Torrey Apple Days

On the Saturday of Torrey Apple Days, once the parade has passed, children set apples afloat in the canal that runs along Main Street. Each child builds a boat from an apple bought at the Chuckwagon for a dollar. The boats launch at the Torrey Trading Post and drift downstream to a finish line at the Big Apple. The 2026 Apple Derby ran from 11:30 to 12:30 on July 4. The Historic Bicknell Theater sponsored it, and the town’s notice promised “fabulous prizes.”

Apple Days is Torrey’s summer celebration, held the first weekend of July. The town sits on State Route 24 in Wayne County, Utah, at 6,800 feet, eight miles from the west entrance of Capitol Reef National Park. A local lodge’s account says the festival honors the area’s apple-growing heritage. The 2026 edition ran from Friday, July 3, through Sunday, July 5, under the theme “Ribbons of History,” and it also marked the nation’s 250th anniversary. Renee Reel chaired it. The town asks visitors to park near the Town Park, walk to Main Street, and use the park’s restrooms rather than those of local businesses.

Friday supper and the dark sky

The weekend opens at the Town Park Pavilion, where Mayor Mickey Wright and the Town Council serve a free community dinner from 5:00 to 7:00. At seven the crowd moves to the LDS Chapel for a patriotic program with the American Legion and a quilt show. At 9:30 the Star Party begins back at the Town Park. Torrey is an International Dark Sky Community, one of the few towns in the country to earn that designation. The nonprofit Torrey Dark Skies sets up telescopes on site.

Main Street on the Fourth

Saturday starts before seven. Young people from around Wayne County cook and serve a breakfast fundraiser at the pavilion from 6:30, at $7 an adult, $5 a child, or $30 for a family of five or fewer. At 6:45 the 5K Race for the Apple leaves from the corner of 100 West Center Street. Runners pay an entry fee, and watchers do not. From seven until three, The Old House on Main sells donated goods at a yard sale whose proceeds go to Color Country Animal Welfare, the shelter serving Wayne County.

In 2026, at about 9:25, four U.S. Air Force F-35s flew over Torrey. The parade followed at ten and ran for an hour down Main Street. The town’s advice is to arrive early for curbside seats and shade, and to bring water, sunscreen, and a camp chair. From eleven to three, classic and vintage cars fill the LDS Church lot. At the Town Park, a carnival with games and bounce houses sells wristbands at the gate. Beside it runs a market of local vendors and food trucks, with home-baked pies, breads, and jams on the tables alongside pottery, jewelry, and other handwork.

Evening brings people back to the pavilion, where Brad Wheeler calls bingo at seven: $5 for a single play, $15 for unlimited. At 8:30 the Apple Days Dance starts in Torrey Town Park, with live music by Grey on Blues and glow sticks for sale, and runs until eleven. On Sunday at 12:30 the pavilion holds the America250 ice cream social, with ice cream from Color Ridge Creamery.

The program also keeps a Saturday-night slot for fireworks at the Town Park. In 2026 the show was cancelled. On May 19, Wayne County had put Stage 2 fire restrictions in place, a ban its fire chief said had to come “much earlier this year.” The town’s volunteer firefighters had also been deployed to active fires. The town’s notice read: “With dry fuels and limited fire resources, a show simply isn’t safe.”

The Big Apple and the outlaws

The derby’s finish line has a longer story behind it. A 1998 Deseret News report called the Big Apple “the dance hall in the middle of town that for decades has beckoned people from all over Wayne County to its open-air venue.” During the Great Depression, the Lee family built an open-air dance hall in an apple orchard on Main Street. They held boxing matches there that drew people from all over the county, and after each match the crowd danced under the stars. That pavilion has since been restored and is still used for community events.

Local legend has it that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid came to Torrey to dance into the night, then shot the breeze with the local sheriff. Townspeople told the Deseret News that the outlaws’ dances were at the Big Apple. The same report recorded a Wayne County official at a county centennial celebration. He praised Loa for its LDS church, Lyman for its church renovation, and Teasdale for its new cultural hall, and then said of Torrey: “they sure do love to dance.”

From Youngstown to Torrey

Mormon pioneers settled the place in the 1880s and called it Youngstown. Wayne County was created from Piute County in May 1892. On September 18, 1898, construction began on the Torrey log church, which was later also used as a school. When the town got a post office, it was renamed for Jay L. Torrey, a Wyoming legislator and colonel of the Volunteer Cavalry. One account of the name hedges: “It seems the exploit of a certain Colonel Torrey from Wyoming, who was in charge of the Rough Riders during the Spanish American War, suggested the name.” The creation of Capitol Reef National Monument in 1937, which became Capitol Reef National Park in 1971, is described as a turning point for the town.

In the fall of 1990 the Church deeded the old log building to the local Daughters of Utah Pioneers, Camp Radiare, on the condition that it be moved off Church property. In 1996 the Daughters placed historic marker #494 at 59 East Main Street.

The festival’s own record is kept in parade reports. In 2008, Elmer Petersen was grand marshal, and Torrey, with a population of 120, drew close to 1,000 people for Apple Days. The 2022 celebration, organized by Carrie Torrey and Pearl Thorndal-Stewart, ran July 1 and 2. Sandy Dietlin was grand marshal, and Dalen Pace rode as Uncle Sam on his ATV. Council member Pat Kearney, honored as Citizen of the Year, rode with the rest of the Town Council and her dog, “Marshal Molly,” also known as “Torrey Town’s First Canine.”