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Vida Wall’s Autobiography – Written in 1976
Autobiography of VIDA Wall
I was born March 30, 1916 on a farm 4 miles North of Cleveland, Utah to David Timothy and Alice Laurena Johnson. My father’s parents were John Griffith Timothy and Margaret Howell. Both were born in Wales. My mother’s parents were James Peter Johnson and Hamma Gundi Helga Thorderson. Grandma was born in Iceland, Grandpa in Denmark. Grandpa and Grandma Timothy came to Winter Quarters and worked in the coalmines. My father was the first child from this family that was born in America. When Grandpa had enough money to start farming he took up a homestead in Cleveland 2 miles south. It was called South Flat. He then worked in the mines in the winter. Grandma and the boys took care of the livestock. Many times Grandpa would walk or ride a horse over the Gentry Mountain to get home. Grandpa’s farm was on the road to Cedar Mountain where Butch Cassidy robbed the payroll in Castle Gate. They rode through Grandpa’s farm with the posse after them. After a few years Grandpa Timothy had enough money to quit the mine and become a full-time farmer. Grandma had a stroke that paralyzed her left side 8 years before she died. Grandpa died 2 years later. Vernice, my sister, went up and lived with her. Sometimes I went up on weekends and took care of her so Vernice could go on a date. I was staying with her when they called and told her that her oldest son had died (they lived in part of their house. That was only a few months after Grandpa died. She prayed nearly all night. Uncle Henry left a large family and a wife who was soon to have another baby. The baby was born 2 weeks later. They sent for the doctor but he didn’t get there in time. Vernice, with the help of Grandma in her wheel chair reading instructions from the doctor book, delivered the baby boy. They were wonderful people and religious. Grandpa and Grandma Johnson lived in Spanish Fork for a while. Grandpa was a carpenter. Then they moved to Scofield. Grandpa got hit by a train and got his back broke and wasn’t able to work very much after that. Grandma sewed for a living. She was a beautiful seamstress. In 1900 the Scofield explosion killed many miners. Grandpa and Grandma worked night and day. Grandma making burial clothes and Grandpa making caskets for the victims of the disaster. In l902 they moved to Cleveland and took up homesteading also on South Flat but about 2 miles West of the Timothy’s. The first year a fire destroyed the barn, stables, hay, and livestock. The next year diphtheria took three of their children – Lawrence 14, Perley 9 and Eunice 3; they died within 30 days. Again Grandpa and Grandma made the caskets and burial clothes, they could have no funerals because the disease was so contagious. When Grandpa could no longer farm they rented the farm and moved to Cleveland where they rented a large two-story house. Grandma took in teachers for a living. They owned a horse they used on their one-horse buggy. She would get mean and wouldn’t do nothing but I could do anything with her. So when they died they both said I should have their horse. Grandpa died November 7, l926 of stomach cancer after suffering five long years. Grandma became ill and three days later she died on May 27, 1927. She always milked the cows, she would never let dad milk for her, she said he would make them hold their milk because he always sang when he milked. We lived on the farm and I loved it. I always had a horse as long as I can remember. I was a middle child, two sisters older and a brother and a sister younger. My oldest sister Lois died at 10 weeks, my brother at two weeks. He was just a little over a year younger than me. He died November 27, l927. They told me before he died I would sit on the bed and talk to him and after he died I never said a thing until I was over 2 years old. The first year I went to school was in Elmo. Lola, Vernice, and I rode our horse. The teacher would come out and get me off the horse, carry me into the school and get me warm (I loved it). She spoiled me. I thought all teachers should do it. The rest of my school years were in Cleveland. Again, three on one horse rode to school. One day the only truck in town came along and the horse got scared and threw Vernice in the first mud puddle, the next jump she threw Lola in another one and me on top of Lola, but instead of going back home which was closer we went to school wet and muddy. Another time about the same place Lola was riding behind me and the horse threw her off, I had quite a time getting her back on the horse. Again we went on to school (she broke her arm.) When Lola started school we used the same horse on a one-horse buggy. That was better, we could ride in the buggy and use blankets on our feet and hot rocks. Not long after that we moved to Cleveland for the winters in the tithing office house just through the lot by Grandpa and Grandma Johnson. When he was sick I went over every morning to see him before I went to school. I was heart broken when he died, but when they died I got their horse. Her name was dolly and I loved her. She would be hard to catch until she would see