With the coming of the railroad through Weber Canyon, the town of Easton quickly became a wild and wooly boomtown with over 100 businesses and a population over 5,000. A railroad station was constructed in 1869 and was originally called Deseret. The name was soon changed to Uintah, after the local Shoshoni Indians. To avoid the confusion in having a railroad station and post office named Uintah in a town known as Easton, the whole thing was called Uintah.

Uintah's second population boom was created by the fact it was the terminus for the freight, mail and passenger traffic headed south mostly for Salt Lake City. Two stage companies vied for control of passenger and mail travel. At the peak of Uintah's boom about twenty-five saloons lined its main streets, where tough freighters and railroaders enjoyed all of the entertainments of other western boom towns. The town also boasted over seventy-five business establishments: grocery stores, dry goods stores, candy shops, tobacco shops, meat markets, barbers, billiard halls, restaurants, and hotels. The town also had a brewery and Union Pacific Telegraph Office.

In 1872 the Utah Central Railroad was opened between Salt Lake City and Ogden, and Uintah's boom period was soon over. Almost overnight residents, business owners, and freighters deserted the town leaving it again to the more sober-minded farmers.