Matheson Dairy

Matheson Dairy. . , By Carolyn M. Jones and Cathy M. Maxwell, In 1955, Ivan, Lamar, and Evan Matheson put their dairy herds together and built a cinder block dairy barn near Midvalley Road and Minersville Highway. Ivan worked days as a body and fender repairman. Lamar was a mechanic. They worked early mornings, late nights, and weekends on the family farm. Evan managed the daily dairy operation. In addition to farm work, the brothers consecrated their lives in service to their neighbors. Ivan donated fields of corn to local families, Lamar snow plowed the neighbors driveways along Midvalley Road, and Evan cut and hauled wood for all in need of it. , The Matheson Dairy began selling raw milk in glass bottles at 50 cents a gallon from the garage of Evan's house in 1961. Their wives, Verda, Veda, and Louise, ran the sales room 1 hour in the morning and 2 hours in the evening. In 1962, Evan retired. Ivan moved his family from Enoch back to Midvalley. Lamar and Ivan began dairy farming full time. Many valley families and more than 300 customers from town formed carpools to purchase the milk. The dairy employed many local women to run the salesroom with Veda and Louise., In 1969, Brent Jones married Ivan's oldest daughter, Carolyn, and began farming and dairying with Lamar and Ivan. In the early 1970's, hot homemade bread and fresh brownies were sold daily by Louise, Carolyn and Lillian Grimshaw at the salesroom to raise money for the new Enoch Ward meetinghouse. The Matheson kids, Jones kids, and many neighbor kids washed 200 to 300 glass bottles each morning for $2.25 a day., A new sales room was built onto the front of the original dairy barn in 1976 for the growing dairy business. When Lamar retired in 1977, Ivan and Brent continued to sell raw milk until 1985. When Ivan retired, Brent and Carolyn and their kids carried on the sales of raw milk as the Jones Dairy until the early 1990's. When the large dairy co-op discontinued purchasing surplus milk, Brent and Carolyn extended the dairy tradition with their oldest son Brennan Jones until 1998. A downturn in the dairy industry eventually ended a 50 year legacy of dairy life in the community.