MEMORIES OF FLORA SNOW WOOLLEY

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Flora Snow Woolley was the daughter of Erustas Fairbanks and Elizabeth Rebecca Ashby Snow. I was born June 16th, 1856, in Salt Lake City, Utah, nine years after my parents came to the Salt Lake Valley.

Among my earliest recollections was my father coming home and bringing me a cloth bound story book, my mother sitting on his lap and I standing by their side. As I read history and compare later, I concluded it was his return from his St. Louis Mission, in 1858. I remember my sister Josephine's birth; when I was about three years old; of going to school to a Sister Atwood, by name. When two and one-half years old I remember the move to Provo, at the time Johnson's Army was threatening to enter the Valley.

In 1861, my father was called to help colonize the Dixie Mission. My mother and family were moved there. I was then five years old. I well remember the journey down, of four weeks. My father pitched our tents on what was later called the "Adobe Yard". They began a survey of the present town site of St. George and in the spring we were moved there.

Mother put her rag carpet on the ground and our "Charter Oak” stove was put in the center by the tent pole. The lizards, scorpions and rattlesnakes were thick, very dangerous and annoying. I remember mother finding a rattler curled up on her bed and also finding one curled up under her rocking chair. It was immediately after our move here that we had the terrible rain storm, of, they said, forty days and forty nights, when the Santa Clara was almost flooded away and much damage done, but the country received the best soaking it ever had before or since.

Jacob Hamblin and Thales Haskel were sent down to Santa Clara to labor with the Indians. I remember at one time, when he with the Indians were in St. George holding a Pow-Wow, and I can always see them in a circle smoking the pipe of peace. A large iron kettle of ours hung on an iron tripod, boiling meat and bones for a stew for their feed and we children running around the town getting loaves of bread to feed them.

My first school days were in a tent, taught by a woman a (?) Everett. Next in a willow school house (one room) taught by a brother Fawcett by name, and later to sister Snell, a very dear friend of our family, who taught my father's children and some of our neighbors. When I was eight years old I was baptized by my father in the Rio Virgin, south of town.

Our meetings, dances and picnics were held in a large bowery, built of willows, until they could make adobes, then they began to build houses and the St. George Hall was built, where our meetings, Sunday school, and dances and theatricals were held for many years.

I attended school there, taught by a lady by the name of Sarah Clark. She afterwards became the wife of Jesse W. Crosby. As time went on we had the best teachers the times could afford. A Mr. Kealer from Salt Lake, a Mr. Sheppman, Brother James G. Bleak and Richard Born, taught in the fourth Ward school house, reading writing, arithmetic, spelling, and geography. We wrote compositions, but had no histories or language. It was equivalent to our seventh and eighth grades today. Charles Thomas of Salt Lake City was called down there to teach music. I attended his classes. He taught us the do, ray, me, fa. He put on a concert at that time and my sisters Libbie and Misha, and Jackie Gates sang in it. My mother made Libbie a white dress ruffled to the waist and a white quilted petticoat to wear under it. In those days we wore clothes for warmth. Jackie sang "The Mocking Birds”. Four of the men sang what was called a round, each one of them sang a line in succession. It was "Rushey Cane Bottom Old Chairs To Men, Old Chairs To Men." Quite unique. I sang in the Ward choir, was secretary in the first Mutual Improvement Association. My sister Libbie was president of the organization. I was also a member of the Ward dramatics for many years, (until after my first child was born), conducted by William Branch; Miles P. Romney, Joseph Orton, Daniel Seegmiller, my sister Artemisia and sister-in-law Maggie, taking the leading characters. Our social times consisted of theatricals, dances, picnics, and horse back rides, sewing bees, etc. A Professor Baswell, on his way to California and a magician or slight of hand performer gave an exhibition which was a wonder for these times, but of common occurrence today.

In 1877, I married Edwin Dilworth Woolley Junior, at the age of twenty-one. The St. George Temple was completed that year and dedicated on the sixth of April. My brother Franklin and I were two of the first couples to be married in the Temple on the twelfth of April,1877. My husband left the following day, April 13th, for a mission to England. He was absent about six months, when he was released and his partner in business was sent to Germany. He, Uncle Dan Seegmiller and Howard Spencer were accused of killing Colonel Pike in Salt Lake City many years before; had to be on the underground, hence Mr. Woolley's release.

