The

Heppler Family
Chronicles
 Forward:
This is a history of my father, Rosco Zar Heppler Sr., my mother, Elmira B Farnsworth and their
family. Most of it was written by my sister, Nola F Heppler. She was the family genealogist and historian.
She wrote many histories, several letters, and pages and pages of notes.
I think her nephew said it best. Nola wrote many different pieces about our family. She had this
insatiable quest to tell us not only of our Mother but of the Hepplers and all of our ancestors as well.
At her death, I inherited them. The rest is from me, siblings, relatives, books and newspapers. Where
possible, I have given credit where credit is due.
At first it was my intention to make one coherent history out of all of it. It soon became apparent that
that would be a lot of work. Also, it would kill the flavor and style of those who wrote it. Thus, here is it,
just as it was written. I have tried to put it in some chronological order. I have also done some editing to
clean it up and correct obvious mistakes. There is duplication. However you would have to read it from
cover to cover to find it.
I was going to include all genealogies, but it added too many pages. I did include fathers forefathers,
his family, his children, and one generation beyond.
Some of the pictures could be better. I wish they were. I worked with what I had.

A few words and explanation about our name.

My father was christened Rosco Zar Heppler He used the name Hepp most of his life. Some
genealogist gave him the name Roscoe Czar Heppler and it was perpetuated forward. I have corrected
where I could.
My mother was christened Elmira B (no period) Farnsworth The B is for Bulkley. She continued
the tradition and name her first three daughters Rhea H (no period), Nola H, and Orpha H. The H
is for Heppler.
Rhea continued and named her sons Colen H (no period), Karl H, Keith H and so on. The H
is for Heppler. This caused Karl problems in his line of work and he legally changed his name to Karl
Heppler Wheatley and uses Karl H. Wheatley.
Colen uses Colin but never made it a legal change.
My sister Annivor did not receive the H but has used Ann for most of her life.
I was christened Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. I got tired of explaining that my name Rosco is spelled
without the e and started using Ross and have used it most of my life.

Rosco Zar Heppler Jr.

Ross Heppler
1900 No. 22nd Ave.
Show Low, Az 85901
928 532 0969
hepp@cableone.net
Heppler Home Olfingen 1965
 Index

Chapter Title Page

1 Origin of the Heppler Name 1

2 Johann Martin Heppler 11

3 Glenwood, Sevier Co., Utah 13

4 Andreas Heppler 19

5 Louisiana Seegmiller Heppler 35

6 Richfield 43

7 Histories by Nola 61

8 Rosco Zar Heppler, Sr. 87

9 Elmira B Farnsworth Heppler 107

10 Rhea F Heppler Wheatley 115

11 Nola F Heppler 145

12 Orpha Heppler Stohl 155

13 Annivor Heppler Job 167

14 Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. 185

15 Max Ronald Heppler 203

Elmira B Farnsworth Heppler & Daughters
 Chapter 1
Origin of the Heppler Name

The Heppler family is one of the oldest in the village of Ofingen. The name is found in the oldest
records of Ofingen as "Hoepler" in which form it appears in the property records of the Cloister
Amtenhauser. This Cloister was founded by the Benedictine Order of Saint George of the Black Forest, and
it lies in the neighbor of Ofingen, nestled in a small side valley from the main valley of the Danube River.
This particular Cloister was the retreat of nuns who had many establishments in Ofingen.
In the records of 1400 A.D. the names appears occasionally in the form of Heppler and from that time
forward to the present day without a break maintains this form and spelling. There is no doubt about the
line as it is uninterrupted from the founding of the village down to the present time. Of course there were
no detailed records kept in ancient times, and therefore you cannot complete a father - son line to any
certain time except where specifically noted in such records as have come down me.
It wasn't until the Dukes of Wurtemburg who rules until 1800 A.D. that there are detailed property
records, tax records, and records of military enlistments. About 1510 A.D. there is a specific reference in
the records to a Hans Heppler who had the loan of the "Kelnhof". An Inn which was situated on an island
called Reichenau in the Bodensee. This meant that he was the revenue and tax collector and the foremost
farmer in the district. He later became the bailiff or head people's representative for the community. Finally
he became a judge before the law for small claims in 1533 A.D. He had a son known as Thomas.
Another Bailiff, or people's representative, was known as Clemens Heppler, 1570 A.D. During the
Thirty-Years War (1618 - 1648), there were four other Bailiffs from the Heppler Family who were later
elected Mayors of Ofingen. They were: Jacob (1677 - 1690), Johann Jacob ( 1729 - 1731), Andreas (1762 -
1777), Andreas (1777 - 1810). The last two were father and son.
Where the Andrew Martin family line ties in, is clearly show in the Property and Personal ownership
records of the Cloister of Saint Blasien. These records show that Jacob Heppler was married to Anna Seyin
von Tuttlingen in 1607 A.D. Their son Jacob Heppler was married to Anna Manger on the 4th of
November 1684. The letter contained the following additional names and dates. Anna Manger was born
July 11, 1658. Johann Jacob Heppler was born April 10 1727 and died April 18, 1796. He was a baker and
in his later years served as a Judge for small claims. He married Ursula Manger on April 26, 1754. Ursula
Manger died September 1, 1790. Johann Jacob Heppler (son of Johann and Ursula) was born on March 11,
1760 and died September 20, 1817. He married Anna Manger January 20, 1788. Anna Manger died
February 3, 1823.
The story of Jacob Heppler (son of Jacob Heppler and Anna Seyin) who married Anna is of special
interest. She was known as Margaretha, and was married to one Adam Woelfle. This man, who was very
rich, left at his death one daughter named Anna. She was married to a Mr. Kohler. A second marriage
united her with the son of the Bailiff, Johannes Kimmich.. Bailiff Kimmich had been the historical recorder
in Ofingen from 1728 - 1752 A.D.

Oefingen Beginnings

By the early Sixth Century Western Europe was divided among six major Germanic tribes. The
kingdoms were loosely organized and only the Franks survived the blows of continued invasions. From
their domain come the modern patrons of France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Most kings ruled in accord with Roman law. But gradually, by a painful process of political
pioneering they learned to rule in their own names. They freed themselves from the benefits and restrictions
of imperial tradition. It was through this process that the Germanic successor kingdoms (as they are known
to historians) finally came into their own in Western Europe.
To a large degree, the salient features of each Germanic kingdom, and even its fate, was determined by
the nature and extent of its founders' prior experience with Rome.
The three major Germanic groups that reached the Mediterranean, the Visigoths, the Vandals and the
Ostrogoths developed quickly under the stimulus of close contact with the Roman Empire.
The two main groups from Northern Europe, the Franks and the Saxons, were less exposed to Roman
influence. They were slower to develop and their kingdoms lasted longer.

1
 All five groups had left there common Germanic homeland in Scandinavia centuries before. Each had
traveled a different route and eventually reached a different destination. In terms of modern regions, Spain
was occupied by the Visigoths, Africa by the Vandals, Italy by the Ostrogoths, England by the Saxons, and
France by the Franks.
As events later proved, the Frankish tribes had much the best of geographic good fortune. The Franks
had been established in Belgium as Roman allies since the middle of the Fourth Century. They were close
enough to Gaul to learn a little from its Roman civilization; moreover, their Belgian home served as a solid
base when the tribes began their invasions early in the Fifth Century. Unlike the other major groups, which
pulled up stakes and then started from scratch in some distant land, the Franks merely expanded into
northern Gaul by spreading out from Belgium.
It is believed that the first evidences of Christian life begin in the Baar region ( a geographical region east
of the Black Forest). It can be traced back to the period 600-750 A.D. In 750-1000 the Baar came under the
influence of St. Gallen and Reichenau and under Frankish rule.
The territory containing Oefingen was given to the Kloster of Richenau by Charles the Great about
800 AD. He controlled the revenue from these lands. The Abbots of the Kloster of Richenau at one time
had a library that was equal to the great libraries of the world.
The Zahringer family ruled the territory from 1000 to 1218 . During this time (1360) the village of
Oefingen was under the control of the Counts of Furstenberg. They were one of the noble houses of
German The Furstenbergs played a stirring part in Germany history as statesmen, ecclesiastics and notably
soldiers. There was a popular saying that "the Emperor fights no great battle but a Furstenberg falls."
In the 1300s this territory came under the control of the Landgrafs of Wuretenburg. The record
recounts that Oefingen was part of this general territory. This specific mention of Oefingen as a village
seems unusual as the actual village of Oefingen could not have been of great importance. Perhaps the entire
area containing the present village is what is meant.
The church originates from the beginning of the 14th Century and in the Middle Ages it was a
Pilgrimage Church of the Holy Cross. The mighty tower of the church with its loopholes (shooting slots)
contains the year 1316 and nicely shows the development from Romanic (bell tower gate) to Gothic (sound
holes) architecture. The parish records date from early 1600.
In 1535 Duke Ullrich sent the reformer Ambrosius Blarer, native of Konstanz, into the area of
Tuttlingen. It appears that Tuttlingen had been settled about one hundred years earlier. Land has been
given first to the Roman auxiliary soldiers. These were later driven out by Germanic tribes who were in
turn were being pushed southward by eastern tribes. Between 200 to 300 AD a group of these Germanic
peoples settled at the base of the Honberg and established a stable society. This area was on the great
Viking trade route from Jutland down to the Volga, then to the Black sea and on along the Danube and
thence down to Rome and then up to England.
In 1558 the princes of Furstenberg were the patrons of the local church. Then they traded it with the Duke
of Wurttemberg for the parish church of Heidenhofen. This is the year the first Evangelical (Protestant)
church came into this area.
During the 30 Year's War the population was nearly exterminated through murder, pestilence and
starvation. Area names are all that remain of formerly populated places
The church building was burned out. The remaining buttresses of the choir section causes one to conclude
that there were originally valuated ceilings. Now in the nave windows and choir there is a flat wooden roof,
which is held by firm rafters. The high windows must have originated in the 17th century. On the old
Gothic south gates is written the years 1613 and 1614. Gradually the community recovered by means of a
high birth rate and new comers, particularly from Switzerland.
In 1806 the greater part of this vast estate fell under the sovereignty of the grand-duke of Baden. The
Furstenberg family during this time continued to distinguished themselves by a liberalism rare in a great
German Noble family. They abolished tithes and feudal dues and they stanchly advocated the freedom of
the press. The Furstenberg palace at Donaueschingen, with its collections of paintings, engravings and
coins, became a center of culture, where poets, painters and musicians met with princely entertainment.
How much influence the personal lives of the Furstenberg Counts had upon the lives of the Hepplers
living on their land is not known. However, decedents of Andrew Heppler in America have been
particularly talented in all fields of art, have been a people who lived well, and esteemed comfortable and
pleasant surroundings.

2
As seen today, Oefingen gives one the impression that it is very old village. It is situated 850 meters above
sea-level on a Jura ridge of the East Baar Mountians. Above and to the east rises the 1000 meter high cone
shaped Himmelberg peak (Mt. Himmel). Under clear conditions certain Alpine peaks can be seen. The
view to the west sweeps over Biesingen, Heidenhofen, and Donaueschingen. Farther on is the Upper Black
Forest with the clearly recognizable Feldberg peaks (Mt. Feld) in the distance.

