George Albert Gardner

George Albert Gardner was born February 3, 1890 to Albert Clifton Gardner and Sarah Chase in Huntington, Emery County, Utah. Irene Ann Johnson was born on October 6, 1891 to Hannah Eliza Rowley and Milas Edgar Johnson in Huntington, Emery County, Utah. Her first home was a two-room log house, which was located close to the Post Office and General Store, which were owned by her father. It was located on Main Street and one half block from Center Street. She was eighteen months old when her family moved to their new large home south of the store. It was in the early spring of 1893. This home had six bedrooms upstairs and three large rooms downstairs. When she could reach the doorknob and could open them, Mother put a feather by the door to keep her in. This is where she grew up and learned the art of homemaking.

Irene started school when she was nearly seven in the big brick school with Elizabeth Brasher Brockbank as beginner teacher. Spelling and art was special. She had singing parts and parts in all the dance groups.

Irene’s early playmates were Annie and Mable Wilcox, Estie and Leth Engle, Rose Hardee and her little brother, Alvin, Myrtle Wakefield, Myrtle, Olive and Nina Nixon, Lydia and James Rowbury, Amplis Kinder, Ruth Gordon, Hazel Leonard, and Edith Kirby.

The boys in her school were Myron Leonard, Evert Johnson, Alva Woodward, Amos Wakefield, Dillard DeFriez, Edd Rowley, Alfonzo Rowley, Jewell Rowley, Katie Guymon, George Gardner, Farr Gardner, Myrtle Gardner, Ella Norton, Maude and Fern Wakefield and Lula Cram.

Her teachers were Alonzo Leonard, Jean Leonard, Dame Leonard, Charles Johnson, Don C. Woodward and her older brother Mide. Esther Grange was President of the Primary with Robena Collard and Julie Wakefield as Counselors. I suppose her older sister, Inez, took Irene along with her.

This was her first social affair. In about 1909, Irene and her sister, Margaret, sang up to the coal camp in Mohrland.

When Irene was about thirteen years old and all through the primary grades, she was asked to be a teacher in the younger classes. She was not old enough to enter M.I.A. (Mutual Improvement Association for the young people of the ward). When she was fourteen, she joined the M.I.A. as a junior and Mary Brasher was the teacher. The year of 1911 and 1912 during the senior year in M.I.A. the Opera Queen Esther was performed. Irene had a very special part.

Irene came home one night from practice with a jumping tooth ache and asked father to please pull it out for her.

Irene was Sunday School Librarian to get the songbooks out. I (Mildred) was called to be Sunday school teacher in the kindergarten class.

About 1910, Irene and her cousin, Fern Wakefield, planned and did go to Provo to spend Thanksgiving with Irene’s older brother, Mide and family and Fern with her sister, Mame. The day before Thanksgiving, Mide sent his little girl and boy, Alice and Ford, and Irene to go get the duck he ordered from a man. But they got on the wrong street, so it was a long walk before they found the man and duck. When they started home and proceeded, not knowing the right way, they scalded the poor live duck with the heat and had to pull the down from it all afternoon and most of the night. The next day they proceeded to get it cooked so they had dinner the day after Thanksgiving.

Irene went with Fern over to Mapleton to a dance along with another cousin, Maude Ethel Woodward. This was a new popular spring dance floor. It was an experience she never forgot. She tore her new dress so she wrote home to get some material to mend it. Well, the folks sent it to her and also two dollars for spending money, but she never did get it. After she got home, Mide had found another Irene Johnson who had received it and had kept it.

Nearly every summer, their gang with brother Rolla and sister Margaret, went to the canyon for a week camping. Some of the boys were told to keep the cattle where they should be. The girls cooked and sewed and sang songs and read stories.

Irene’s cousin, Fonzo, had a horse named Charley. When he was hitched up he was not used to it. He always bucked if you tapped him with a stick, so Fonzo would say, “Charley, you may buck”, tapping it with the stick, and he did buck. That was always a big laugh.

One night, we were out after curfew, so brother Albert Gardner was the Marshall and he put us all in jail and he sat outside and laughed.

One other night we saw Joe Meeks push a load of wood on a wagon out into the street so the crowd of us pushed it clear to the bottom of town and decided to leave it there. Joe said, “Now I helped you push it down, so now you help me push it back.”