Soon after my husband's return, I went to live at his home. Emma and I lived together for two years. On the twenty-sixth of August,1878, my first child was born, Florence Evelyn. Emma's son Royal was born soon after Evelyn. On the twenty-second of December, 1880, my son Dilworth was born, and her daughter Rachel was December 2, 1880. When Dilworth was three and a-half months old, my father and mother wanted to go to Salt Lake City to attend April Conference, so I went to our old home (the so called Big House) and took charge of her family and boarded the school teacher, Mr. Sheppman. Just before their return from Conference the diphtheria broke out in our school and my little brother Herbert came home from school with it and was very ill. They returned about the twelfth or thirteenth . On the twenty-second of April he died. Soon after Evelyn became ill with it and died on the eighth of May, On the sixteenth of May he (Mr. Woolley) moved me down to the Washington field, where I lived and boarded his hired men, in the fall he moved me back to town. I had two rooms in Emma's home and kept house by myself. In the Spring of 1882, Mr. Woolley moved Emma and her family to Upper Kanab, where he engaged in the farming and dairying business, making cheese for market. In 1883, he moved me to Upper Kanab on May the nineteenth 1883, my son Herbert Elliot was born. Mr. Woolley built a little house for me under the hill on the north east. I lived there about one year, then I went to St. George for the winter, lived in two rooms of the Big House and Dilworth attended his first school. In the spring I moved to Lower Kanab. Bessie was born there on the eleventh of March,1885. Moved back to Upper Kanab in the fall and in the spring of 1886, he moved me to Pipe Springs, Arizona. I lived there five years. During that period my son LeGrand was born in St. George at my mother’s home, April 3,1887. My son Arthur was born at Pipe Springs on the twelfth of May 1889.

I boarded his hired men and entertained the traveling public, which were numerous. This being the period when the "Edmond Tucker" law was being enforced and the Church property confiscated, polygamist men and women hunted and hounded for that principle. Pipe Springs being in Arizona was a safety zone and many plural wives, whose husbands were in the Penitentiary or trying to keep out of the clutches of the deputy marshals were there also. My sister Josephine, J. M. Tanner’s wife, also my sister Georgie, Moses Thatcher's wife, Lynda Arriver, Bishop Marrigers wife, of Kanab was our telegraph operator. Brother Thomas Chamberlain's two wives, Ann and Ellen were there. He was in the Penitentiary, wearing the stripes. Also a sister Bringhurst and a Mrs. Langford were there. Their husbands also in the Penitentiary. There were six babies born while I lived there, five boys and one girl.

J. M. Tanner came down to visit his wife in 1890, and as I had lived in isolation so long, he suggested I go back to Salt Lake with him for a visit. My cousin, Lucy Grant, Heber J. Grant's wife had asked me to make her a visit. So when I left, I took Bessie and Arthur, leaving Dilworth in Kanab with Aunt Emma, and left Bert and LeGrand in St. George with my mother. We left Pipe, went to St. George and on up to Pine Valley, where nearly all St. George were celebrating the twenty-fourth of July. I remained there several days and then continued on our journey. Arrived in Salt Lake to find my cousin Lucy and family were in Brighton at their summer home, so I went to my sister Susie's and visited until my cousin Lucy came back. I went to her home, remained there through August and September. In October when Mr. Woolley was on his way up to the Conference, he was arrested by Deputy Marshals. They would not let him telegraph to anyone. Through the good offices of his friends and I mine I was notified that they were planning to arrest me at the same time, but they made the mistake of going to his (Heber's) mothers house a block north of us that night. Monday fore-noon, my sister Susie came down and told us that Brother Thatcher came to her house the night before to see if I was in Salt Lake. He had met David Cannon that day on the street and David told him I was in town, for a very dear friend of Dee's and Dan's, by the name of Lyn Sprague, who was on the police force, had said they had been spotting me on the street for six weeks with a babe in my arms and for them to get the word to me. I had been doing a little washing that day, but I gathered them partly dried and my cousin Lucy put me and my children in her surrey and took us over to Dee's half sister Minnie Wardupe, where I remained several days. The Deputies searched seven homes of my relatives and were greatly chagrined when they did not find me. When they were convinced they could not find me they let Mr. Woolley go free. He came on up to Conference. While at Minnie's I read the so called "Manifesto" which was voted upon at Conference. My cousin took me down to Midvale to a dear friend of the Stringham family, Aunt Margaret Spencer. I remained there several days when Mr. Woolley had me taken up to Centerville to his brother John Woolley's.