The following is taken from the diary of Colin Heppler Wheatley. June 1965

Mon. 21th, Oldenberg, Hamberg, Berlin, Munchen, and the cities of Austria were behind me and I
arrived in Zurich, Switzerland via a long train ride around Lake Constance. Here I called the Swiss Mission
and ascertained that Nola was coming for certain. Late that afternoon, after I had found a place to sleep in a
youth hostel, (one giant bed with one large blanket to cover all the occupants), Nola and I finally met. We
spent the evening traversing the streets of Zurich and eating at a delightful outdoor restaurant.
Tue. 22nd, Finally we are on our way to Ofingen. To say that Ofingen is not exactly on the beaten
path is an over statement. We changed trains at Schaffhausen, and then again at Singen. Finally at
Donaueschingen we took a small rural bus. Each conveyance became progressively smaller and slower.
The route between Zurich and Ofingen is indescribably beautiful. The mountains, which are steeper
near Zurich and the Swiss Alps, gradually become more gentle as one progresses northward into Germany
until they have only soft contours and soft sloping profiles. The hills are densely forested and peeking from
the summits and from behind tall firs are the remains of ancient castles and rock fortresses. The valleys also
widen as one moves into Germany and the deep meadow grass is slowly replaced by row crops and rolling
fields of grain.
The small villages surrounding Donaueschingen and Ofingin are sleepy, as though time had passed
them by. However they are very tidy, and bright flowers are every-where in abundance. Generally the
villages are nestled along the river banks, the railroad tracks, or at convergence of some country road.
The houses stand closely together to either side of the narrow winding streets or they encircle the
cobblestoned market place. Behind the towns stretch the productive little fields and orchards, which give
way to rich grass and clover meadows on the higher, more uneven ground. Beyond these meadows and

Typical House and dress

3
 dominating the steeper hillsides are the dark forests which abound in legend and folklore. These ancient
forests once covered most of southern Germany.
Upon our arrival in Donaueschingen we did not immediately continue to Olfingen. We wanted to view
this little city, which as the feudal seat of the government, must have played an important part in the lives
of or ancestors.
The Lords of Furstenberg controlled the surrounding areas for many centuries and their presence is
still manifest in the large land holdings and stately edifices such as the Furstenberg Palace, part of which
today is a museum. In the museum were priceless works of art collected over the years by the Furstenbergs.
Near the city center is a church, impressive in its simplicity and harmonious lines. The interior,
contrary to many churches of Germany, is well lit, the walls being white and interspersed with large arched
windows. Much of the woodwork is also painted white except for the naturally stained oak pews.
At the back of the choir area is a beautifully carved altar piece depicting Christ upon the cross and to
either side there is another carved figure. The Church has classical architecture and in comparison to many
of the churches in Europe cannot be very old.
We toured the library in Donaueschingen which is famous for its collection of ancient hand written
documents and manuscripts. The most important manuscript deposited here is the Hohenems-Lassberg
copy of the Nibelungenlied. Of the three existent copies the Hohenems- Lassberg is the oldest. It was
written at the beginning of the Thirteenth Century in Middle High German. The unknown author of this
work, who was a contemporary of Gottfried von Strassberg (Tristan und Isolde) and Walther von der
Volgelweide, transformed the century old heroic tales of the Germanic migrations into what has become the
German national epic. It is one of the most famous works of the Middle Ages.
Situated on the palace grounds is a simple water fountain which local tradition holds as the origin of
the Donau (Danube River). However true this may be, the Danube receives its main impetus from the
confluence in Donaueschingen of the Breg, Brigach, and other clear mountain streams. The Danube
continues from its modest beginnings in Donaueschingen across Southern Germany, Austria, Eastern
Europe and finally terminates in the Black Sea. Some of the Danube water moves underground recharging
the Bodensee (Lake Constance) and from there it gravitates down the Rhein River to the North Sea. Thus
the Danube moves in two different directions.
From Donauschingen we boarded a bus for Olfingen. En route we passed through the small hamlets of
Heidenhofen, Biesingen, and Oberbaldingen. These tiny villages were all two or three miles apart and
separated by a patchwork quilt of rolling fields, frayed here and there by groves of trees and creased by
meandering streams.
Instead of the one story thatch-roofed houses common to the farm villages of Northern Germany, the
houses here are generally two stories high with reddish-orange tile roofs. Generally the animals are
sheltered in one half of the house. The lower floor contains the stable and stalls and the upper level is a
storage area for the grass and grains. The two levels in the other half of the house are the family living
quarters. This is again different from Northern Germany where the farm houses are generally one story.
The animals in the fore part, the family
dwells in the rear.
After a long and gradual climb we
were suddenly in Olfingen. In response
to my request for directions to the
Heppler home, the bus driver first
deposited all of the other passengers,
and then he graciously drove us to the
Heppler ancestral home, Haus Nr. 155.
He waited a few minutes while Nola
met the family and then returned her to
the hotel in Donaueschingen.
The first relative to greet us was
Kurt Schatz, the son-in-law, seated in
his wheelchair, then the grandparents,
Johann and Anna Heppler, and finally
the grand-children, Sylvia and Gisela. I Rathans or town hall

4
conversed with Kurt until his wife Anna returned home from the neighboring town of Bad Durheim where
she works. Since I had not eaten all day the warm meal she prepared was very welcome. After all the
household tasks had been completed we chatted and drank "Saft" until late into the night.
Wed. 23rd, Upon arising the next morning, I conversed with Anna, the grandmother, in the kitchen
and enjoyed a typical farm breakfast of potato pancakes, warm milk, and plenty of bread, cheese and jam.
While I ate several friendly neighbors dropped by to meet the guest from America. Maria Heppler,
Johann's sister-in-law, came for a visit. She is a very loving woman and despite her advanced age still had
jet black hair. After breakfast and conversing with the neighbors I helped Johann bring in fodder for the
livestock. Then we went to the fields and weeded potatoes. It was here that I met most of the other family
relatives: Anna's brother Emil, and his family, and Eugene Heppler and his wife.
In the afternoon Nola joined us and we chatted and discussed the family history. Johann could still
recall his father receiving letters from America. He especially remembered a letter signed by our
great-grandfather, Andreas Heppler (ggf is for my generation) and all his brothers and sisters. Johann
didn't know why our direct ancestor, Johann Martin Heppler, left Germany and came to America in 1847.
Later in the afternoon Nola and I wandered around in the village. We viewed the small Lutheran
Church which contained family records back many, many generations. The church stands at the north end
of the village and is slightly elevated above the surrounding homes and shops. This gray colored structure
is adjacent to the cemetery. Like all other buildings it has a reddish-orange tile roof and the exterior walls
are plastered. Next to the church is a tower containing bells and on the outside is a large clock.
The interior of the church is more appealing with its white walls and its arches framed in gray and blue
stained glass windows in the choir. The pews are dark brown and are accented by the light brown tile floor.
Not far from the church is the "Rathaus" or town hall. This is a three story building in two shades of
gray and the regular reddish-orange tile roof. While wandering around the village we met Maria's son Karl
and his wife Inge who live in Villingen, and her daughter Sigried and husband Willi.
That evening we were guests of Eugene Heppler. We met his wife and daughter, Helga, who was soon
to be married.
Thur. 24th, It had been raining in Southern Germany for several week but upon our arrival the skies
has cleared and by Thursday the grass was dry enough to begin mowing. I helped Johann attach the mower
to the small tractor. Since the parcels of land are small and often spread out large equipment was not
practical. Some of the farmers were still using horses to pull their farm implements.
In the afternoon we were treated to a tour of Villingen by Karl Heppler and his mother. This medieval
city long ago spread beyond its original borders. However the old city wall remains as well as the Rathaus
which was built in medieval times. Inside the Rathaus we saw the jail and tools of torture common to the
Medieval Ages. They were a gruesome sight. It requires little stretch of the imagination to sense the pain
and horror they inflicted upon their victims.
Karl then drove us through the newer parts of the city beyond the old city wall. Each newly built
section has been designed with a church,
park, and elementary school at its center. We
were impressed with the school where Karl
taught and the church where he and Inge sing
in the choir.
We then proceeded from Villingen to
the famous Schwarzwald, known more
commonly through out the world as the
Black Forest. We sped through the beautiful
little cities of Triberg, Furtwangen, and St.
Georgen which were nestled in the forest and
which cater to the tourists.
Among the noted sights of the
Schwarzwald are the enormous farm houses
which are centuries old. They have steep
pitched roof of thatch and are often four
stories high. The typical Schwarzwaldhaus
has a ground level housing the animals in Lutheran Church

5
pens and stalls. The next floor is utilized for the storage of the grass and grains to feed and bed the animals.
The next two levels are for the families. I say "families" since often several generations and several families
will live under one roof.
The government is trying to save or preserve these ancient and massive homes as cultural landmarks.
They are very susceptible to fire and since they are no longer built they are nearly extinct.
In Stockelwald, (Stockel Forest), we ascended a tall observation station from where we could see all
the surrounding countryside. To the East we could see Villingen and Olfingen , to the South the famous
Feldberg, the highest mountain (1493 meters) in the Black Forest. Karl explained that on a clear day you
could see the Swiss Alps.
Fri. 26th During the morning I again assisted Johann with the grass mowing. I must have presented
quite a paradox since on one hand the visit of the two Americans was probably one of the most exciting to
happen in this small village, and on the other hand, there I was with a hayfork in hand dressed in my old
clothes feeling right at home being a German Bauer (farmer). Following lunch it was time to pose for
pictures. Anna brought out a doll dressed in the Olfingen Tracht or native female costume. Historically,
many villages and localities had an individual native dress worn by women on holidays and special
occasions. There was, or is a special costume for the men too but not as prevalent. Whether the men of
Olfingen had a special attire or not I do not know.
It was interesting to see this little doll and costume because our ancestors were costumed in this
manner for feasts, weddings, or special holidays.
We later walked with Sylvia, Gisla and their friend Carman through the village taking pictures,
eventually wandering off through the fields and meadows. As we wandered, the barefoot girls sang their
native folk songs and "Wanderlieder". I joined in singing the ones I knew and ten year old Syliva sang the
harmony.Along the way we plucked wild flowers, breathed in the fresh meadow air an rolled down the soft
gentle slopes of thick grass.
Sat.26th, I arose early to prepare for our departure, but Anna was already ahead of me. She had
washed, ironed, and folded all my clothes. She was very thoughtful in all she did. Our leaving was very
difficult. It is surprising how love and closeness can develop in only four days. As Kurt rolled to the
doorway and waved good-bye, it was all I could do to hold back the tears. I can still hear his soft"Tschuss
und Aufwiedersehen". Anna, accompanied by Gisla and Sylvia, drove us to the depot in Tuttlingen where
we boarded the train for Stuttgard.

