October 7, 2012 Majestic elk, one big bull, a waterless water tower and a rockin mailbox BECKY CAIRNS/Standard-Examiner Calvin Grant stands next to a fiberglass bull that sits on the grounds of his family business west of 1-15 in Brigham City. Just think of the steaks ... As advertising "signs" go, here's one that rustles up quite a bit of attention - and that's no bull. Well, actually, it is a bull. A huge black fiberglass bovine, standing 12 1/2 feet tall and measuring 20 feet long, tail and all. Maybe you've seen him, towering along the west side of Interstate 15 just north of Brigham City. It's been a year ago this October that the enormous creature rambled into a hayfield and became the official "mascot" of Grant Range Bull Company Inc. "We see a lot of people stopped on the freeway taking its picture," says Doug Grant, one of the owners of the Brigham City company that sells registered breeding bulls. Some folks will even hop the fence to pose with the jumbo- sized Angus. The bull - he doesn't have a name - came to Utah from Colorado, after company founder Cal Grant spotted him in a Western antiques shop in Cortez. He took a picture of the statue and brought it home to show his son Doug, and grandsons Tim and Clint, who run the business with him. "I'd never seen anything that big and I thought, 'Oh, it'd just be fun to have,' " says the Pleasant View resident. So the cock-and-bull story ended with the Grants purchasing the critter and having him delivered, by trailer, to Brigham City. The bull sat in the yard at Grant Range Bull for about six months, tethered to a semi-truck so he wouldn't blow away. Then the Grants hauled him out to a site on their 300-acre property north of Exit 365, the turnoff for Corinne and the Golden Spike National Historic Site. Cal says he likes to tell folks, "We tried to keep him in the corral here, but he wouldn't stay. When we caught him out there, we just tied him up and left him. The big guy is bolted to a metal stand, and tethered with four guy wires, to hold him steady in the wind. Before going on display, the bovine got a touchup coat of black paint, in part to cover some "wounds" in his 1/2-inch- thick fiberglass hide. "There's lots of bullet holes in him if you look close," says Doug, a resident of Slaterville. The business owners believe the bull was originally a Hereford before someone painted him black, because there are red and white markings visible under his coat. As a black, he "matches" the Angus bulls that are part of the company's 500 head of stock. "A black is a very popular color in cattle right now," Cal says, "but maybe if the Charolais cattle get real popular, we'll paint him white." No, he doesn't have any horns, but black Angus cattle are naturally lacking in horns, Cal says. The bull is believed to have been an advertising logo for a steakhouse before he wound up at the Colorado antiques shop. And now he's becoming a sort of Top of Utah landmark, something to brighten a daily commute or tourist route along this patch of interstate. Last Fourth of July, the bull was decorated with a wreath of American flags around his neck by an anonymous do- gooder. One of these Christmases, Doug says, the owner of Fantasy at the Bay at Willard Bay State Park has an idea for giving the critter some holiday spirit. "He's going to build me a Santa Claus on top of that bull and we're going to light him up," Doug says. But the company drew the line at a caller who offered to decorate the bovine for every holiday, from St. Patrick's Day to Easter. Shaking his head, Doug says, "That would be kind of overbearing ... (to) turn him into an Easter bunny." 216