HISTORY OF GEORGE H. WOOD (The dictation of this history began on June 10, 1966, and continued for several days thereafter, with Dad talking and Faun typing.) In the first place, I was born too soon. I have had lots of people tell me that they never did see how I survived. Especially Alonzo Russell, bishop, told me he never could see how I lived. In fact, I got named twice. They didn’t think I would live, so they gave me the name of both of my grandfathers, one was “John” and one was ‘William,’ and my father was away from home at the time I was born, and he didn't approve of the ames they had chosen, since he wanted me named ‘George Henry” after im. My mother used to show me the pillow she put me on. She couldn't handle me any other way. It’s a miracle she ever did it with the facilities they had at that time. I was born September 4, 1882, at Grafton, Washington County, Utah. I weighed less than four pounds. A midwife by the name of Sister Stocks helped deliver me. I spent the early part of my life in Grafton. In fact until I was married, I lived there. I went to school in the little adobe school, meeting and recreation hall. There was one teacher for all of the grades (eight in all) for a total of thirty students in all. Each grade would go up for recital in front in turn. This little building is still standing (walls and roof only still intact). I visited there just two weeks ago with some of my family. I always had plenty to do -- chores, carrying and chopping wood, carrying water; sometimes carrying it from the river for all of the house use which was quite a distance -- one-quarter of a mile at least. We lived in a two-room house. One room was made of pine logs and a ‘lean-to” for a kitchen. A family of seven children lived here plus the parents. As far as I know, there was never a power or water system in the town of Grafton. Mother did all of the sewing for the children as well as cooking. She did all her washing on a wash-board. She made bread every night for the next day -- made her own yeast. She also made her own quilts. We did have a few blankets we purchased from the Washington Factory. Both of my grandparents lived close. Grandmother Hastings, Grand- father Wood, Uncle John Wood, Aunt Emily Gibson -- we alll lived close together and neighbored. Nobody had any luxuries of life.T always remember when I was eight or nine years old, I got a pair of boots for Christmas and went down to the river to skate, and the heels were slick and I'll never forget how hard I fell on the back of my bead on the ice. I stil prized the boots -- my first pair. My schoolmates in grade school with me were: Andrew Wood (who was my cousin), Harold and Alfonzo Russell, Frank Jones, John Ballard and Angus Ballard, Belle Ballard and my sister, Ella, who was almost two years younger than I was. ‘Andrew Wood and I were very close. Even after we were married, our families were close until he died -- I think about 1932. We were more like brothers than cousins. My father always had livestock, and I grew up to love and raise live- stock - especially horses. My father caught a little mustang colt for me when I was five years old, brought it home, and we raised it on cow’s milk. When it was three years old, I broke it. We were dairying on Kolob and my father took me out with him to gather the cows, and I was riding the pony, and he went by some brush and my heels scraped back by the side, and it bucked and threw me off. I got on again and rode it back, but my father said I hadn’t better tell my mother because she wouldn’t let me go again. That pony turned out to be a wonderful little horse (sorrel, bally, named "Bolley’). He even lived until I was married and was living in Hurricane. Ail of the children in the family rode him, but he did throw me off a lot of times until he was broke good. One time he threw me off on a strawstack. We were threshing and had a strawstack started and I was on him and Uncle John Hastings handed me a saw and I was on the horse when he handed it to me and the horse started to buck and threw me off right on the straw pile. He threw me many times before on places that were not so soft. He eventually got over his ways, so all of the other children rode him pretty good. Ican well remember when I was baptized in the Virgin River about 150 yards from where I was born, down by the point where Alonzo Russell had his barn. The records show that Uncle John Wood baptized me and Grandfather Wood confirmed me. I can remember when and where I was baptized. In our school, we had classes to a certain time and then go out to recess, We had to make our own play games, balls and bats, and we used to have a rough game we played with rocks. I don’t think I can exactly explain the game, but we used to call it “duck.” We all had a big rock and 2would place another one on top of it, and would throw at it. The ball game we played the most was called “rounders.” In our Primary, we all assembled in one class and the whole Primary had two teachers. These teachers were Sister Nancy Russell and Sister Charlotte Ballard. Our Sunday School was also held in the adobe building as well as Sacrament Meeting. Each group would meet in separate comers. Our Book of Mormon class met in the southeast corner and Alfred Jones was our teacher. David Ballard was the Sunday School superintendent for many years. We used to look forward to the times when my cousins the Browns from Milford and the Westerns from Deseret would come down to Grafton to get fruit to bottle. While they were there, we had lots of good times. We had to pick the fruit, in fact, I used to dry peaches on boards or scaffolds, and then in the fall when we would harvest the cane, I would top the cane (seeds) off. I used to raise chickens I called my own. They would make their nests in the bushes. I thought I had quite a lot when I had a hen with a brood of chicks coming up. I used to like to go with my father out on the range and the cattle drives. I was about ten or twelve years old then. All the time until my father died, I liked to go with him. He did some team freighting, and 1 sure liked to go with him on those trips. I remember my first trip with my father to Silver Reef with a load of cord wood. It took three days to make the trip from Grafton and return, The roads were in some places almost impassable. This was about the time the Silver Reef was closing down. Phoebe Terry was my first school teacher