Horseback riding was the sport with their horses, Gyp and Floss. Riding skirts and white blouses with cuff links was the fashion then. There were many hayrides. It was a very special event when we went to the Indian War Veterans Campfire in 1905. We had to get loaded into the covered wagon and get moving to get to Wilberg resort about four miles south of Huntington. Irene was nearly 14 years old then.

Irene married George Albert Gardner in the Salt Lake LDS Temple on October 3, 1912. As I (Mildred Johnson) remember it, they stood by the west window in the living room of the Johnson home. Irene wore a white embroidery lawn dress. They were at the head table where the guests sat for the wedding supper. I think everyone in town was getting a turn to sit at the table. Their wedding gifts were on their table in the corner of our dining room for some time.

Their first home was a 2- room log cabin rented from Ida and Francis Brasher in Huntington. Their first child, a daughter, Gerene was born in that house on June 29, 1913. I was there with them for the days it took while Irene made my white dress to wear as Lydia Shaw’s bride’s maid. I was one of four. Later they moved into another home, the Heber Leonard house two blocks east of their old home, which was a white abode brick with 3 rooms, where the 1st and 2nd sons, Rollan Loran born November 25, 1914 and Dee Albert born February 22, 1916, were born. There was a fireplace in the living room. Gerene thought she could burn the hair out of a comb at the fireplace and it caught fire and the flames ran up her arm and caught her hair on fire and scorched the whole right side of her head. From then on the rest of her life the hair on the right side was much thinner than the other side. Then when she must stay indoors but wanted to go out, we told her the wind would blow her hair, so she stayed inside. One time we were having ice cream down to Margaret’s. She was eating her ice cream with George and Alvin (Margaret’s husband), and they told her to blow on it because it was hot and would burn. She did and we all had a big laugh.

Their next move was to Ira Strong’s long house on Main Street one block south of our old home. This is where Volmer Milas was born September 6, 1917. Now Gerene was put to wash dishes and had to stand on a chair to do it. She has been doing it ever since.

Their next move was to Mohrland in what they called the barn house (where the man had lived who tended the horses in the barn). George worked mining coal. That was in the year 1918 when World War I was going on and on November 11 when the Armistice was signed the coalmine whistle began blowing at 8:00 a.m. and continued all day – never stopped -. Gerene remembers how boring that got to be and how people were so puzzled.

There were no phones then in individual homes, so the word of the end of the war was passed by men and boys riding bikes or horseback down the streets shouting the news of war’s end.

Mildred remembers almost living in Mohrland as well. She remembers ironing starched denim overalls. It was warm weather and they soured and mildewed if they didn’t get ironed the next day. “Well, I was homesick but couldn’t go home till the day the peddlers came. I was glad to see Andrew Anderson and others

About the first thing Gerene remembers of her Dad was when they were living in Mohrland, a mining camp town North of Huntington. “Dad worked in the mine too. I remember being in Sunday school and they were singing ‘Put your Shoulder to the Wheel’. This saying completely floored me. I had never heard that expression before, so when we got home I asked Daddy what it meant. He sat down with me on his knee and explained what it meant. Don’t be afraid of work. Be diligent and do missionary work for the Lord. Ever since that day, when I hear that hymn, I think of Daddy.”

The next spring George got an offer from his brother-in-law, Eric Erickson, to operate his farm in the little community of Cleveland so he had to quit his job at the coalmine in Mohrland and move to Cleveland. It was in the winter when George got his foot broken and moved from Mohrland. They moved in with Irene’s family until spring.

While they were loading the furniture into a double bed horse drown wagon, they had moved the mattress and bedding off bed frames and the children, Gerene, Rollan, Dee and Milas were playing tag, etc. in and around the iron frames. Gerene

slipped and bumped her shoulder on the frames and broke her shoulder bone and had to wear a brace for 3 or 4 weeks. Gerene recalls, “I remember moving from Mohrland to Cleveland. Just before my 6th birthday. Dad farmed on Uncle Eric Erickson’s farm. The coyotes were on the loose and on the warpath, it sounded like, and Daddy would take his gun (around sun-up and again at sun-down) and try to get rid of them. Their noise was awful. He did get a lot of them and we kids; Rollan, Milas and I got to see the coyotes.

