Family Unites to Honor Ancestor

In August 2006 the idea of making contributions to the Snowflake Academy Restoration Fund in memory of their progenitor was presented to the Logan Brimhall  family. During the past year many of the Brimhall families have sent what they could, and each of their dollars are recorded in the name of Logan. The family goal is to have contributed enough by the time the restoration is completed to have a special part of the building named permanently in remembrance of Logan Brimhall, a beloved father, grandfather, great grandfather and teacher.

As a student at Snowflake Academy Logan Brimhall recorded in his journal the memory of  two winters when a lady, Carrie Leigh, was responsible for making lunch for the students: “The Home Economics Department was housed on the ground level of a three story building (must have been the Academy Building). The cook stove was located at the lower end of a monstrous stone chimney that sucked the smoke the wrong way much of the time.  Carrie always sent a freshman girl to start the fire and put the carrots on to cook(warm). By the time the hungry hordes rolled down to the dining hall, the carrots were almost to boil and were well smoked. So we drank the warm water, chewed the carrots, called it a raw deal, and hurried back to class to get a little clearer understanding of some foggy idea. To this very hour, I can’t look a carrot in the top without blowing cedar bark smoke.”

After his graduation from the Academy 1914 Logan served a two year  LDS mission to the Northwestern States. Upon his return in 1916 he married his childhood sweetheart, Mary Hatch of Taylor.

Logan began to further his education at BYU soon after his marriage. In 1918 the couple moved back to Arizona where he assumed principalship of the Taylor school. The great flu epidemic of 1918 closed the schools and Logan moved his family to a cotton farm near Mesa, Arizona.

Soon the heat and misery of no air conditioning made them long for cooler climes. They moved to Vernal, Utah and purchased a 160 acre farm. They did well here and Logan was once again able to return to his education at BYU where he graduated in 1924. The family returned to Taylor, Arizona where they made their permanent home for 27 years while he taught at Snowflake Union High School until 1947.

Mr. Brimhall taught government, history, geography and many other subjects when a teacher was needed.  He also drove the school bus from Taylor to Snowflake for a few years.  He remembers “the first one (bus) was painted green and dubbed the Doodle Bug. It did resemble a big beetle with over-stuffed back pockets.”

Logan Brimhall became a much admired and beloved classroom teacher in Snowflake High School.  His philosophy was “every child must succeed in some chosen field. Every child counts, is a person who has ego, ambition and is worth as much as the next one.”

He possessed a great sense of humor and gave each student a nickname, usually something to do with a physical attribute or personality trait. He never seemed to forget the nicknames, even years later, which endeared him to his students.

Logan and Mary were the parents of 13 children, and for over 70 years their posterity, which now number in the thousands, have gathered each August on the 70 acre family ranch near Pinedale to renew and strengthen family ties and honor Logan and Mary who are no longer with them.