and David Hirschi was one of the best school teachers I ever had. He taught me for several years. Later, he turned out to be my bishop, and he also ordained me an Elder when I got married. Tused to do lots of things to help my grandparents, I chopped wood for grandfather Wood and grandmother Hastings and did the chores. I used to read to grandmother Hastings after she was blind. She used to like to have me read the newspapers to her. She never got tired, but I did. I have always been sorry that I didn’t read more to her in her condition.When I would go in the fields, my grandfather was particular about having everything cleaned up. He didn’t do the heavy work, but he would rake up all the leaves, twigs, sticks and willows, and have everything ready for the plowing and planting. I think he took me more than any of the others. Sometimes he would take two or three of us -- Andrew, George (Dordy) Gibson and me. He would say when he took a boy, “One boy is a boy.” When he took two boys he would say: “Two boys is a half a boy,” and when he took three boys he would say: “Three boys is no boy at all.” We would play lots more. I might especially relate one horse drive that I went on with my father. Some of the horse owners were from Grafton, Rockville and Virgin City. They all went out and camped at Antelope, Arizona strip. On the way out it took a day to go a total distance of twenty-five miles. They left me driving the saddle horses while they went out and gathered in other horses, We went down through the “Gap,” south from Kanaan ranch on the way to Antelope. They started some horses running and this started the saddle horses to running. They left the road and started toward the mustangs. I can remember that I was riding a big, brown horse of Henry Herschi’s named “Roscoe.” Trying to get the horses on the trail as they were running, I suddenly came upon a big wash. I had to let the horse go and I hung on to the horn of the saddle, and he managed to jump over the big wash. It seemed like a long time to me going over, ‘cause I was afraid he would never make it. The wash must have been twenty to twenty-five feet wide. I was about twelve at this time. But I did get the horses back and did the job -- they didn’t get to the wild horses either. The next morning on this same drive, my father put me on another horse that had been out all winter on the range; he belonged to Andrew ‘Wood, and I started out after some mustangs from Antelope Springs. The horse hadn’t been ridden all winter, and I undertook to chase those mustangs. I stayed along the side of them for three or four miles and was getting them turned when my saddle turned with me on the horse, but the horse had run far enough that he was pretty willing to stop, and I got out of that mess without any injuries. This is only one of many similar experiences I had when I was young. My grandparents (all four of them) accepted the gospel in England and immigrated to Utah. They all went through many hardships and trials all through their lives, and were steadfast to the gospel. Grandfather Wood hardly ever missed a chance to bear his testimony on Fast Sunday. And I think he made the benches we had in the adobe building. He had one especially for himself on the stand. He was a wheelwright and made and 4repaired wagon wheels. He was handy at carpenter work and blacksmithing. My father was also handy to do these things. : Inever knew much of Grandfather Hastings as I was a child when he died of chills and fever (I think malaria), but the rest of my uncles were good to us and helped all they could. I wasn’t very old when Uncle Hyrum and Uncle Joseph got married. I sure wsed to like to visit Grandmother Wood because she had lots of good homemade bread and butter. She could make butter out of the smallest amount of milk of any person I ever knew. I visited her every day. For a long time, it was difficult for her to get around, her legs were bad and she had them wrapped with bandages. I can remember being spoiled and putt’: > a fight when I didn’t get my own way with her. My Grandmother Hastings was a very good cook too before she went bli-d. Grandmother Wood took my father’s death hard and never g« mourning; in fact, she didn’t live long after he was killed. My father’s accident happened on a cattle drive out near what was then known as the "Troughs Ranch” about five or six miles south of Grafton, when a horse trying to get his own way and go back to the saddle band (he was riding a mustang he had captured on a drive) and was bucking and throwing his head, threw itself and fell on my father making him strike his head against a greasewood bush. Father was knocked unconscious and the horse laid there on him until someone came and got it off of him. I can remember where I was at the time of this acide: had chores to do and some watering to do in the fields and I was but at the time o' this accident, I was up north of town on the Black Hills gathering in the cows, riding a little grey horse of Orin’s called “Champ”. ‘When I got home, some parties had come in, taken a buggy and had gone back to bring my father in, and it was way after dark when they arrived with him still alive, but unconscious, and he passed away the next day without regaining consciousness. At this time, I was fifteen years old. At this time I suddenly had a great burden and responsibility as the oldest of seven small children in the family. Conditions then were very different to what they are today and everybody was good and helped all they could, but there was no one who was wealthy, and nobody got government assistance like they do today. But all of my uncles were very good and helped lots with the things that had to be done, such as hauling wood, taking care of the cattle and farm work. But this put a damper on my getting much of an education becausethere were so many things that had to be done to keep things going for a family. Others that I remember who were so good to help us were the Stansworth brothers, Immanual and James N., Charlie Jones, Henry Spendlove, Albert Russell, Alonzo Russell; in fact, all of the people were very thoughtful of us and helped us out many ways because we would be considered, under those circumstances, very poor although we did have cattle and horses, and I took great pride in raising horses and cattle. In fact, I never had a time that I didn’t have from one to twenty horses from the time I was five until