I was mad, then she would come up to me. When I got her I had to promise when she became old and sick I would let them put her away. She started having heart attacks and she would start to shake and fall down, then she would get up and act like nothing was wrong but the attacks came more often. Dad saw her one day, so I had to tell them they could kill her. It was a hard thing to do. While I was up helping Monte and Lucille Allen in a boarding house in Huntington Canyon they got rid of her. When Vernice got old enough to go to mutual, she was coming home one night alone on a horse and a car chased her. It was a good thing she was on a good fast horse. She left the road as soon as there wasn’t a fence and went up in the hills above John Anderson’s and got home. After than we moved to town. We bought a lot across the road from Uncle John Thorderson. They moved the one house from the farm, before they got it fixed on (added to) the other house. Us three girls slept out there for a couple winters with no heat, but we heated rocks and wrapped them in a blanket and put them at our feet. When we woke up there would be frost on the blankets, but we never had a cold all winter. I sure missed the farm. I used to ride out there when I got lonesome and cry. I went to the farm all summer and helped dad bail hay and grain. Dad was the town sheriff. When he had business, I would go tend the water and herd cows. For a while, we drove them from town night and morning. I used to herd Mrs. Alger’s cows for 2½ cents a head. She liked me to herd them because they gave more milk. One day there was a good ditch bank that had a lot of feed on it and nothing ever fed on it, so a couple other kids and myself put our cows on it, it wasn’t very long before the owner of the property came and he gave us the devil. (He had a terrible temper anyway) so we moved our cows but we went back and took a whole skeleton of a horse and put it in his head gate. The next morning he caught dad and I on our way to the farm and told him about it – he was still mad. That was the first lie I ever told dad, but I didn’t dare tell him in front of that man, he would have killed me so I said I didn’t do it. I told dad later the truth. The cows started getting tender footed on the road so we took them out to the farm and we milked out there. We carried the milk and cream for the house back in town. We milked at least 5 cows. A lot of times I did it alone. One time, during the depression, you couldn’t sell a cow or calf. When Roosevelt was President, the government gave a farmer 15 dollars a head for just the ears of the animal to show them that you had killed them. You could keep the meat. That was to get rid of the surplus. Dad had killed some cows in the corral where I milked, and the smell of blood drove them wild, so he told me to put them in the stack yard to milk them. We had a good Gurnsey cow we had got when Grandma Johnson died, she was a pet and wouldn’t let you milk another cow first, so I did her and four more and put them back in the corral while I was separating. I looked out and saw she was bloated. I didn’t have a knife, only a case key and a spike nail. I tried to stick her but she fell on her side – I couldn’t do any more, she died. I felt so bad. After that I had a pocket knife. After Dolly (Grandma’s horse) died dad gave me another one, his name was Napolian. He was a mustang from the San Rafael Desert. He was the ugliest horse you ever saw. Roman nose, very little main and tail, rope burns across his nose, wire cuts across his chest; you couldn’t get him fat if you fed him a ton of grain, but, he ran like the wind. I enjoyed him so much. The last time I saw him I called him down off Poison Spring Bench to me. While I was up to Provo picking berries for ten cents a case Dad was putting salt up on the mountain. He had the horse with him he said he got sick and he gave him away. I still would like to know for sure. Dad gave me a colt, but he wasn’t broke. I never did ride him and by that time I had left home and it didn’t matter much. I spent 4 summers picking berries in Orem. A group of girls from Cleveland and Huntington went the first 2 years. We ate pretty good, but we saved enough to buy our school clothes. The next year wasn’t so good as we had more living in the house. A couple of girls thought they were going to date, we didn’t want that so one night while they were gone we locked them out. They slept out all night on an old mattress that was outside – they never went again. The last year there were 15 girls that went. Only about three of us could do anything. The rest didn’t even know how to bake bread. One day we decided we were going to make them make the bread anyway, but we were sorry. One of the girls asked me to throw her a piece of bread – I hit her on the head and knocked her off her chair it was so hard. We didn’t have much during the depression. We always had plenty to eat. We would sell eggs to get sugar and salt and we sold cream. Eggs were 10 cents a dozen; some people said they didn’t have enough to eat. I used to worry about having enough money to pay the taxes. Dad used to say there was a man in town that wanted our farm, and if you