Uncle John's home had been dedicated as a safe refuge for many leading Church Officials, John Taylor, Joseph T. Smith, George T. Smith, George Q. Cannon, my father and many others of the Authorities were hiding in the "Amelia Palace" at that time. I remained at Uncle John's several days, when Mr. Woolley had Adolphus Whitehead, a young man who was from St. George, pick me and the children up. We went home by way of Cedar City and around by the Mountain Meadows, arriving at St. George on Saturday. Monday afternoon a telegram came to Ralph from Mr. Woolley to say his freight must be shipped immediately to Pipe Springs, meaning me, of course. So I gathered up my family and loaded them onto the buckboard and started out. We ate our supper just at the foot of the Hurricane Ridge, traveled all night arriving at Pipe Springs just as day was breaking. Brother Thatcher had already moved Georgie to Mannasa, Colorado and J. M. had moved Josephine to Salt Lake City. The next year Mr. Woolley moved me to Kanab. There being no one to entertain the traveling public I opened my doors and kept public house for thirty-two years and boarded the school teachers. I saved what I conveniently could of my earnings and took a trip north as often as I could as my mother had moved there from St. George. My father having died in Salt Lake City while I lived at Pipe Springs. In 1888, I was First Counselor to Sister Halliday, fifteen years in the Stake Primary and President in the Ward Primary four years. Marion was born in 1895, and Prueda in 1902. In 1904, Bessie married Albert Day, a schoolteacher here, from Fillmore. He died while attending U. of U. the next winter. Six weeks after his death Berta was born.

I sang in the Ward Choir and entered into the activities of a new and growing town. My children received their grade and high school work in Kanab. They went away to school one after another to finish and get into professions. Dilworth went to the BYU, Alice Snow, of Manti. They both went to Ann Arbor, while he studied law. He is now a Judge of the Seventh District in Sanpete County, a position he has held for twelve successive years. He was recently elected to his fifth term. He has four children, three sons and a daughter.

Herbert Elliot attended the U. of U. one term. The next summer he was called on a mission to the Eastern States, serving two years, after which he worked in the Forest Service. He was transferred to Washington D.C. where he worked four or five years. While in Washington he came to Logan and married Precinda Ballentine. He has three sons, they are now in Oakland, California, and now in Washington D.C.

Bessie graduated from the A. C. College at Logan, and the Columbia University New York. Is now married to George C. Jensen, a Professor of Language at the A. C. They have two sons.

LeGrand married Alida Snow, of Manti. He graduated from the U. of U., then taught school at Price, Utah. His first child, LeGrand Jr., was boon there. He went to Berkeley two or three years, then to John Hopkins and studied Medicine. He is now a practicing physician in Salt Lake City. They have four children, two sons and two daughters.

Arthur attended the L. D. S. High School and two years at B. Y. U, when he was called on a mission to Germany. He served two and a-half years He remained in Washington D.C. as secretary to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and studied Law at the George Washington University. While there he married Ivy Houtz, came back and is now practicing in Ogden.

Marion received his education in Kanab and at the Branch A. C. at Cedar City, Utah. When graduated he was called on a mission to Australia. He labored in Launceston, Tasmania. He died in Brisbane, the tenth of May,1918. His remains were brought home and he is buried in Kanab. He was twenty-one years old. Died of Appendicitis.

Prueda was born in Kanab, in 1902. Received her education in Kanab, the U. of U. and the A. C. at Logan. Was married to Glen Hamblin, in Kanab.

