|
|||
  
 
 |
By Amber Bailey AMALGA -- If you visit you'll find pine-crested mountains with crystal streams flowing down an age-old river, its banks lined with brush and willows along patches of sagebrush and meadows. Does it sound picturesque? Distant? Well, it's not. Just go north on Highway 91 and turn left at the Smithfield Implement Co.. and about eight miles later you'll be there -- in Amalga. Where? Amalga is a small agricultural community tucked three miles west of neighboring Smithfield. It was first settled in 1860 and named Amalgamated. Its name came from the Amalgamated Sugar Co., when it built its sugar beet processing plant there. Later its name was shorted to Amalga. Though now it's known for its cheese. Amalga's Cache Valley Cheese plant holds the record as "second-place Swiss" in the U.S. Championship Cheese Contest for 2003. It could be considered Amalga's claim to fame, said City Councilman Jerry Munk. There are only two other businesses in town: Terry's Fiberglass & Paint and Moonlight Diesel. There is no main street lined with the usual shops and restaurants. Instead, "downtown" consists of Sugar Park, a town hall and an LDS stake center. So why would any of the town's approximately 450 residents choose to live there? "It's a real dairy community," Munk said. "[And] with a town of 400 people, you know everyone,"‘ he said. Although a small town does have its shortcomings. Amalga doesn't have some of the same comforts as other residents in Cache Valley. They don't have a sewer system; instead they need a septic tank. "You have to drive 10 miles to town to go to a movie," Munk said. In today's world, a town like this may seem old-fashioned. Amalga is an exception.
NW |
||