Ann Amelia Clark

• Name: Ann Amelia Clark
• Born: September 18, 1883 Malad, Idaho
• Died: July 1, 1958 Provo, Utah
• Related through: Erin's grandfather James Madson

 
Ann Amelia Clark Madson was born in Malad, Idaho, September 18, 1883, to William Hyrum and Harriet Matilda Williams Clark. Her father died when she was about seven years old. She had some memories of him and spoke of him almost reverently, always calling him "Dad", while her stepfather was always "Pa". Her father was away from home a great deal as his work required. I'm not sure what work he did, but he did leave a little money to the family when he died and my mother was quite bitter about the fact that her mother gave the money to her next husband to invest in sheep. He never did seem to be successful either with sheep or farming so they were always very poor. Mother thought the money should have been saved for the children when they grew up.
 
Mother was the oldest of three children. The others were Mabel Venetta, born October 13, 1886, and William Hyrum, born November 1, 1889. After her husband's death Grandma cooked for men and thus met Oliver Cowdrey Bake whom she married. They moved to a small farm at Elkhorn where Mother grew up. Children born to this marriage were Elizabeth Sarah, Oliver Leslie (lived only a few years), Earl (died at birth) and Everett Lester.
 
Mother talked very little about her childhood, but she and her sister, Mabel, seemed to be very close and did everything together. She spoke with pleasure of the time they spent with Grandpa Bakes' father who lived near them. He told them stories of life in England before the family migrated to America.
 
Mother spoke often of the one room school at Elkhorn which she disliked and never seemed to be able to get through the eighth grade there. She loved to tell of the year she went to Malad to school. She stayed with her Aunt May Bush and family (her mother's sister). She enjoyed the literary society at school and never tired of telling of her thrill at being asked to be in the school play. She was often called upon to give readings at social gatherings long after she was married and had a family.
 
She enjoyed this and liked to read whenever she could find any reading material. It was scarce and there were no libraries near. Our parents always ordered a few books at Christmas time from Sears or Montgomery Wards --- often popular novels like English Orphans by Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth. We read them over and over again. My older brother was an avid reader, but really had to wait until he was in high school and used the Public Library in Malad. They were not very well supplied, but he selected the well worn books which meant they were popular at least. He read anything from Shakespeare to Stanley's travels in Africa to Zane Gray to the Bible and enjoyed every minute of it.
 
After marrying Mads Jonathan Madson they first lived in a two room log building with a so-called shanty or lean-to on the north. We also had a cellar to keep canned fruit, store potatoes and carrots etc., for winter, keep milk cool and as a general storage area. Later an extra storage space was built over the cellar entrance. This helped, but sleeping space was especially scarce since the new brick house with five bedrooms and a full basement didn't exist until after the sixth child was born. Rex was the first to be born in the new house. All eleven children were born at home.

John and Amelia Madson family

 The new house was finished in the fall of 1919 and after being so crowded seemed like the lap of luxury to us. There were a large living room, dining room, kitchen and two bedrooms on the main floor, three bedrooms upstairs and a full basement with no rooms finished there. There was a room meant for a bathroom on the main floor; plumbing was roughed in and thus it remained until James and Idonna moved in after Mother and the three youngest children came to Provo to live in 1941. Thus all of our time on the farm meant using outside toilet facilities and bathing on Saturday night in the kitchen using the round wash tub. The washbasin remained until 1941 also. The water from the sink was cold only and the sewer system consisted of a drain from the sink to the front yard near a large tree. Hot water had to come from the teakettle or the reservoir on the kitchen stove.

There was no lawn, but we did have five large silver maple leafed trees in the front yard. There was a swing attached to a limb on one of the trees which gave us all a good deal of pleasure. It was a good place to swing or read and relax or just enjoy the clean fresh air and meditate. The yard was fenced (partly painted picket) and thus kept our animals like cows, horses and sheep out. The chickens roamed at will.
 
Coal oil lamps furnished the lighting in the old house, but shortly after moving into the new house we had the luxury of an acetylene gas system which furnished a much better light. It was set up in the cellar and had to be serviced with carbide at intervals. As this was consumed the calcium carbide had to be drained and carried out of the cellar by bucketfuls. It was used to whitewash the chicken coop, or paint the fence or just discarded.
 
We also had a new record player or phonograph in a nice cabinet with room to store many records. This was a hand windup machine (rewinding necessary about every other record). This was considered a luxury, but it gave all of us considerable pleasure.
 