eighty years old. And I raised lots of really good horses, both draft and saddle stock; some very good polo horses when polo games were popular, and I've raised horses that have run in local races -- good stock. After I got older and my brothers took over on the farm, I went to work for several years for the Bar “Z" Cattle Company owned by B. F. Saunders. I was working for the company at the time they sold out to the Grand Canyon Cattle Company. I spent a lot of time on what is known as the Arizona Strip where they did run thousands of cattle and lots of wild horses and other kinds of animals. I spent several summers on Kaibab or Buckskin Mountain with the companies and had many experiences every day. I trailed with many herds of cattle from the Arizona Strip, “Cain Beds”, and Buckskin Mountains to the railroad at Lund, Utah. Some herds we would have as high as 2,500 head of cattle ina herd. I made a trip one time with a herd that was sold at Lund and went on out into Colorado and trailed for a couple of months. Sometimes I would be gone for four or five months without going home. I might relate a kinda foolish, but funny, experience. We had been trailing from Cain Beds, Arizona, to Lund, Utah, and when we got the cattle all loaded on the train and shipped, it was stormy, and we were all worn out and tired -- we had very little sleep for weeks and had lots of stampedes of the cattle -- but this one time it was raining, so we decided to sleep in a boxcar which was on the sidetracks, and as it was storming, I had put my saddle under the edge of the car, not having any idea that the car would be moved. But in the night, after we were all asleep, we heard them backing up to hook onto this car, so I jumped out of bed to move my saddle and while I was doing that, the car went off and left me standing there with my bed and trousers gone and the wind a blowing -- so I just had to wrap my saddle blanket around me hoping the car would come back close to me, which it did after a while, but not too close. It was cold. I eventually gotback into the bed in the car again. We had lots of funny experiences similar to this. There was always somebody in the crowd who had funny stories to tell. In fact, I had many things I can think of that would be funny to think about now. ‘When I was in town I really had fun as much as I could, along with the work I had to do. I guess I had my share of girlfriends. At one time I was corresponding with three Williams girls (no relation to each other), one being the girl that I married, Iva. Of course, when I got married I quit writing to the others. At least I think I was after a “Sweet-Williams”. I first met Iva when I was working on a threshing machine in Kanarra. She was playing in a wheat bin throwing the wheat round, she must have been about twelve years old. We did own an interest in a threshing machine. I worked on it for sometime in the summer. I helped do some of the first threshing done on the LaVerkin bench and also threshed in Leeds and Toquerville. The threshing machine I worked on in Kanarra, Hamiltons Fort and New Harmony belonged to William Ford, Dick Middleton and Frank Prince and we threshed in these places. The crew all came from Grafton -- one was Uncle John Wood, one Bishop James Ballard and others. ‘The machine we used in Dixie was the one that my father and Uncle John Wood, Uncle George Gibson and Uncle John Hastings and William Isom bought from the Stansworth family. 1 guess it was the first horse- powered thresher that was in the county. We have pictures of that machine and some of the settings still in our possession. My father was driving the horse-power on one of them. I held different jobs on the thresher. I took care of the tally box and also I did the driving on the horse-power. All of the family was really interested in the things in general, live- stock and farming. My sister Ella was an excellent rider. My mother was also an excellent rider. I heard my grandmother tell how my mother would get on a horse and take off and everybody was afraid she might fall off, but she didn’t and she always rode side-saddle. I remember seeing her ride lots. When we would have to go to parties and dances from Grafton to Rockville or Virgin, Ella would either ride behind me or ride her own horse, and even after she was married she did a lot of riding. My brother Orin was really a better rider than I was as far as riding a bucking horse. He broke a lot of horses and was seldom thrown off.Elmer diid lots of riding and was good with all kinds of livestock and could easily get a job. I don’t tthink Bertha took too much to the milking of cows and riding of horses as diid Ella, but she was really a good home-girl. She did a wonderful job of taking care of Grandmother Hastings. Even after we all left Grafton amd moved to Hurricane, she stayed up there to take care of grandmother. Jenny and Nennial were not too old when I got married. Jenny was always a likeable zi:! -- everybody really loved her, and she wasn’t very old when her health began to fail and we didn’t realize what was going on until she went to St. George to high school and then we found out that she had a bad heart condition. I really believe that she ust have had rheumatic fewer and we didn’t realize it, and I think it was « : heart condition. She was grown at the time of her death, . . ne married. She was the first corpse taken to the Hurricane Cemetary in « motor vehicle. Nennial did lots of chores. He was the youngest, being only a few months old at the time of his father’s death. He was always a good little blond curly-headed boy and never got into serious trouble. Our family always enjoyed singing and we were all very good singers. Ihave heard many men sing around the campfire, but I have never run into one who “ould sing as long without rep-ating the same sor as I could. Mot * - ould sing and } song “or e° occasion. Talwa,. « oye 5 parties and 2: oun. vs. ine homecoming committee at Kanarra has asked me to sing on the program there. Even now, when I run onto old-timers, they'll ask me to sing. I never had any formal singing lessons. 