Dad was a horseman, he loved them, and he broke horses for lots and lots of people in all of the county. He broke horses to ride and also teams of workhorses to work, pull wagons, plows, harrows, etc. I remember once in Cleveland, he was breaking a team to pull a harrow and it began to thunder and lightening. I don’t know if that is what spooked the horse, but they ran all over the farm, up the hills and even across our garden, and finally came to a barbed wire fence, which of course, stopped them. Next day we learned that one of Mom’s cousins, Clarence Johnson, had been killed by lightening the day before, while he was driving a team pulling a hat mower in Huntington (south of town). Dad said then he was glad he had been smart enough to let his team go, or he may have been caught by lightening too.”

Gerene turned six years old that summer but because there were no busses in those days she didn’t get to go to school, because the family was living 3 miles out of town. That summer Norman George was born in the farmhouse on August 17, 1919. Gerene recalls, “When we needed to go to Huntington, where our families lived, both Dad’s and Mom’s family, we had to travel in a wagon pulled by a team of horses. It was about an hour trip as I remember (seven miles). So to pass the time, Mother and Dad would start a song and both sang, then us kids would join in. We would sing all the way to and from Huntington. That and other times we were introduced to music, and we all learned to love it. I remember the fun times when the whole town of Huntington, on special occasions, like the annual Relief Society Birthday party (Feb. 25 for the day R.S. was organized in Huntington and March 17 when it was observed in all LDS Relief Society’s observance of it’s organization in Nauvoo in 1842) and the 4th and 24th of July, and ward married couples or other dances, anyway, all the younger people, especially unmarried kids would go to the dances and actually fight to get to be first in line behind Mom and Dad when the Heel and Toe Polka or the Scottish or the Quadrille was coming up. They would really draw a crowd on to the dance floor.”

Then in early November when Gerene was six years old they moved back into town first to a 2-room log house across the street from where George’s sister lived. While living there the children all had whooping cough.

Gerene remembers the first house fire she ever saw. The Merc store and theatre burned on New Year’s Eve. That spring the family moved across town 1 block North and 1 block West of George’s Mother’s home. On Mother’s Day Gerene and Rollan were on the program to sing at Sunday school. It was their first experience at singing in public. On the way out from the house to the sidewalk they heard a strange noise coming from high up. On May 10, 1920 they saw the first airplane they had ever seen in their lives. And they made their first public appearance at singing all in the same day. Later that year the family moved to a home 1 block North across the road from the schoolhouse where Gerene and Rollan went to school, it was the old Nixon home. It was good that it was walking distance to their families. Burke Erastus was born here on March 2, 1921.

When Gerene was in the second grade and Rollan in first grade on April 12, 1921 when the fire bell announced a fire, the first and second grades both marched out double file – and stood at attention outside until the teachers went back into the building to gather the children’s coats off the hall hooks and distributed them to the students. Then they dismissed them to run home, which Rollan and Gerene did and informed their Grandmother Johnson of the fire. She grabbed a bucket and filled it with water, then ran all around their house. When she got back to the door the kids showed her the fire at which time the roof of the school tumbled down and Grandmother Johnson nearly fainted with surprise.

When Burke was six months old they went to Moab to a Johnson family reunion. As Mildred remembers, “They went in Brother (Albert) Gardner’s Model “T” Ford. The top was so torn that George put it down. They were nice to let Deane (Irene’s sister) and I crowd in to go too. That morning it was a question if we would go. Dee had a fever but we did get started late as everyone had gone. We were car number 13. It was unsettled weather, but we had a denim quilt to put over us if it did rain, but the sun shone hot all the way to Green River and I was getting sunburned as my face cracked when I laughed. Just before getting to Green River, we came to the railroad and a place of water that was the start of a flood. We had to push the car up every little hill. Irene, Deane, and I piled out each time to be ready behind the car to push so we knew we must do it this time. We had to walk over the railroad bridge with the kids. I was responsible for Norman. He had sandals on and one came off between the ties, so I had to get it and I got dizzy looking down, but we made it. Then we parked the kids on the other side and Irene, Deane and I went down to the water and waited for George to go back over the bridge and start down. He got over the water where we could get behind and push it up the bank. We got all packed in the car again and the rain caught us so we put the quilt over us as we went through Green River and people had watched the caravan and we heard them say “13” so we knew the rest of the family were ahead of us. They had stopped too by the river and everyone was eating watermelon, but they were ready to go. We got a piece of melon before we pulled out, so we hurried on then too. Well, it rained so we sang the rain songs then when the sun came out we sang the sunshine songs. Then a little one-seat roadster was behind us. When we came to a place to push, we were ready to climb out and there were three men in the roadster behind us ready to push. Well, it was Uncle John Wakefield and Perry and Odd Wakefield. They were always ready to push. We arrived after dark, but someone was there to direct us to where we could stay and we stayed to our cousin, Nora McKonkie’s home. We stayed three days. Everyone had a good time going here and there for dinner. Uncle Al had a grape arbor and Uncle Horace had all the fruit and melons. And we went to Annie and Bert Allred’s farm. Rolla and family joined us coming home by way of Price. Irene missed her purse and after a frantic search it was found on the fender of the car. They put the top up on the car so it was a shade.”

