Utah State University Eastern, community raise $8,000 for Ori family

The university and community came together on Feb. 5, to raise over $8,000 for a former Eagle newspaper sports editor, assistant baseball coach, and overall great human being.
USU Eastern sponsored a Bread ‘n’ Soup Night in the Jennifer Leavitt Student Center with all proceeds going to the Frank Ori Jr. family. At 42, Ori suffered a massive stroke and has been in a Utah Valley hospital since December. The father of four, he is the Carbon County Recreation Director and co-host of a daily radio show.
The dinner started at 5 p.m. with the baseball team volunteers serving 450 people in the first 50 minutes. Bread ‘n’ Soup night quickly became pizza night as 37 pizzas were ordered and served to the waiting crowd.
Sponsored by the Serving Utah Network Center (SUN), cosmetology students, baseball athletes and newspaper staff students, the fundraiser included a bake sale and silent auction that garnered almost $4,000.
The bake sale goodies were provided by the cosmetology students while the silent auction items were provided by community members and Eastern’s Athletic Department
Organizers for the event included Susan Polster, Debbie Prichard, Scott Madsen, Terry Johnson and Pam Cha.
Those providing food for the event included Lin’s Market, Smiths, Dominos Pizza, Groggs and the LDS Carbonville Ward. The Assumption Greek Orthodox Church and Notre Dame Catholic Church provided funds as well as Jason Tatton of Nicholas Co. Steve and Pam Cha plus Aaron and Jessica Keller paid for the pizzas.
The committee thanks, everyone who helped make the event “beyond successful” plus Greg Dart, vice chancellor of enrollment services, who helped make everything work for the fundraiser.
Eight days later, the cosmetology sponsored another fundraiser with $1,200 raised and donated to the Matt Thomas family. Thomas, 37, died in November 2017, leaving four children and his wife, Anna.
Anna works as a nail tech in Price in addition to working with students in USU Eastern’s nail tech program each semester.
Cosmetology students worked from 8:45 a.m. to 8:45 p.m. on Feb. 13 in the cosmetology lab and donated all services performed that day to the Thomas family. w