My Grandfather, AWB by Steven Jemmett

My Grandfather, AWB by Steven Jemmett

My grandfather, Ardean William Bench, was 5th out of nine children born to Samuel Exile Bench and Lenora June Breinholt. He was born on February 19th 1928, in Salina, Utah. Now to take a trip up the family tree, Ardeans dad, Samuel Exile Bench was born in Manti, Utah to William Bench and Martine Larsen. William Bench was born in St. Mary England the 6th of November 1840, while his wife, Martine Larsen was born the 27th of May 1850 in Hellinge, Denmark. Because Ardean’s grandfather was a polygamist, and would not abandon any of his wives, he was either in prison or on a mission or hiding in Mexico. When Ardeans father Samuel was born, William was on a mission in England and wrote home in a letter to have Samuel named Samuel Exile, because he felt he was in exile… because he felt he could not come home safely. Now as to the family tree on Ardeans mothers side, Lenora June Breinholt was born June 30th, 1899 in Redmond, Utah. Her parents were James Christian Breinholt and Anne Margaret Frandsen. James Christian Breinholt was born August 3rd, 1869 in Ephriam, Utah. Anne Margaret Frandsen was born the 14th of July, 1874 in Sobyvad, Denmark. The Bench grandparents settled in Manti, Utah after coming from their home countries and across the plains. The Breinholt grandparents settled in Redmond, Utah after their families came across the plains also. They lived their until they could no longer farm and then they moved to Salina Utah until they died.

Ardeans grandmother Martine Larsen Bench lived with Ardean and his parents for a period of about 13 or 14 years after her husband died. She died while Ardean was still young but he remembers her. He never knew his grandfather Bench. He had past away years earlier. Ardean remembers visiting with his other grandparents on occasion.

Ardeans father worked in the Sevier Valley Coal mine about 15 or 16 miles out of Salina where he had a small garage that they lived in. Eventually they moved this garage into Salina and for a time used it as their home. They divided it into rooms by hanging blankets up. While his grandma Bench was living there, she became blind. He recalls the story of how one day, while doing house cleaning, she bent over a chair which had two wooden spindles on the back. She ran into one of these with her right eye, which blinded her, then as the doctor explained it, the other eye went blind out of sympathy. Eventually they built a small brick home that attached to their garage home. They lived there until Ardeans sophomore year in high school, when the family moved to Orem, Utah. Ardean did not want to leave school and his friends at that time, but more importantly he was needed to help with the farming and to milk cows, so he lived with his uncle Roland Crane for the remainder of his high school years there in Salina Utah. In exchange for living there at his uncles, Ardean worked on the farm and milked cows twice a day. He was a hard worker and rode his bicycle home during every lunch hour at school just to feed the cows.

His childhood home in Salina was heated with a coal furnace which was economical since their father was able to purchase coal cheaper since he worked in the mine. Ardean remembers that he along with a couple of his brothers slept down in the soil walled basement next to this furnace and was responsible for keeping the coal bin filled. They also had a deep hole dug just off the porch that they had ice in covered in saw dust. In the winter they would go to Price Pond and cut one foot square blocks and bring them back to put in this ice house and then they would sell it for 1 penny for a pound to their neighbors to make a little money.They had a large garden that their dad would plow up then they were responsible for all the planting. It raised all sorts of vegetables that they lived on through out the year. They had a nice root cellar that they kept all their carrots, potatoes and apples in. Ardean about burned it down once when he took the candle that they used to light the cellar and got a little carried away burning down the cobwebs. They also raised all their own meat that they used. This included cows, pigs, sheep, chickens and rabbits. They did all their own butchering and even making their own sausage. Ardean said he still likes rabbit the best, even better than chicken! Ardeans mother did all the cooking, and she would gather her family around the family kitchen table and feed them wonderful home cooked meals of meat, potatoes, and vegetables. For lunch, they would often eat sandwiches or toast and fresh or canned fruit. His mother canned a lot of beans, peas, and whatever fruit they could harvest off their trees or get their hands on. She did all this canning on their old wood burning cook stove. It was quite a job keeping the woodpile stocked for the stove and Grandpa remembers the family trips to the mountains with the team of horses and wagon to cut and load wood to bring back and chop for the families fuel supply. They had a refrigerator box outside that was made of chicken wire covered in burlap sack. They put a big tub of water on top and would drape burlap over the sides of the box and as the breeze would flow through the wet burlap it would keep things cool inside. This is where they kept their butter, milk, and homemade cheese. It was about 5 foot tall and 30 inches deep as Ardean remembers.