Gerene remembers the same experience this way. “I remember when I was 8 years old we went to a Johnson family reunion in 1921 in July. Dad borrowed grandpa Gardner’s Model T Ford and we left Huntington before sun-up, went down through Lawrence, through Buckhorn, Sinbad, Desert Lake and on the Green River, where we had to cross by wading and pushing the car through the water, about 50 feet, because the bridge had broken down. But Dad wouldn’t give up. He let Rollan guide the car at the steering wheel and the baby, Burke, was in the seat. The rest waded and pushed the car across the water. We got to Moab where the reunion was held about 10 p.m. It was way after dark.”

Dee remembers “One Sunday morning when I was just six years old, as I was leaving the house, Mother told me not to go horseback riding and to come straight home from Sunday school. But when Sunday school was out, I let a couple of kids talk me into going riding with them. But I could not go home and get my horse or Mother would see me, so we decided that I could ride behind one of them.”

“After we had gone about a mile from town, they started to race and during the race we began to laugh, as it was such fun, until I fell off the horse and lit on the back of my head and knocked myself unconscious. Since we were in front of Ezra Harrison’s house, Ezra saw me fall and took me home in his car. I was unconscious for three days and the doctor gave no hope of recovery. But through Mother’s faith and prayers I did recover.

“When I opened my eyes, Mother was the first person I saw. She was sitting in a chair next to the bed. She had sat there almost constantly. The next thing I saw was a box of crackers that didn’t last too long. We need to mind our parents. They know what is best for us.”

The next year the school classes were held in 4 or 5 different houses in town. The 1st grade met across the road from the burned down school. Dee was in that class. Gerene’s 3rd grade and Rollan’s 2nd grade classes were in the old R.S. building in the middle of blocks east of the burned school house and west of the new elementary school being built and next year it was all ready for school. This year Gerene was in 4th grade and Rollan in 3rd, Dee in 2nd in the 1923-24 year. George’s mother, Sarah Chase Gardner died in February 1924. It was the first funeral Gerene remembers which gave new meaning to life for her.

The next year the family moved 2 blocks east and 2 blocks south of the Nixon home to a house owned by Irene’s Uncle Samuel Rowley. It was a very cold winter. The frost even came through the keyhole. Irene was not well and George was away, so Mildred had to stay with them. “One night it was real cold and the fire had gone out, so I had to rekindle it and I took a chill and by morning I was sick too. I went to school, but I had to come home and was out of school for a time.” Mildred recalls. They lived here one year, then moved to a house on fourth east and second north in a house owned by the Harrison’s. Then they moved out to George’s father’s farm three miles northeast of town. They lived there one year, and then moved into the three-room log house in town, that George’s father left when he remarried and went to live with his new wife, north of town. Her name was Minnie Guymon.

Gerene recalls “Dad liked to tease, the kids especially. He would play with us by the hour. He always had time for us, one on one or all together. He worked in coalmines in Mohrland, Deer Creek and the Church mine in Huntington Canyon. Mother loved to sew, and taught me early to sew. She used to say that that was the only way I used to play with dolls. Since I was 8 years old I would sew for my dolls with scrapes from her sewing for family overalls to shirts and dresses etc. She sewed quilt blocks to make quilt tops, but never quilted because it made her dizzy. The movement of the quilt made her dizzy. Even swinging she disliked or rocking in the rocking chair and it took years for her to learn to ride in a car because it made her seasick. She made yeast bread, 8 loaves every 2 or 3 days. She always did lots and lots of canning, fruits and vegetables”.

“Mother and Dad sang duets together for Relief Society parties, married folks parties, etc. Besides dancing for showoff”.

