Remember When From the Past--Peerless Cleaners

Remember When
Thursday, July 03,  2008
Kenna Holm

PEERLESS CLEANERS

    I remember thinking about the old Peerless Cleaners we had here in town.  I called Shirlene (Peery) Wood to ask her what she remembered about it because she was best friends with Gerry (Lunt) Snyder whose parents owned it.  She in turn called Gerry in Kanab and then Gerry called me.
We had such a fun time talking about the “good old days.’
    VerDel and Laska Lunt moved here from Cedar City where Del was a manager of a large laundry and cleaners.  They bought the business that was on about 165 West Utah Avenue from a Mr. and Mrs. Tiegen in 1941.
    The Lunt’s had three children who all helped with the business. They were Melvin, Patty, and Gerry.  Melvin lives in Levan and Patty who was married to LaVell Gasser has been deceased for many years.
    At that time, there was only one other cleaners in Payson and that was Hill’s Cleaners on Main Street.  The Lunts lived in the west side of the business. They had a kitchen, living room, and one bedroom upstairs and two downstairs.  In the basement was a room with the furnace in it and Del would have to go down and throw coal in so they would have steam for the cleaners.  There was also a room for the coal.
    The reception area was in the little front part on the east side.  The back room held two presses and the spotting table.  He built a shed out back that held the washers.
    Gerry said when she was in about the sixth grade (and I won’t say how long ago that was) they had a fire and all of the neighbors were running and helping them get the clothes out.  It only burned the downstairs but all of the clothes smelled like smoke.  Del did get burned in that fire.
Gerry remembers pants only costing 55 cents to clean (boy that would be nice now) and her dad used to pick up and deliver cleaning all over Santaquin, Eureka, Salem, and Payson. (Couldn’t  afford that these days with the price of gas)

    In 1953 they sold the business to Ronal and Zella Crump.  They had an office on the north side of the building and the cleaners on the East.  Zella always had geraniums in the windows.
    Zella and Ronal worked together with her doing the repairs and him doing the cleaning.  They had big irons they used to press with.
    In those days, it seemed like pleated skirts were all the rage and I guess they were not easy to press.  Ronnie remembers that often one of his sisters skirts would have to be repressed.
    They loved the business and made a sufficient livingwith it for nine years after which Ronal began working as a bookkeeper of Page’s in Spanish Fork.. He later worked for Payson City as the city recorder.  Zella worked and retired from First Security Bank.
    The shed that the Lunts had built out back had always held all of the old heavy equipment and other junk.  One year the police decided to render other services to the community that was above and beyond the call of duty.  They supported the beautification program in the city.  They launched a program to rid the town of old abandoned automobiles and such. They could get a whole whopping $5.00 for each car and different prices for other junk.  Money from these sales went
toward building a new police building.
    At that time, the Crumps had given up the cleaning business because of all the coin operated dry cleaning and wash and wear clothing that was becoming popular.   So the building and the contents were removed from the premises.
Now the Lunts and the Crumps are gone but isn’t it fun to remember when?