Hal Edison

Louis HAL Edison

1919-2023

Our handsome, elegant, kind and intelligent dad, grandpa and Gpa slipped away on Thursday, August 3 2023 just a few weeks shy of his 104th birthday. He was truly a member of the Greatest Generation -- a man who never talked about his service in WWII but who carried the lessons learned then and never passed by anyone without smiling and raising a hand of greeting.

Hal was a Cache Valley boy. Born in Logan on August 24, 1919 to Ferrall Priscilla Evans and Louis Milton Edison, he spent his youth in Hyrum near his paternal grandparents, immigrant farmers from Norway. The middle of three boys, he worshipped his older brother Bud and was in awe of his talented younger brother Monte. At age 13 during the height of the Depression, his life of working in and around grocery and drugstores began.

Drafted in 1942, Hal volunteered for paratrooper training and was assigned to the 82nd Airborne. After more than a dozen training jumps in the states, he jumped into combat zones in Sicily, Italy and Holland and served as the company clerk for the 505th Regimental Headquarters Company. The 82nd was at the forefront of the war - the first troops into Naples, Italy and Holland, and one of the first units into Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge. When the war ended, they were in Ludwigslust, Germany where they liberated a concentration camp and met up with Russian forces coming from the east. Luckily for Hal’s family, his future wife and two daughters, he missed joining D-Day -- the Normandy Invasion, because a serious auto-bicycle accident resulting in punctured lungs and broken ribs kept him in the hospital in England for a month!

Back in Logan after the war, he completed his education at Utah State Agricultural College graduating in 1947 with a BA in Business Administration. In the summer of 1948, a cute girl named Alice Nelson came to the drugstore he was managing, asking for a job. That was the beginning of a 69 year long romance that didn’t end when she passed away in 2018.

Hal worked for Drug Wholesaler McKesson and Robbins for 33 ½ years supplying drugstores throughout northern Utah, and beyond, with all their needs. A man of true integrity, he put his might, mind and strength into his work and was a loyal and trustworthy employee. He was friends with all the druggists he served and could tell you the history of all the drug stores and their owners throughout the region.

A true disciple of Christ and a faithful member of the LDS Church for his entire life, Hal had two favorite church callings. He served for 17 ½ years as executive secretary for three Bishops and he served with his beloved Alice at the Salt Lake Temple.

Hal loved his family. Nothing transcended his love for his wife, children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. And he really loved his “boys” -- Jim, William and Dave! He is survived by his daughters Carol Anne and Margaret (Jim Greenberg), by his granddaughters Jamie (William Munoz) and Kristen (Dave Kane), and his great-grandchildren Hilary, Eden, Kate, Oliver and Keira. Hal was preceded in death by his eternal love, Alice, his mother, father and his brothers.

Funeral services will be held Saturday, August 12 at 11:00 am at the Rosecrest 2nd Ward, 3101 South 2300 East. Friends and family are invited to visit Friday evening from 6:30 – 8:00 pm at Holbrook Mortuary, 3251 South 2300 East, and at the church Saturday morning from 10:00 – 10:45 prior to the service. Internment at Wasatch Lawn Memorial Park. Guestbook to post messages and tributes for the family available at HolbrookMortuary.com.

The family wishes to thank Dr. Margaret Lunt for her years of loving care as well as dad’s caregivers at home and at The Ridge. In lieu of flowers, please donate to the L. Hal and Alice Nelson Edison Aggie Family Scholarship at www.usu.edu/haledison.

Hal loved music and sweet rolls, and coke! And he greeted everyone with a song. This was the last song he sang:

If I had the wings of an angel

Over these prison walls I would fly

I would fly to the arms of my darlin’

And there I’d be willing to die.

We love you dad and already miss you more than you know!