“Dad used to cut all the boys’ hair (the girls’ too) and also was barber for Reo, Aaris, Paul, Brig, Val Young; Revo and Loran Rowley (all nephews of George’s). Then Uncle James (George’s brother) took to barbering too and then he would cut Dad’s hair. During the depression years, he worked for the P.W.A. (Public Works Administration) for $1.75 per day. So, because Rollan, Dee, Milas and myself graduated from school in 1932-38, he could not afford to send us on to college. Rollan, however, did manage to support himself at BYU for one year. But he taught us all how to work and be honest. He never smoked or drank nor did he drink tea or coffee. In fact, mother never had a can of coffee in her house, ever!”

“Mother taught the 7-8 year old children in Primary for 50 years. Even when we lived out on the farm, 3 miles out of town, she would walk with us kids if we had no other way to get to Primary. The road was not oiled then, just graveled, so it was not easy to walk on. But, she got a lot of kids baptized that wouldn’t have wanted to be if she had not been a dedicated teacher. She never worked outside our home for money, but was always willing to help anyone in need. She did a lot of sewing for friends, almost always for no pay in exchange.”

“Mother wore her long dark hair in a braid – long enough to sit on it and sometimes she would wind it around her head, and sometimes she wore it in a bun in back. And she never let anyone but herself comb her hair. She said she was tender headed. She also was available to cook, do dishes and baby-sit at quilting parties, but never quilted herself.”

“I remember my Dad was addicted to pool. He would go to the pool hall almost every night for years and get home in the wee hours of the night (or morning). But finally gave it up entirely, but I don’t know just when”.

One spring while planting wheat, Dee remembers, “Dad and I were planting the old fashioned way, called broadcasting. Dad was using me as a marker. I was to stand so many feet from the edge of the plowed ground and Dad would walk to me broadcasting the wheat, then I would move the same amount of feet closer to the other side from the opposite end and he would broadcast in the opposite direction. One time he thought that I had moved and I denied moving. Consequently, I got a spanking. When the wheat came up, it was even all the way through. When Dad saw he had made a mistake, he apologized for the spanking.”

Van Johnson was born August 5, 1924. Gerene was in the 7th grade. In the summer months, George worked his father’s farm and in the winter months he worked in the Mohrland coal mine, also Hiawatha mine. In his spare time, he was always breaking horses to ride or to work behind the plow, hayrack, wagon, buggy or bob sleigh, not only for himself, but also for neighbors and anyone who needed horses broke to work or ride and who would be willing to pay for the job. That’s how he supported his family. Valene Ann, the second girl after six boys, was born November 14, 1925 in this three room log house.

Ann remembers that “mornings came early on the farm, and as Gerene and the older boys will tell you, I could be more easily be found out helping to feed the chickens, ducks, turkeys, pigs, cows, and horses than in the house helping with breakfast or making beds. Many times I would wait while Dad threw the harness over the horses’ back so I could fasten a buckle here or a snap there. Then I could usually ride one, holding on to the harness, from the corral to the wagon. Sometimes Dad would even let me ride while he plowed.”

“Feeding the animals was fun. I helped to shuck corn for the pigs, slipping an ear to the horses. Then we’d shell some for the chickens, ducks, and turkeys. Turkeys are dumb and they don’t drive very easy. One time I couldn’t get a mother turkey back in the little pen with the babies. I was using a broom to guide her and after forty attempts to steer her through the little door, I lost my temper and slapped her with the broom. Dad came and cut her throat and we had turkey dinner. But guess who had to bail eggs and feed and water the chicks several times a day for weeks?”

“I also liked to help pick corn and potatoes and we had large fields of each. I liked to help irrigate too. Never did use a shovel or put in a dam, but I did lots of wading, sand castle building and stick floating. However, there was one thing about farm work that I didn’t like, weeds. And we had lots of them also. I remember going with Dad to the garden to pick a fresh tomato and then I would hold it while he sprinkled salt on it. However, when he put sliced tomatoes on his plate, he sprinkled sugar on them.”

“Thrashing time was always a hectic time. I could watch for a little while, but then I had to help with dinner. I was big enough to shuck corn, slice tomatoes, peel potatoes and set the table, which was set up on the lawn under the trees. To me it seemed like there were about 50 men to feed, although I’m sure there weren’t that many.

“After the old straw was dumped out of the mattresses and they were filled with new straw, we had to have a fight in the straw. Dad made a good foreman, not only for the trashing and mattress filling, but also for the fighting. Sometimes he got a little carried away, and some of us would wind up crying. Then we got spanked for crying. He was also a big tease and often carried it too far and then get after us for crying.”