went 3 years without paying he could buy them for taxes. He was a veteran of the war and he had a pension. We managed to pay. Another thing I used to worry about is in the spring when the hay got low I was always afraid there wasn’t going to be enough for the horses to do the spring plowing. Dad sold hay in the summer to the goat ranchers. They had a home in the cedars below Hiawatha. I went to school in Cleveland. In the tenth grade I went one year to Huntington. I only needed 2½ credits to graduate but I didn’t finish. I couldn’t have gone that year. Mom, Lola, Vernice and I all wore the same clothes. I stayed out of school one year and was going to go back the next year but I got a job working for Beckels. They ran a meat packing plant, I kept house for them and their children. I did all the housework – washing, ironing and canning. That fall I put up 7 bushels of peaches, 5 of tomatoes and a lot of other things. They were real good to me. They never made arrangements to go out unless they knew I was going to be home that night. They paid me $16.50 a month and I was glad to get it. She never told me to do anything - she would ask me if I would like to. That is where I was staying when I met Clarence. I don’t know why I went with him it was the first blind date I ever went on. I knew his cousin but it was the best thing I ever did. The date was September 16, l935. We went to the show. (The Farmer Takes a Wife) Henry Fonda played the lead. Clarence was working at Spring Canyon and was living with his Aunt and Uncle Slug Krebs. Denton Patty a friend stayed there also. He had the car so Clarence paid all the expenses. When we went to eat they would have me order first, I’d have a sandwich – I wasn’t sure how much money he had. The rest would order a big meal but I never learned. He came down nearly every other night, but on weekdays he had to be home before 10. But on weekends we stayed out longer. We always went dancing on Saturday night. There were some good dance halls. The Silver Moon, just about where the nursing home is in Price. The Rainbow Gardens in Helper were across the street from Workman’s market. That is where he first asked me to marry him. We were married December 21, l935 in my parents home in Cleveland by Bishop Joseph J. Larson. He was the same person that blessed me. Denton Patty and Bernice Burgener were the witnesses. Vernice was in bed with a baby and watched the ceremony. The baby was Doris. We lived in Price in the Olsen Flats, an apartment house back of the court house until March. Uncle Slug and Aunt Ellen were going to California sheep shearing and we were going to tend Bud and Bob while they were in school. (This was in Spring Canyon). They had been gone a week when Clarence got laid off. He had to go tromp wool for Slug so I was alone in a strange place. I got my groceries in Helper – no car but the neighbors were wonderful. They would ask me to go with them every time they went to town. Mom and Dad had a car but didn’t get up very often. For my birthday Nedra Monroe and Josephine Nielson gave me a surprise party – it was wonderful. They were seniors in high school. Bob and Bud were so good I never had a minute trouble with them. They would go clean the confectionary for a nickel and bring the money to me for stamps. They were about 7 and 9. The spring after we were married we bought our first car – a l929 yellow Studebaker convertible with wire wheels mounted on the sides. We paid $129 for it and we paid $12 a month payments. It was hard to make them sometimes. After Clarence came back from California tromping wool, we went to Salt Lake and Clarence worked on the railroad for a while. He made 37 cents an hour. We stayed in a boarding house for $7 a week for both of us. The same summer we went to Thousand Springs, Idaho and worked on a farm. Everything on the farm was pure bred and we stayed there until September 14, l936. We came back to Spring Canyon. On our way home we stopped in Granite Furniture and bought our first furniture, a bedroom set and a kitchen set and we were so proud. The mine was only working two days a week so when Lois was born on December 9, l936 I went down home to have her so Mom wouldn’t have to leave home. When she was born there was a lot of snow, we took her home when she was 2 weeks old and there was 3 feet of snow. I never took her out again until she was three months old. I was so afraid she would get pneumonia and die like my sister did. Sixteen months later our first son was born. James Clair was born at 5:40 on March 24, l938 at Spring Canyon. Dr. Merrell was the doctor. Mom came up and took care of me. Clarence had been laid off two weeks before; but, the day Jim was born we got our first unemployment check for $16. Art Carlson, the Superintendent, came to the house and hired him back to work. On November 3, l939, three minutes before midnight, our second son was born in Spring Canyon – Lynn Earl. When he was a little over a year old I started going shearing with Clarence. The first year we were in a tent but we bought a trailer house. We were the only ones on the crew that had one for a few years and then the rest got one. One spring we were on the Dubose Desert