1 was employed by William Ford in Kanarra when I started dating Iva. We went together for a couple of years before marrying. She was a very attractive girl, and my cousin, Andrew Wood, was going with Laura Parker, Iva’s best girlfriend. At one Christmas time we decided to come to Kanarra to spend Christmas, and didn’t have any work horses available that we could bring, so we put a couple of saddle horses together and drove them around Grafton a few times, and then started out with the horses unused to pulling Uncle John Wood's white-topped buggy to spend Christmas at Kanarra. It was really a trying experience for the horses as well as ourselves, but wehard, it blew the gate open and one of the horses got out and went back to Grafton. I can’t remember how we finally managed to get home -- we didn’t care about getting back, and it really snowed too. When we went to St. George at Thanksgiving time to be married, we left Kanarra about noon and drove to Leed’s and stayed at the Stirling Hotel that night. On the way down, my bride-to-be decided she'd like to drive, so I let her have the lines and we really had a good, lively team that was used to work, and when they would approach a hill the lines were tightened so they would get in and work harder, but Iva just held the lines and they decided it was time for action, and it really took place, and away they started -- faster and faster up the hill near Kelsey ranch. She said as they started out: “Look at them go, look at them go!” So at that point I had to reach over and take control. My wife’s mother was with us on this trip. The second day we reached St. George, got a marriage license and stayed at the Eph Webb residence as Aunt Emma was Hannah William’s (my mother in law’s) half-sister. The third day we went to the Temple (we tied the team out in the street), had our photographs taken and drove to Hurricane, arriving there about ten o’clock at night very tired. My mother, mother-in-law, wife and I slept the rest of the night in Uncle John Hasting’s house, as they were away from home. The fourth day we went from Hurricane to Kanarra (November 24th, 1909) and the following day were honored with a wedding reception. Everybody said there never was a bigger or better time for the whole town. I purchased 20 gallons of strong wine and five gallons of weak wine for the women from James Judd, one of the best members of the Church in LaVerkin. This was a tradition and was expected by the folks in Kanarra. They told me I couldn't have the Kanarra girl if I didn’t furnish the wine. The untimely death of my mother made the occasion sad. The night of the wedding dance in the old recreation hall underneath the chapel (a two-story building), mother caught a bad cold and developed pneumonia and only lived a week. All of the family with the exception of Ella (who was confined to bed with Itha) was present at the wedding. When we left Kanarra to take the body to Grafton for burial, we left about 2:00 or 3:00 p.m. and it was snowing hard. My brother Orin came up and some of the other members of the family with one white-top buggy, and we took my wife's folk’s team and white-top buggy, and we did stop inand we took my wife’s folk’s team and white-top buggy, and we did stop in Bellvue a short time at night, but it still kept snowing all of the time -- three or four inches deep in Bellvue -- and it was still snowing when we reached Grafton and it continued through the funeral and burial. We returned the team and buggy in a week or two, but returned to Grafton for the rest of the winter. Another thing I should mention is that I had taken Iva down to meet my folks in July of 1909 and after we got to Grafton we had to travel other Places, s0 we took some horses to go to Rockville. In crossing the river, the horses stopped and wanted a drink in the middle of the river, and there was a boulder showing up in the river and Iva looked at the boulder and said: ‘Oh, look at that rock going around.” She wasn’t as used to crossing that old river as I was, and was dizzy. My mother had a very good impression of Iva and was happy to have her become a member of the family. In early 1910 we moved to Hurricane. We were some of the first settlers of Hurricane and we lived in a tent for a year. I had a small farm and continued to work with livestock and did cattle driving and worked with John Adams or “Uncle Johnny” as we should call him as he had married Aunt Allie Berry. Talso did quite a lot of freighting with a team and wagon. I hauled a lot of wool from Gould’s shearing corral and St. George shearing corral. On one of these occasions, I was close behind Manti Workman when he tipped over and was killed on the Gould’s hill driving four horses and two wagons loaded with wool. The sight was something I couldn’t get over for days. His brother, Nephi, was also with me. I also hauled lumber. Lalif was born on September 19, 1910 in Kanarra. I'l never forget what a stormy night it was. The thunder and lightning was very bad and he wasn’t an hour old when he would jump and flinch when the thunder would roar. Tretumed to Hurricane and Iva stayed in Kanarra with the baby and he got sick, and they called for me to come. I didn’t have a horse available to ride back, so I went to Man Stansworth and told him what I needed and I thought he had the best horse in town to make the trip on and he didn’t hesitate to let me take him (the horse’s name was "Dunk”). I left at night about sundown and rode him from Hurricane to Kanarra in less than four hours. The word came by telephone of Lalif's illness. That was exceptionally good traveling time in those days because there weren't many cars around then. 10I might mention that my father made a similar ride from St. George to Grafton years before when my brother, Orin, was sick. My father was in St. George helping take care of my Uncle George Gibson, who had had his leg broken and had a bad infection which resulted in his losing his leg) and my father rode his favorite horse, Juno, that distance in four hours. He had to ride trails rather than roads, Grandma Williams wanted Iva and Lalif to stay in Kanarra with her, but they returned a little later to Hurricane. We went through lots of trials the first years of our marriage. The conditions of a new settlement were not good. The water was out of the canal. When there wasn’t any water available from the canal, we'd have to go to the river which was a lot of the time because they sure had a lot of difficulties getting the canal to settle and hold. Also, we didn’t have any of the conveniences of electricity. We still owned some property in Grafton which we worked after living in Hurricane which took a lot of traveling back-and-forth. One trip tuned out bad as I took