“When hay hauling time came, Van and I were put upon the load to tromp while the bigger boys and Dad threw the day onto the wagon. Many times I would catch a gleam in Dad’s eye just as I caught a fork full of hay and then had to brush myself off before I could tromp it down. One time Dad had sold a load of hay to someone in town and since it was Primary day, I rode with him on top of the load. Naturally I couldn’t stay put and was walking back and forth. When we went around the corner between Myran Granges’ and Amos Manchesters’, the left hind wheel missed the culvert and the load slid off. Most of it was on top of me. Dad hollered for me to put my dress over my face and breath slow. (How do you breathe slowly when you KNOW you’re dying?). Then years later, (actually only seconds) he helped me from under the hay and spanked me for not sitting still and then hugged me and put me back on the wagon. I didn’t go to Primary.”

On February 27, 1928, Kendall Milton, the 7th son was born. Gerene, now was 15 years old and she had taken responsibility of the home during her mother’s last two confinements. Then when Lowell LaMond was born on March 6, 1932, Gerene was in the 12th grade and her mother went to her mother’s home for the birth of this baby, leaving Gerene fully responsible for everything. Her mother told Gerene she could have the money that she received from the cream that she would separate from the milk, night and morning, and she would once a week take the cream to the creamery to sell. So Gerene used that money to buy her graduation dress ($2.98) and shoes ($1.98). She graduated on May 28, 1932.

Now the family moved back to the farm, three miles northeast of town. The kids still in school either walked to school or if on time, they could catch either the Mohrland school bus or the Cleveland school bus. Both entered the main road at forks, two miles from town. Next year, on November 5, 1933, Shannah Vee was born at Grandma Johnson’s again. Gerene took over the care of the family while her Mom was at Grandma’s for two weeks.

On June 6, 1936, the moon was full, it was a nice warm Sunday evening, and because Rollan had not showed up as he had promised to the Mutual Conjoint Meeting, Gerene decided she would have to walk the 3 miles home on the gravel road. So about half way home a car stopped by her and a young man asked if he could give her a ride – after a few minutes he finally persuaded her to ride with him. That was the beginning of a long lasting friendship.

On August 31, 1936, as Mildred recalls, her and Gerene went with Lowell Johnson to Provo or Orem Utah to pick peaches and “we picked about 20 bushel.” We got them for half price by picking them ourselves. The next day Irene had to go to Grandma Johnson’s again the town, where she had baby no. 12, a boy, named Sharon Varell. That was Tues, Sept 1, 1936.

After each and every boy was born by Dr. Hill he would make the comment “there’s another soldier” and Irene would say, “there’s another missionary”.

This meant Gerene was in charge again and here is about 10 bushel of peaches to do by herself and she was just 23 years old. Well, she made up her mind to do it and then Irene developed milk leg so she had to stay off her feet for 9 weeks. That meant Gerene had not only the peaches to bottle – some fresh and some preserved or jammed besides it was pear, plum, tomato, watermelon rind preserves- time of year. So altogether she did 500 quarts of food, some in bottles, some jams or preserves she put in 5-gallon honey cans and sealed with paraffin wax. Also she dried some corn, apricots, prunes and apples. Then on October 30 she got her back burned by leaning over the cook stove to warm her back and her sash caught fire and burned her back so she was laid up for a week or 10 days so Irene had to come home and take over. Irene walked on the one good leg and rested the other kneeling on a chair and moving the chair ahead of her and pulling the good leg along for many months.

On Thanksgiving eve, 1936, Roland Jones, the young man who had offered Gerene a ride home a few months before, came and took Gerene out for the evening, a show at Price. One year and 7 months later they were married on June 19, 1938. That year, they had Thanksgiving with Gerene’s folks in the home on the farm. The next year George bought a house from the Mohrland mine camp, which was closing down. They were selling the houses, which were then moved to various locations. George had his moved to Huntington on the lot that was his father’s just a few blocks east of the old 3 room log house they lived in a few years before. That was the last home the family lived in from 1938-1969.

Ann also remembers “the hay wagon was used for transportation a lot in the summer because we didn’t always have a car. Mom made quilts out of denim and old pants and these were spread on the wagon to sit on. In my opinion, Dad could handle the reins with the best of them. In the wintertime, the hayrack was replaced by a box and straw was put in under the quilts. We also had quilts to put over us. If the snow got deep enough and it usually did before the winter was through, then we used the box sleigh. I can still remember watching Dad fasten the bells to the horses and the pretty sound they made as the horses trotted along. Sometimes there was enough snow to use the sleigh to drive to Grandma’s for Thanksgiving dinner.”