My mother and I did quite a bit of sewing. I never did have a ready made dress until I was teaching and earning my own money. Mother taught me to sew when I was about twelve and after that it was my job to make dresses, aprons and rompers regularly.
 
Most of our food was produced right on the farm including meat (pork, beef, chickens, mutton), vegetables (lettuce, radishes, peas, beans, onions, carrots, potatoes, turnips, parsnips and squash), dairy products (milk, butter, cream, cottage cheese, and of course eggs). The cream was sold in town or used to make butter for our own table and some to trade along with any extra eggs we had at the grocery store. Mother was always very proud of her butter mold and the paddle which she used to shape the butter. Her step-father had carved the paddle out of lovely mahogany wood. The finished product looked very much like the solid pounds of butter we buy at the grocery store now. The grocer weighed each pound carefully to test for full weight. Mother's was usually a little over which was a source of pride and satisfaction to her.
 
Mother made good bread (not as good as Grandma's) and baking was done every other day. Our big family made it disappear fast. It was mixed at night and made into loaves in the morning. Then it had to rise and be baked by noon. Special treats came when some of the dough was made into hot biscuits, fry cakes or scones, doughnuts or cinnamon buns.
 
We had oranges once a year, in our Christmas stockings and bananas were almost as rare. Holiday treats included plum pudding made with suet and raisins in a cake like batter and boiled n a bag made from a clean flour sack which had been opened to form a square. This was served hot with a dip made with sugar, water, cornstarch, vanilla or rum flavor (rum was seldom available). Fruit cake was another special Christmas treat.
 
We never did go hungry, but we were limited by the seasons and lack of refrigeration. There was no such thing as salad dressings or relishes from the store. We mostly went without, but sometimes we made our own. All our food had to be prepared from scratch. It was time consuming and lacked glamour, but it was wholesome and never went to waste.
 
It wasn't quite all work and no play, but it did seem like it, especially in the summer when the farm work was heaviest. There were no near neighbors and few children our ages even then. We were four to eight miles from church and never did go until the branch Sunday School came to Elkhorn when I was in the late teens.
 
In summer our Sundays were pretty well taken up in visiting relatives or neighbors. No warning was ever given; we just started early in the white top and later in the old Studebaker and drove to the desired spot. We would go to Uncle Will's, Mother's brother, who lived on a ranch at Devil's Creek north of Malad. We also visited her two sisters, Aunt Mabel lived just north of Malad until she moved to town in the early 1920's and Aunt Lizzie who lived north and west of us about eight to ten miles in a place called Daniels. My Father's brother, Uncle Frank, lived near Cherry Creek south and west of Malad. Then there were the neighbors who lived only a few miles away. One of these was David Williams, Mother's uncle, and Dave Edwards who lived near him. All of these families would return the visits and everyone seemed to come up with a good Sunday dinner, often prepared from scratch after we arrived. The visits were very satisfying and gave us an opportunity to get acquainted with uncles, aunts, cousins and neighbors.
 
Her oldest son, Earl, was killed in a well pulling accident on May 28, 1928. This was the first death in our family and it was very hard on all of us. I guess Mother mourned most of all. She used to sing as she did her housework, but I never heard her sing again and she didn't like to listen to music after that. Another son Orlin died after he was hit by a car in Provo in 1948.
 
Her husband, John, died suddenly from a heart attack at home on July 18, 1930. He had been suffering from chest pains for some time and over-exerted himself putting out a small fire in the motor of the combine-harvester he was running the day before his death.
 
In 1941 Amelia and the three youngest children moved to Provo to live with daughter Hattie. (who wrote this article) She passed away on July 1, 1958 in a Provo rest home where she had been for about two years. She suffered from Parkinson's disease and senility and could not be left alone. We kept her at home as long as possible, but I had to work and the rest home gave her better care than we could have in any way provided at home.
 
This history was written and compiled by daughter, Hattie Madson Knight, 1976.

William Cornwell Patten

• Name: William Cornwell Patten
• Born: March 24, 1799 West Pikeland, Chester, Pennsylvania
• Died: March 9, 1883 Bloomington, Bear Lake, Idaho
• Related through: Dan's granmother Elvira Wilde Langford

William Cornwell Patten was born March 24, 1799 in West Pikeland, Chester, Pennsylvania, to John Patten and Ann Cornwell.

On December 21, 1821 he married Elizabeth Harriet Cooper in Philadelphia. One daughter was born to this union, Mary Ann Patten. William and Elizabeth were only married for a short time before she passed away. On December 28, 1826, William married Julianna Bench. Three children were born to William and Juliana: George, Ann and Julia.

