Reunions column for Iron County Today and Nelson Reunion 2025

Reunions to Reconnect

by Sara Penny, CCAC Vice President

July is a popular month for family reunions. Connecting the younger children with their family heritage is a daunting task. How do you capture your grandparents and parents in a few words to share? What do you want your family to remember? What is best forgotten?

I joke I am related to most of Southern Utah from before 1960. My father's family is the Nelsons in Cedar City and my mother's family is the Hafens in St. George. Both families have a plethora of progeny. The best part of reunions for me is visiting with relatives and remembering the past. It is also fun to meet the younger members of the family and hear their stories.

Getting older has the advantage of realizing how much the world has changed and how lucky I am to see it. I started writing this while waiting for the 4th of July parade to start. The parade just started with two of the red SUU helicopters flying above Main Street. Just think of how air travel has changed our lives. Friends and family are traveling the world with much greater ease than when I was a child in the 50s.

How do you explain to a modern child how much daily life has changed? My grandparents had an even bigger transition. My Grandma Hafen told me about electricity coming to St. George when she was a child. Her family thought electric light was a miracle. It really is amazing to flip a switch and have light. At our Nelson reunion we heard about my father's family getting their first car when he was 12 and that he drove his siblings into Cedar City from the valley farm to school. The road was probably a dirt road in 1928 and the distance was five miles.

Though many things change, we are still enjoying the classics. Shakespeare’s plays seem particularly relevant. Watching Marc Antony make a series of very poor life choices is excruciating. Cleopatra in the current Utah Shakespeare Festival is a force of nature. Strong women have guided my life. How can we use the lessons from our own family histories and great literature to help guide modern children so they make better choices?

At a recent Arts Council meeting we were thinking of books for the Literary Group for next season. What great fiction and nonfiction books would you recommend? Send suggestions to cedarcityartscouncil@gmail.com. The tricky bit is a book that is engaging, but of broad appeal.

I suggested The Women by Kristin Hannah. It is an engaging and emotional odyssey with a Vietnam era nurse.The transition from socialite to combat nurse makes it a compelling book. Dealing with PTSD as her parents devalue her service is another gutcheck. Sometimes it is through the family stories, theater, and literature that we can understand each other and ourselves.

For the writers out there this is a reminder from Gabino Iglesias: "Many people have a book in them, but it takes a special kind of freak to leave the Land of Laziness, cross the Plains of Procrastination and Insecurity Mountain, find the Blade of No One Made You Do This, and use it to cut your chest open and yank that book out."

Share your stories at the reunions. Write your stories. You have unique perspectives that are worth sharing.

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From Sara Nelson Penny for the 2025 Nelson reunion.

I think better through writing. Corrections welcome. It was good to visit with cousins, Aunt Luana, and meet some of the next generation. What a great family.

Motto for Nelsons could be Service

Both of our parents did an incredible amount of service for Cedar City, the university and Iron County.

I know many of you give service through local organizations like the Lions Club, Arts Council, the Shakespeare Festival and now two of you are running for Mayor. Good luck to Steve in Cedar and Katherine in Enoch as they tackle these campaigns.

Howard Roice Nelson was the eldest son of Bengt and Emma Nelson. He was born in 1916.

He worked hard from the time he could walk. There were always chores to do.

Emma was adamant about education and Howard graduated from Utah State University in agriculture and art.

In addition to the farm work he ran the Nelson Packing Company from 1940s to the mid-60s. He and his team provided meat for southwest Utah during World War II up until the company was closed because the federal government wanted him to rebuild to new specifications which were not financially possible.

He loved the Rotary Club and it was fun to go with him on daughter's day. We sang Smiles with Win Seegmiller playing piano. Our daughter sent me a photo of a Rotary meeting plaque in Japan at their hotel. We had dinner guests from all over the world because of Rotary and that is part of why Roice and I have felt comfortable as global citizens.

As a member of the Iron County Planning Commission Howard worked to balance the needs of agriculture and growth.

Howard and Pauline Hafen married in 1948. She was from St. George and had a career in business, first with Loren Whetten's accounting firm, then with Dixie Leavitt Insurance. She went back to SUU for a Business degree when I was in middle school. She used to do a massive open house at Christmas which some of you will remember with lots of food and Laurel and Hardy movies in the basement.

She took me to Bowling Green, Ohio when I was a sophomore to get a Master's Degree in Business Education. She was on the faculty for Business Education for many years and eventually became Assistant Provost. After her stroke in 1985 Howard took care of her until he died of cancer in 1996. Pauline died in 2003 from heart problems.

Roice is my older brother and he is currently on an LDS mission in Frankfurt Germany with Andrea. Between them they have 10 children. Roice was a transformational force in the development of oil exploration after graduating from the University of Utah. He came up with an idea of three dimensional seismic graphing which is involved in locating new oil locations. He has traveled the world. His current project is using lightning strike data to find oil.

Roice's children with his first wife Marti are Paul who is a rocket scientist in Logan, Sara who is a Vice President with Expedia, Rob and Roice who work at General Electric in computers, Melanie helped her husband establish a dental practice in San Antonio, and Ben works in alternate energy in Iowa. Andrea's children live in Seattle, Salt Lake, and Virginia. Lots of grandchildren with lots of adventures.

I went to the University of Utah and met my husband Des Penny there. I was working as a secretary in the Civil Engineering Department because of the financial setbacks after the Meat Packing Company closed.

Des was from Limerick, Ireland. We graduated on June 7, 1975 and married the next Saturday on June 14, 1975 in Cedar City. That meant Des' parents and his little brother could pack a lot into their trip from Ireland. Aunt Mary Mae made our wedding cake with pink roses.

My degree was in Communications with a music minor. I have played violin since age 8 when I started with Roy L. Halversen.

We lived in Salt Lake, Cork Ireland, Carlisle Pennsylvania, and Beaumont Texas before moving to Cedar in 1982. Des helped develop the Physics and Engineering programs at SUU. Engineering went from a two year program to a four year accredited degree. He was a talented actor and was in several plays including being Professor Higgins in My Fair Lady and Koko in the Mikado. I miss him terribly since he died in 2021 from cancer.

I have helped establish the Music Festivals in Cedar City, helped build the Orchestra of Southern Utah, and currently serve as Vice President for the Cedar City Arts Council.

We have two children. Bridget and her husband Justin live in Centerville. She currently works as a marketing director for a financial advisory firm. She recently directed Suessical for a local elementary school. One of the fun moments was having the cast that had their show cancelled because of Covid come back for an informal performance now they are in high school. So fun. They have four children who are all doing well.

Our son Brian is a sound engineer and lives in Peekskill, New York. He is helping raise his girlfriends' three boys and is currently an executive with a cybersecurity firm.