“I (Ann) can only remember two cars when I was younger. One was a Model “T” and the other one a Model “A”. Something must have gone wrong with the Model “T” cause it sat down by the corral for a long time. It made a very good playhouse. I hung blankets at the windows and ate carrot and radish sandwiches in the kitchen (the front seat) and put my dolls to bed in the bedroom (the back seat). The only thing I remember about the Model “A” was that we tipped over in it going to Old Folk’s Flat to a family reunion and one of the boys had his pocket knife open.”

“Dad was a good checker player and nearly always won. He was also good at Chinese checkers and cards. In fact he was too good at cards. When we lived in town during the winter sometimes, he would spend far too much time at the pool hall playing cards. It’s no wonder Mom always hated cards and discouraged her kids from playing with them. She did play “Old Maid” and Chinese checkers with us but she was usually too busy with a baby or darning socks or sewing. I swear the only time the thimble came off of her thumb was to mix 6 loaves of bread twice a week or when she was canning hundreds of quarts of fruits and vegetables. Or maybe when Dad had killed a pork or beef and we all got involved in grinding, cooking and bottling it. The best sausage I have ever eaten was what Mom had seasoned and bottled. She also made head cheese but I had to convince myself that I could eat it. Cottage cheese was another thing she made that was good and homemade butter and lumpy dick and corn bread and gruel. When I was little I promised myself I would learn to darn socks like my mother. I have darned lots of socks, but they are not darned as neat as Mom’s were.”

“My first recollection of wash day was packing water in buckets and filling the boiler on the stove. The clothes were put in this and boiled then dipped out and put in the tub to be scrubbed on the board. Mom and Gerene did the big things like the towels, sheets, underwear, overalls and shirts. I got to stir and punch the clothes in the boiler and scrub the socks, wash clothes and dish towels. I learned to iron standing on a box and using the old irons that were heated on the stove. I learned on handkerchiefs and pillowcases. Mom also heated and wrapped those irons in the wintertime to put by our cold feet in bed. Dad would heat and wrap rocks for the same purpose.”

“Easter was a special time. For several days we were allowed to get an egg and hide it. Then Mom would help us decorate a shoebox, a peanut butter can or some other container and on Saturday we colored our eggs and went to one of the hills and rolled them. One year Dad saw where I hid mine and sneaked them away. I got them back in time to color them.”

“One summer there was a forest fire up Huntington Canyon. I don’t remember if any of the other boys were with Dad, but Norman was. They were all black and dirty when they came back. Shortly after the fire, there was a cloudburst and a flash flood. The water ran over the banks in our ditch and onto the lawn. That was the shortest fishing trip I ever took and we didn’t even need a pole, we just picked the fish up with our hands.”

“Dad liked horses and he made several trips to the desert to catch wild ones. If he ever caught more than my two favorites, I can’t remember. But when he came home with Midge and Babe, I was in seventh heaven. Midge was a little mare, not much bigger than a Shetland and her colt, Babe, wasn’t much bigger than a dog. Babe was my favorite toy until she got big enough for Dad to break. Then I rode her all the time because she was small enough for me to saddle. I even rode her to and from 4-H meetings.”

“I remember two different swings that Dad built. Each was a single long rope fastened to a large limb up in a tree. One was at one of the homes where we lived in town one winter. But the really fun one was in a huge tree by the canal at the farm. The trick was to swing clear over the canal to the opposite bank. Sometimes we didn’t make it, generally on purpose. I didn’t know how to swim so I always got scolded for falling in. As long as the canal wasn’t too keep for me to stand on the bottom and keep my head above water, I wasn’t scared.”

“I don’t ever remember when Mom and Dad weren’t singing or dancing. They taught us all to sing and enjoy it. From the time I was tiny, I can remember hearing them sing at all the different celebrations and at home. We were having “Family Home Evening” long before the church made it official. However, it wasn’t always on Monday nights and wasn’t restricted to one night a week. In the winter it was around the stove and in the summer, in the yard (swatting mosquitoes) or by a fire. Back then, (in the olden days as my kids say); the kids went with the parents almost everywhere, including dances. I don’t think the word “babysitter” had been invented yet. No wonder we all learned to dance for fun. Mom and Dad showed us how much fun it was. Nothing tickled me more than to watch them collect their prize after winning a dance contest.”

