Historic Business

The Christmas Village downtown has been updated to include many of the historical buildings of old Brigham City. Those of you who enjoy Brigham City history may enjoy visiting and seeing the work done by Daniel Kennedy and volunteers to help preserve these memories. Some of the buildings are gone and some remain. Here are the structures paired with photos of them in earlier times. The older photos are mostly from the Compton Collection at the Merrill-Cazier Library at USU. Al

The office of Dr. R.A. Pearse immediately east of the Nichols home that became the Pearse Hospital. An accompanying news article notes its construction in 1910. Dr. Richard Armstrong Pearse (1875-1945) was born in New York where he excelled in athletics. After graduating college, he attended medical school in Denver, Colorado and graduated in 1900. He eventually moved to Ogden to practice medicine but then met Venna Nichols, the youngest daughter of Alvin and Virginia Ann Cha

Historic Business: Packer Motors Ira Packer’s father apprenticed as a blacksmith under John D. Rees in Brigham City. Ira learned blacksmithing skills from his father and was very mechanically-minded and able to understand how things worked and fix them when they didn't. Ira and his wife lived in Corinne and Ira eventually took a job at the J.A. Stewart Motor Company as a shop foreman. Eventually, the family moved to Brigham City and, after a couple of moves, bought a large, r

Historic Business: Ford in Brigham City With the changes in locations of some of our car dealerships, we thought it may be fun to look back at some of the dealerships of the past. We would love to hear the stories or any information that you may have about these pictures and places. This article will focus on Ford in Brigham City. One major contributor was Glenn Andersen. Glenn started working for Peach Motors as a young man and took over the agency in 1943, naming it Anderse

Historic businesses: Smith's Key Dates: 1911: Lorenzo Smith opens a small dry goods grocery store in Brigham City, Utah. 1932: The family business is named Smith and Son's Market. 1952: After refurbishing and expansion, the original store is reopened as Smith's Super Market. 1969: Smith's acquires its first nonfood business, the Utah-based Souvall Brothers. 1980: Having diversified its range of products and services, the company begins using the slogan, "We're not just a food