Tuesday, November 26, 2019

 
 
 
This article appeared in the Salt Lake Tribune July 20th, 1945
My father and his five brothers were all WWII veterans.
 
 

Thursday, April 25, 2019


SAVE THE DATE! MAY 10, 6 – 9 PM FREE!
AT THE UTAH CULTURAL CELEBRATION CENTER 1355 W 3100 S, West Valley City, UT
Opening Reception with artists, light refreshments, and live entertainment by Idlewild! Join us as we play music from the period that was prevalent here in Utah. Dave Sharp - Claw-hammer Banjo, Mountain Dulcimer, Mandolin and vocals, Carol Sharp - Whistles, Tambourine, Krista Baker - Fiddle and Steve Keen - Accordion. Pioneer Folk songs, Railroad Songs, Old Time... American dance reels and several original pieces written by me in the Old Time American genre. In particular we honor the memory of my Ancestor John Sharp the Railroad Bishop. His work accomplished the Union Pacific side of the Transcontinental Railroad and all of the Southern and Central Utah Railroad completed in that time. There were other groups that also contributed greatly from the Central Pacific side of the Transcontinental Railroad and we honor their incredible contributions as well. We would like to thank the Utah Cultural Celebration Center and Music Performance Trust Funds for the continuing support of music and culture in our community.

Wednesday, April 3, 2019


Our Family has served Home and Country and made many contributions to society.

We have many veterans in our family and I have much to look up to and be proud of in looking back. I was in the Navy and my ship was the USS Ticonderoga, shown here on it’s way to Yankee Station in the Gulf of Tonkin. We made two WestPac cruises to the Tonkin Guld, and picked up Apollo 16, 17 and SkyLab 1 while I was on board her. I came home to earn two BFA's in Drawing and Painting and Sculpture, with a minor in Art History. I worked as a commercial artist in the television and aerospace industry for twenty years and later went to graduate school in sculpture and became the Business Agent of the Musicians Union for twenty plus years at Utah's local 104. My wife and I have a recording label, Idlewild Recordings that has produced 31 albums by us and I am now showing my sculpture around the region with many commissions and gallery sales.
 
 My Father Dr. Byron Sharp was a Glider Pilot in the early morning hours landing behind the beach head on D-Day in Normandy France. He flew members of the 82nd air born to help with the invasion. He later became a Phd in Geology and the best father any of us could ever have. He also had many ground breaking scientific theories and discoveries, accepted by the scientific community during and after his retirement. He worked for Energy Research and Development Agency of the United States government. My father was a wonderful Watercolorist having gone with his Uncle Mahonri Young on many trips to the Southwest. He sketched and painted alongside Uncle Hon. He met my mother Helen Elaine Spalding Sharp when visiting his Opera Singer older sister Marion when back from World War II. My mother took lessons from Aunt Marion and could sing very well and had a lovely voice as did my father who had the family talent. My mother went on to be a CEO and to form a number of non-profit corporations that championed the cause of handicapped residents in the state of Utah. She modernized care for this population in our state at the Utah State Training school in American Fork. She had many politicians and community leaders on her board and was an advisor to Governor Rampton, and Matheson. She earned many awards for her work from Jackie Kennedy, Richard Nixon and President Johnson. She pioneered the group home concept for care of these residents and became one of the leading women business persons in the state.
 