William was a plasterer and weaver which didn’t always make a very profitable living for the family. They were very poor and the older children received little education.

His wife Julianna passed away on January 1, 1835, when her oldest son was six. William moved his motherless children from Chester County, Pennsylvania to his mother’s home in Philadelphia where she took charge of the family.

William joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1841 and in the fall of 1842 he moved his family to Nauvoo. The older children attended school there that winter.

On January 18, 1844 William married Mary Jane Crouse. They became the parents of five children: Thomas, Joseph, Hannah Jane (our ancestor), Matilda and William. Thomas and Joseph were not on the wagon train roster when they came to Utah so they must have died before then.

William and his oldest son George helped build the Nauvoo Temple. The family was well acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith and they often heard him preach. They suffered the persecutions of the mobs and experienced many trials and tribulations along with the other Saints. They were devastated at the news that Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum, had been martyred. It was a sad time for the Saints and there was a gloom over the whole city of Nauvoo.

William’s oldest daughter, Mary Ann, married Charles Shreeve Peterson on March 22, 1845 in Nauvoo. On January 21, 1849, William’s other daughter, Ann, also married Charles as a second wife.

In 1846, William received his temple endowments and was sealed to his wife Mary Jane. He had his first two wives sealed to him on the same day.

George Patten left in February of 1846 to help some of the Saints cross the Mississippi River and into Sugar Creek, Iowa. He returned to Nauvoo two times and stayed the last time to remain with his family. They stayed in Nauvoo until the last of the Saints were driven out.

George Patten gives the following account of his family’s exodus from Nauvoo. “We disposed of our house and lot in Nauvoo, worth about $500, for a cow valued at $15. Remaining in Iowa during the winter of 1847 and 1848, we hurried on to Winter Quarters early in the spring of 1848 and put in a crop. Being ordered to vacate Winter Quarters as the land on which it stood belonged to the Indians, my father moved his family over the river and made a temporary home on the Big Pigeon, nine miles north of Kanesville, Iowa. In the fall of 1849 I went back to St. Joseph. My father was living near there trying to get an outfit to go to Utah, so I helped him. We struggled hard to get an outfit with which to cross the plains and the mountains to the Great Salt Lake Valley. We started for the valley in the spring of 1850 with two old wagons, three yoke of cows, one yoke of three-year-old steers, one yoke of three-year-old heifers, and a yoke of two-year-old heifers. So we had plenty of milk. We left Florence [on the Missouri River] June 21, 1850 in Wilford Woodruff’s hundred and Edson Whipple’s fifty, arriving in Salt Lake City, October 3, in the fall of that same year (1850). It was eight years to the day from the time we arrived in Nauvoo, and in the same man’s company, that of Edson Whipple.”

One day as the company was traveling they were surrounded by about 500 Indians, all mounted and armed. It was a scary situation for the company until they saw the Piute Chief reach out to shake hands.

The company endured “cholera, stampedes, thunder and lightning storms, rain and tempests of winds and false brethren.” While entering Utah the company had to travel through a snow storm and had no food when they arrived in the Salt Lake Valley.

William moved his family and young daughters to Payson, Utah in the fall of 1850, where they were some of the first settlers. His oldest daughters, Mary Ann and Ann were living in Alpine, Utah with their husband and when George married in 1851 he also lived in Alpine before making his home near his father in Payson.

One account says that William and Mary Jane welcomed a son to their family on June 8, 1851, named William Patten. He was born in Payson, Utah. He must have not lived long as he is not listed with his family in the 1860 census. Also in June of 1851 his wife, Mary Jane, passed away.

Some family histories tell of a marriage between William and Elizabeth Anderson, from Sweden, on September 7, 1851. In February of 1857, William married Wealthy Eddy. They had a daughter named Sarah.

William, Wealthy, Hannah, Matilda, and Sarah are all listed as living in Cache County, Utah in the 1860 Utah Census, where William was a farmer. They moved to Cache Valley after Brigham Young called William to help settle the area. They were advised to settle “on the muddy,” now known as the Cub River. They later moved to Franklin, Idaho where they camped in the fort for protection from Indians.

In 1864 William moved to Bloomington, Bear Lake, Idaho which at that time was thought to be in Cache County, Utah. William and Wealthy separated about this time.

William is listed on the 1870 Bloomington, Rich County, Utah census as living alone. At the age of 81 he is also listed on the 1880 Bloomington, Bear Lake County, Idaho Census as living alone and divorced.