“We all knew that when the 24th of July came around, we would either be riding in or pushing or walking by a handcart or wagon. These were usually decorated with sagebrush, Indian paintbrush, willows or cactus or all of the above. To this day when I smell sage brush I get nauseated and nostalgic.”

“Every wash day we had to check Dad’s overall pockets to make sure he had removed his peppermint drops. Only in the wash were his pockets without them.”

“After Dad sold the farm and we moved to town for good (when I was 13), he had two jobs that stand out in my memory. He was the water-master for the canal company, and spent many hours building head gates, measuring the water in each and going back several times to re-measure when someone decided he wanted more than his share.”

“He was also the town Marshall and chasing kids off the street after curfew wasn’t his most exciting job. One night, he spotted a burglar in Guymon’s Merc, and while someone went for help, he watched. When the man decided to leave, he trailed him. The man was caught and it was discovered he was on drugs and armed.”

“Does it sound like Mom was in the background? Essentially she was standing in the wings, waiting to pat a back, kiss a hurt, encourage better performances and hand out praise. She was always ready with a bandage for a scraped knee, making a costume or making clothes. Gerene was a big help in that department. I don’t remember a store bought dress I had until I was in the ninth grade and Gerene had been married for about 3 years.”

“Mom had the patience of Job, but when discipline was needed, she could handle that too. I don’t think she ever spanked me, but my legs knew what a willow felt like and the short hair on my neck got pulled many times. Mom handled having anywhere from one to four or five kids down at a time with mumps, whopping cough, chicken pox, or rheumatic fever. She even took in stride having 10 kids in bed at the same time with measles. But she really showed her strength and faith when Dad had his brain surgery and was bedfast and helpless for six weeks before he passed away. They didn’t get to celebrate their Golden Wedding but they were together to the end. Mom was with us for another 18 years and all of them were lived for her family, even to hanging on in the hospital until she saw all 12 of her children together again.”

George died March 9, 1952. Irene died December 13, 1969.

Shannah Gardner Lewis recalls “My mother had a strong testimony of the gospel, and she tried her best to live the gospel every day in every way.” She taught us children right from wrong and with her there was no in between. It’s like my daughter said, “to Grandma, everything was either black or white—there was no such thing as gray.”

“I’m thankful to my mother for setting such a good example to me and my children. I hope and pray we can all live up to her expectations.”

“My Dad was a great man. He was a good Dad and a good provider for us 12 children. I know he had to work long, hard hours to provide for all our needs, especially during the depression. I know he, too, had a strong testimony of the gospel and was a good missionary among the town’s people, even going into the pool hall to reach them. In Moroni, Chapter 8, Verse 8 we read: “I come into the world not to call the righteous but the sinners to repentance; the whole need no physicians, but they that are sick”

“I pray we will all repent of our sins, that we may live together in our family units”.

A Mother in Israel
Written by Irene Johnson Gardner
Age 51
Mother of 12 children
I am proud to be a mother in Israel. I am thankful to my parents that I was born in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My first recollection of church service is that performed in early childhood in Primary, with Sister Esther Grange as President. I took several parts in cantatas and helped sing duets in programs. I graduated from Primary when 13 and was set apart as teacher in the second group I was first counselor to Amelia Brasher when I was married in 1912. A few months later the Primary was reorganized and I again went into the second group as teacher, which group I have now. I have worked in the Primary the greater part of my life, resting a few years at different times, thinking my home duties were all I should attend to. But I find it a true saying that “where there’s a will there’s a way.”

I joined the ward choir at the age of 13 to sing alto. I had a special seat and I occupied it regularly, especially at funerals. Thomas L. Hardee and J. E. Johnson were my first choir leaders. I became a member of the Mutual when I was 14 and took many parts in various entertainments. I served as Librarian in Sunday school and also teacher in the Kindergarten. One year I labored as Religion Class teacher.

I joined the Relief Society in 1921. My 6th baby (Burke) was small, but I promised myself I would never refuse anything the Relief Society asked of me, and I have kept that promise. I was set apart as a visiting teacher in 1939, which office I still hold. I have helped with many funeral lunches, and I have labored with my husband as Stake Missionary in Emery Stake.

At present I am a teacher in Primary, visiting teacher in the Relief Society, Era Director, and a member, and also secretary of the Singing Mothers. I have tried to live my life by example rather than precept, and I feel that the little I can do to earn a reward in heaven I must do before it is too late.
Irene Gardner

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