They had water that was provided by the city that came from Salina Canyon so there never seemed to be a shortage of drinking water. They used ditch water to water their gardens. But they had an outhouse that the family used. It was a 3 holer! There was electricity also at the time Ardean was born. He remembers the street lamps, but they still used coal oil lamps a lot at home.

When it came to family chores everyone had their share. Although his mom did all the cooking he remembers having to help with the dishes. One day he complained that this should be his only sister, Valene’s, job. He was promptly told that she would have her chance for plenty of that in her future. He still had to do them! Other chores they had to help with as children were, to build fires, split wood, help garden, mow the lawn, with an manually turning blade, and help clean the house. Mom sewed most of their clothing, or was given clothing which she revised to fit them. The ironing was done with the old fashioned iron that you heated on the stove, and grandpa remembers that everything was starched. Even the pillow slips! Because their money was so tight, many times they had to go on public assistance, or welfare. This meant wearing the government issued bib overalls. My grandpa really disliked doing this because with it came the stigma, that if you wore those overalls, you were poor. He still carries this hate for bib overalls. My mom remembers when she was in high school, it was “in fashion” to wear overalls, and her dad, my grandpa, got mad at her for buying some. He was still reminded of the olden days when it meant that you were poor, if you wore them. Grandpas dad had a 6th grade education, and after that was on his own to make a living and although he worked very hard, there was never very much money. The one very important thing this taught their family was how to work and work hard! To this day they have all had a very good work ethic and are what you would call real workers!

Ardeans family would, on occasion, visit with other family members such as cousins. They would go for a day or two to visit their cousins in Redmond, Ephriam and once Grandpa and his brother Reid traveled to Idaho to visit one cousin. He doesn’t really remember the family taking any real family vacations, though they would go to the mountains occasionally and pack a picnic. They mostly worked on Saturdays. When they were younger they got to play a bit on that day, but as they grew older it was designated as a day of work. Sundays, meant going to church, they did this at different times of the day then in between meetings they were allowed to play. Some of the games they played were cowboys and indians, kick the can, jump rope, no bears are out tonight, and marbles. There were two wards in the town of Salina, the North and the South ward. They belonged to the Salina South Ward.

Although Ardean didn’t have any pets, he said he enjoyed playing with the rabbits, that is until they had to eat them. His brother Reid, had a pet dog named Karlo, whom he loved dearly, and he had him for quite a while until one day the neighbor brought him home in a wagon dead. He said he had got into his rabbits so he had to shoot him. Reid was devastated over the death of his dog. He loved him so much that later after he was married he named one of his girls Karla, after his favorite dog Karlo. Grandpas oldest brother, Marlen, had a pet owl as he remembers that they would feed scraps of meat to.

Ardean was especially close to his brother Wendell, saying that he was just a good person! Reid and Ardean played a lot together also. His oldest brother, Marlen, was in the service for World War 2 when grandpa was pretty young so he didn’t get to know him as well, but he did remember that one Christmas when money was really tight, that Marlen bought a bicycle for him. He gets tears in his eyes every time he talks about that gift, knowing how much his brother loved him to give him such a gift. He rode that bike to school everyday during high school.

Ardeans dad, Samuel Exile Bench, worked in the coal mines. Earning his way since he was very young. After many years of working in the mines, he eventually was hired with Geneva Steel and that’s when the family moved to Orem, Utah. Lenora June Breinholt Bench, grandpas mother, worked when she was a young girl as a maid and a home cleaner, as well as taking care of children. When she was married, she stayed at home and raised her children, until the time when Ardean was the oldest left at home, and the war was in full swing. She then got a job in Ephriam, Utah at a parachute factory. Ardean started making money to help with the family at the age of 12. By the time he was 14 he was working side by side with grown men working in the fields making 25 cents a day for 10 hours. He made 2.50 a day until he was a senior and he started making a little better wage. He worked on a farm while he was in high school that was 4 or 5 miles out of town in the alfalfa, grain, and corn. Every fall he would thin, top, and load beets. They got out of school to do this for a few weeks at a time. He was really careful with his money and had saved $900.00 by the time he graduated from high school. That next year he worked for the Pacific States Carrot Company Warehouse. He loaded train cars with 125 lb. crates of carrots. He could load 4 or 5 boxcars in a day all by himself. I told you, he was a hard worker! He learned to drive a car at the age of 13 or 14, but never really got to do it because they didn’t own one. Their Uncle Roland had a fancy surrey, which is a nice buggy that was pulled with a horse.

