A half century later, RehnÂquist remembered his excursion through Utah when Jay Jorgensen, one of his 1999 law clerks, said he was from the Beehive State.

The chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court asked where in Utah Jorgensen was from. The Uinta Basin, he replied. Where in the Uinta Basin? Near Vernal. Exactly where? Ioka.

And Rehnquist, the top judge in the nation, remembered the tiny town and exactly where it lies on the map.

Jorgensen, now a Washington, D.C., attorney, said the conversation revealed both RehnÂquist's sharp intelligence and warm personality, traits other former Rehnquist clerks from Utah also recall.

"He is a very charming and wonderful person," Jorgensen said earlier this summer. He clerked for the justice for a year beginning in mid-1999.

"He's a genius. He can remember everything he has read or heard."

Michael Young, president of the University of Utah, describes Rehnquist as extraordinary.

"He's certainly one of the smartest people I worked with," Young, who was a clerk to RehnÂquist during the court's 1977 term, said in a July interview. The two stayed in touch and had lunch together occasionally when Young visited the Washington, D.C., area.

He said Rehnquist, then an associate justice, liked to be briefed extensively by his clerks about pending cases. Many of the conversations were conducted while walking.

"He loved to walk. We had to bring clothes for whatever weather there was that day," Young said.

Jorgensen said that once during oral arguments, a question came up concerning an issue that no one had included in any filings in the case. RehnÂquist sent him a note saying the answer was on a certain page of a particular volume of a book in his office.

The chief justice was right. He later told his clerk that he remembered reading that passage in law school 50 years before.

"He is one of the most outstanding minds I've ever seen," Jorgensen said.

Stephen Sargent, a Salt Lake City lawyer who clerked for RehnÂquist a decade ago, also enjoyed working for the chief justice, who he said always read all the briefs in a case before oral argument and understood the issues "incredibly well."

"He was wonderful," Sargent said this summer. "He really did take the time to get to know not just you, but your spouse and children, too."

Jorgensen agreed that RehnÂquist also put his memory to work on a personal level. Walking through the court's halls, the justice always greeted the security officers by name and asked about their spouses and children, also by name.

Jorgensen said Rehnquist, who had vacationed in Utah, once gave him a nail from Brigham Young's St. George home that someone had given to him.

"He's just a pleasant person," he said. "It was a great experience."

pmanson@sltrib.com