Typical Dress

6
 Nola accompanied Colin to Ofingen, This is her impressions.

On a small knoll, surround by farmlands, enclosed by the great Schwartzwalt of southern Germany
close by the borders of Switzerland, is the small dorf of Ofingen. Although only a few miles from the busy
market town of Donaueschingen, and joined to it by a fine hard-surfaced road, it seems to have been passed
by time.
"Over the tower of the little Lutheran church and the roofs of the village, the lights of nature shine. A
more distant view opens ups in the bright and clear morning air, and the eye follows over the snow fields of
the Alps. Below, on the plain, the eye looks down on the blossoms of the fields and orchards. Their
perfume is everywhere. Clear, like an arch or vault of the sky, is the lovely heavens over the earth."
(translation by N F H)
The road to Olfingen from Donaueschingen winds up to the top of a knoll, following the controls of
the hill, and goes on to a second small village where the road ends. The bus goes only as far as Oefingen
and then returns to Donaueschingen. The homes border the road and where the road levels a bit and widens
before climbing up to the kirke, is the platz or town center, with the gasthaus, the school, the post office,
and the market.
From the kirke yard, the eye looks out over the fields to the closed-in edge of the forest, and beyond,
far beyond, the snowy peaks of the Alps. It is a vista of incredible beauty.
In medieval times the area containing Oefingen was owned by the monastery rather than by the baron.
The Jura range is cut here with deep ravines and steep knolls of basalt rock jut up from the rolling valley.
Lookout towers were built upon these knolls and fortified. Villages and then towns grew up around the
base of these towers, and in medieval times there were some large and important cities; Tuttlingen which
today has a population of 14000, and Donaueschingen which became the seat of the feudal lords of
Furstenberg.
The land was gained through conquest and each lord was eager to extend his boundaries. The borders
changed continually until the time of the Second World War. The area has belonged to Furstenberg,
Wuttenberg, Baden, and presently is part of Baden. One of the most powerful landlords of medieval times
was the Kloster of Richenau, one of the chapters of the abbey in St.Gallens, Switzerland. The abbots of this
Kloster were very wealthy and the Kloster was a center of culture and created one of the largest and most
important libraries of the age. Books and illuminated manuscripts from this ancient library can be seen in
the library of the Furstenbergs in Donaueschingen, which is ranked as one of the three most important
collections of illuminated manuscripts in the world today.
During the Reformation this area became Lutheran and remains so today. The name Heppler appears
on the records of this area as early as the 14th Century, and the Hepplers were land agents for the Kloster.
While the name is found in the years that follow, the earliest direct ancestor of our family is recorded
in 1625 in the parish church at Oefingen. From this time forward we have a direct line to the present
Hepplers in Utah.
The Hepplers in Oefingen were tradesman, civic officials and a few Burgemisters, but the people of
the villages were first and foremost farmers and relied on the land for their economy.
The general aspect of Oefingen today is that of a series of extending circles, with the church at the
center and the homes ranged around the church, and circling the homes are the fields, and all is inclosed by
the dense forest. The amount of land owned by any one person in the village is limited to the total land
cleared from the forest. No man owns any large piece of land, all of the cleared land is divided into small
sections and a man may own several of these sections. Thus he must work in one section for awhile and
then move to another section. The fields begin at the edge of the home and the forest begins at the edge of
the fields. Thus they are all small holders. With tillable land so limited, every square inch of ground is
utilized.
The ancestral home is of three stories. It is built of thick rock walls, some three to four feet thick, and
divided into two sections, separated by a wide corridor which is entered directly from the street. One half of
the house is the family home. The ground floor has the dining room and master bedroom. The first floor
has the kitchen and a parlor or sitting room. The second floor had the bedrooms for the family. A corridor
some six feet wide or wider separates the living quarters from the farmstead and a wide stair leads up to the
upper rooms. The living quarters cannot be entered from these rooms but only from the corridor. On the
landing at the first floor level is the little sanitary convenience, actually an outside convenience brought

7
inside, not a modern flush unit. The family members wash at the sink in the kitchen.
In the farmstead, the animals were housed on the ground floor with fodder stored on the first floor and
the second floor used as a storeroom and utility room. Flower boxes filled with bright blossoms hung from
the windows. The windows were glazed and hung with lace curtains, and there were also shutters but these
probably were only closed in the winter. The windows were of casement type and were left open during the
summer.
The home was spotless and due to the wide corridor and thick rock walls, and general open air
ventilation, no odor from the farmstead came into the living quarters. At the rear of the house was the
orchard, kitchen garden, and poultry yard. The house fronted directly upon the street with a wide door
stoop where the family sat in the evenings and visited with passing neighbors and friends.
At one corner of the house, marking the extreme boundary of the property, was a large manure pile,
gathered from the barn and stored for fertilizing the fields. These villages are entirely self sustaining,
producing almost everything that is needed. In this way our ancestors lived for generations.
The kitchen contained a sink with a pump and all washing was done here. Since these people drink
only safts (fruit juice) and wine which they make themselves, along with cheese and wurst, they need only
secondary water in the house.
Colin and I had a real problem, accustomed as we were to drinking a great deal of water every day. A
special supply of safts was provided for us, but we longed for water and continually tried every stratagem
to win a drink. Finally Anna said to Colin in some desperation: "Why do you drink water?" "You shame
me before the people of the village that I can give you only water to drink." After that we drank saft. But I
cheated. Pleading the need to brush my teeth, I carried a glass of water to my bedroom. Colin, sleeping
with the family had no such recourse. Do not think these people poor or to be scorned. They live well.
They are marvelous cooks and have an abundance of that nature can provide.
Their labor in the field, compared with ours, is hard. Everyone works in the fields. The women leave
later than the men and come in earlier to have time to take care of the home and prepare the evening meal.
Colin worked in the fields, but I, an honored guest, had to stay home. I went on walks with the
children, the entire village gathered as soon as I appeared at the door, and we walked in the fields and
picked wild flowers and somehow always ended up at the `bakerie` with Tante Nola buying `eiskreme` all
around.
These were charming unspoiled children and they sang lovely little songs, in part singing which they
are taught at school. Gruss Got is the greeting they would give you in soft, melodic voices, meaning,
God be with you.
My efforts to help with the house work brought shocked refusals. I really wanted to help, and
especially learn about the marvelous meals they prepared. Finally it was decided in family council no doubt
that making spatzel was lady-like enough for an honored guest from `Amerika` and I was allowed to roll
out the spatzel. This is a soft noodle made of eggs and floor and rolled and pressed through a little
hand-operated machine that cut it into noodles, and then it is cooked into veal stock, flavored with herbs.
As I rolled and rolled the dough, in the little kitchen looking out through the lace curtained window at
the magnificent view, across the fields where the men were making hay, to the forest beyond, watching the
flies buzzing in at the open window, from the hen coop to the manure pile to the little house on the hill and
into the kitchen, it occurred to me that perhaps we make too much of hygiene. Perhaps in time such
contentment would pall. But there is always plenty of hard work. Then after supper, time to gather with
friends or neighbors and drink the good wines and safts. To sing the old songs. To tell the old tells. And to
tell all the town gossip.
The beautiful Donauschingen close by with its lovely river promenade along the banks of the young
Danube, here a wonderful shade of blue, its busy markets, beer gartens, and gashauses, and a very modern
movie house showing very old American films.
In early evening in Oefingen, after the women had come in from the fields and the children gathered
up and the evening meal prepared, then the men would come in, bringing the hay on the horse drawn ricks
to be stored in the barns, or in the case of a few modern farmers, towed by tractors, and the late coming
women, grandmothers who worked later than the young women, astride bicycles, haying forks carried
across the handle bars. As they passed, we called to them, "Aben." And they called back, "Aben," in soft
musical voices, and "Aben," these soft musical voices would call back and forth all along the winding
street.

8
 As soon as supper was over and the men refreshed and the women relaxed, after the house had been
put in order, tranquility vanished, and we would walk over to visit friends or relatives, and then the tables
would be laid out again with all kinds of cakes and torts and jams and jellies, and bottle after bottle of saft
and wine would appear, disappear and reappear.
It was simply amazing how much of these liquors were consumed and how much we were expected to
drink. Delicious as they were, we soon had enough (genug haben). As a delicate lady from Amerika, I
could beg off, but Colin, being a healthy young lad, had to keep drinking. We would visit as many as five
houses in an evening.
I remember at one house, one couple, the host and hostess got into quite an argument, and she was
rather flounced about it all. Her husband said,"Hitler schreibt Mien Kamf." Meine Frau schreibt Unser
Kamf`." (Hilter wrote "My War." My wife wrote "Our War.")
In 1965 there were five Heppler families living in Oefingen. We had traced a fifth cousin relationship
to them. They were members of one family, two sisters and three brothers. Two brothers, Johann and
Eugene, and one sister-in-law were still living. Only one Heppler still bears the name. This is Karl Heppler,
son of Maria, the widowed sister-in-law. He lives in the modern new city surrounding the old medieval
city of Villingen. He has a son. Soon all the Hepplers will be gone from Oefingen, where the name has
lived for some six hundred years. There is another Heppler family in Oefingen, Eugene Heppler, the
Ratschrieiber, (town clerk). They claim no relationship, but these people have little interest in genealogy
and Colin and I felt sure if we could get his genealogy, we could connect his family with ours. I met his
mother, a widow, but not being able to speak German, could not converse with her.
Anna has a doll which is over 100 years old and is dressed in the old costume of the women of
Oefingen. In older days, all the women of one village dressed in the same costume, and in some places
today, these dresses are still worn. The Oefingen doll is dressed in an elaborately pleated black skirt and
little weskit, with a white muslin blouse with large puffed sleeves. She wears a little black brocaded cap on
her head with two long ribbons of black silk hanging down her back. Her hair is flaxen and is braided into
two long braids. She wears muslin underwear and petticoats and knitted stockings. Her slippers are black.
Oefingen will change. The car will replace the
bicycle and children are being bussed to larger schools.
The radios replacing the recorder and zither and children's
voices. The young people are going to the factories and
cities to work. Young men talk of fast motor cars and
motorcycles and tinker with machinery. Land reform laws
will give each farmer one large tract of land. Plumbing
will be installed. The little store now sells Mel-Mac ware
and electric blankets and aluminum pots and pans. I am
afraid old Oefingen will not wait until I can return, and I
do not know if I would care for the modern town.
But the memories of the hospitality of the Hepplers
in Oefingen will never change. Of that I am sure. Anna's
smiling face and her cheerful song as she went about her
work, the gentle courtesy of the children, Giesla and
Sylvia, Kurt showing me how to slice off a piece of the
rock-hard wurst, Anna, the mother, making the spatzel,
and Johann, the father bringing the hay home from the
fields. And the gentle voices of Oefingen calling in the
evening aben - aben. ("aben'" is the soft southern
slurring of the greeting "guten abend" good night).

9
 Olfingen 2010

10
 Chapter 2
Johann Martin Heppler
By Nola Heppler

Johann Martin, left Oefingen in the summer of 1843 with his wife and four sons. His daughter,
Elizabeth, is reported to have been married and remained in Oefingen but came to Canada sometime later,
but there is no accurate record of this. He settled in Waterloo County, Ontario, which was a German
settlement. He is listed on the tax rolls of Wilmot with taxable property..
There are no records that establish the reason Johann Martin Heppler emigrated from Ofingen. The
Napoleonic Wars completely destroyed the old way of life. The old nobility and gentry were ruined or at
least greatly hurt by the political and economic changes that occurred. The common landowners and
farmers were the ones who had to shoulder the debts of the war. Many towns and counties were find or
assessed large sums. This left the people in a state of poverty and many sons of well-to-do families were
dispossessed of their inheritances and had to start a new life elsewhere.
Waterloo County at that time was settled by Germans coming from Germany and from Pennsylvania.
These two groups kept their own customs. The German women wearing the German dress and the
Pennsylvania women wearing their own costume. Public notices and other official documents were
published in both English and German. The houses were heated with wood. The women of Waterloo
County were great homemakers, the bread pan and washboard were in daily use and ironing was done
beside the kitchen stove. The everyday dress of the woman was of cotton or muslin. Sunday gowns were
merino, velvet or satin. Later, print dresses with a lace collar were worn. Girls were dressed as their
mothers. In winter they wore velvet bonnets or hoods and in summer straw hats trimmed with feathers or
flowers. Mothers and daughters wore their hair long, either braided or pulled into a knot. Pink, cheerful
wives were the rule. It is noted that only gypsy women smoked.
Some women had sewing machines. These were run by a hand wheel. The machine did away with
much of the sewing which had been done by hand under the light of candles and lessened eyestrain.
Stockings, underwear, and winter clothing were knitted by hand.
News was told over the garden fence. Everyone knew everyone else's business. Friendship beamed
brightest wherever sickness or death visited a family.
Christmas day was the feast of the year. Children never tired of hearing about Santa Clause and his
coming from the north-land on Christmas evening in a slay drawn by reindeers carrying gifts for good boys
and girls. Girls usually received a doll, a set of dishes, and gay ribbons. The day was spent in entertaining
kinfolk with good cheer and music and song.
There is no record that Martin owned land property; but it would seem certain that he had some land,
perhaps leased, as nearly everyone had a vegetable garden and some fruit trees.
Martin must have prospered as his four sons were well-educated, Andreas became the county probate
judge of Sevier County, and Martin and Jacob had the title of "Gentleman" which meant that they were
landowners. Johannas was a cabinet maker in Listowel. All of these men became quite well to do. and they
all spoke English.
The time and place of Martin's death is not known, nor is there any information concerning the death
of his wife Ursula.

Decedents of Johann Martin Heppler

Born 7 Nov 1791 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.