From the time William moved to Bloomington he bought a small farm where he lived. He also continued to weave and helped plaster and build many of the buildings in that area. One such building was the Tabernacle at nearby Paris, Idaho. He lived his last years quietly, but he was strong in his testimony right to the end of his life.

He passed away on March 9, 1883 and is buried in the Bloomington, Idaho Cemetery.

This article was written by Anjanette Lofgren for the daughters of the Utah Pioneers in 2007. Her information came from published sources and another biography by Mary Crook Bursik, 1984.

Ernest Fountain Langford

• Name: Ernest Fountain Langford
  
• Born: September 5, 1888, Junction, Piute, Utah
• Died: December 1, 1983, Ogden, Weber, Utah
• Related through: Dan's grandfather Heber Langford

Ernest Fountain Langford was born September 5, 1888 in Piute County, Utah, son of James Harvey Langford Jr. and Rose Ellen Jackson.

Ernest and his brothers and sisters grew up in pioneering circumstances. He was only three or four years old when his family moved to old Mexico and he spent his entire boyhood and young manhood in Mexico. When the family was driven out of Mexico in 1912, Ernest and some of his brothers went back and forth between Tucson, Arizona and San Jose, Mexico bringing out the wheat crop they had been forced to leave behind them. Several times they just missed being discovered by the revolutionaries.

He married Zina Charlotte Chlarson September 24, 1914 in Tucson, Arizona. They were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple, October 8, 1916. She was the daughter of Heber Otto Chlarson and Ida Isabella Norton.

Zina Charlotte Chlarson is on the
right

Ernest and brother James Harvey Langford III

Just after their marriage they moved to Hurley, New Mexico where Ernest had a job in the mines. Soon after taking this job, he took a job in the mines as a plumber’s helper. He realized that although it meant a cut in salary it was an opportunity to learn a trade. With this in mind, and with his wife’s encouragement, he applied for and almost completed a thorough correspondence course in plumbing and heating.

In about 1919 or 1920, Ernest took his wife and his then three children and moved to Ogden, Utah. He took a job with a contractor doing plumbing but soon decided to go start his own business. When he first started he didn’t even own a truck, but from this humble start he built a successful contracting business. Except for an unsuccessful effort at homesteading during the depression years, he always worked in plumbing and heating contracting.

About 1937, he and his wife bought a ten acre piece of property during a tax sale. They paid for their new home as they built it and changed an old brick yard into a lovely home site. Since then they subdivided the ten acres and it became a nice residential district.

Charlotte was a wonderful helpmate to her husband. She was extremely good at sewing and always made the children’s clothes, even her boy’s shirts. Every fall she would make several shirts for each of the boys — blue for Ernie, green for Jim and tan for Heber. She was also good at remodeling clothes and when she was finished with them they looked completely new. She always had the best dressed children on the block and for very little money.

She loved to garden and they had a large garden every summer. Each fall would see her shelves packed with fruits, vegetables and meats that she had canned. She had a cow and would make her own cottage cheese, butter, ice cream and cheese. She also would make her own baby food.

Ernest and Charlotte always seemed to be helping a relative. Charlotte’s parents came to live with them in their old age. She was the oldest child in her family and had helped raise her brothers and sisters and Ernest and Charlotte’s home was kind of a second home to the Chlarsons.

Both were members of the LDS Church. The gospel was important to them and they encouraged their children to be active in the Church. Charlotte was seldom without some church job. She was especially active in the Relief Society but worked in Primary and Sunday School as well. They were certainly wonderful examples to their children, teaching them the value of hard work, honesty and thrift.

Charlotte kept busy crocheting and quilting until shortly before her death from cancer in 1966. Ernest lived alone in his home on Orchard Avenue in Ogden for many years. He continued to garden well into his 80s. He passed away in 1983. 

This article was taken from the book "The Progenitors and Descendants of Fielding Langford" by his daughter Ida-Rose Langford Hall.

George Allemann Sr.

• Name: George Allemann Sr.
• Born: August 6, 1840 Tschappina, Graubunden, Switzerland
• Died: January 31, 1932 Logan, Utah
• Related through: Dan's grandfather Lynn Crookston

George Allemann Sr. was born August 6, 1840 high in the Alps in Tschappina, Graubunden, Switzerland to Abraham and Sara Marchion Allemann.

On July 12, 1842 when he was two years old, his father died of pneumonia. January 20, 1843, about six months later his mother gave birth to a little sister, Elsbeth. His mother died five days after the baby was born. Thus four little children, Anna Barbara, Matheus, George, and Baby Elsbeth were left with no parents. Little George went to live with his grandfather, who was a widower with two grown sons. When he was old, he still remembered how his grandfather took him by the hand and led him to his home.

