Cafe owner survies ToddKats’ ambush

We are flying through Utah at the moment. Since the last posting we (that’s me and Todd Witcher, ToddKats for bloggage purposes) talked to Dell Hollingshead, owner of Arshel’s Café at 711 North Main Streat in Beaver, Utah. Or Beaver City, Utah. Sign out front says Beaver City. Folks say Beaver. It’s a the great Beaver City or Beaver conundrum.

Hollingshead is 63 ½ years old, which means he’s 12 years younger than Arshel’s Café. The café has been in the family for “at least 75 years,” he tells us. It sits across Main Street, just a couple of cartwheels, from the state-operated liquor store.

Dell is bemused at first, amused eventually, at the site of ToddKats wading into his eatery. This was an interview not set up in advance. I called the Beaver City or Beaver librarian to ask who in town would be able to speak with authority about the city. She led us to Dell, who told us that the town – nor the whole state of Utah -- was not as right-wing wacky as the rest of the country seems to believe. But it is conservative, certainly, more prone to vote for traditional values (he seems to wince when he says “family values,” a trite term even in Beaver City or Beaver) rather than the economy or even national security. They don’t condone such controversial aspects of their regional culture, such as the practice of polygamy, but they do understand the lifestyle. Dell’s great-grandfather was a polygamist.

Beaver is a proud little place, sharing that trait with seemingly every township on this route. It is the birthplace of Butch Cassidy and Filo Farnsworth, the man who invented the TV.

In his honor, Beaver still has a fully operational television set.

Cheap shot. Sorry.

Recently Dell was asked to climb atop the roof of a Filo’s old home, which is being renovated as a local landmark, to clear off some old, worthless bricks. Why was he selected? Dell laughed and said, “I was the youngest one there.”