Up wintry Park Avenue and Main Street crawled my dad’s little coupe loaded with four kids in the back seat. Coal smoke wafting down Empire Canyon filled the cold, cloudy sky and permeated the car. We parked by huge, soot crested snow banks and unloaded in front of Grandpa’s house. Climbing the stairs, we admired 6-foot icicles hanging from the porch.Inside, cold vanished as we greeted the big, old kitchen coal stove. Nana was dressed in full aprons and Grandpa stood nearby in an immaculate, starched white shirt and tie. She somehow cooked turkey, dinner rolls, multiple pies and more in and on that range, all at once. The 1900 house was far from modern and the floor crooked but oh, the sights and aromas in that old house! In the dining room, the table was set to perfection with Nana’s china and simple seasonal décor.Just in time for dinner, my hero young uncle came home from a morning of skiing, Head Standards in tow. Nana’s brother, John Baxter, a lifelong bachelor who lived next door, completed our perfect dinner group of 10. I couldn’t wait to sit down and eat!Once at the table, we kids were awed at the array of turkey, all the trimmings and unique-to-us extras on the crowded table. Prayer invoked thanks and blessings on us and our national leaders — especially the Kennedys. We were conservative union Democrats like everyone else in town and assumed the Kennedys were, too.Lively table talk varied between family affairs, politics, town events, mining reports and news from the newly opened ski area. Mom and Nana chatted, old miners Grandpa and John dined in silent satisfaction, and the kids chattered while going for seconds and thirds.After-dinner guests were Uncle Claude and his brood from up the canyon. Claude had been a war hero and shift boss at the mine, and he told fascinating, profane stories.  Hand washing a mountain of dishes in the adjacent kitchen (this was a four-room house), my mother winced but everyone in the living room listened intently. There was no TV to dilute the conversation and no early Christmas decorations.Dessert included pumpkin and mincemeat pies and Scottish shortbread. Grandpa tended the parlor stove, occasionally throwing in a fresh lump of coal. Best heat ever. Fire glowed through little mica windows in the door and radiated warmth.Later, after long farewells, we were homeward bound, sliding down Main Street in a freezing car yet to warm up, headlights blinded by falling snow, tires crunching under the town’s single strand of colored lights that crisscrossed Main. Another Thanksgiving for the books was already over.Paul WilliamsThe post What an old-time Park City Thanksgiving was like appeared first on Park Record.