in Idaho when a swarm of crickets came, the ground was covered with them for almost two days. They were dark red and about a half-inch long. We were lucky because of a ditch. We couldn’t get our trailer through the ditch and the crickets didn’t get up by us very bad; but the tents were covered with them and then they disappeared like they came. We were lucky, in the summer the mines closed down and there was no work and the people charged at the Company store and it took them all winter to get out of debt and we were able to make money during the summer and we even saved a little. Clarence was always a good provider. He would find something to do or some way to make money. We sheared starting in Utah, Idaho and finishing up in Montana. We were always in the mountains where the fishing was good and the kids enjoyed it very much. On January 28, l946 we bought our home in Cleveland. We paid cash for it with the exception of $800. We moved down on March 15, l946. The mines were on strike for a month from the first of April until the first of May. Clarence sheared sheep down at Sand Wash, west of Green River. Henry, Lola’s husband was with him. Lola came down and stayed with me while they were gone. And when they finished the day, the strike was settled. Clarence had made enough money to pay our house off in that month. That is the last big shearing job he went out on. He sheared a lot of farm herds. In October, l946, he quit Spring Canyon and went to work in Hiawatha for the U.S. Fuel. The only bright thing I could see about the move was we would have Dr. Merrell again for our doctor. He had come back from the service and had come to Hiawatha. On July 5, l946 at 3:40 p.m. our third son, David, was born in Standardville hospital. The doctor was Gorishek. Dr. Merrell was on Guam, in the service. David had a lot of red hair. Lois was so upset about another boy she wouldn’t speak to her Dad for a little while. But, thirteen months later she got her sister. Wilma was born at 8:45 in the Carbon Hospital. Dr. Merrell was our family doctor again. We had our family. We had already bought a horse before we moved to our farm and dad kept her for us; but, she was old and smart and it didn’t take her long to find out she could throw the kids off and they would leave her alone. Her name was Tony and we were afraid the kids would get hurt so we got rid of her and bought another one. She was a dapple gray and was round and it was next to impossible to keep a saddle on her, she also kicked. But then Clarence bought the best horse we ever owned. A quarter horse and he gave him to me for my birthday. His name was Copper and you could ride him all day and he would never give out. We brought him up to Hiawatha a couple of summers and kept him in a pasture in South Fork. Lois and Kevin moved out to our farm when we moved to Hiawatha and Clarence was put in as General Mine Foreman. They kept the horse for me and bought the sheep and cows from us. That’s how they got started in the sheep business. I thought the end of the world had come when we had to leave our house. Clarence had to stay up to the camps for three months before we could move and we had to wait for a house and I had the responsibility of the sheep, lambing and sick calves. I was ready to move. Wilma wanted to move but we had quite a time getting David to move. We moved on March 28, and David stayed with Lois every chance he got and they finished school that year in Emery County. Wilma stayed with Lola. I would take them down Monday morning and get them on Friday night after school. The rest of the family were either married or away working. But they all soon loved to live in Hiawatha. We made wonderful friends. I had joined the LDS Church and was baptized October 32, l953 by Bishop Bob Lister and confirmed by Joseph J. Laison. In Cleveland I had been a primary teacher and counselor in the MIA, president of the MIA, and a MIA teacher. It was in Hiawatha that Clarence became active in the Church. We went to the Manti Temple on February 19, l966. Lloyd Wall and Francis Priner were witnesses and we were sealed for time and eternity. This was a wonderful experience for us and our lives have been fuller and happier. In Hiawatha I have served as MIA president and teacher, Relief Society President and Primary president and Sunday School teacher. I enjoyed working in the church. We have bad a good life and we were kept busy going to the school activities. The boys in sports and the girls in plays and dancing and we went to them all. We have owned four boats. The first one was a homemade one, made of California red wood; it was big and safe. We used to go out all day with the three older children when they were young. When they got sleepy they would get in the nose of the boat and go to sleep. When we got back from shearing we would go fishing for a week at a time, come home, wash and sign up for unemployment until the mine went back to work. We have had many good fishing trips with the family in Montana, Fish Lake and Yellowstone. Our hunting trips were a family affair also. Clarence’s family, Lloyd and Orval’s boys would all go with us and, of course, ours – all but Lois. We could never get