My Grandfather Dr. John Francis Sharp was the commanding officer of the medical unit during WWI in France and the Pancho Villa Campaign. He was later Chief Army Surgeon of Utah and the head surgeon at LDS Hospital. He was champion skeet shooter, owner of the Duck Club now part of the Farmington Bird Refuge. He was a personal friend of Browning the arms manufacturer, and had several custom shotguns he prized. He studied medicine in New York as well as music where he met and married Llewellyn Ferin who was an Opera singer and favorite student of Madame von Klenner. She sang in the Salt Lake Opera here in Utah. Her daughter the oldest child in front was Marion Sharp-Robinson a Fulbright in Opera and member of the Paris and San Francisco Opera Companies. Her art collection was eventually donated to the University of Utah and was the start of their Art Museum. The two oldest boys were Klenner (Klink) and Harlow (Bones). Both became medical doctors. They also played concerts on the Piano having studied many years of music as well. The little girl in front is Martha who married Wallace Toronto the president of the Chech mission to Europe during the Nazi regime and later the communist take over. She wrote a book called "A Cherry Tree grows behind the Iron Curtain." The little boy in my Grandfathers arms is Gil. He and my father were mentored by our Uncle Mahonri Young. Later Gil studied art in Paris and taught at the New York Academy alongside his Uncle Mahonri. He taught art after retirement at the Art Barn in Salt Lake for the Arts Council for many years. Gil played the Piano as well, more self taught than formal training, but he had a marvelous grand piano that sat in the front room of the Sharp family home that I heard him play for my father and I on occasion.
 
My Great Grandfather the Honorable James Sharp was a Major in the Mormon Battalion and later became, Mayor of Salt Lake, Representative and Speaker of the House for the Utah Senate, District Judge and President of the Board of Trustees at the University of Utah. His home was where the Thomas S. Monson center is today. James had three sons that all became medical doctors and his daughter Cecilia married Mahonri Young while she studied Piano in Europe and he was winning fame as the leader of the American Artists in Paris.
 
My Great Great Grandfather John Sharp had been the commanding officer, a Colonial, of the 3rd infantry of the Nauvoo Militia and operated in the field against Johnson’s Army during the Federal incursion into Utah. He was the senior partner in Sharp and Young the contracting firm that completed the Transcontinental Railroad for the Union Pacific side of the Railroad. He was a member of the Council of Fifty, as Bishop of the 20th ward in the avenues of Salt Lake, he became known as the Railroad Bishop. For a time he and his younger Brother Joseph took over from Porter Rockwell as Salt Lake Constables, when Porter Rockwell became the Federal Marshall. He also had his house on the same block as James' house and where the First Presbyterian church stands at the present time. He and his wife Jane sang in the early Tabernacle Choir and he and his brothers had been quarrymen and stone cutters before coming to Utah from Clackmannen, Scotland. He played the flute and I found some reference to some stone carvings he had made for buildings he worked on. He led the Sharp family wagon train along with 64 other families along the Mormon trail to Utah in 1849 arriving in 1850. His son James was 5 years old at the time. His father Clackmannen John, brothers, Adam and Joseph, his wife Jane and his younger sister Agnes with her husband James Patterson came along on the journey. Quarrying into the hillside in Red Butte Canyon for their first home that winter.
 
My wife’s father Leslie Hansen was a highly decorated WWII tail gunner on a B-17 in the Pacific Theater with more than two dozen air medals. He was the base photographer at Hill Air Force base for many years. Shown here with his wife Elma Snow Hansen. My wife’s brother Richard was a Lieutenant in the Army in Vietnam, riding shotgun on many supply convoys for the base he was stationed at. He never wrote about what they were doing since he did not want to worry his parents.
 
 My Uncle Colonial John Sharp, was a fighter bomber ace in WWII and the Korean War. He flew a B-26 Maurader and a night flying version of that air craft that he flew, during Korea. With many confirmed combat kills it was fascinating to hear him tell stories about some of his exploits. He was later commander of the San Francisco Air Force Base and the Fighter wing that is now stationed at Hill Force Base in Utah. He was an airline pilot for many years after his retirement and flew Air Force One for President Regan for a time as well. My Uncle Gil was a lieutenant in the house to house fighting across Europe during WWII and later an artist that taught art at the New York Academy alongside Uncle Mahonri Young. Uncles Klenner and Harlow Sharp were medical doctors, like their father, aboard Naval Ships in the Pacific. Rod Heath a Brother in law was an Executive Officer on a cruiser in the Pacific during WWII as well. I'm fortunate to have such incredible examples of intelligent, artistic and musical family. Singing was as natural as breathing and creativity, education and curiosity was highly prized as a precious commodity. None of us are war like or aggressive, but when the time came we answered the call of community, home and country, and our contributions in peace time, were perhaps, greater still.