Coming Up in The Chronicle

 COMING UP in The Payson Chronicle—Highways Through The Heart Of Central Utah: The Roadways That Shaped Payson And Santaquin

Few forces have reshaped the economic and social life of central Utah as profoundly as the state and federal highway systems. In communities like Payson and Santaquin, highways and freeways have not just carried cars and trucks — they have carried livelihoods, commerce, culture, and opportunity. From the first graded state roads that connected farm towns to markets, to the roaring interstate that today moves thousands of vehicles daily, the story of central Utah’s roadways is inseparable from the story of its people.

 

PHOTOS: Farming in his blood, Myron Olson (pictured, right, standing in Santaquin pasture in August 1961) carried on the agrarian tradition he inherited from both his father Vivan Olson (pictured, left) and his maternal York and Carter family lines on a small farm in Santaquin. With his Chicagoan wife Ethel Walin Olson and the couple’s children a home and farm were built on land that, today, is part of the Macey's grocery store parking lot. Fruit trees, blackberry and raspberry bushes, grape vines, and vegetable gardens that were rotated and replanted with the changing seasons were spread out in plots and groves on the Olson family property. The farm flourished along what once was a busy stretch of Highway 6 that was later outpaced with the arrival of Interstate 15. The family harvested the fruits of their labor and sold them from a stand set up just steps from their home.

 

A few blocks west of the Olson family farm was Verl Wall’s produce stand. A permanent structure with a cooler was built in 1988 next to his home along the highway of East Main Street, or SR 198. The business was called Grandpa V’s Family Fruit Stand (Verl is pictured in front of the fresh produce company’s sign). Locally grown fruit and vegetables fed thousands of new and repeat customers. Consistent use of this well-traveled roadway kept the fruit stand in the sight of travelers and customers who had become accustomed to the stop off I-15. The modernized stand thrived until its closure following the final harvest of 2020 and Verl Wall’s retirement.