The two little girls, Anna Barbara and Elsbeth went to live with an aunt, Katharina Marchion Brunett. She had a baby about the age of little Elsbeth so she nursed them like twins. Anna Barbara was about nine, so she was a big help. She tended babies, did housework, helped feed the cattle and gather wood. She worked very hard and often was wet and cold, she developed rheumatism at an early age and suffered of it all her life.

Matthew (Matheus) was about five, he went to live with his Godfather who had no children and somewhat spoiled him.

Little George became very close to his grandfather who became both father and mother to him. His grandfather, Matthew Marchion was a very religious man and taught him to pray, to be honest and upright in everything and to keep the Sabbath Day holy. They never did any work on the Sabbath Day. Little George slept with him and remembered him praying sometimes until he fell asleep. When beggars came to his house he would always give them something to eat, he would never turn them away hungry.

In 1848, his Uncle Benedict got married and brought his wife to live with them, so they finally had a housekeeper. When the babies came along George became a nurse and servant.

The four children lived with relatives for thirteen years, then all moved back into their parent’s home to live together and keep house for themselves.

In 1862, Elsbeth married Christian Tester and moved to Saffien, his home town. In December 1863, Elsbeth, like her mother, died giving birth to a baby girl. Anna Barbara was by then sorely afflicted with rheutimism, and couldn't go to see her in her sickness or attend the funeral of her only little sister. This was a sad blow to her.

May 8, 1863, George married Anna Maria Allemann. They were very happy and loved each other dearly. She was eight years older than him, very neat, intelligent and could write beautifully. Two years after their marriage, December 12, 1865 Anna Maria gave birth to a baby girl. Two weeks later December 26 she passed away. Losing his dear wife was a terrible a blow to him. The baby was named Anna Maria after her mother. Anna Barbara (Aunt Bassie) moved in to care for the baby the best she could with her afflicted body.

About eight years later he married Anna Maria Gredig, also born in Tschappina and the daughter of Johann Peter Gredig and Ellsbeth Allemann. March 10, 1873 their first son, John Peter arrived.

In the spring of 1873, a man named Buchli and his family came to father and wanted to rent a house from him. Father had heard that these people belonged to another church that was very unpopular, called the Mormon Church. He thought they would not take it if he would charge them a big price, but they rented it anyway. One day Father went up to see how they were getting along, he found the man reading the Bible. Father thought he couldn't be so bad if he was reading the Bible. They talked and Father soon found that Mr. Buchli knew more about the Bible than Father did. After that Father went to see him often. They talked about Mormonism and through the Bible he could prove the truth of his beliefs. Father believed it and told his wife and sister about it. They studied it together and soon wanted baptism. Their folks became very prejudiced against them. Mother's parents came and took her away and wanted her to leave father if he would join that church. She soon came back to him. May 5, 1874, he was baptized with his wife and sister by a missionary, Elder J. Keller. They wanted to go to Zion, but were unable to sell their property for several years.

April 12, 1875 their second child was born, they named her Sarah. She died in September of the same year. April 12, 1877, I was born to them and they named me Sarah also. Rulon S. Wells was in Switzerland and he blessed her. In the fall of 1878 a young man came to father and said he knew a buyer for his property, they agreed on a deal and made preparations to immigrate to Zion.

Their relatives became more prejudiced than ever and tried to hinder them in every way possible. An aunt to his little girl of his first marriage took her by force out of school and away to another town. Father followed her and finally located her. She clung to his neck and wanted to return with him but they tore her away by force. The law, the officers and everybody were against him and he was unable to get her back. Anna Barbara, father's sister who raised her from when she was a baby was heartbroken. She tried to follow her on the train but never saw her again.

May 11, 1879, their fourth child, Abraham was born. He was a delicate, sickly child and mother wasn't able to nurse him. They believed the midwife gave her something to dry her milk and prevent them from going to America. When he was only five weeks old Father, Mother, Anna Barbara, father's sister and their three children sailed for America, June 17, 1879.

They had no idea where they would settle when they arrived. A missionary, Henry Flamm advised them to settle in Bear Lake, a newly settled valley. They took the train to Evanston, Wyoming, where several teams were waiting to take the emigrants to Bear Lake. It was a very rough, frightening ride by wagon. This little immigrant family couldn't speak the language and the teamster was drunk, whipping the horses so they seemed out of control. Uncle Peter said a rider on horseback came along and knew they would not make it down the Laketown dugways. He took over and drove them the rest of the way. Uncle Peter knew the Lord was surely protecting them. They arrived at Paris, Idaho, at midnight on July 17, 1879.