Died 9 Nov 1887 in So. Easthope, Perth, Ontario, Canada.
Ontario Vital Statistics Death Registration No. 011874 1877
This family came to America (Canada) in the summer of 1847.
Occupation: Tailor, Religion: Methodist
Married Ursula Woelfle, daughter of Johann Martin Woelfle or Woelflin and Anna Mauthe on 21
Aug 1825 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden,Germany. Ursula was born on 13 Jul 1801 in Oefingen,
Villingen, Baden,Germany. She died in Wilmot, Ontario, Canada.

11
 Johann Martin Heppler & Ursula Woelfle had the following children

Anna Heppler Born 23 Mar 1823 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.

Died 22 Mar 1884 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden,Germany. Married Johann Woelfle
son of Johann Woelfle and Christina Reigger 13 Oct 1846 in Oefingen, Villingen,
Baden,Germany. Johann was born on 4 Dec 1822 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden,
Germany. He died on 13 Mar 1883.

Ursula Heppler Born 20 Nov 1825 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany. Died 31
Dec 1825

Ursula Heppler Born 2 Jun 1827 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.

Johann Jacob Heppler Born 3 Sep 1829 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden,Germany

Died 27 Jan 1898.
Married (1) Unknown
Married (2) Mary Godfrey

Johann Martin Heppler Born 6 Mar 1832 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany. .
Married Elisabeth about 1857 in ,Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Elisabeth was born
about 1836 in ,Waterloo, Ontario, Canada..

Johannes (John) Heppler Born 8 May 1834 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.
Died 5 Aug 1903.
Married Ursula Schwartz daughter of John Schwartz and Christina on 4 Apr 1865
in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Ursula was born on 19 Sep 1848
in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. She died on 2 May 1928 in New
Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

Andreas (Andrew) Heppler

Born 15 Nov 1837 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.

Died 24 Nov 1906 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.
Married Louisanna Seegmiller, daughter of Johann Adam Seegmiller and Anna
Eva Knechtel on 15 Nov 1863 in Stratford, Perth, Ontario, Canada. Louisanna
was born on 2 Apr 1847 in Stratford, Perth, Ontario, Canada. She died on 12 Mar
1926 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

12
 Chapter 3
Glenwood, Sevier Co., Utah

The small community of Glenwood is located five miles east of Richfield. It has an
elevation of 5310 ft. and was first settled in 1864. When first settled there was a spring located
back in the hill in a large meadow beyond the escarpment, which rose above the town. This
stream ran down the escarpment rather like a water fall and then ran along the foot of the
escarpment and the town follows along this stream. During the time of the United Order the
essential (and messy) business of' the colony was conducted back in the meadow. It was a
lovely place but none of the buildings exist today.
About 1863, Robert W. Glenn, Isaac Sampson and a number of other men, called by
Brigham Young to explore the Sanpeat country, came upon a small cove with two cool clear
springs sending a large stream of water west to the valley about one and one-half miles below.
Seeing possibilities of irrigation and water power, they sent reports to Brigham Young who
called these and other men to bring their families and settle in the section. The first settlers
arrived on the site January 11, 1864. The settlement was founded by Robert W. Glenn and was
named Glens Cove or Glencoe. He was succeeded as president by James Warehem who was
appointed by Orson Hyde in 1865.
Orson Hyde named the settlement Glenwood in lieu of Glen's Cove of Glencoe as it had
been named by the first settlers. By the fall of 1865 about twenty-five families wintered there,
living in dugouts, cellars with thick rock walls and a roof about one and a half feet above the
ground. In this space were small windows. Some of these dugouts were still used as homes as
late as 1928. These dugouts were of great value as they furnished protection from the Indians.
After shelter had been provided, the soil was tilled, crops were planted and strong corrals
were built to care for their cattle. There was very little peace in the early years, for the Indians
were trouble some and the beat of the drum often called everyone to run to the home of the
bishop.
These Indian raids preceded the Black Hawk Indian War of 1866, and it was often
necessary for armed guards to stand day and night. At times the people remained hidden in
their dugouts, not daring to strike even a match to see to attend to their various needs, and there
is one record of a baby being born in such circumstances. It is also recorded that men stood
armed guard while graves were dug to bury those who had died. In many cases, one or two
settlers would manage to get to Richfield and bring assistance from the settlers from this
section.
As the Indian danger grew, men stood guard day and night. One man, George Powell,
standing guard at the head of Indian Creek, spread his lunch out on the ground at noontime, and
while asking a blessing upon his food, was observed by a prowling Indian who crept up upon
him and was about to scalp him when the Indian observed that Powell was talking to the Great
Spirit and became frightened and ran away. Years later, afer peace had come, this same Indian
told this story to Mr. Powell.
By April 1866, it was thought advisable to built a fort. This fort was made of rock with
high thick walls. On the west side were two small heavy wooden doors where the people could
enter. On the east was a large wooden gate where a loaded wagon could pass through. All
around the top and by each door were peek holes through which the men could shoot. Inside the
fort was a spring. The fort was built around half of a city block.
On April 20, 1867 there occurred an Indian atrocity which eventually caused the little
settlement to be abandoned by its members. In those times, stores were few, and Glenwood had
one of the largest. Although people were warned not to travel between the settlements without
armed escort, one family, Jens Peter Peterson, his wife Mary Smith, and one daughter, started
from Richfield to Glenwood by ox team to trade at the store. They had left their eighteen-
month-old daughter at the home of a relative in Richfield. When they reached Black Ridge east
of the Sevier River, they were attacked by Indians and all of them murdered and their bodies
mutilated. About the same time, Indians raided and attacked some boys herding cattle and

13
drove off the cattle. Rescue parties from Glenwood and Richfield chased the Indians into the
hills and retrieved most of the cattle, but were too late to save the Peterson family. The
retreating Indians made a stand near a little creek in the eastern hills, and this is now called
Indian Creek. Quite a battle was fought here between the Indians and settlers.
After these terrible events, the little settlement was abandoned until the spring of 1868,
when it was believed safe to return. However, recurring raids again drove the people away.
In 1870 Glenwood was resettled, this time for good. Missionary work had been started
among the Indians, and the people were urged to make friends with the Indians, to feed them
and give them shelter and to trade with them. A marvelous work was done by the missionaries
who frequently stood between the Indian and the whites, averting further trouble and possible
bloodshed.
The little dugouts were replaced by adobe buildings, the first being a one room school
building.
In Oct. 2, 1879 the United Order was organized by Arastus Snow under direction of the
First Presidency. The organization consisted of as many of the members of the ward as were
willing to turn over their property to a board of trustees.
The bishop of the ward was the chairman of the board. All property was appraised and
each man received credit for the amount he turned in, and then he received credit for the labor
he performed. From this source the families were provided with the necessities of life.
Those wishing to join who had no property were permitted to do so, and secured credit for
their labor and received the necessities of life for their families.
During the lifetime of the Order, covering a period of about five years, the people were
very united and were blessed both materially and spiritually.
By their united efforts they were able to build up a number of industries, among them two
grist mills. Much of the grain grown in the county was ground and made into flour in these two
mills. One of the mills is still in use.
A sawmill was located about three quarters of a mile southeast of town. It was operated by
water. Logs were hauled from Cove Mountain by ox team to this mill. A short distance below
this mill on the same stream was a shingle mill, and the roofs of the homes of the settlers were
shingled from the product of this mill.
On the same stream a tannery was located superintended by Andrew Heppler, an expert
tanner. The tannery consisted of a large pole corral enclosing open sheds. There were several
barrels used as vats.
The leather made here was taken to Salt Lake City and supplied leather for a large shoe
shop there. It also supplies leather for a shoe shop in Glenwood. Everyone wore home made
shoes, the stitching being done by Mary Hendrickson on her machine for all of the shoes.
A fish hatchery was established and later was Grandfathers house. It was further up the
river. It was a very pleasant spot with its very clear sparkling stream and lush vegetation
growing on the banks. I remember being taken there as a child by my father.
Other enterprises were a cording mill, where wool was corded into balls and rolls. The
wool was spun and cloth woven and the cloth was divided and made into clothing, blankets,
dresses, suits and underwear. Overalls, jumpers, hats and buckskin suits were also made to
supply the store.
Sugarcane was raised in the fields, and a molasses mill was erected. All of these things
were accomplished though the United Order. When the order dissolved all of these industries
were unable to operate, due to insufficience means and lack of unity. Out of all the mills, only
one, the first grist mill, continued to operate.
For entertainment during the United Order, a Martial Band, (Brass Band), was organized.
Andrew Heppler was it first director. Later another took over the direction and he played as a
member of this band. The band would ride on decorated wagons and serenade the town on all
holidays, especially the fourth and twenty-fourth of July.
After the United Order days, the main industries were sugar beets, cattle and sheep. Later
hay was grown using irrigation. Most families kept sheep and the women sheared the sheep,
carded the wool and spun it into yarn. In my family, my father and his men sheared the sheep

14
but my mother washed it and carded it. It was then sold, and we did not spin the yarn. Mother
only kept as much as she needed. The rest was pushed in wool sacks and sold.
The people made salt-rising bread, by setting a sponge without yeast or baking powder or
soda. There was corn bread and white bread as well as "graham" bread. Sweet rolls were made
along with the white bread by adding eggs and sugar to the dough after the first raising.
Yeast was made from potatoes. A bottle of potato water was kept in the warming oven of
the stove. Sour dough bread was also made, but this was used mostly in the sheep camps. If
yeast "died" a "fresh start" was obtained from a neighbor.
They made their own soap. At first, greasewood ( a sort of sage brush) was burned and the
ashes put in a barrel of water and boiled down to make it potent. This made a soft soap. Later,
they used lye and ashes, which made a harder soap. The soap was poured into vats and
hardened and then cut into squares about four inches square and stored. All of the cooking fat
was saved for use in the soap. Mother could always tell when the soap was "ready" by tasting
it, she would always spit it out after the taste.
Brooms were made from birch twigs and from sagebrush and rabbit brush. Sagebrush was
also used as a dye as were other shrubs and some species of soils.
Farms were irrigated from ditches dug by hand with shovels, leading from the canals, and
each farmer had his "water turn".
The people met together socially, using their homes as dance halls and social centers.
Those with the biggest homes were the social leaders of the day, but everyone contributed
something in the way of food, (candy pulls, corn popping, roasting pine nuts), or candles or
music.
Grandmother Farnsworth was very popular for her humorous readings. The people talked a
lot as they quilted or carded wool, telling the old stories of the Nauvoo days and the trek to
Utah, and stories of the Prophet Joseph Smith and Brigham Young and other leaders of the
Church, who they all knew and had met personally.
Every town had its band, which provide music for all occasions. Richfield had a little
"park", just a vacant space in front of the school, no grass or trees or flowers, but it had a little
band stand and every Sunday evening, the town band would play and the people would gather
to the park and eat ice cream from the drug store and confectionery store, and drink pop and
listen to the music and then walk back to their homes in the cool pleasant evening.
The telegraph was installed in 1876, bringing Glenwood closer to the outside world and
the first rock building was erected in 1878. This was the store and it is still in use.
Early activities were carried on by Church Authorities. In 1886 Heber W. Bell was
ordained as bishop (the second man to hold this position) with Andrew Heppler and A. W.
Powell Sr. as counselors.
In 1873 the Relief Society was organized. A comfortable rock building was erected for a
meeting place. There were bins in the basement in which to store the wheat they gleaned. One
of their projects was to weave a rug of blue and white rags which was presented to the Manti
Temple.
Glenwood was incorporated as a town on April 15, 1897. Electric lights were in use in
1907, but street lights were not installed until 1928.
In the winter of 1911 a brick mill was built over by the Indian Creek area and Glenwood"
bricks were made. The old brick kilns are still standing.

Nola wrote this about their home in Glenwood

Just before you got out of town on the county road you turned off to the north and there
was Lester Ogden, and the old man, whose name I have forgotten, but who used to take us
fishing in his horse and buggy, and 1 still have a scar on my hand where I cut myself, while
fixing his dinner for him one day., and then the Waters, Elmer and Olive, and across the street
was Fawn Colbys home, and then their apple orchard, where we always let the cows wander
and they got bloated and we got spanked, and then someones beet field, and the lilac hedge
and poplar trees and then our place. Beyond us was the sage brush where the Indians camped.

