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Roots go deep in tiny, close-knit Newton By
Katrina Cartwright NEWTON -- Living in a small town is very different from living in a big city, as nearly any resident here will tell you. According to the 2000 census, Newton has 699 residents and is only 0.8 square mile in size. It ranks 201st out of 235 cities and towns in Utah in land area, and 89th out of 235 by population, according to state statistics. To Shirley Fabricius, who was born and raised in Smithfield and has lived in Newton for 40 years, small towns are better than cities because they feel safer and people care more about each other. "If there's a problem, people rally around each other and care about each other," she says. "I feel safer here than in a big city." Max Cooley was born in Newton and has lived there his whole life. He says the town has a history of everybody knowing everybody and people helping each other. "My father's father's father lived here," he says. "The people here know everyone, and everything's centered around the town. If somebody runs into trouble, pretty soon the whole neighborhood is down helping." Carol Milligan, born and raised in Cache Junction, moved to Newton to restore an ancestral home from 1875 after living in cities for 40 years because she missed the small-town feel. "I wanted to live a simpler, slower-paced life and live in a smaller community," she says. "The benefits are the community service. Everybody comes and helps because it's their community: their library, their town council, their fire department. It's very civic-minded. "The larger a city gets, the harder it is to keep the community camaraderie. People solve problems together and achieve great things. People care about each other. It's a nice lifestyle." Gil Miller, who lives in Logan but works with the Town Council, says people come to Newton seeking a certain lifestyle. "Almost everyone in town has a job outside of Newton now," he says. "It's a bedroom community with a rural feel." Mark Rigby, chairman of the Planning and Zoning Commission, agrees that people like the rural feeling of Newton. "It's pretty hard to have a horse in Logan City, and they can still do it here," he says. Another reason people say they liked growing up and raising their children in Newton is because it teaches hard work. "One thing that I really liked was that my children growing up could go out in the field with the farmers and learn how to work," Fabricius says. "If you're raised on a farm, you know how to get up early and work hard and how to appreciate things." Cooley remembers when he was in the fourth and fifth grade he used to herd 50 to 60 cows all day by himself, which taught him responsibility. One thing Fabricius says is both good and bad about living in Newton is being farther away from things. "In a way, maybe that's good because if you don't get in as often, you learn how to save a little more," she says. "It helps that if you are out of something you can run to a neighbor. "But if you're sick or need to get to a doctor quick, then it's a bad thing to live far away. My husband fell in the backyard and ended up being paralyzed. It would have been better to be closer to a doctor." Cooley remembers when the town store had just about everything anyone needed. "You could get anything you wanted at any time of year. "We're still pretty self-sufficient. If we had a catastrophe, I'd rather be here than anywhere else because we can pretty much take care of ourselves." Perhaps living in Newton can be summed up by Milligan's story of the volunteer fire department. "One night, the fire alarm went off," she says. "They were all out harvesting and working in the fields. They came in tractors to fight the fire. I wish I would have had my camera with me that night. It was quite a sight. "You don't find that in big cities."
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