A few days after they arrived, Father and Mother were offered a job to milk cows and do diary work at Nouman. They moved out there in a little cabin with only their trunks for a table and milk stools to sit on. Uncle Peter, who was six and didn't understand English, remembered how some neighbor children played with him. They had a wagon and let him coast on the hill.

After a few weeks, they got some furniture and were quite comfortable. Later in the fall they moved to Montpeliar. The next fall in 1880, they bought a house and lot in Montpeliar. This was a very cold house, the windows froze during the winter. The children would sit on the stairs behind the stove to keep warm, but they all kept well. November 5, 1881, George was born in Montpelier.

Father worked in the Temple Saw Mill in Logan Canyon, as a volunteer from his Stake. He drove a team from the sawmill in Temple Fork of Logan Canyon with sawed lumber. At the Forks he would exchange his sleigh for an empty sleigh and return to the sawmill. Coming from the Alps in Switzerland he was familiar with the sound and wind of an approaching snowslide. On one trip he yelled to the other teamsters to abandon their sleigh and climb to the opposite mountain side. Teams were buried and killed.

Father took up a quarter section of land in Bern, down by the river. He built a little one room cabin with a dirt roof. In 1883 diphtheria broke out in Montpelier and many died. Just a day or two before the town was quarantined and the road closed, Father took his family to Bern. Here, daughters Elsbeth was born in 1883 and Maria was born in 1885.

June 5, 1887, Mother gave birth to a pair of twins, a girl, Anna Barbara and boy, Matthew. The little one room cabin they lived in didn't give them very much shelter any more as the roof leaked terribly. When it rained you would see our auntie holding the umbrella over Mother's bed to keep the rain off her and the babies. Father went up Montpelier Canyon and got out a lot of logs, had them sawed square and had a five room house built with a shingled roof. In the spring of 1889, we moved into our new home.

In 1889 the dreaded diseases malaria and scarlet fever broke out. All the children were sick. For six weeks Mother never had her clothes off except to change. Our two littlest girls died, Maria, and Elsbeth just a week apart. They are buried in the south west corner or the Ovid Cemetery.

June 16, 1890 another baby girl was born. They named her Emeline. Benjamin Martin was born in May 2, 1893.

Mother was a hard working woman and never complained. She spun the wool and knit all the stockings for the family and sewed the clothes by hand.

Auntie or Aunt Bassie (Annie Barbara) as we called her, helped with the children and the work as much as she could with her crippled hands. She was a dear soul and the only relative we ever knew. We all loved her dearly. She had a chance to marry into polygamy to J. Kunz. She decided not to marry but he wanted to have her sealed to him after her death.

Edwin Leonard was born September 7, 1895. Soon after, father bought a ranch up in the mountains by Montpelier, a little valley we called Ephraim. He traded a beautiful team of black horses to John Cozzens for this ranch. In the biography of Emily Almira Cozzens Rich, written by Ezra J. Poulsen, she tells about the severe winter of 1892 and 93. "Snow fell to the depth of 4 to 6 feet. John Cozzens hay gave out and there was none for sale in the valley. He and his animals were snowed in and he saw practically all of his live stock, seventy head, die of starvation and cold. In the spring of 1983 he disposed of his ranch as best he could and returned to Montpelier. He never recovered from his financial lose."

Father went there with his older children every summer to milk cows and make cheese. He took neighbors milk cows for the summer and gave them cheese in return. He and Peter spent some winters up there feeding the cattle. They skied all the way to the valley for supplies and mail. Mother and Auntie stayed with the younger children in Bern.

In the fall of 1899 Father and Mother with nine children went to Logan to the temple to have their endowments and sealings done. It took us two days to get there and two days back. The following spring in May, 1900, George took sick with diphtheria. One after another got it, some not as bad as others. Father and some of the children that were better went back to the summer ranch. My sister, Anna Barbara took sick on Decoration Day and died June 11, 1900. I was up at the ranch at the time. I shall never forget the time when we received word that she had passed on. This was a hard trial for us all. She was a sweet, loving girl. A week or so after she died, Benjamin took sick up at the ranch. They took him home to Bern. We thought he was getting better, but it left his heart bad and he died August 1, 1900. October, 1901 J. Peter left for a mission to Germany.

