When Peach Day was held in Farmington

The north end of Farmington City, as viewed from the top of Farmington Canyon.  --Photo by Roger Arave.

  PEACH Days is Brigham City’s premier annual celebration and dates back to 1904. This year’s celebration is set for Sept. 9-12. However, strangely, the event hasn’t always been held in Brigham City.

“Annual Peach Day to be held at Lagoon Sept. 12^th” was an Aug. 24, 1923 headline in the Standard-Examiner.

So, the 19^th annual Peach Day was actually held in Farmington that year, some 43 miles away from Brigham City.

Why was the event held at Lagoon?

The story stated that the State Board of Health wanted to call off Peach Day entirely in 1923 for health reasons. There was a lot of sickness in the town.

“While the health condition is rapidly improving in Brigham, the drinking water made pure and the sanitary conditions of the city brought to an almost perfect condition, it is possible that the visitors may be somewhat endangered by coming in contact with sickness in visiting with relatives here, at their homes,” the story stated.

“So rather than bring thousands of people here, it was decided to take Peach Day to where there is no contagion, and where the mingling of thousands of people together can have no serious results,” the story continued.

Peaches were shipped by rail, in a refrigerator car, from Brigham City to Lagoon. The railroad also featured special rates for passengers.

Peach Day returned to Brigham City the following year, in 1924 and every year thereafter, later expanding to a multiple day event.

More historical tidbits:

--‘”Crazy people shipped from Farmington: Sheriff Abbott takes peculiar methods to rid Davis County of unwelcome citizens,” was an April 4, 1902 Standard headline.

According to the story, the Farmington Sheriff had put a mentally unstable family on a train to Ogden.

“As a result of his misdirected efforts, Ogden City is burdened with a man and wife, both demented, and their three children,” the story stated.

Police Chief Browning of Ogden initially refused to have anything to do with the family. So, the railroad conductors took the family from the depot and left them at the corner of Lincoln and 25^th Street. The mother soon became violent several times in the area and her actions attracted a crowd. Finally, a few hours later the two police leaders communicated and found a solution to what to do with the family, through the story doesn’t mention what that was.

-“Wolves attack sheep and driven off only after two men use their rifles” was a Feb. 14, 1918 Standard headline.

A marauding band of wolves in the area just north of South Fork Canyon, east of Huntsville, produced heavy losses of sheep in the area that winter.

John Coffin and Louis Allen of Huntsville had to shoot several wolves and move in on the rest, before they were driven away. The men said the pack showed little fear of them. The bounty for Utah wolves in 1918 was $50.

The story stated this was the first time the northern part of Utah had suffered a wolf problem recently. Most of the recent wolf problem had been centered in southern Utah.

-A huge cloudburst on Aug. 6, 1912 in Bair Canyon, east of Fruit Heights, cut a 20-foot-deep gorge in sections of the canyon.

 (-Originally published on-line on Sept. 3, 2015 in the Ogden Standard-Examiner, by Lynn Arave.)

-NOTE: The author, Lynn Arave, is available to speak to groups, clubs, classes or other organizations about Utah history at no charge. He can be contacted by email at: lynnarave@comcast.net

The Roots of ‘Peach Days,’ ‘Tomato Days’

                         The Brigham City LDS Temple.


“PEACH Days,” the premier annual celebration by Brigham City, is set for Sept. 3-6 this year (2014).The first Peach Days event was held in 1904,to celebrate "an abundance of the best peaches in Utah."“Peach Day crowds at Brigham” was a Sept. 20, 1911 headline in the Ogden Standard-Examiner. By then, the event had hit its stride, when some 400 people boarded the Oregon Short Line Train at Ogden to travel to Brigham City for the festivities. In all, some 1,500 people were riding the rails from the south to Box Elder County’s largest city.Events held for the two-day event back in 1911 (Wednesday-Thursday timeline) included: a parade, balloon ascension, a baseball game, wrestling match, musical concert, moving pictures exhibition, dancing and horticultural judging.A highlight of the festivities were free peaches and other fruit – available in abundance – to visitors at the city park and various stores in town.By 1912, Peach Days had welcomed the automobile age and many Weber County visitors traveled north by car. However, there were also at least five traffic accidents reported en route to Peach Days, between Brigham City and Ogden.According to the Standard of Sept. 18, 1913, at least 10,000 people attended Peach Days.“A delegation of Commercial Club members met the first train at the station and escorted the visitors to the city park,” the Standard reported of the celebration 101 years ago. “Huge piles of luscious peaches, with a score of pretty girls to serve them, awaited the visitors.”300 barrels of free peaches were given out that year. Besides baseball games in 1913, there were also various horse races. Festivities ended with a dance.

-Switching to another historical celebration:Hooper City’s annual Farm Bureau Day/Tomato Days, dates back to 1926.About 2,000 people were reported to have attended the premiere event, 88 years ago.George Parker headed the committee to organize the first celebration, which included a lecture on feeding beef and dairy cattle, chariot races and other pulling and riding competitions.A free melon bust was also featured and “Visit Hooper on Labor Day” was the slogan organizers wanted the public to remember. Team pulling contests and horseshoe pitching competitions highlighted events at Hooper on Sept. 5, 1927, in its second annual celebrationCecil Newey, Robert Purdy and John Wilson, some of Utah’s best horseshoe pitchers, gave a demonstration of their skill at the event.Horse races, foot races, a tug-of-war, dance and various agricultural judging were other events held.(“Tomato Days” this year is Saturday, Aug. 30 and Monday, Sept. 1, with a rodeo, farmers market, 5K run/walk, parade, craft fair and more.)

-Also, earlier in 1926, the Hooper Farm Bureau had staged a very unusual “Mock Wedding Party Feature,” according to a headline in the Standard of Feb. 26 that year.A mock marriage between “Joshua Farmer” (played by Mrs. Dale Russell) and “Madelda Farm Bureau” (portrayed by Les Stoddard) was the highlight of the banquet/dance, attended by 75 couples.John Belnap impersonated a minister, with a wedding march after the “ceremony.”James K. Widdison was the toastmaster of the evening and old time dances followed the banquet.

                The center of Hooper today, looking north along 5900 West.

(-Originally published by Lynn Arave on August 29, 2014 in the Ogden Standard-Examiner.)

-NOTE: The author, Lynn Arave, is available to speak to groups, clubs, classes or other organizations about Utah history at no charge. He can be contacted by email at: lynnarave@comcast.net