places and pastimes of Ogden’s Historic 25th Street, but what makes the street so captivating is that it’s one of those places where anyone can still write their own story today. I love the positive, and permanent, plaque on the street sign.
Not surprisingly, 25th Street has a very colorful past. Brothels and bootleggers rolled in and out like the trains at Union Station located at the end of the street.
We were caught in a pretty intense rainstorm so we got warmed with coffee at Grounds For Coffee.
There is a lot of art in Ogden and I was enamored by this repurposed stamp machine dispensing local artist's sticker art. These curated displays change monthly like a tiny gallery. The idea is to elevate local artists and make art approachable to buy and collect. Yes, I did support the arts. Fun stuff.
Also while sipping coffee, we enjoyed the kindness wall. On several shelves are mystery acts of kindness. You are asked to take one and then return the card for others to do the same. The tasks varied from "buy the person behind you's coffee" to mine which suggested hiding treasures in books at libraries or bookstores. Sweet ideas.

Interesting art was throughout the town.

We ended our day in Union Station attending the play Citizen Wong.
Citizen Wong is a play inspired by Wong Chin Foo (1847–1898), the late 19th-century celebrity speaker-writer known as the first Chinese American. His affair with a rich suffragette whose father runs for president captures the essence of an era when racists supported an “anti-Chinese wall” and passed the Chinese Exclusion Act that Wong fought tirelessly against. It was a live, timely history lesson. A perfect end to our first day in Ogden.