During this period in our pioneering lives traveling was a luxury, and I being of a rather restless nature, always was desirous of getting out and see something of the world and took advantage of every opportunity of going. I took many trips to Salt Lake City. In 1912, when Bessie was attending Columbia and Art had returned from his mission and he and Bert were working their way through Law school, they all thought it a good time for me to go there and see that much of the country. I was boarding the school teachers and saved all my earnings that I could, and paid my own and Prueda's expenses there and back. I had not told Mr. Woolley about my plans and when I told him what I intended to do he did not think it possible, but when I explained to him how I had been saving for that purpose that changed the face of things and he got busy and found a pass for Prueda and I too Marysvale with Brother Seaman. When I got to Salt Lake I contacted President Ben E. Rich of the Eastern States Mission, who was there for April Conference and went to New York with him. I remained in New York two weeks with Bessie. My sister Georgie Thatcher was there with her three sons, Ashby, studying accounting as his profession. I attended the best theaters, both in New York and Washington. Visited the museums in New York, Columbia University, Grants Monument, both situated on the Hudson River. At the door on the outside of the museum was the largest known Meteor in the world. Rode in the subway and elevated railways, the first to be built in the Nation. Left New York at about nine o'clock and was met at the Union Station in Washington about dark by Bert, Arthur and Percy. It being very warm in Washington they had moved out to Glen Echo, a summer boarding house, seven miles northwest of Washington, situated on the Potomac River. They could swim in the river only a short distance away. It was a delightful ride of one-half hour to town on the street car, which passed a very short distance from our door. Sundays and as often as the boys could be at liberty, we went sight-seeing. Visited the Capitol one day when Congress was in session. Went to the top of the Washington Monument and had a most wonderful view of the City and its surroundings. Visited the Zoo, the Congressional Library, Corsican Art Gallery. They were just erecting the model for the Lincoln Memorial, since completed. Attended some fine theaters. Heard Madame Butterfly, when it was first produced. Attended Church at Senator Reed Smoot's home. Crossed the Potomac River and visited Arlington Cemetery, saw General Lee's home there, went through George Washington's home on the Potomac. Things had been collected of his period by the Daughters of the Revolution, as we collect ours of our pioneer period. Dolly Madsen clothes, Martha and George Washington’s, just as they were then and everything as when he lived there. His surrey he used to ride in. The old. earlier Pioneer kitchen with all the old fashioned cooking utensils. Fire place with iron rod for hanging the kettles on. The iron bake ovens, and an old fashioned brick oven in the southeast corner for baking bread and their Boston baked beans. Visited Washington and Martha's Tomb, guarded by a sentinel night and day. Back and had a chicken dinner on the grounds. Remained six weeks, Bessie and Bert had come from New York, her school had closed and I was planning to leave for home the sixteenth. They persuaded me not to leave that day for why I do not know, but it proved to be my birthday which I had forgotten, and they had not. They planned a surprise for me of a trip to Chesapeake Bay, a pleasure resort. We hired an electric launch and we had an hour or two sailing. Afterwards catching crabs in the lake. The next day I left for home bringing Berta with me. Bessie remained there. George C. Jensen met her later there and they were married. Came to Salt Lake and remained there two weeks, as Prueda and Berta had just recovered from what proved to be diphtheria. In 1913, Bert and Percy came from Washington, and Arthur and Ivy in 1914. In 1915, I went to Berkeley, California, with LeGrand and Alida. I remained there two weeks. It being the year of the Panama Exhibition, I went to San Francisco every day and took in every phase of the Fair. In 1916, Marion was called on a mission to Australia. He was gone eighteen months, when he was taken ill and operated on for appendicitis. He died on the tenth of May,1918. His remains were brought home and interned in the Kanab Cemetery. His death was a terrible blow to me. In short time Mr. Woolley's health began to fail and in March of 1920, he went to Salt Lake for medical treatment and was operated upon for cancer of the diadem. He came home and in July he died. The children all came home for the funeral. After his burial, I decided to move to Salt take, as Prueda was ready to enter college. I immediately packed up my things left some (or most if them) to be sold, and took passage with Brother Bowman, by truck.

I lived with Josephine all that winter, sharing the expenses of the rent and home. The next summer Prueda went to Logan and I lived on third south and thirteenth East street in Salt Lake with Bert and Percy, and in February of that winter went to Logan and remained there until spring, when I went back to Salt Lake. Lived with Georgie in the Buckingham Apartments about two months, when I rented one of my sister Martha's Apartments in "Kearns Court". Bought furniture, lived there until 1928. Prueda attended the U. of U. and I boarded Emma Seegmiller of St. George, who also was going to the University. The next winter Prueda went to Logan to help Bessie and Katherine Miles and Maurine Whipple boarded with me while they were attending the U. of U. Prueda lived with Bessie the next winter in Logan. I hoarded Theresa and Marve Pugh. At Christmas time Prueda and I went to Long Beach to visit Bert and Percy. On Christmas day they all went to the ocean. The next year Prueda attended the L. D. S. Business College. The following summer Bessie, Berta and Prueda and I went to the Kaibab Forest. Remained there about six weeks. On the twenty-seventh of July, Prueda and Glen were married and in the summer she moved back to Kanab, into my home, where she is still living.