Father had left the Ephraim ranch and bought a ranch on Crow Creek from a "squatter." It was just south from Wells Canyon. Several of the children took up homesteads to make the land legal. Emeline homesteaded the ranch house and spring. Abraham homesteaded just south of the creek, Matthew the south fields, Sarah and Edwin east of the main road.

The following three or four summers after my husband Adolph Boss's death, I with my little girl Anna stayed at the ranch and milked cows. In the spring of 1910 just as we were going back to Bern, I found I wasn't feeling well. I went anyway. When I got back to Bern I broke out with small pox. They all got it. As soon as some got better they fumigated them and went to the ranch. I went again with Anna and stayed at the ranch.

I bought a lot in the Logan 10th ward and had a house built for five hundred dollars. Mother and Father came to live with Anna and me.

April 14, 1924, Mother took a stroke in the morning while she was still in bed. At first she couldn't speak, but thankfully her speech returned. It left her weak and ailing and often she got smothering spells and she had to be out in the open air in order to breathe. She lingered on in this way until the summer of 1926 when she got worse. She got dropsy again and was very sick all summer. Emeline and Byron lived a few blocks away and were a great help. We took care of her day and night until the last eight nights when I had to call the Relief Society sisters in to help. For many weeks she couldn't lie down. She died, sitting up in her chair, September 25, 1926. She would have been 78 in November, she was buried in the Logan Cemetery.

Father didn't go back to Bern, but stayed in Logan and worked in the temple continuously when it was open. Even at his advanced age, he walked almost a mile each direction. When he got too weak to walk to the temple, Brother Bowman took him over in his car.

On August 6, 1930, all his children went with him to the temple to celebrate his 90th birthday. There were thirteen in all, seven children, four daughter-in-laws and one son-in-law. President Shepherd made a nice speech in honor of Father and his family and mentioned him being able to come to the temple at his age. He held him up as an example to the young people. He had father dismiss the meeting. Father went to the temple two days after his birthday, then the temple closed for the summer.

He died January 31, 1932, at the age of 92 and was buried February 3, in the Logan Cemetery. The morning of his funeral there was two feet of beautiful fresh snow. The city opened the roads in our driveway and to the church and cemetery.

Most or the following is taken from a history written by Sarah Allemann Boss. Published in "History of Bear Lake Pioneers" 1968, by the Daughters of Utah Pioneers, Bear Lake County, Idaho. Some additions were made by Lynn Crookston. Thanks to Grandma Melva for sharing it with us.

Joseph Smith Nelson

• Name: Joseph Smith Nelson
• Born: December 20, 1838 Caldwell County, Missouri
• Died: April 6, 1911 Star Valley, Wyoming
• Related through: Dan's grandmother Elvira Wilde

Joseph Smith Nelson, son of Edmund Nelson and Jane Taylor, was born December 20, 1838, at Calwell County, Missouri. In his boyhood days he was well acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith. With his parents he came to Utah in 1850 and settled in Ogden, afterward at Mountainville. In 1857 he moved to Payson, then to Cache Valley in 1860 and settled in Franklin, Idaho where he was captain of the Minute Men for four years. He was married in 1861 to Hannah J. Patten. They went to Bear Lake in 1864. They settled in Star Valley in 1886 and lived there most of the time until his death which occurred April 6, 1911. Death was caused by organic heart trouble. He was the father of 16 children. He died a faithful Latter-day Saint.

From his obituary found in the archives of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers.

William Hazelgrove Pidcock

• William Hazelgrove Pidcock
• Born: January 18, 1832 Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, England
• Died: November 27, 1906 Ogden, Utah
• Related through: Erin's grandmother Margaret Udy 

William Hazelgrove Pidcock was born January 18, 1832 in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, England. He was the only child of Thomas Pidcock and Martha Hazelgrove. Thomas Pidcock was a military officer, so during the war between India and England he took his wife Martha to India with him. After their return to England their son William was born. Both parents had been married before and had older, grown children from these previous marriages.

William’s father died when he was 12 and at 13 he became an apprentice to a man named Sam Vickers to learn the trade of whitesmith. The contract required him to stay until he was 21. In his journals he stated that the family he apprenticed with starved the help and he would go to his mother’s each day for food.

In 1847, when he was 16 years old, he stopped in the town square to hear some preaching. He listened to two missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He liked their message and attended Sunday night meetings. After reading and studying he soon knew the doctrine they preached was true and on May 2, 1848 he was baptized.

There was persecution and oppressive antagonism at work which he endured patiently until he was 20 years old. Then it became intense and he broke his apprenticeship and left with the approval of a lawyer and the owner’s son, George Vickers.

