The Granatos of Salt Lake City are bridge builders. Not the bridges that cross rivers, but the bridges that bring people of various religions, races and cultures together.
During the first century of Utah’s existence its population was both culturally and religiously homogenous. It owed its founding and development to Mormon settlers of primarily English and Scandinavian ancestry.
They arrived here because this was the frontier, and they were seeking refuge from religious persecution.
Here they found safety, but their history complicated their relationship with outsiders. The mormons are a wonderfully Christian people, but suspicions based on a lack of understanding festered among peoples both inside and outside the faith. With a growing influx of newcomers these divisions became more obvious, and seemingly intractable.
Since then many good people have dramatically narrowed that divide, but no family played a more important part in that endeavor than the Granatos.
The founder of that local dynasty of bridge builders was Frank Granato. Born in 1914, and raised as a goat herder, he shepherded back and forth across the Salt Lake valley as if his destiny was to sew this beautiful place together.
Though a Catholic, he joined his boyhood friends when they attended seminary (much like a Mormon Sunday school.) And when he married, he chose Edith, a person equally devout, but Mormon. Together they raised two children, one of whom, Sam, became a believing Mormon, and the other, Glenda, became an active Catholic.
In time, Frank’s boyhood spent as a shepherd grew into a thriving food business. He and Edith worked together and expanded their home based enterprise into a regional food service business that today owns a chain of four local delis.
That success was put to good use. Frank became a leader in scores of community causes, but nothing was more emblematic of his spirit than a tradition of Saturday lunches. Every week these lunches were held in his warehouse, and in these less than glamorous circumstances the movers and shakers, both Mormon and not, would gather to design the future of a community that could be generous, caring and inclusive.
Those attending were local business leaders like Roy Simmons of Zions Bank, or Izzy Wagner, a local Jewish entrepreneur famously successful and immensely generous. Seated at those same folding tables would be religious leaders like Tom Monson, then an LDS Apostle and now president of his church, or Bishop Federal of the Catholic diocese of Salt Lake City. Also in attendance could be Governor Rampton or any of a score of mayors, senators or congressmen.
Today that same tradition continues under the leadership of Sam Granato. Sam has served in a variety of important community positions including the Salt Lake County Board of Health and the Governor’s Economic Development Board. He was commission chair of the Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, and is currently a Salt Lake County Councilman.
Sam continues holding those lunches that bring good hearted leaders together from all walks of life. They may no longer be held in the back room, or on folding tables, but Sam has taken that tradition one better. At the back of his large and busy deli on 1632 South Redwood Road is a warren of variously sized dining rooms, some informally named for the great leaders of Salt Lake County. There on Saturdays, and every other day of the week, you’re likely to find important men and women intent on building a greater future for their community.
In those rooms a lot of knitting gets done. It’s the kind of knitting the Granatos are famous for, the kind of knitting that brings diverse threads together in a glorious pattern of common good.
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