15
 We had a nice home here, three bedrooms, a large parlor, a huge kitchen with pantry and
bathroom, and two porches, cement walk all around, and a large lawn planted with apple,
cherry and plum trees, and two big cottonwoods, from which hung several verities of swings,
and then the yard, where mother made soap and the wash~house , and the kitchen garden. Then
the stables and granaries, coal house, root cellar, the hen houses, and the alfalfa fields. All of
this was ours.
In fact, except for the little haunted house, we owned the entire block. Our kitchen was
large, we learned to roller skate around the old mission table, with Annivor scooting along
behind us, or among us, as the case might be, in her walker. the linoleum on the kitchen floor
was laid in three strips, the large center strip and a small strip on each side. One small strip
extending into the pantry and the other into the bathroom.
We took turns about on Saturday mopping these three strips, an along each joint line was a
two inch border that never got mopped, so assiduous were we in not doing any of the other
work. For hours, we would hang over the sink, blowing soap bubbles through the dish rag,
which was an old sugar sack, doing everything but the dishes. We could sweep the front room
and dust in two minutes flat, tracing our dust clothes carefully around each scarf and doily and
vase of paper flowers on each flat surface, never moving one by so much as a fraction of an
inch, and we were even reasonably swift with making the beds, and hanging up our clothes, but
dishes took forever.
We also had to weed the garden and crate the eggs. And I would never wish this horrible
task upon any small child. We got paid ten cents per crate, each crate held 30 dozen eggs, and
we saved them until Friday night when the "continued" show was on at the Rinemay theater,
then how elbows and wiping rags and eggs would fly, and we would crate enough to earn our
admission to the theater and off we would go. Ambition was not our overpowering sin.
Out on the lawn in the summer time were three wash tubs, with which we held water
fights, each of us having a tub full-of water. Annivor would come running out with the scrub
bucket or the egg bucket, complete with yoke and feathers, or whatever she could lug, and it
bothered her not at all that no one filled her bucket. She would visit the others splashing and
laughing.
We had an old inner tube swing and a rope swing, and a wonderful two seated swing with a
little platform between the seats. I never knew what this was called. But sometimes, traveling
through southern Utah, I see one of these swings still in use in this we traveled to all of the
cities in the world.
There was an old wagon box in the yard, beyond the soap kettles, in which we rode all
over the wild, wild west. The cherry tree leaned against the wall and via its trunk we scampered
up on thereof, where we were hauled down and spanked. I never knew why we got spanked.
We never seemed to remember for we kept climbing up t e tree and getting spanked. Nor did
the spankings we got for playing hide and seek in the alfalfa just as it was ready to be cut, keep
us from this wonderful sport.
Year after year these were our favorite pastimes, and the cause of our constant spankings.
We had a special attraction in our yard, which was the envy of the entire neighborhood, and
this was what we called the cow shed. It consisted of a low open building, roofed with planks
over which straw was piled, and of course, floored with manure. Through the cracks and knot
holes in the planks, sparrows would build their nests, back in the straw. Gathering sparrow
eggs was the joy of the neighborhood. kids. No space craft in Disneyland could compete in

Glenwood Ward, Sevier Stake

The town of Glenwood, originally called Glenn's Cove, is pleasantly situated in a natural
cove on Cove Creek on the east side of Sevier Valley. It consists of a farming and stock-raising
community, the farmers irrigating most of their lands from Cove Creek, which rises in the
mountains about a mile southeast of the center of the town. This remarkable stream heads in
two main springs, one of which issues from a little lake and the other bursts out from the
mountain at once large enough to run a mill. Cove River is a separate stream which rises a

16
short distance west of the town of Glenwood, in three large and a number of smaller springs, at
the foot of a low mountain spur. From these springs issues forth a large stream, which,
however, on account of its low source, can only be partly used for irrigation purposes at
Glenwood. After a short run with a very little fall it empties into the Sevier River. Glenwood is
classed by many as the finest located settlement in Sevier Valley. It is also the oldest. The town
is 6 1/2 miles by road, or five miles in an air line east of Richfield, 18 miles southwest of
Salina, 15 miles northeast of Monroe, and about 30 miles northwest of Koosharem.
Glenwood was settled in 1864 by Robert W, Glenn and other Latter-day Saints who had
been called by Apostle Orson Hyde to settle in the Sevier Valley. These first settlers arrived on
the ground where Glenwood now stands Jan. 11, 1864. After a townsite had been surveyed, the
brethren returned to Sanpete Valley after their families. The settlement was founded under the
direction of Robert W. Glenn, but he only presided during the summer of 1864, when James
Wareham was appointed by Apostle Orson Hyde to take charge of the Glenwood settlement.
Apostle Hyde visited Glenwood in November, 1864, on which occasion he named the place
Glenwood, in lieu of Glenn's Cove and Glencoe, a name formerly adopted by the people. Other
families of saints arrived in the fall in 1864 and about 25 families spent the winter of
1864-1865, living in log cabins, adobe houses and dug-outs. Considerable canal work was
done, and other improvements made. A school house was built in 1865, and in March, 1865,
the Glenwood Precinct was created. The Indian War, commencing in 1865, threatened the very
existence of the settlement, which was temporarily abandoned in 1866, when the women and
children were taken to Richfield for safety. In the spring of 1867, when the Indian hostilities
were resumed, the settlement was entirely vacated, the people moving to the older settlements
in Sanpete County for safety.
Glenwood was re-settled in 1870 by Joseph L. Hall and others, and at a meeting held Feb.
28, 187 1, Archibald W. Buchanan was chosen as president of the branch, succeeding Abraham
Shaw, who had presided since 1870. Pres. Buchanan was succeeded in 1872 by Helaman Pratt,
who in 1873 was succeeded by George T Wilson, who in 1874 was succeeded by Archibald T.
Oldroyd, who presided until July 13, 1877, when the Glenwood Branch was organized as the
Glenwood Ward, with Archibald T, Oldroyd as Bishop. Bishop Oldroyd was succeeded in 1886
by Herbert H. Bell, who in 1914 was succeeded by Andrew Oldroyd, who in 1930 was
succeeded by J. Elmer Sorensen, who presided Dec. 31, 1930. On that date the Glenwood Ward
had 364 members, including 51 children. The total population of the Glenwood Precinct was
401 in 1930, of which 350 resided in the town of Glenwood

Andrew Jenson, Encyclopedic History of the Church, p.288

Heppler Pond Glenwood, Utah

17
18
 Chapter 4
Andreas Heppler

Your Grandfather was a fine man, a fine man--

Robert D. Young, President of the Manti Temple
Prolog:

It is unfortunate that we are so late in

writing the history of our grandfather. His noble
life was lived beyond the memory of our time
and little of his life and mission remains. He was
survived for many years by a wife who was so
beloved of all who knew her and who served her
fellow men so devotedly that her life
overshadows his. There are a few tradition that
have been handed down about his life. The most
prevalent one being that he had a terrible temper
which all of his descendants inherited.
While we sometimes seem to be quick with
our emotions, we also have inherited many fine
attributes. A list would include courage,
sympathy, compassion, generosity, laughter,
gaiety, honor, and integrity. You could also add
talents such as music, painting, poetry, dancing,
and the ability to teach and inspire others. But
most of all laughter, enjoyment of life, a strong
testimony of the Gospel and a willingness to
serve the Lord. Some of these finer aspects of
our character must have come from our
grandfather. We set out to"discover" him.
The other side of the family, The Andrew Martin Heppler
Seegmillers, were a more sober, people with a
higher sense of responsibility and a greater ability for service and leadership. The civic and
Church leaders in our family were among the Seegmillers.
The first recorded evidence of Andrew is found in one sentence in a history of Sevier
County: "Andrew Heppler was a farmer in Glenwood." This was true of him later in life after
the United Order was dissolved. But he started in Glenwood managing the tannery with the
United Order. He was born in Germany and at age eight he come with his family to Canada and
then to Utah.

With these facts and a few traditional stories we began.

First of all his name, he was always called, Andrew Martin Heppler. He son John
Edmund said "I never heard my father called Martin. His name was Andrew." Martin was
added because it was a tradition that the sons of his sons were named "Andrew Martin". We
assumed this was the name of our grandfather.
His name as it is recorded in the parish record of Oefingin is "Andreas. His father was
named "Martin", Johann Martin. This is after the custom of the country where he was the first
born, to give male children a saints name and a Christian name. Johann and Jacob are the
traditional names given to Heppler sons, whereas Adam is the traditional name given to the
Seegmiller sons.
Andrew was the name he was know by in America.
Andrew Heppler was born 15 November 1838, in Oefingen, a small farming village in the

19
Schwartzwald of Bavaria, near the Swiss border. The Hepplers may have been originally Swiss,
but the name first appears in the parish records of Oefingen in 1625. They probably had lived
there longer, but the parish records do not exist beyond this time.
When Andrew was eight years old, (1846) his father emigrated to Canada and settled
in Waterloo County. This area had originally been heavily forested and contained wild game. It
appeared to be uninhabited by any Indian tribes and may have been something of a communal
hunting tract.
It was settled first by a German religious group from Pennsylvania and then received an
influx of emigrants from Germany. Johann Martin Heppler was the only one of his family who
came to Canada and it is not known why he made this move. It would have been about 1830, at
the end of the Napoleonic Wars, and there was a general restlessness throughout Europe.
Of Johann Martin we know he was a tailor and Lutheran, The nature of their affiliation
being determined by the landowners on whose land they lived.
Tradition tells us that he was apprenticed to Adam Seegmiller, who was a tanner. And it is
a fact that he was "called" to operate the tannery at Glenwood, so he knew the trade of a tanner.
This could not have been the occupation of his choice for he did not seem to practice it of his
own choice. In the census he is listed as a molder or a worker of ornamental iron and was
quite well off at the time of his marriage.
With the characteristic ability of the Hepplers for industrious application and their innate
love of the good life, one may assume that Johann Martin was successful.. It is not known how
much wealth he acquired. It may be that he did not have the time left in his life to become
wealthy. His sons acquired property and attained the title of "Gentlemen". They had large land
holdings but did not do the work themselves. They had tenants or hired laborers who did the
actual work.
His son, Edmond, said that the greatest trial to his father's testimony, that is, the great
regret that Andrew had in leaving his home in Canada and coming to Utah was that he was not
able to provide a comfortable home for his wife.
On once occasion his wife gave birth to a son in a horse stable which was the only kind of
living accommodations available to them at that time. This was in Prattsville. This almost
broke the spirit of this proud and honorable man. Seeing his wife lying on a bed of straw in the
torments of labor, pan set around to catch the rain that was coming through the roof, brought
him close to renouncing the Church and returning to Canada.
In Canada, Adam Seegmiller was a wealthy man. He owned and operated a tannery and
also owned large tracts of land. His daughter ,Louisianna, told the story that on her sixteenth
birthday a large dinner was given to which all of the apprentices at the tannery were invited.
Among them was Andrew
Heppler. A young, handsome,
high spirited man. He threw
her a rose and cried out, "One
day you will be my wife."
Louisianna thought this quite
impossible, but only one year
later they were married.
Andrew was ten years older
than "Lucy" and if this event
happened on her sixteenth
birthday he would have been
twenty six years old. She said
this was the first time she had
seen him. That is rather old for
a new apprentice. It is more
probable that he was
completing his apprenticeship Louisiana Andrew
rather than starting it. He did