He left Mansfield on foot with two pence and his spare clothes in a box. At Chesterfield he stopped at a lodging house and found an LDS family that helped him. He soon had work and preached in different towns. After two years, having saved enough, he bid his mother goodbye and left for America on the ship “Marshfield” The ship left Liverpool, England on April 8, 1854 and were bound for New Orleans. Four days after setting sail he married Hannah Blench, an LDS girl he had been courting for awhile.

From New Orleans, they traveled up the Mississippi and traveled emigrant style in covered wagons to Salt Lake City in the William A. Empey Company. They arrived in Salt Lake City October 23, 1854.

He started a blacksmith shop on Main Street in Salt Lake City and lived there for a year before the family moved to Ogden. Here he purchased a lot on 27 Adam Street and a tent to live in. He eventually built an adobe house on this property.

He was a member of the Weber County militia and was involved in the Utah War of 1857. In 1860 he was among the volunteers to drive an ox team to Omaha to help bring more emigrants to Utah. In Omaha he met George Q. Cannon who asked him to return with a handcart company, which he did. There were 21 handcarts and eight wagons in this company. They arrived in Salt Lake City September 24, 1860. Then he joined his family again in Ogden.

In Ogden, they started a store and sold all kinds of medicinal herbs. Hannah had training as a nurse and William became knowledgeable in the use of herbs. Their store was very successful and William also became manager of the Ogden branch of the ZCMI store when it was run a co-operative store. He proved to be a very successful merchant.

William returned to England in 1869 and 1870 for another mission. He labored in the area where he had lived and helped many of the converted families come to Utah.

Both William and Hannah loved the gospel and had gone through much for it. After talking it over, they decided to live the law of polygamy and Hannah gave her consent for William to take other wives. He married Fannie Branson August 5, 1870. On October 31, 1870 he married Annie Burton and on December 23, 1872 he married Annie’s sister Sarah Burton. Each family had their own home. We are descended from Sarah.

Both Burton sisters married William just after arriving in the Salt Lake Valley. They were also from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, England, where William was from. He made rooms from them in the upper level of his store on Washington Avenue. In 1873 the balance of the Burton family came to Utah including their mother and father and some brothers.

When the government started cracking down on polygamy, William was sent to prison for “unlawful cohabitation.” He was sentenced for 13 months but was released after six months possibly for good behavior.

When the Manifesto was given and approved my members of the Church in 1890 Hannah met with the other three wives. At her suggestion they decided that William should stay with Annie since she had the youngest family. She also advised them to each get her home in her own name before having the marriage dissolved.

Annie and William decided to move to Cardston, Alberta, Canada. They arrived there in 1885 and remained there for seven and a half years before returning to Ogden. In Ogden, William acquired a small store and adjoining house where this family lived. He died at his home on November 27, 1906.

This article is based on two articles I found in the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers archive. One was written by a granddaughter Mary Pidcock Jordan and I don’t know the name of the other author.

Henry Getz

• Name: Henry Getz
• Born: December 19, 1935 Bonfeld, Wurtemberg, Germany
• Died: September 13, 1914 Monte Vista, Colorado
• Related through: Dan's grandmother Melva Castleton

Our first ancestor to come to America from the Getz family was our great grandfather, Henry (Heinrich) Getz. He was born in Bonfeld, Wurtemberg, Germany, son of Peter and Katherine Kres Getz.

In Germany, his occupation was dying materials. On November 7, 1854, he came into Peoria, Illinois on the "Rocket," a wood burning locomotive which pulled the first passenger train into Peoria, from Rock Island, Illinois. He was 19 years old and traveled to America with the George Wenger family. They were of the Apostolic Christian religion; he married their daughter, Hanna, February 9, 1858.

After coming to America, he became a farmer. When he was first married, he and his wife lived near Roanoke, Illinois for a short time, and from there they moved south of Morton, Illinois, to the farm now owned by Frank Hoffman (this book was compiled in the 1940's by Hanna M. Koch, of Tremont, Ill., she probably knew all the farms in the area) Next they lived south of Tremont, Illinois on the Benjamin Getz place. About 1879 they moved to Greenwood County, Kansas, and lived there five years, and then they came back to Tremont again and lived on the farm now owned by J. C. Schweigert. In the year 1906 he and his wife moved to Monte Vista, Colorado, and spent their remaining years there with their son, Peter.

Henry died September 13, 1914. He was buried back in Tremont, Illinois at the Mount Hope Cemetery. He was known to be an easy going, quiet, gentle, loving man.

Thanks to Grandma Melva for writing this history and sharing it with us.