In 1928, I boarded my brother, Edward Snow, Julia's eldest son, also my brother, Arthur's daughter, Rebecca, until just before Christmas when her mother got a position for her to teach in Detroit, Michigan. Bert and family were now in Kansas City, Mo. Went to Kansas City and Independence too. I remained there fifteen months and Independence three months. While there I did a little sightseeing, visited "Liberty Jail". Liberty is fifteen miles northeast of Independence. It was of great historic interest to me, as my father was in that jail at the time the Prophet Joseph, his brother Hyrum and five others were imprisoned there for seven months. My father went down to Liberty on business and went to the jail to see the brethren and was pushed into it by the Jailer. He was there three weeks. He had no money with which to buy or plead his way to liberty and asked the Prophet what he should do. The Prophet said, "Brother Erastus plead your own case." But father says, “I do not know the law". The Prophet says, "Plead 'Justice', 'Truth', and 'Liberty', and quote Blackstone," which he did and gained his freedom, They asked him when he had finished where he studied law. He was the means of having the others brought to trial and released. I told them when I went through the jail I felt I was not only on historic ground, but on sacred ground. The jail and grounds were sold to a man, and he has built his home there. The sons of the Prophet asked that the room where their father was imprisoned be preserved, which they have done. The sons and now the grandsons of the Prophet is the leader of the so called "Josephite Church", in Independence, Mo. The jail is on the northwest corner of the building a little under ground. There is a door on the north and a small three pane window on the east. The room is about twelve by fourteen feet. A flag stone floor. It was while in the jail this time that they were given human flesh to eat. The Prophet was warned of it and they did not eat. I had peculiar feelings while in Missouri. It is verily a land of "Zion", a most beautiful country and I felt rebellious that my parents had been driven from it. I left Independence the second of November,1939, and went right on to Logan, as Bessie was working and Arthur Lowell needed care. I went up to help her and was there three winters, going to Salt Lake and places in the summer. Joined the "Wilford Woodruff" Chapter of the Daughters of the Pioneers. Attended "Clio" with Bessie often, which was very interesting and instructive.

In January,1933, Art invited me to go to St. George with him. He was going down to try a murder case. He was living in the "Hotel Ben Lomond". I came to Ogden Wednesday the fourth of January, and all went up the to Arthur's canyon home for a duck dinner. At six P.M. Friday the sixth we drove to St. George, three hundred and sixty miles. Left Ogden at ten-fifteen and arrived in St. George at five-thirty P.M. Saturday, Ivy drove me all around town to call on old friends and see the old landmarks. I had not been down for thirty-two years. Not many of my old associates were living. We were in the car nine hours making calls. Visited the Cemetery. Ivy took a picture of me at the side of the old school house, the last one I attended. Took a picture of me and the Elmore House, where I lived five years, and from which I was married. Sunday, we came to Kanab, had dinner with Prueda and Glen, then rode down to Fredonia to see Thomas Jensen about the sheep. Monday all rode out to House Rock Valley and the New Bridge, crossed over to the other side and sat down by the river and ate our lunch. It was Art's first trip to House Rock, as well as mine. On our return we stopped and chatted with a man and his wife, who are from New York, he was out for his health. They were building a camp, calling it the Cliff Dwellers built around a large cluster of rocks resembling mushrooms, a very unique place, ten miles from the Bridge. Saw the "Sand Hills" where Prueda and Glen go trapping. Returned home about nine o'clock, and Art and Ivy went back to Rockville to hold a preliminary hearing in the murder trial, then down to St. George and back to Kanab, the next day we left Kanab. He left me in Manti, and I remained in Manti about four weeks, then to Salt Lake a week, Ogden another week, then to Logan again.

In June,1933, Berta brought me to Kanab, as she was on her vacation with her mother and Arthur Lowell, going to Los Angeles. I remained in Kanab five months. The last of October, Dilworth came down and we went to Fredonia, to see Thomas and left here the fourth of November to Manti and then on to Salt Lake the next day.

I lived with Bert and family until the fourteenth of February, when I went to my sister Martha 's. Was there the remainder of the winter and all summer. In June, Martha and Helen went to Los Angeles, I kept house and looked after the renters until she returned, the first of September when Berta and Mahlen brought Prueda and I down to Kanab. Prueda had been making a visit. One of the first things I did here was to quilt, I pieced for a wedding present for Berta. She and Mahlen Potter were married in Salt Lake, the first of Jan. 1936. They surprised us New Year Eve when they dropped in on us. They remained over night. Prueda and I have quilted the other quilt. I have written a history of the Pipe Springs Monument, for the Daughters of the Pioneers. and am now writing my memories for them as well as for my children.

In 1930, Bessie, Prueda, Dilworth, and Arthur Lowell, went out on the Kaibab. There was an aviator there with a small airplane named "Girlie". We all went over the river to the South Rim and back; a one-half hour ride. It was a wonderful sight from the air.

In 1922, LeGrand and his family, Prueda and I went to American Fork. All went up to Timpanogos Cave. I walked to the cave, it was five in the afternoon and the man at the door inquired my age, sixty-six. He said I was the oldest person to walk up to it.