Memories of My Dad (2.22.25)

A lunch of Indian thali in Logan, Utah?  On February 22, 2025, Dave and I drove to Logan, Utah, as a casual, Saturday outing.  We stopped by the Bluebird Cafe for lunch and learned, to our sorrow, that it had closed, after more than 100 years of serving dinners, shakes, and homemade chocolates.  

 

I immediately thought of my dad, Grant Calder, and how he stopped by "The Bluebird" often as a student at Logan's Utah State University in the 1930s.  

Dad was a friendly, popular student who edited the college yearbook, was a Sigma Chi fraternity man, and was a member of the debate and track teams. 

All his life, Dad identified as an Aggie from Utah State.  Dad took a class in ice cream making at Utah State, and, over the years, he made many gallons of homemade ice cream.  His devotion to his ice cream included flying to Bangkok, Thailand and bringing home frozen raspberries from the Army BX there, to flavor his ice cream, when we lived in Rangoon, Burma.  Dad also made good friends at Utah State, including Lucy Beth Cardon, who became the wife of our Utah governor, Cal Rampton.  Dad paid Utah State tuition for his three cute Hamilton cousins who couldn't afford college.  One of them, Ruth, became the wife of James Faust, of the LDS First Presidency.

I spent a week at Utah State as a high school student attending Girls State (I was, as I recall, elected County Recorder, the officer who handles real estate records).  Another connection, over the years, has been attending the Logan Temple.  For several summers, I attended the Logan opera festival with my mother, after Dad died, and I recall attending a temple session with Mom while we were there.

With The Bluebird closed this February, Dave and I checked our Google restaurants map for an alternative.  A top-rated spot was "Himalayan Flavor" with the recommendation, "Loved the curry, korma, and vindaloo dishes, and their naan was fabulous."  The food was delicious, but it seemed strange to eat spicy, exotic dishes while visiting this town that reminds me so much of my father.  Dad notoriously drove hundreds of miles across Europe so he could eat hamburgers at a U.S. army base rather than French cuisine!  When we drove through Russia in the 1960s, he ate steak and plum ice cream for ten days straight, since he couldn't abide anything more exotic from the standard Russian Intourist menu!

Dave and I finished our outing with a drive home through beautiful, snow-covered Sardine Canyon.  I was nourished by my memories, as well as by the thali.