Parade Grand Marshals Dean, Nancy Callahan important part of Royal

ROYAL CITY - With a theme of "Royal's 5 Decades", the Summerfest organization has chosen a five-decade couple - Dean and Nancy Callahan - as grand marshals for the parade on July 9.

"I can hardly wait to see their grand marshal entry," Summerfest member Leslie Fanning said. "A few years ago, Dean assigned his granddaughter to make a float for the parade representing all their businesses. It was wonderful, like a train, and even had a small dairy calf that Dean gave away to a child who entered a drawing."

One of those businesses is Callahan's Manufacturing, which has been of great service to the community through the production of farm implements since 1969. No greater has that service been than in 1980.

On May 18, a date keenly remembered by most who were alive then, Mt. St. Helens erupted and dumped its ash on Royal Slope fields of mowed hay. Growers needed help in a hurry, and Dean invented a machine to shake off the powdery substance.

"I got the idea from a farmer by the name of Taylor Phillips," Dean said. "We built 30 in a week. They were passing them around and going through everybody's hay."

According to Dean, the machines were needed over a period of about two weeks for only that year. Later, he said, all of them went to the scrap heap, except for one that farmer Dave Miller maintains as a museum piece.

Dean was a Nampa, Idaho boy of 17 when he came to his grandfather Joe Callahan's farm in 1963 for a summer job. It was the first year of water in the high canal, and Grandpa Joe had just opened a unit of land. Dean's job was changing hand-line sprinklers.

The Royal City of that year, as Dean recalls, had a grocery store with a post office within, a restaurant, Jerry's Chevron, Sun Basin Growers and a small real estate office. The first phase of the Red Rock School went up about that time.

"I liked it here, and I never went back," Dean said.

One good reason to like it here was a 16-year-old, jet-black-haired girl by the name of Nancy Hempel of Hiawatha Valley. Dean spotted her hoeing beets on his uncle Everett Callahan's farm.

"I was good at it," Nancy said. "I also pulled weeds off the back of a potato digger."

But it was probably not Nancy's prowess as a field hand that caught Dean's attention. More likely it was her deep summertime tan. He couldn't wait to ask her out.

"Our first date was the Grant County Fair," Nancy recalled.

"Neither of us had ever been on a date," Dean said.

Dean was 19 and Nancy 18 when they married at the LDS temple in Salt Lake City in 1965. They started out life together content with Dean's income from his Grandpa Joe's farm.

However,  life changed dramatically late in 1968 when Joe sold his farm and headed to Canada with Everett to open up new land. Dean's job was gone.

The Callahans moved in to Royal City, where Dean took a job as a mechanic for Royal City Truck and Tractor. Nine months later the Callahans opened Callahan's Service, which was a repair shop and manufacturing place. It became Callahan's Manufacturing in the mid-1970s.

Farming eventually became a big part of the Callahan operation. Today it includes more than 3,000 acres and a dairy unit of 1,500 cows. Under the leadership of son Kelly, it won a national forage quality award earlier this year.

In 2009, the Callahans were chosen National Entrepreneur of the Year by former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich's American Solutions. They traveled to Washington, D.C. to receive their honor.

Several members of the family are tied to the operation. The Callahans have five children, 14 grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

The Callahans are a gracious couple and are honored to have been chosen grand marshals, but they are a humble pair.

"It's a little shocking to be chosen," Nancy said. "I had no idea we were in the running. There are people who are more deserving."

"I thought you had to be old to do that," said the 65-year-old Dean. "I still like fast cars and drag racing. I don't think I'll ever grow up."

Dean is a fully-involved member of the community's lone car club, DTP Racing, Nancy noted.

"He has a 1967 Camaro that's pretty fast," she said. "All of the members are young guys. He's the only old one."

Nancy confirms that Dean had a "crazy" side when she met him and still has.

"I had to do his homework so he could graduate," she said. "I still do his paper work. That's my job."

According to Fanning, community involvement is what attracted the parade committee to the Callahans. Dean has served on the city council. Nancy wrote a column for the now-defunct Royal Review and is a precinct committeewoman.

"Dean and Nancy have been huge supporters of the Chamber of Commerce, Summerfest and just about anything going on in Royal City," Fanning said. "Dean and Nancy are integrally involved in Lions Club and the DTP racing venue."

When one needs a hand, Fanning said, there is no one better to turn to than the Callahans. They work best under pressure, she said, citing the recent circus visit to town as an example.

The person who was to mow the circus venue had a motor home breakdown and was not certain to make it on time. Fanning called the Callahans, who were in Spokane, and they directed an office employee to send someone to mow.

"Dean and Nancy are always available to help," Fanning said.