20
learn the tannery trade.
After their marriage, Andrew practiced the trade of a molder. Louisianna said that they had
a very comfortable home. Andrew excelled at his trade and provided a comfortable home for
his wife and was actually a gentlemen in his community.
One of several tradition indicates that four of Grandmother's brothers had a quarrel with
their father and left home to go to the gold fields in California. They stopped to work on a farm
in New York owned by a man named Crow. Mr. Crow was a member of the Church and
converted these young men. They went to Utah rather than to California and settled in St.
George.
At the time of their father's death they returned to Canada to help settle his estate. During
this time they converted their mother, their sisters, Anna, and Lucy, and Lucys husband
Andrew Heppler. This group, with the brothers, return to St. George. Anna was married but her
husband appears to have been something of a reprobate. Tradition has him as an auctioneer. He
traveled quite a bit and was somewhat careless of his obligations as a husband. In any event,
Anna was thought to be justified in leaving him. She later married Alfred Musser as his fourth
wife and settled on his farm in Tooele, Utah.
They were reported to have been baptized in Salt Lake City, and may have intended to
settle there. Andrew and Lucy did go to St. George, and Lucy's mother, Anna Eva Knecktle
died in St. George.
In the book "I Was Called to Dixie" it mentions Andrew Heppler as a member of the band
but gives the date as the later part of the 1860's. Tradition has him coming to Utah in 1875.
John Edmund Heppler, their oldest surviving son, was born in Canada in 1867, and Amelia
Louisa (Aunt Millie) in 1871. Their next child, Franklin Judson, was born in Prattsville (in the
horse stable) in 1873. This seems to make the year 1872 as the time of their arrival in Utah.
This coincided with the ending of the Black Hawk Indian Ward in Utah which had
terrorized settlers in Sevier, Piute and adjoining counties for seven years. A large spring had
been discovered in the hills in Sevier County, and a small settlement started was started there
but had to be abandoned.
President Brigham Young was intent on resettling this area and Glenwood was resettled as
a United Order Community. Andrew was called to operate a tannery there. It is at this point
that he becomes a man of flesh and blood, and passions, rather than the mystical figure tossing
a rose to a young sixteen year old girl.
Under the United Order, Glenwood became one of the most important and affluent towns
south of Provo. The large spring furnished water power for a number of mills whose products
were sold as far away as Salt Lake City.
Andrews' tannery was along this stream. His daughter Eleanor describes it as a large area
enclosed with a pole fence. The tanning vats were made of wood standing out in the open. The
spring is in a meadow land behind a small spur of a hill. The creek from the spring forms a
large pond and then flows through the meadow and falls down the hill to the land below where
Glenwood is situated.
Nola remembers her father taking her there a long ago. I remember we climbed up along
the fall to the top of the hill and then came out into the meadow. Father did not mention the
tannery at all and he may not have know it ever existed. Andrew probably abandoned it when
he left the United Order.
The tannery provided leather for all of the needs of the valley and particulary for shoes. It
produced a very fine quality of leather. Shoes were also manufactured in Glenwood for sale as
well as for home use. When the United Order was dissolved, Andrew purchased a farm in
Glenwood and eventually built a large comfortable home on it for his family.
He later sold this property and moved to Richfield when he became the County Probate
Judge. However, he may have retained the property and continued to live there, traveling to
and from Richfield each day.
His son Rosco remembers living in the home in Glenwood and said that after his father
died, the children together built a small house for their mother in Glenwood where she lived
until she died.

21
 There is no record that Andrew lived anywhere else. It appears that he continued to live in
Glenwood until he died.
The daughters of Aunt Lou and Aunt Hillier, said that after Andrew died, their
grandmother, Lucy, would stay with them. She would take turns. They loved to have her come
as she would let them climb into bed with her and tell them marvelous stories about her
childhood.
It is a fact that Andrew did built a home in Glenwood where he had his farm and that Lucy
did have a small house in Richfield. This house was given to his son Frank by mutual consent
of all of his brother and sisters when their mother, Lucy, died. Frank and his wife, Aunt
Caroline, lived in this house until their death. What happen to it after that is not known.
Andrew did not immediately setter in Glenwood because there were no homes available.
Many of the original settles were living in dugouts at the time of the Indian troubles.
He settled first in the farming community of Prattsville, located about midway between
Richfield and Glenwood. This is in the valley of the Sevier River and, for that area, is quite
fertile. The valley is in a high plateau surrounded by mountains from which water was obtained
for irrigation and the area was mostly meadow and irrigated farmland. The climate was quite
mild. Alfalfa and sugar beets were the main crops, but dairy products were also produced.
This valley did not seem to be the land of any particular Indian tribe and was probably a
common migration and camping territory shared by the various tribes.
Prattsville was settled by Helaman Pratt, son of Parly P. Pratt and today does not exist. It
was a very lovely place. There were canals and small irrigation ditches cutting through it lined
with wild rose bushes, milkweed, lilac, holy-hock and iris. The trees were mostly cottonwood,
but there were chokecherry and pottawattamie berries, and a little orange berry called "bull"
berry, which made a wonder jelly.
It was in Prattsville, that Andrew moved his family into the horse stable, and walked the
two miles to Glenwood to operate his tannery. He enjoyed this walk in the early morning and
late afternoon. Meadow-larks sang from the fields and bees hummed above the clover fields
and wilde rose bushes. The dew created crystals on every blade of grass and he could doff his
hat to every man laboring in the fields as he strode along.
His sixth child, Andrew Martin, was born in Prattsville in 1876. His seventh, Arthur
Lewis, in Glenwood in 1878. It was sometime between these two dates that he moved his
family to Glenwood into a small two-room log home. There was a sort of garret and an outside
ladder leading into it where the boys slept.
Andrew a natural gift of leadership and also the reticence that allowed him to remain in the
background. It was said of him that he was often asked for advice but never gave counsel
unless asked for it. It appears that he was a man of good sense and judgement.

Nola remembers her grandfathers (Andrew) farm and home in Glenwood.

I always thought it was such a lovely place. I do not know who owned it when I was a
girl, but my father was employed by the cheese factory in Richfield to gather the milk from the
outlying farms and I often went with him, sitting in the cab of the truck and looking at the
fields and meadows as we drove along the little country roads to the various farms and villages.
My father often drove by the old home in Glenwood, but I do not remember that he ever talked
much about it.
The house was wood frame, two story, and was painted a warm yellow. It stood some
distance back from the road, and the area in front of the house was like a meadow where sheep
grazed, and there were fruit trees. Behind the house was the mountain and between the house
and the mountains were the out-buildings, the stables, barns and storage buildings. The
mountain was actually a spur of the main range and had jutted out into the meadow.
Andrew had taken a horse and an implement called a dredge. It was a square made of
boards with handles attached to it something like a plow. With it a man would dig into the earth
and the horse would pull the earth away. It was a primitive type of scoop shovel. It was a
common farm implement when I was a girl. With this apparatus, Grandfather dug away the end

22
of the mountain and built his barns close up against the earth.
He then built a road up over the mountain above the barns. Then all he had to do was to
drive his wagon filled with the harvested grain and hay up to the barn and tip the produce down
into the barn instead of having to fork it up as most farmers do.
Rosco (son) said that during the United Order times, Andrew had discovered another
spring of water back in the hills and had advocated that the people develop this spring for
culinary needs. The villagers reaction was that they had an adequate, more than adequate pond,
from the large spring and saw no need to put time and energy into development another source
of water.
When the United Order was dissolved, Andrew purchased the property which contained
this second spring and developed it for his own needs and use. The townspeople soon found
that they could use more water and came to Andrew with the demand that the spring should be
community property. It was a natural resource should not be controlled by one man. Andrew
lifted up his shotgun and told them to come and take it if they could. They didn't. Rather the
story is true or not it demonstrates his farsightedness, his industry, and his determination to
protect that which was rightfully his.
Andrew could play many musical instrument and he formed a band in Glenwood. They
played for every occasion. The members sat on a wagon bed which was drawn by a team of
horses gaily decorated with braided tails and manes entwined with flowers. He was a fine
craftsman, carpenter and loved working with wood. He made the cabinets and tables in their
home and carved little toys out of wood for all of his children.
When he moved to Richfield and built his home there, he found that his land included the
ancient camping grounds of the migrating Indians who traveled north in summer and south in
winter. The chiefs came to Andrew about this matter and Andrew promised them that as long as
his family held the land, they had the right to camp in one of the meadows. This promise was
kept. Later when his son, Rosco, lived on the property, the Indians continued to camp there
twice a year until they were moved on the reservations. The camp would appear overnight. One
day there would be a town of tepees, and one day it would be gone.
The Indians were never molested or ill-treated and they came and visited. They would
leave their babies in their cradle boards leaning against the porch. They never took their
children into the house, but left them outside.
Nola remembers it well. She marveled at the trust these Indian mothers had to leave these
little children outside. They were so darling. My sisters and I would squat down and look at
them. We never dared to touch one. They looked back at us with their bright dark eyes and
their soft silky hair laying over their foreheads. They never cried nor smiled. How we hoped
one day some mother would forget her baby and leave it to us. When our sister Annivor was
expected, and mother told us we were to have a baby "brother" (after three girls) we wondered
why father was not making a cradle board for "our" baby.
In 1883, Andreas Heppler became the judge for Sevier County and held this position until
1888. It was at this time that he suffered his fatal illness. And from this time on, little more is
known about him.

A brief sketch of the lives of Andrew and Louisianna S. Heppler

By their youngest daughter in law, Elmira Farnsworth Heppler.

This was written when mother was quite old and while there are some errors, it is
essentially true. R.Z.H. Jr.

Andrew Heppler, son of John Martin and Ursula Wolfe Heppler, was born Nov. 15 1838 in
Oefingen, Germany. His future father-in-law owned a large tanning factory and Andrew
worked with him tanning leather. When a young man, he met Lousianna Seegmiller, a daughter
of Dama and Anna Eva Knechtel, (John Adam Seegmiller and Anna Eva Knechtel) and fell in
love with her and desired to marry her.

23
 She was a very delicate girl. She had her own private maid and as the family hired house
servants also, she wasnt required to do anything only as she pleased. When young Andrew
asked for her hand in marriage, her mother said, What will you ever do with such a delicate
wife. Oh, said Andrew, I can provide for her as she is accustomed too, and I promise Ill I
will take very good care of her.
So they were married and settled in Waterloo, Canada. Annie Eva was born Jan 23, 1865,
John Edmond Dec. 17, 1867 and Amelia Louisa Oct. 27, 1871. William Henry died 8 days after
birth, all at New Hamburg, Canada.
Soon after this they heard the gospel and became members of the Church and wanted to go
to Utah. Their parents were very bitter and told them if they went to Utah they would not give
them a penny of their inheritance. However they made the journey, leaving all of their earthly
possessions and having only enough money for the trip. Their experiences were many and
hard. In a few years three more children were born to them, Franklin Judson Nov. 5,1873,
Andrew Martin, June 23, 1878, both at Prattville, Sevier County and Arthur Louis Nov. 4, 1878
at Glenwood where the family now lived. They were very poor and had a hard time feeding and
clothing their children.
At this time Andrew was called on a mission to Switzerland? (Germany is what I always
heard). No thought of rejecting the call ever entered his head. Leaving his delicate wife and six
children in the hands of the Lord, he left for his mission.
Louisianna taught school and kept things going praying for the day to hurry when Andrew
would return and relieve her. Andrew fulfilled a wonderful mission, converting along with
others, Katherine Rothlisberger, who was a widow with six children. ( Her husband was a
drunkard and she left him.) Katherine and her six children came to America with Andrew. She
died shortly after arriving here and requested on her death bed that Bro. and Sis. Heppler would
raise them and never separate them. So instead of Andrew coming home to relieve her, he
brought her six more children to raise. Not one of them spoke a word of English. Sis Heppler
took them in and it was now just like she had six sets of twins. Because they were so poor, they
were greatly criticized for not giving the children to other people who could provide for them.
But they had given their word to a dying mother and only once were they tempted to part with
any of them.
Some wealthy people who were moving to Arizona were very desirous of adopting little
Eleisa, a beautiful blue eyed child. They came to the home bringing a large doll for her. Of
course it was the most beautiful doll any of them had ever seen and Eleisa was soon won over
by the many wonderful things they promised her. Sis. Heppler bundled a few clothes and bid
her goodby. As soon as she turned into the house tears were running down her cheeks and she
was sobbing as her children had never heard her sob before. Just then Ed, the oldest boy came
in from the field and when he saw his mother he said, Mother dont you want her to go?
No, said Sis. Heppler. Ed ran after the wagon and didnt stop until they returned Eleisa to
him. Soon he was leading little Eleisa back home. That was the only time they considered
parting with any of them.
Only once did Sister Heppler have a desire to do more for her own children than for the
adopted ones. She had some how gotten a few eggs and made a big cake. Now, she said to
herself, my own children have given up so much for these others, surely they are entitled to the
larger pieces of cake. She cut six large pieces and six small ones, but as she called the children
to eat it, she turned the plates around and gave the large pieces to the little German children.
Never again was she ever tempted in any way to show any particularity.
Well she had six more children of her own making a family of eighteen. And when Eds
wife died at the birth of their first child, she took the baby too and raised him until Ed married
again. So she really raised nineteen children.
She was Stake Primary President for twenty five years and it took her a week to make her
visits. She would bid her family goodby and drive away in her buggy and visit all the wards
and then return home.
My husband, Rosco, the youngest of the eighteen children told me of how he used to set by
the hour and watch the road for her return and resolved in his young mind how when he got