Lalif along with me. He was only four or five years old and we had turned the horses loose to go to the river to get a drink, and on the way back to the corrals, they came running up the street and Lalif ran out in front of them. One of the horses ran over him and got him tangled between his hind legs and in the accident Lalif got some bones broken on his back. We started in the buggy for Hurricane (we had called the doctor and mother) and Sister Rebecca Russell had a feather bed on her lap and she sat in the back of the buggy. George W. Gibson was also with me when we left Grafton, and at that time of year and day, the river was extremely high with snow water melting in May and we had to cross the Virgin river three times, and one crossing especially the water splashed up into the bed of the buggy and it was dark. We met Iva and the doctor between Virgin and the top of LaVerkin hill, but we kept on going and kept Lalif in the buggy until we reached Hurricane. Then we really had troubles keeping that lively rascal quiet on the bed for the next few weeks. T'll just never forget the feeling I had when I picked him up off the ground. While living in Hurricane we had two homes - one was built mostly from the estate funds of my father and we lived in part of that for sometime and Bertha, Jenny, Elmer and Nennial lived in the other part. The second small home was built on the west street of Hurricane. When we moved to Kanarra we sold it to Uncle John Hastings.Our third home was built in Kanarra on what was known as the “Four-Lots.” We lived there from May, 1927, until June, 1944, when we moved to Las Vegas and we built another home in Las Vegas in 1948 and that is now considered our family residence. All my life I've always held a church job of some kind (when Pve been available). I was Elder’s Quorum president while living in Hurricane, and when I moved to Kanarra I was YMMIA president for approximately three or four years, then I was Ward Clerk while Horace Roundy was Bishop. I was a Stake Missionary at the time I moved to Las Vegas. I hadn’t served the full time, but was released when I found employment in Las Vegas. Since living in Las Vegas, I've served as Ward Teacher and Ward Teacher's Supervisor for about twelve years. Also, after I was made a High Priest, ordained by Bryan L. Bunker, I was given the job of High Priest Group Secretary, which I also held for about eleven years. The only church job I presently have is Home Teacher. I probably should say something about my health condition. I had serious troubles for years with a sciatic nerve condition. It started when I was about nineteen years old. I'd been to Milford from Grafton for a load of freight. It was on my way home between Minersville and Rush Lake and I had camped for the night in a snow storm in January, and through the night the pain hit me and I suffered severely all night. The next morning I had a very hard time to harness and hook up the team and get back in the wagon. Still, with rain and snow falling, I managed to make it into Rush Lake about 4:00 p.m., still suffering from the sciatic pains. The next day it seemed some better, but the mud was deep and the storm was still coming, but I did get through to Cedar City. My sister Ella was going to school there and I stayed over one day in Cedar City, but the next day I made it on to Kanarra and Uncle John Wood came with another team and met me there and helped me on into Grafton, but the sciatic condition has not entirely cleared up. I’ve suffered very much with it and have been bedfast many times and could scarcely turn or move, but my health conditions have been better in my later years. Talso had a hip fracture in Cedar City in February, 1942, from a fall on a slippery street. I was in a cast which covered most of my body for eight weeks. In 1932 I had a bad condition which paralyzed part of my body and the doctors said at one time an operation was necessary. He told my wife, but he didn’t tell me, that my chances were one in ten thousand to recover. But I really was in poor condition for about five years. I feel through the help of the Lord and Dr. Harris, a chiropractor, I came through this illness. 12T was in Salt Lake in 1954 when I was stricken with prostate gland trouble. Dr. Weaver operated and because of serious internal bleeding was unable to complete the operation. It became necessary in 1960 to complete this operation in Las Vegas with Dr. Hirsh operating. Delila, Javauna, Erlene and LaRae were all born in Hurricane. I can remember when Delila was born (February 14, 1914) that I went up to Ella's place and I can remember telling them that we had a Valentine and it was no burlesque either. I can remember her mother made her a little blue coat with white fur around it and Delila called it her ‘little kitty,” and she was a little afraid to touch it. Javauna was a very pretty child. When we would go to church or any place, she was so friendly we hardly got to handle her at all as she was passed from person to person. All of our children were cute babies. We had some serious illnesses with Etlene. While we lived in Hurricane when she was two or three years old, there was a flu epidemic among small children. She developed pneumonia, and the doctor said she was his sickest patient, and then he named a child who had passed on the night before. Several other children in the community died at that time. No one could have ever been more persevering and staying with it like her mother did. She seemed to never give up but what the Lord would save Erlene, and I’m sure it was through His power that she did survive. And when she grew up and got stronger, she always took the place of my second boy in the family and helped with all of the chores. She inherited my great love for horses. LaRae was a little over a year old when we left Hurricane. She was terribly ill and it looked like she wasn’t going to live after we moved to Kanarra. We were at Navajo Lake (I was helping to build the lodges there) in about 1928, and Dr. Aiken was the man who built the lodges. We happened to have LaRae up there with us and she developed a sickness where it seemed like she wouldn’t recover even though we had a doctor with us. We took her back to town and this condition lasted for some time before it was corrected. She overcame this and seemed to be quite a healthy child and one of the cutest little dancers that one could ever hope to see. LaRae