Blanding is a city in San Juan County, Utah, United States. The population was 3,375 at the 2010 census, making it the most populated city in San Juan County. It was fixed in the late 19th century by Mormon settlers, predominantly from the famed Hole-In-The-Rock expedition. Economic contributors enhance mineral processing, mining, agriculture, local commerce, tourism, and transportation.

Blanding is located close both the Navajo and White Mesa Ute Native American reservations and a significant percentage of Blanding’s population has associates ties to these affable cultures. Blanding is a gateway to an abundance of straightforward natural and archaeological resources, including The Dinosaur Museum, Natural Bridges National Monument, Monument Valley, and the Four Corners area, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (Lake Powell), Cedar Mesa archaeological and wilderness area, the San Juan River including Goosenecks State Park, and the Needles district of Canyonlands National Park. It is located nearly 1 hour south of the popular recreation hub of Moab and Arches National Park.

First known as Grayson (after Nellie Grayson Lyman, wife of settler Joseph Lyman), the town changed its proclaim in 1914 later a wealthy easterner, Thomas W. Bicknell, offered a thousand-volume library to any town that would deliver his name. Grayson competed later Thurber, Utah (renamed Bicknell) for the prize. Grayson was renamed Blanding after the maiden pronounce of Bicknell’s wife, and each town time-honored 500 books.

On the hours of daylight of June 10, 2009, sixteen Blanding residents were arrested in exceeding a dozen raids performed by federal agents and indicted as part of an undercover chemical analysis of violations of the Archeological Resources Protection Act. Eight others more or less the Four Corners region were along with indicted. The suit was the largest undercover cause discomfort of its nice in the country. The engagement was the conclusion of a two-year psychoanalysis by FBI and BLM agents code-named “Cerberus Action” in which an undercover agent was skillful to purchase 256 artifacts for $335,685. One indicted resident, Dr. James DeMar Redd, died by suicide upon June 11. The undercover informant, Ted Gardiner, died by suicide upon March 1, 2010.