her to go; she didn’t like guns. We are still hunting together. We are finding less deer but we still have a good camping trip. My first gun was a 25 Remington that Clarence gave me just after we were married. I got new hunting boots also. I always said when my gun and boots wore out I would quit hunting; but, I didn’t. I have had two more guns a 30-30 and a sports model 306 with a scope and I don’t know how many pairs of boots. We have another hobby, we started square dancing in l963 and thirteen years later we are still dancing. We have danced in Canada twice, California, Mexico, on a boat in Acapulco, in a coal mine and a cow pasture in 9-mile. At this writing I will be 60 this month. I am sure I’ll have a good many years more to write. I had a good life when I was growing up, but we didn’t have much. Mom and dad worked hard but I think we were better for it. I remember Mom telling us when dad was gone she would have to go after the cows up in the hills. Lola and Vernice were not very old and I was just a baby. She would have to leave them and take me in her bib-over-alls on the horse to get the cows. Sometimes she would have to go up on Poison Spring Bench. It was a hard thing to do to leave her children when they were that small; but she had to. She used to help Dad brand the animals. Dad would hold them down and she would brand them. Mom was a good horseback rider and she would go up on the mountain with dad when he went up to ride for cattle. When they went they would have Dad’s sister come and say with us. Her name was Aunt Jane Ellen. We all liked her. She was fat and jolly and always had a story to tell. Her husband was murdered in Colorado by five Mexicans. It was when the Union first started to organize in the coal mines, he was a union organizer. He left a wife and four small children. For several winters Dad and Uncle Charlie worked the road grader on the highway from the Emery County line across the Poison Spring Bench. They would be out all night no matter how cold it was. It was pretty good money in those days and we were glad to get it. Dad and Grandpa Johnson would haul wood for winter and we would get it in the cedars below Hiawatha. They would leave home one day and stay overnight, load up and come home. It was a great day when we could go with them. It took quite a few loads to get us through the winter. He also hauled the coal from the mines in a wagon either from Huntington Canyon or Moreland. Sometimes he got coal from other people for money. In January, l955, mom started to have problems. She was unable to attend her sister Helga’s funeral who died on the 27th of January. But, my Mom then she started to get better and was able to get up and drive the car. In June she got much worse and she got so she could hardly walk. The last time she came to our house I don’t know how she could have drove the car. On June 20, we had to take her to the hospital but she wouldn’t go until Clarence, Henry and Dywane got home from work and had their supper. She had MS. The doctors said she would be paralyzed for at least nine years, but on June 27, l955 she died. When mom was gone it seemed like the house was gone. Dad stayed on the farm for a year after she died and then he sold it to Jim and Doris Atwood, a granddaughter. Dad came to live with us children. On July 9, l955 my brother and his wife lost their first born son They waited 10 years for him. On July 27, l955 Lola’s husband was killed on the tipple. She lost her mother, nephew and a husband in the sort time of a month. Dad moved in to Lolas home to take care of her chores until she got a job and moved to Salt Lake. And then he took turns staying with us girls until he had to have nursing care. At this writing he is 90 years old and in the nursing home in Price, Utah. He is a wonderful man and I have never heard him swear or get real mad. Our children all have married and have wonderful companions. They all own their own homes and all the boys have good jobs. The boys all have wonderful wives and they are good mothers. They have encouraged the boys in their church and have been great help; the girls have good husbands. They have good jobs and have just about everything they need. We have 21 grandchildren and two on the way. A person has never lived until they have grandchildren. We love them all. The Lord has been good to us, that is why I feel like any job I am given in the Church I should do to try to repay him for His goodness. (Robert Wall Note: these last two paragraphs were written a few years later, most likely in 1981 or 1982.) When Clarence was given the Superintendent job we didn’t have to live in canyon any more to we sold our little farm to our grandson and bought a new home in town. We moved her on October 15, l977. Clarence drove to work in company truck. In October, l980, he had open-heart surgery. On January 15 he went back to work he was 65 years old. He decided to call it quits and retired on January 15, l981. We traveled a lot and did square dancing. We spent l4 years going to Quartzsite, Arizona for the winter. Now we have sold our motor home and stay home and we enjoy our family a lot.
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