Beverly Frank

Beverly Frank of Salt Lake City passed away on Saturday, March 21^st surrounded by her family. She was five days short of her 92^nd birthday. Beverly lived a rich and full life, brimming with music and style, and brightened throughout by her joyful love of family and friends. Beverly’s warmth and kindness made every person she encountered feel listened to, cared for, and loved. She will be missed beyond measure.

The youngest of four children (brothers Grant and Jack, and sister Wini), Beverly was born in 1934 in Montpelier, Idaho, to Elma Jensen and Orrin Jensen.At her birth, she was proclaimed a “wonderchild” by her Swiss grandmother, which became a longstanding part of the family lore. Beverly’s family moved to California for her father’s cancer treatment, and then relocated to Salt Lake City following her father’s early death, after her mother remarried Johnny Mumford. Beverly loved to perform and entertain from a very early age, and eventually formed a meaningful bond with music, especially jazz standards and the repertoire of the Great American Songbook.

After winning first place in the Ted Mack Amateur Hour, a national talent contest broadcast from the Lyric Theater in Salt Lake City, and receiving her own radio show broadcast on KHO out of Reno, Nevada, Beverly moved to Los Angeles to live with her aunt and to pursue a career in music. She was 16 years old. Beverly worked as a receptionist at CBS Television City and then at the front desk at Capital Records in Hollywood, and came to know some of the star performers of the era, figures such as Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Nat King Cole, and Peggy Lee.Beverly was also able to make recordings of her own during these years, most notably “Go Home, Cheater,” released under the name Beverly Brent.

In 1958 Beverly married George Sherlock, a prominent Los Angeles music promoter, and gave birth to her daughter Susan in 1960. After separating from her first husband, Beverly and Susan moved back to Salt Lake City, where Beverly began working as a buyer at Auerbach’s department store, a position that allowed her to indulge her love of fashion and develop her own lifelong sense of style. While working at Auerbach’s, Beverly was reacquainted with a locally prominent advertising executive, television personality, and jazz pianist and vocalist, Alan Frank. They were married in 1970, and had two sons, Jason, born in 1970, and John, born in 1974. Beverly dedicated her life and love to her three children during these years, Susan, Jason, and John. The family lived together in the Olympus Cove neighborhood of Salt Lake City.

Beverly and Alan’s home was filled with music, entertaining regularly for family and friends, practicing for public performances, locally and internationally, and eventually for their weekly performances at Salt Lake City’s Club Manhattan, where they performed for over a decade to admiring audiences as a quartet called the Beverly Brothers. Beverly considered Salt Lake City’s community of jazz musicians to be among her dearest friends.

After Alan‘s death in 2011, Beverly remained in her Olympus Hills home and devoted much of her time to her growing family, and especially to her beloved grandchildren: Susan‘s three children Ally Marie Dahlstrom, Mikey Dahlstrom, and Jack Dahlstrom, and John’s three children with his wife Melissa, Jackson Frank, Johnny Frank, and Samantha Frank. Beverly continued to pursue her love of music, performing regularly at parties and weddings, and also for the nonprofit organization Heart and Soul, with her best friend and companion Warren Trulson

Beverly will be forever remembered by her family and friends for her warmth, generosity, and kindness, and also for her beauty, charm, and elegance. Beverly knew how to light up a room. A video interview of Beverly with Ted Capener of PBS can be found here: https://www.pbs.org/video/beverly-frank-lnccjf/

Beverly is preceded in death by her parents Elma Mumford and Orrin Jensen, her beloved siblings Grant Jensen, Jack Jensen, Wini Davidson, and her husband Alan Frank. She is survived by her daughter Susan Sherlock Dahlstrom, her son Jason Frank and his husband Jerry Johnson, her son John Frank and his wife Melissa Frank, and her grandchildren: Ally Marie Stewart and her husband Andrew Stewart, Mikey Dahlstrom, Jack Dahlstrom, Jackson Frank and his wife Avery Frank, John Frank, Jr., and Samantha Frank.

A public viewing will be held at Larkin Mortuary in downtown Salt Lake City on Thursday, March 26, from 6:00 to 8:00 pm, followed by a private family graveside service the following day. A celebration of Beverly‘s life is planned for later in the spring.