24
married he wouldnt allow his wife to neglect her children as his mother was neglecting him.
He was a delicate child, the scrapings of the dough pan, Aunt Anna called him. After we
were married and had three lovely children, she came to visit us one day and said, Oh, Rossy,
the scrapings of the dough pan, I never never thought you would ever grow up to be such a fine
fellow.
Well getting back to my story, Grandmother Heppler influenced the lives of thousands for
good. She was a wonderful speaker, an inspiration to all who knew her.
One month before she was buried, she was called to speak in the Union Meeting. As she
tottered down the aisle, now being seventy nine years old, I wondered just what she would say
to us. But I never heard a better talk or a stronger testimony than she gave that day. The
following month the Union Meeting was postponed for her funeral.
She had been a widow for twenty years and for sixteen years before that Grandpa Heppler
had been almost an invalid. I only knew Grandma Heppler twelve years but her philosophy has
tided me over the rough spots of my life. I shall relate one more incident in her life of the many
she has told me.
Shortly after Bro. Heppler returned from his mission and things looked their very darkest
to them; they had hardly been able to feed six mouths, and now there were twelve to feed. It
seemed to her it was just more than she should be expected to bare. She felt like her burden was
more than she could stand when the words to the 4th verse of How Firm A Foundation came
to her as though someone was reading them. You know we rarely sing the forth verse. If we
sing four verses, we sing the third and fifth, so she was not very familiar the words which are:

When through the deep waters I call thee to go.

The rivers of sorrow shall not thee overflow.
For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless
And sanctify to thee, thy deepest distress.

She dried her tears and went into the house praising God for her many blessings.
Bro. Heppler, after returning from his mission, bought a farm in Glenwood, Utah. It had a
large house on it and plenty of work for all. Each child was given a responsibility and my
husbands was to keep the chip box full. The older boys had to keep the wood box full but
Rosco must always have plenty of good chip and cedar bark. The one or two times he went to
bed without, he was aroused in the early morning and had to fill the box before breakfast.
At meal time a large bell was rung so everyone on the farm could hear it and they all came
for meals, especially morning and evening meals when family prayers were held.
On one occasion when Brother Heppler was praying a dog got after their large white cat
which ran into the house right up on his back and clawed the back of his neck. He just quietly
arose, carried the cat outside and came back and finished his prayers as if nothing had
happened.
Their home was like a hotel. They were always entertaining visiting brethren and church
officials. Everyone was welcome.
Financial conditions became a little better and three sons were sent on missions and mist
of the eighteen children had at least one year at the BYU Academy.
Brother Heppler was greatly respected in the community where they lived. His advice was
sought by many. One time when the UPRR (Union Pacific Railroad) was going to be laid to
Marysvale in Piute County through Richfield, a delegation of the railroad officials were sent to
Glenwood to sell stock in the company. They promised that if the people of Glenwood, which
was six miles east of Richfield, would raise a certain amount of money (quite large) they would
run a spur to Glenwood. What an event. A railroad right to Glenwood. The RR officials were
very convincing, although it was really quite ridiculous, and most of the people were ready to
sell or mortgage all they had to get the required money. Bro. Heppler sat very quietly all
though the meeting when finally some one said, Bro. Heppler, we would like your opinion.
As Bro. Heppler arose, he said, Well gentlemen, I am afraid what I have to say will not meet
with your approval. But to me, for these men to take your money from you, promising what

25
they have promised, is just like a poor widow taking the last piece of bacon she has and going
out and greasing a fat hogs rear end with it. I thank you. It was as if a bomb had exploded and
everyone could immediately see how foolish they had been and the RR men werent long in
leaving.
Bro. Heppler was made district judge and moved to Richfield where he lived until his
death Nov. 24, 1906. I never knew him, but love and respected his memory because of the
many wonderful things I have been told of him.

Obituary

PROMINENT AND ESTEEMED CITIZEN ANSWERS FINAL SUMMONS AT 68

The Deseret News - Friday, November 30, 1906: Page 11 Richfield, Sevier County,
November 27. Andrew Heppler, one of the best-known citizens of this county passed away
this morning at 8:00 A.M. The deceased has been an invalid for many years due to the effects
of a paralytic stroke received fourteen years ago. He was not confined to his bed, however,
except for a few days preceding his demise.
Andrew Heppler was born 15 November 1838, at Oefingen, Baden, Germany. At the age
of eight years he emigrated with his parents to America. His first home in this country was in
Perth County, Ontario, Canada.
In 1863, he married Louisiana Seegmiller, and nine years later, in 1872, he received the
Gospel at the hands of his wife's brother, William H. Seegmiller, now president of the Sevier
Stake. The same year, he came to Utah, settling in St. George where he remained about a year,
and then removed to Plattsville, Sevier County, and later to Glenwood.
Elder Heppler and his family were members of the United Order in Plattsville and
Glenwood until the organization was discontinued. They passed through many trying
experiences incident to those early times.
In 1879, Elder Heppler was called to perform a mission to Europe and labored in the Swiss
and German Mission for over two years. As a preacher of the Gospel, he was very successful,
having the privilege of baptizing between 75 to 80 souls.
Upon his return home, he was called to served the people in a public capacity and spent
fifteen consecutive years in the County Court House, filling the Positions of Probate Clerk,
County Clerk, and Probate Judge.
Elder Heppler was always active in the performance of his religious duties. Before leaving
for his Mission, he served as a counselor to Bishop H.H. Bell of Glenwood Ward, also as
superintendent of the Sunday School, and leader of the Ward choir. He possessed great faith
and was singularly blessed with the gift of healing, and numerous persons today can testify to
being restored to health through his administration.
Five years ago he moved to Richfield, which has since been his home. He leaves a wife
and twelve children and nineteen grandchildren.
The funeral over the remains of Andrew Heppler was held today at 11:00 A.M., at the
Academy Hall. Bishop Virginius Bean of the Richfield Second Ward presiding. The singing
was conducted by the Stake Chorister, George M. Jones. The Hall was beautifully decorated
and there were many floral contributions.
The speakers were President Joseph S Horne, Herbert H. Bell of Glenwood, President
Robert D. Young, and Elders Charles W. Powell of Glenwood, and Simon Christensen of
Richfield. All bore testimony to the noble character and sterling worth of the deceased and the
faith and sacrifices he had made for the Gospel.
There was a large attendance, nearly one-half of those attending being from the
surrounding settlements, especially from Glenwood where the deceased had resided for many
years prior to his removal to Richfield.

26
 Andreas Heppler remembered:

People who might have known him were sought out and it was found that his image was
bleared. He had suffered a paralytic stroke and lived the last sixteen years of his life as an
invalid. Here are the comments of people who were acquainted with him.
Unknown

He was strict with the German attribute of order and discipline, and his children were
rigidly controlled. He demanded strict obedience and gave no quarter for slackness. His
children remember him mostly for his temper and his ridge discipline. But that he had other
attributes is attested to by the fact that his funeral was held in the Tabernacle and business
houses closed their doors for the afternoon in his memory, this even after sixteen years of
invalidism.
Unknown

I remember him as a lonely old man, standing out in the garden, melancholy and
uncertain, and saying over and over again, She is never home". Once, when I was playing the
piano, he suddenly cried out,"If I had a wife who could play like that, I would not care if I did
not have a chair in the house."
Eleanor Bigler Heppler

I was taken to see him when I was a very small girl. I He was sitting in a big chair, large
and immobile, his heavy beard spread over his chest, slowly rolling one thumb around the
other. From time to time he would look at me from under his lowered brows and say gruffly,
So you are Millie's girl."
Lina Hansen Christensen Petersen:

He had a terrible temper, and many times Mother had to come between him and us or he
would have killed us.
Louisa Anna Carrie Heppler

I do not remember him, myself, but my father told me of one time when he (my father)
was working in the field and suffered such a severe migraine headache that he could not stand
and lay down in the middle of the field. Mr. Heppler came and saw him and picked him up and
carried him home. Mr. Heppler was a very kind and compassionate man.
Eleanor Seegmiller Butler

Father had a terrible tempter, but mother could always talk him out of it. She would put
her arms around him and speak to him in loving tones, and soon he would be smiling again.

Amelia Heppler Hansen

He was so strict with his children. The younger boys had to keep the wood box filled with
chips, and one day we had visitors come and the whole family gathered in the parlor to visit.
One of my brothers and I had been sent out to gather chips but when we saw the visitors come
in, we left our buckets and went into the house. Father saw us and without saying a word, got
up and took us by the scruff of our necks and pushed us outside, telling us not to come in until
we had finished our chores. He was a fine craftsman and made much of our furniture. And he
would carve little toys out of wood for all of his children. He made a little wagon for me. He
could play any musical instrument.
Rosco Zar Heppler

Reporting a party held in the Glenwood Ward chapel... "Brother Heppler was then asked
to say a few words. We were always pleased to have Brother Heppler speak to us. He was a

27
man of great wisdom and people often came to him for advice but he never offered his wisdom
unless it was sought and he never spoke unless he was asked to do so.
Glenwood Newspaper

"If she had said less, he would have said more."