has always been very apt at dancing. I was going to sell some cattle to Fred Beiderman and was on my Way out to the Arizona Strip when I was stopped at Hurricane and leaned that my wife had to go to the hospital in Cedar City -- when of all the 13surprises Fernard and Faun were born. Both were quite frail (Fernard especially) and in the days of the depression we really had a struggle with them to raise them until they were older, but they've really proved to be a great joy to us as they grew up. My sister Jenny died in about 1918 or 1919 -- the first of the immediate family to go. She died as a result of pneumonia, but had had a bad heart condition for many years. She was around twenty years old at the time of her death. She was a very popular girl. The next to go was my sister Ella. She died a horrible death. She had a paralysis condition and her legs and feet just seemed to dry up before she died. She left three small children. Orin was accidently killed by a horse in Hurricane when he was about thirty-eight years old. The horse tried to follow a steer over a wire gate and caught his four legs and threw Orin some distance ahead causing a skull fracture. He died a few hours later. He left a young family of four children. Nennial lived to partially raise his fine family. He was subject to some sort of a seizure and was shaving when he had an attack and fell over into the bathtub and died. He had a pleasing personality and an exceptionally good singing voice. He died in 1952. Elmer was the last brother to pass away. He died in November, 1964. He had had lots of problems to put up with. He had a serious illness in the early part of his life, and it seemed for months that he would never get out of the V. A. Hospital in Salt Lake. Following a prostate gland operation and an accident of puncturing the bladder during surgery, he rode to Hurricane from Salt Lake City the next day, then was home for about a week when he became so seriously ill that they decided to take him to Cedar Hospital where Dr. Graff put a drain in his abdomen and remarked afterward that he was the nearest dead man that he ever put a knife into, and he had many serious troubles after that and never fully recovered from this condition. So there’s still Bertha and I left of the family. Bertha still works every hour of the day and never gives up. Like Iva used to say: “Bertha is so generous, she’d give her head away if it wasn’t connected to her shoulders.” While lived in Hurricane, I was interested in dry farming. I started out with my brother Orin on his homestead entry of 320 acres and really 14started plowing and the first year plowed by walking plow, which I used for two or three years until I could afford to get a disc-riding plow. We farmed on a small scale compared to what they do now, but we were quite successful raising very good crops for several years and also handled our livestock in connection with this, and took other livestock for winter feed from other people, especially Ford’s cattle from Kanarra and a bunch of horses for one winter which turned out to be a very severe winter and we were out a long while working with them in cold, freezing weather. And I also proved up on a homestead of my own with Orin helping, but his accidental death prevented him from continuing to help prove up on it. In the dry farming business, we were quite successful. I disposed of that property after I moved to Kanarra. I did a lot of things while we were in Kanarra. I not only operated the farm that I purchased from Berry Williams, which was about twenty- five acres, but I also operated my mother-in-law's property, known as the “ten acres” down in the south field. I also handled some livestock and was in with my brother Elmer and also Joseph Haslam in buying and selling cattle until the depression struck and we dissolved the partnerships. It wasn’t long after we moved to Kanarra that we built a home there, and I can remember the first night we moved into the place, as we had no blinds at the windows. The flashing from a beacon light on the other side of the valley really flashed through the windows and kept us awake a lot of the night. I was also town treasurer of the Kanarra Town and water master with the Kanarra Field Reservoir & Irrigation Company for several years and still had the job when I moved to Las Vegas in November, 1942. T also served as a school bus driver, driving the school bus from Kanarra to Cedar. When I got the job to move to Las Vegas, I lived there over a year before my family moved down in 1944. _Early in 1936 one of the members of the Groves family, Annie, died and the two remaining members of the family, Alvin and Lewis, who had been sent to the mental institution in Provo, came to Kanarra along with other relatives, for Annie’s funeral. They thought they would get to stay there, but no preparations had been made for anyone to take care of them and they had no place to live. It was really a sad, sorrowful feeling when they had to return to Provo and they showed great concern about it and hated to go. So in talking it over with Bishop Horace Roundy and the County Commissioners, my wife and I decided we would fix a place with the help of the County and take care of them. They lived in a little one-roomed 15house which the County furnished, but we furnished their food and clothing for the price that the County would pay to the hospital which was $40.00 a month for both of them. But we had the use of the Grove brother’s lots which we raised a little garden on. They lived on our premises until their death, which was after we moved to Las Vegas. Delila and Dayton, then Park and Camille Williams, and then Preston and Lillian Williams lived in our house and still took care of them after we moved and until they died. Alvin and Lewis never ceased to express their gratefulness in our taking them out of the Provo Institution and giving them an opportunity to farm “them-there lots down there.” Talso helped Frank Kelsey over at New Harmony with a deer camp for several seasons and it was while I was there in 1942 that Lalif was working in Las Vegas and came up on the hunt with, among others, the general superintendent of the Manganese Ore Company, a defense plant. While I was dressing a deer out for him, he said if you'll come to Las Vegas I'll give you a job you can do easier than this, because I was somewhat crippled from the hip fracture I had had in February. And