Early on the evening of Saturday, August 14, 1982, a car full of young people and a pickup truck met head-on on Arbon Valley Road, the road between the valley and Pocatello. A 13-year-old boy from May, Idaho, Harley Hatch, was killed. Brett Lusk, 13, of Arbon Valley, was badly hurt and died nine days later. The Idaho State Journal in Pocatello followed the story in short reports over the next week and a half.
The first word came in the Sunday paper of August 15, under the heading "Crash Kills One Near Arbon". Idaho State Police had no names yet. According to the troopers, the wreck had killed one person and injured others. They placed it on a Power County road roughly two miles north of Arbon, and their early view was that the pickup and the car, traveling in opposite directions, had each strayed over the middle of the road. That was all the police had given the paper before it went to press.
Monday's paper had the names. The car was driven by Drew Thomas Lusk, and the pickup by Lee J. Clark, 20, of Inkom. Police put the time at about 6:45 p.m. and the place on Arbon Valley Road, where the road went over a small rise. Riding in the car were Harley Hatch and DaNell Hatch, 16, both of May; Brett Lusk and Ross Lusk, 15; and Lonnie Malan, 13, and Jess Malan, 16. Harley was the son of Mr. and Mrs. William L. Hatch. Brett had head injuries and was in intensive care at Pocatello Regional Medical Center. Brett's obituary of August 25 shows that Drew and Ross were his brothers.
The reports do not all agree. The paper put the crash two miles north of Arbon on August 15, and four miles south of Mink Creek on August 16. It gave the number of people in the car as seven on one day and eight on another, and Drew's age as 17 and then 16. The early reports listed the Lusk boys as of Pocatello; the later ones said Arbon Valley. These pages do not settle which is right, and no later report of what the investigation found has turned up.
The Journal's reports of August 17 and 18 still listed Brett in critical condition. He died on the afternoon of Monday, August 23. A short notice the next day named him as the son of Mr. and Mrs. Steve Lusk of Arbon Valley.
His obituary appeared on August 25. It gave his full name as Brett Wayne Lusk and his birth as November 12, 1968, in Pocatello. His parents were Stephen Thomas and CaroLynne Hatch Lusk, and Arbon had been his home from the start; the obituary said he "had resided in and loved Arbon all his life." Farming was already part of his life, alongside his father, his grandfather and an uncle. Away from the fields he rode with the Idaho Junior Rodeo Association and wrestled with the Arbon Valley Wrestlers, and he cared for horses, hunting, fishing and the outdoors. In the Arbon Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints he held the office of deacon, and his home teaching companion was his grandfather. That autumn was to be his eighth-grade year, at William Thomas Middle School in American Falls. He left his parents; three brothers, Drew Thomas, Ross Shawn and Jared William Lusk, all of Arbon Valley; and two sets of grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Dave Lusk of Arbon Valley and Mr. and Mrs. William M. Hatch of the Pahsimeroi Valley.
The family set the funeral for Thursday, August 26, at 11:30 a.m. at the Pocatello LDS Stake Center. David L. Bird, who presided over the Arbon branch, was to lead it, and burial was planned for the Arbon Valley Cemetery. No report of the service itself has been found.
Brett's father was Steve Lusk, son of David Wayne and Bette Lusk. Steve Lusk served nearly forty-seven years as the Power County highway district foreman at Arbon, keeping the valley's roads open. Brett's grandfather Dave Lusk ran the Lusk Loop ranch that the Lusk family had held since homestead days.
Some things the papers leave out. They do not say where the young people were going, how the Hatch children of May came to be in the car, or whether they were kin to Brett's mother, CaroLynne Hatch Lusk, whose parents lived in the Pahsimeroi Valley. Nothing is known here of the Malan boys or of Lee Clark beyond the names and towns printed.
On this site: the Lusk family's story is told on the Lusk family page, the Arbon branch Brett belonged to appears in The Arbon LDS branch in the papers, 1976–1998, and other accidents and losses in the valley are gathered in the Stories of the valley's tragedies.
The story as reported
Idaho State Journal, August 16, 1982, page 9. The original article is under copyright; this is our own report of what it said.
Monday's Journal gave the name of the boy who died on Arbon Valley Road on Saturday evening, August 14: Harley Hatch, 13, from May, Idaho. The Journal printed the report together with news of a second, unrelated fatal accident that weekend.
Harley's parents were Mr. and Mrs. William L. Hatch. Idaho State Police put the time of the crash at about 6:45 p.m. and the place at a small rise in the road, some four miles south of Mink Creek. Besides Harley, the police counted seven people hurt.
Lee J. Clark, 20, of Inkom was at the wheel of the pickup, police said. Drew Thomas Lusk, 17, of Pocatello was driving the car, which held seven young people: Harley, five other boys counting the driver, and one girl.
At 11 a.m. Monday, a spokeswoman for Pocatello Regional Medical Center reported Brett Lusk, 13, still in critical condition in its intensive care unit, where he was being treated for head injuries. The other young people in the car were named as DaNell Hatch, 16, of May, and three listed as of Pocatello, Ross Lusk, 15, Lonnie Malan, 13, and Jess Malan, 16.
The paper said the crash was still under investigation.
The same article carried the second, unrelated death. Alvin J. Mecham, 56, of Pocatello, was on a tractor on Siphon Road late Saturday night when a tire blew, and the machine left the road and went down an embankment, trapping him. He died early Sunday at Pocatello Regional Medical Center.