At Christmas time, they decorated the tree with popcorn and tin cutouts, and they had lights too. They didn’t have many gifts, mostly clothes, but they had lots of fun anyway! Mom always made fruitcake. Ardean remembers getting a wind up toy train one year when he was about 3, and he remembers placing it on the table then running around they other side to catch it, but he was too late and it fell to the floor and it broke.

Grandpa didn’t have a television. until he was married. His uncle Roland Crane, whom he lived with for a couple of years had one, and he really got excited over the wrestling matches on television. This uncle of his also got a little excited at some of Ardeans basketball games as he remembers, and wanted to punch a kid for hitting Ardean. They did listen to the radio to hear what was happening with the war.

Grandpa loved school and learning. He doesn’t ever remember doing homework though and still doesn’t believe kids should do it. He says that you should be able to learn everything you need to during the hours of school, and leave the time after, for working and family. He got pretty good grades and even earned himself a scholarship to Ricks College. But not knowing what he wanted to do, he turned it down. He didn’t think much about what he wanted to do when he grew up. Not one of his high school teachers or counselors suggested to him that him might go on for more schooling.

In his adult years he got his education at BYU and Ricks College. He earned his bachelors degree in Biology and Sociology with a secondary teaching degree. He said that now that he is retired, he could have made a lot more money but he couldn’t have had a better job. He worked until he retired teaching seminary to high school students and then for the last few years worked as a building inspector for the seminary and institute buildings. He always had a farm that he worked on the side and usually a herd of cows too. This helped him and his family out numerous times. In addition, he worked for the forest service also during the summers.

He met his wife Rhoda Laura Moulton through an old missionary companion. He came courting her in Idaho and though he can’t remember how he asked her to marry him, they got married November 3rd 1950. They took a honeymoon to Salt Lake City. They traveled to Escalante Utah to start his teaching career and after a number of years moved to Roosevelt Utah where they built their first home. Ardeans wife Rhoda had many different callings in her life, one was a mother, a leader with the women in her church callings, when she worked she was a clerk, a secretary, and a school teacher. While living in Roosevelt they had 4 children. Douglas William, Kathleen, (my mom) , Val Denton, and Laurel Marie. They had all the challenges of a normal household with 4 active children, a demanding job, and a farm. Ardean tried to bring his children up with the same work ethics that he was raised with. He always had a large garden, usually with lots of pumpkins, or peas for his family to harvest. His family has many memories of lots of mountain trips and family vacations. In 1977, Ardean moved his family to Rigby Idaho. He there started another farm and another teaching job with Bonneville high school seminary being his first assignment before moving onto Madison high school seminary. Once again a big garden graced his yard along side of all those cows in the pasture. His children learned once again new experiences as they had to ride a school bus for the first time in their lives. One by one his children grew up, and got married, and moved away. Douglas, his oldest, lives in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, Kathleen lives in Rigby, Idaho Val lives in Ririe, Idaho and Laurel, their youngest lives in Springville Utah.

When Grandpa was asked about his political views he answered that he has voted in every election since 1948 and that he is a conservative republican. His philosophy of life that he wants to share with his descendants he said was to long to share here, but put in simple terms was “Be true to yourself, to others, and to God.” He does not have any favorite philosophers but he has very strong religious beliefs. He states that “What I know, I KNOW!” Some of the most important inventions he could think of were, the cotton gin, gasoline engines, and of course the knotter for hay bailers. Modern inventions are beyond belief and his understanding. The things that give him the most pleasure are always doing good, helping others, living a long time, and serving two missions, one of which was to the American Indians. The continual degrade of moral standards and the fact that there is hardly an honest person to be found cause him the most concern or grief in his life now. He also believes that prayers are answered, not always as we hope, sometimes they are answered even when we pray for the wrong things. He had the privilege of praying with a companion for a lady who had been given two weeks to live. She had cancer, her family had been notified and she quickly recovered and lived another whole year before she died peacefully. He states that love, what ever it is, comes from selflessness. A self centered person cannot truly love anyone but themselves. We, of course, must also love ourselves, but our love with all the emotions needs to be centered in the welfare and happiness of others. The lack of love for others is the source of all the worlds problems. He also believes that there is no such thing as will power. The only way we can accomplish anything is to be willing to make a firm commitment and go to, with all we have, to do what we are committed to.

Ardeans greatest accomplishments or achievements is as he says… I have survived till now, have been able to feed, clothe, and house my family, and have even helped relieve a few burdens of other people.

resources for report

Interview with Ardean Bench

4 generation sheet for dates and places