in a week, I got word that he had a job for me and I went to work in a machine shop tool room as tool-checker, and I worked there until the plant closed in 1944, due to the end of the war. We sure had lots of good friends and neighbors in Kanarra and lots of good get-togethers and parties. Even when the snow was deep we had a homemade sled we would drive to make sure we could get to the party. In those days there was a lot more snow than there has been these late years. Many times I'd have to take the kids to school either on the sled or horseback because the snow was deep and it was so cold. We also had some other chores to take care of. We had a few cows to milk all of the time and other livestock to feed. There are not many of the folks left still alive that we used to gather with and have our parties, but I still feel I have a lot of good friends in Kanarra and I like to visit there. During the years of the depression in the early 1930's, I can never forget what a terrible thing it was for me to be disabled and my family young and needing my attention. I was unable to do anything for a long time and expenses went on and no chance for any income. Only because of some life insurance policies which I surrendered (one matured) and borrowed all I could on another one was the only thing that kept me frompassing away at that time, as no money was available any place other than this source, When the government administration changed and President Roosevelt went into office and began to make work -- different kinds of jobs for the people -- my wife worked on a sewing project for the WPA while I stayed home and tried to take care of the children, which was a situation I had never been used to. Not wishing to discuss politics, Ihave always felt since that time that the Democratic Party was the best for the people. I might say, it looks like I'm the only Democrat in the family. Well, I've never missed many chances of using my power to vote, which I consider is a great privilege to live in a country where we have this privilege. It was after school was out in 1944 that the family moved to Las Vegas. In June, after LaRae graduated from Cedar High School and Fernard and Faun from Kanarra Elementary School we loaded what we could in a horse trailer and the car, fully expecting to return to Kanarra, probably in the fall, and we moved to Nevada to stay. I at that time was working at Las Vegas Air Force Base where I held a job with the sanitary engineers on the water system, until they cut the crew to skeleton force in about 1946. When they re-opened the Base, I was considered too old to get my job back. Then I worked for the City of Las Vegas for a year as a maintenance man; then in late 1947 I quit and started to build a home, which we now have, and we moved into it in late May of 1948. Then I worked several months with part-time donation on the building of the LDS Chapel at Eighth and Linden, Las Vegas. On the first day of March, 1949, I started as custodian for the Clark County School District. I worked the balance of the school year at Bonanza School. Then in the fall of 1949, I took over Sunrise Acres School, and was there for eight years and was transferred to North Ninth Street School where I worked for nearly three years when I retired in March, 1960. My health had been good up to this time and I think I could have gone on and continued with the work for a couple of years although I had had another serious operation, but had recovered pretty well by the time to g0 to work.In January, 1960, my wife was ailing and felt poorly for some time. She became so bad that it became necessary to take her to the hospital for a checkup, where they found she had a ruptured appendix and they operated on her. I too was ill and they kept me in the hospital and I had another Prostate gland operation to correct the condition which was not taken care of when I was operated on in Salt Lake in 1954, I think I could have gone back to work, but Iva’s health was not good and she needed a lot of attention and she really never did get back to good health again. She had had high blood pressure and a heart condition for years before we left Kanarra. It was the day of Kerry Davis’s missionary farewell testimonial (September 20, 1964), that she had a stroke as she was just ready to leave the house for the services. I had already gone as I had a part on the program and she was coming with Max and Javauna. By the time the services were over, she was in the hospital and she had a terrible struggle until she passed away on October 9, 1964. The funeral was held in the Las Vegas Second Ward Chapel with Bishop Richard Worthen conducting the funeral services and the chapel was filled to overflowing with friends and relatives. It was her wish to be brought back to Kanarra to be buried, and that wish was granted. There was also a graveside service held at the Kanarra Cemetary with a large group of old friends and relatives attending. We were pleased that all of our family had all gone to the Temple and received their endowments. Alll had nice families which we were both very proud of. We feel that we have had an exceptionally nice bunch of in- laws and they have all treated us exceptionally well. We liked to visit together among our children and friends, from the time I retired until Iva’s death and we did quite a lot of traveling and visiting with them. Since mother’s death, I have done a lot of traveling and visiting with my children and am with Faun and family in Salt Lake at the time I’m dictating this history. I didn’t get to send any of my children on missions, although Fernard had been interviewed, but was unable to go because of the Korean War. I am surely proud of my grandsons who have gone on missions; Kelly, Kenton and Kerry who is now out and Bruce expecting to receive a call momentarily. 1am proud of my daughters and granddaughters who have gone as far as they have to get an education.Probably I should mention our Golden Wedding event which was in our home in Las Vegas. We sure had a lot of friends and relatives call on us and complimented us on our way of life and the family we had raised. ‘Well, it would be impossible to mention all of the trips and good times we have had with the family, but I recall making my first to California with some members of the family while Lalif was running a dude ranch called ‘Rancho Mirage’ near Palm Springs and Indio, California, Iva, Javauna and I took Pole Pollock, Hettie and Lois with us. Thad just bought a car (not new) so we made a trip down there and stayed for about a week. Then later that year, Iva, LaRae the twins and I took a trip to Mesa, Arizona. One object in making this trip was to take a horse that I had sold the year before and had been wintering for a party from Wickenburg, Arizona, and as we had relatives in Mesa, we went on and visited there for a few days. Then from there we went back down by Blythe and back to where Lalif was. I think this was in 1940. We enjoyed these trips very much, although Iva had a disappointment. She bought a large nursery plant and when we got to Blythe, we couldn’t take it into California. She felt very bad about this situation, so we sent it back to Phoenix and had them ship it to Kanarra where we kept it for several years -- in the house for the winter and outdoors for the summer. It got so large it took two or three men to handle it. Iva was a great lover of flowers and plants. Sometimes they would occupy a good portion of the house. Other trips that we took after we moved to Las Vegas that we enjoyed very much was to Reno, San Francisco and back through to Salt Lake with Fernard and Faun. We also had taken a trip to Yellowstone and Grand Canyon with the twins on their summer vacations from the Huntridge Theaters. We also had a nice trip with Max and Javauna down to California and up the coast to San Francisco and back to Cedar City. Kenton and Gayle went along too. On another trip we went with Stanley, Erlene and their little girls (1961) up through Yellowstone and through Glacier National Park and on up into Canada where Stanley had a New York Life Insurance Company convention at Banff. We really got to see wonderful scenery and a lot of country.We also had another enjoyable trip in 1957 with Durrel, LaRae, Bruce, Geri, Faun, John and Baby Frances into Yellowstone National Park. In our younger married life, we'd take trips with team and a wagon on the mountain and spend a few days. It was always very beautiful up there. I guess I'd better not tell about shooting a deer out of season. We had gone from Hurricane up on Kolob for a few days and as we left early in the morning to return to Hurricane, up on the Home Valley Knoll near Blue Springs a couple of deer appeared on top of the knoll. I had a gun so I couldn’t resist the temptation of getting one of them. This really upset the children a lot, but I dressed it out and took it home, and I don’t think the youngsters have ever forgotten it either, and I never will. The game Jaws were not as strict then as they are now. I could tell lots of incidents that are probably not necessary, but I will mention one or two that happened before I was married, and in my early married life. On our big cattle herd trail from down on the Arizona Strip to Lund, Utah, we would have lots of bad stampedes. One that I might mention happened out between Hamilton Fort and Iron Springs. We had hardly got the herd bedded than they stampeded and they continued to run the entire night. No sooner would we get them circled and quieted, than they would break and go again. None of the men got any sleep that night and in the morning we had three or four bunches scattered throughout the valley and some were still missing. One of the cowboys in chasing them had his horse go through a wire fence with him, and when he got straightened out, he was on one side of the fence and the horse on the other and the cattle had gone and he didn’t know where. It was two or three days before we got them all rounded up again and in one bunch. I remember another time especially when we had reached Lund and the cattle was thirsty crossing the desert. They didn’t have enough water in Lund for them, so they had to ship some water in by train, and just as we were getting the last of the herd watered, the engine got over-loaded with steam and it blew off and the cattle went everywhere. This was between sundown and dusk, and that was another night nobody got any sleep. We would no sooner get them circled than they would stampede again. We all rode hard all night -- some of us without eating any supper and it was late the next day before we could get back and get anything to eat. The cattle we had were in several different bunches up in the foothills. 20I might mention another experience I had trapping mustangs and wild horses. My brother-in-law, Joe Scow and some Toquerville fellows were out trapping a band of wild mustangs on the Arizona Strip where there were plenty of them. In the dry summer the water would dry up and we could make corrals around the water holes that were left, and the horses would learn to come into those corrals to water. Then we would set up and watch the gates nights and days, and hide out of sight and then pull a rope that would shut the gate when the horses would get in to get a drink. But this one time we had gone farther up the Clay Hollow Wash to help the Toquerville boys at their corrals. It started to rain very hard and we undertook to go back to our camp which was down the wash five or six miles, and it continued to rain and was so intensive dark that you couldn’t see or tell where you were going. Joe was riding a mustang horse that he had caught in that country a year or two before, but my horse would take the lead and that’s the only way we could make our way back to camp because we couldn’t see and we had lost our directions. That horse did a good job of getting us back, but he did miss his mark a little and slid into the wash, down an enbankment and when he hit the bottom, he rolled over me, and I couldn’t speak. I knew when Joe called but I couldn’t answer because the breath was knocked out of me, so he kept calling until he knew something had happened as his horse stopped, but I finally got my breath enough to answer him and when we were talking we heard the horses down in the corral where our camp was. The horse hadn't missed the trail over 100 yards. That was another long night as I sat around the fire trying to dry out and I really had a sore ride the next day into Hurricane as I was really sore after being rolled over under the horse. NOTE: This was the last of Dad’s dictation. He died on November 10, 1976, at the age of ninety-four, in Salt Lake City, Utah. After spending two miserable years following a stroke, he was more than happy to see his sweet wife and family again. 21