Eleanor Bigler Heppler

He was a new apprentice to my father, and it was on my 16th birthday that I first met him.
A big dinner was held at a long trestle table out on the lawn. All of the apprentices were
invited, and he sat at the end of the table, young, gay and handsome, and he threw a red rose to
me and said, Someday you will be my wife."
Louise Anna Seegmiller Heppler

Grandma (Anna Louisa Seegmiller) came from a very wealthy family. She was rather
delicate and had her own personal maid and they also had servants in the house so she never
did any work. When Grandpa asked for her hand, her mother asked him if he could support her
with as fine a life as she had at home. He promised that he could and would. But after they
were married, her mother visited them and found Louise Anna doing the housework. She
questioned Andrew about this, reminding him of his promise to provide servants for her
daughter. "Oh," said Andrew, "I found out it didn't hurt her to work."
Elmira Farnsworth Heppler

It seemed to me that marriage was all for the man and nothing for the woman. The man
came home from his work and had his dinner and then went off to his club and spent the
evening with his friends, but all the women did was have babies, wash clothes, and keep the
house. I did not think much of this arrangement.
Louise Anna Seegmiller Heppler

Mother would sing all the time. She had such a beautiful philosophy of life. People would
come to her in trouble and she would talk to them about their blessings and soon she had them
happy again.
John Edmund Heppler

Andrew had a terrible temper. One day his wife cooked his egg and turned it over as she
put it on his plate. He picked up the plate and egg and dropped it on the floor. Grandmother
then hit him over the head with her pancake turner. She hit him really hard. He went out into
the back lot and climbed over the fence and began to walk away. When he was out of sight,
Grandmother sent Ross after him. He had gone to the canal and was sitting on the bridge all
alone. Ross brought him home again. This was in Richfield, after he had the stroke. He would
have very bad spells in which he could not control his temper. After these spells, he would be
in bed for several days. Gradually he would recover, but soon would have another spell. It was
very difficult for the family as he would lose control of himself and threaten the children

Rosco Heppler Sr

28
 Historical Notes

Andrew Heppler was born November 15, 1828 in Germany. When he was eight years of
age (1836), he, with his parents, emigrated to America. His first home was in Canada. He came
to Utah in 1872 (age 44) settling in Sevier County. In 1879 (age 51) he was called to labor as a
Latter-day Saint missionary in Europe, and on his return home two and one-half years later
brought six orphan children. He spent fifteen years in the Sevier County courthouse as clerk
and in 1883 (age 55) was elected the Probate Judge of Sevier County. He had married Louisa
Seegmiller in 1863 (age 35) and twelve children came to bless their home making eighteen
children that he and his wife reared. He died on November 24, 1906 (age 78) at his home in
Richfield.
Treasures of Pioneer History: Vol 4, The Pioneer Attorney Sevier County

The call of Professor Charles 3. Thomas to St. George soon bore fruit in a brass band
composed of Charles L. Walker, William H. Thompson, William Webb, Henry Lang, Harrison
Pearce and Andrew Heppler. This small band was very active and much appreciated in St.
George and the surrounding communities. Thomas arrived in St. George late in 1865, and had
organized a band at the beginning of the year 1866. Under the date of February 11, 1866,
Charles L. Walker wrote in his diary, "I commenced the study of music the beginning of the
current year, and take a part in the Brass Band under the tuition of Prof. C. 3. Thomas."
Undoubtedly some of the first members of Thomas's band had already had some experience
with their instruments: Harrison Pearce, for example, played clarinet with the group of five
who furnished the music at the first theatrical performance in St. George. At any rate, it was
not long before Thomas had his musicians playing at public functions. We learn from Charles
L. Walker that the band was active as early as March 15, 1866.
An Enduring Legacy: Volume Eight, Pioneer Vocations - Instrumentalists

Andrew Heppler was born November 15, 1828 in Germany. When he was eight years of
age, (1836) he, with his parents, emigrated to America. His first home was in Canada. He came
to Utah in 1872 (age 44) settling in Sevier County. In 1879 (age 51) he was called to labor as a
Latter-day Saint missionary in Europe, and on his return home two and one-half years later
brought six orphan children. He spent fifteen years in the Sevier County courthouse as clerk
and in 1883 (age 55) was elected the Probate Judge of Sevier County. He had married Louisa
Seegmiller in 1863 (age 35) and twelve children came to bless their home making eighteen
children that he and his wife reared.
An Enduring Legacy: Volume Eight, Pioneer Vocations

List of officers of Academy of Sevier Stake: A. K. Thurber, W. E. Seegmiller, G. W. Bean,

Jens L.. Jensen, Andrew Heppler, Theo Brandley and H. M. Payne.
Journal and Diary of Albert King Thurber, Notes From Church Records
p.315 August 27, 1887.

United Order

During the lifetime of the Order, covering a period of about five years, the people were united
and blessed both temporally and spiritually. They were able to build up a number of industries,
among which were two gristmills, one built and operated by Joseph L. Wall, while the other
was built and operated by Peter Christen Peterson. A sawmill located three-quarters of a mile
southeast of town was operated by water power. Logs were hauled from Cove Mountain by ox
team, which provided lumber for all improvements where lumber was needed. A short distance
below this mill and on the same stream, a shingle mill was operated by John Jackson and
others, while at the edge of town on the same stream a furniture shop was operated by Thomas
Jackson. A tannery was superintended by Andrew Heppler, an expert tanner. Most of the
leather was taken to Salt Lake City and sold, but some leather was for a shoe shop in

29
Glenwood, operated by Carl Carlson, an expert shoemaker from Denmark. Mary Hendrickson
did the stitching on her machine on the shoes. Another enterprise was a carding mill, where the
wool was taken, carded into rolls, then spun and the cloth woven by Henry Hendrickson,
Anliza Carlson and others. This cloth when divided among the people, was made into blankets,
dresses, suits and underwear, etc. Maria Powell, Mary Hendrickson, Mary Oldroyd, Emma
Payne and Ellen Pierce formed a committee in the order that made overalls, jumpers, hats and
buckskin suits.
Many acres of sugar cane were raised in the fields of Glenwood. A mill was erected in which
the cane was ground and made into molasses. When the United Order dissolved, these
industries were unable to operate, due to insufficient means and lack of unity. Out of all those
mills, only one remains, the first gristmill, built by Joseph Wall. For entertainment during the
United Order a martial band was organized with the following members: Charlie Powell, H.
H. Bell, Fred Bell, A. Steffeson, Harry Payne, Jed Wardell, Andrew Heppler, and others. They
would ride in a decorated wagon and serenade the town on all holidays. The first large rock
store built in 1878, during the United Order, is still being used, having changed hands only
three times.

Our Pioneer Heritage Volume 15, The United Order - Sevier County

Mormon Immigration Index - Personal Accounts S S Wyoming (May 1881)

A compilation of General Voyage Notes

"COMPANY STARTED. -- At 2:30 on Saturday afternoon the second company of Saints

numbering 278 souls, left Liverpool on the S. S. Wyoming of the Guion Line in charge of Elder
Joseph R. Mathews. The following elders returned with the company, J. R. Mathews, H.
Margetts, S. L. Ballif, E. Lewis, D. R. Davis, A. M.Buchanan, J. M, Moody, Jr., J.
Burningham, W. C. McGregor, Andrew Heppler, F. Oberhansli, C. Bryner, J. Hansen, also
Miss H. Baraclough, visitor. We wish them God speed both by sea, and land, to their
destination in the gathering place of the Saints.

MS, 43:21 (May 23, 1881), p.329

"Sat. 21. [May 1881 ] -- The steamship Wyoming sailed from Liverpool, England, with 278
Saints, in charge of Joseph R. Matthews. The company arrived at New York June I 1st and at
Salt Lake City June 10 th.
CC, p 107

The following names were also listed on the ships manifest of passengers.

Rothlisberger, Anna
Rothlisberger, Elise
Rothlisberger, Emma
Rothlisberger, Friedrich
Rothlisberger, Johann
Rothlisberger, Katherina
Rothlisberger, Rosa

30
Andreas (Andrew) Heppler

Andreas (Andrew) Heppler Born 15 Nov 1837 in Oefingen, Villingen, Baden, Germany.
Died on 24 Nov 1906 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.
Married Louisanna Seegmiller, daughter of Johann Adam Seegmiller and Anna Eva
Knechtel on 15 Nov 1863 in Stratford, Perth, Ontario, Canada. Louisanna was born
on 2 Apr 1847 in Stratford, Perth, Ontario, Canada. She died on 12 Mar 1926 in
Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Andreas and Louisanna had the following children:

Anna Eva Heppler Born 23 Jan 1865 in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Died 1 Jun 1903.
Married Isaac John Stewart on 17 Nov 1889 in Manti, Sanpete, Utah. Isaac was
born on 29 Sep 1855 in Draper, Salt Lake, Utah, USA. He died on 26 May 1911 in
Rexburg, Madison, Idaho, USA.

William Henry Heppler Born 23 Jan 1867 in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Died 29 Jan 1867 in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

John Edmund Heppler Born 17 Dec 1867 in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Died 23 May 1958 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.
Married (1) Julia Hansen or Anders on 22 Jan 1893. Julia was born on 8 Oct 1872
in Draper,Salt Lake, Utah, USA. She died on 24 Apr 1894.
Married (2) Eleanor Bigler daughter of Henry William Bigler and Eleanor
Parthena Emmett on 29 Dec 1898 in St. George, Washington, Utah, USA.
Eleanor was born on 21 Sep 1880 in St. George, Washington, Utah, USA. She
died on 27 Nov 1962 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.

Amelia Louisa Heppler Born 27 Oct 1871 in New Hamburg, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Died 29 Oct 1967 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA. Married Andres Kroge Hansen
(Jr.) son of Anders Kroge Hansen and Aurelia W. H. Quistgaard on 13 Oct 1897 in
Manti, Sanpete, Utah, USA. Andres was born on 12 Dec 1870 in Draper, Salt Lake,
Utah, USA. He died on 27 Oct 1920 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Franklin Judson Heppler Born 5 Nov 1873 in Prattville, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died on 31 Jul
1964 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.
Married Caroline Anderson daughter of Andreas Ole Anderson and Johanna Storm
Felt on 22 Jun 1898. Caroline was born on 1 Sep 1878 in Ephraim, Sanpete, Utah,
USA. She died on 3 Jun 1969 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Andrew Martin Heppler Born 23 Jun 1876 in Prattville, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died 26 Mar
1954 in Cut Bank, Glacier, Montana, USA.
Married Mary Almina Rodebeck daughter of James Rodebeck Jr and Lorrana
Hannah Weeks on 14 Sep 1898 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA. Mary was
born on 4 Dec 1876 in Cedar Fort, Utah, Utah, USA. She died on 2 Oct 1955 in
Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.

Arthur Lewis Heppler Born 4 Nov 1878 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died on 15 Nov
1962 in Missoula, Missoula, Montana, USA.
Married Mary Mae McDonald daughter of Graham Duncan MacDonald and
Anna Gardner on 14 Jul 1904. Mary was born on 10 May 1897 in St. George,
Washington, Utah, USA. (Other genealogy gives birth as 1882 Glenwood,
Sevier, Utah) She died in Jul 1969 in Phoenix, Maricopa, Arizona, USA.

31
 Louisianna Carrie Heppler Born 6 Jul 1882 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA.
Died on 16 Jul 1970 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.
Married James Morton Peterson Jr. son of James Morten Peterson Sr. on 18 Nov
1903 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA. James was born on 12 Jul 1879 in
Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA. He died on 7 Jul 1939 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake,
Utah, USA.

Charles Marion Heppler Born 4 Feb 1884 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died 14 Aug
1963.
Married Maria (Minnie) Peterson daughter of Soren Christian Peterson and
Mary Ann Jensen on 3 Feb 1904 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA. Maria was born
on 13 Aug 1882 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA. She died on 30 Aug 1979.

Columbus La Mar Heppler Born 12 Oct 1887 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died 10
Mar 1963.
Married (1) Sally lone Woolf, daughter of Martin Woolf Sr and Roseltha Hyde
on 16 Jul 1912. Sally was born on 15 Oct 1889 in Millville, Cache, Utah, USA.
She died on 31 Aug 1929 in Utah, USA. Married (2) Marion Maider on 10 Jun
1914. Marion was born in 1891 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Sterling Knechtel Heppler Born 22 Jul 1889 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died on 20
Jul 1934.
Married Hazel Lucile Smith on 24 Jun 1914. Hazel was born in 1893 in
Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Rosco Zar Heppler Sr Born 24 Apr 1892 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA. Died 2 Apr
1978 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah, USA. He was buried on 6 Apr
1978 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Elmira Bulkley Farnsworth, daughter of Moses Franklin Farnsworth and
Lovina Jane Bulkley on 10 Jun 1914. Elmira was born on 16 Jul 1895 in Manti,
Sanpete, Utah, USA. She died on 2 Nov 1977 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah,
USA. She was buried in Nov 1977 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

Besides the twelve children of her own she raised six other children of Katharina Zuercher
Rothlesburger. Some took the name of Heppler, others did not. They were never legally adopted
and Elmira Heppler wrote in her genealogy book that they were sealed to their own parents.
Louisanna also raised a grandson Julian Edmund Heppler

32
Andrew Heppler Sons

33
 Farnsworth Bulkley Family

34
 Chapter 5
Louisiana Seegmiller Heppler
By Nola Heppler.

Louisiana Seegmiller Heppler was truly one of the great and brave pioneer women whose unselfish
service will live throughout the ages. Her firm faith in God and divine courage were unsurpassed. Her
sense of failure, if failure there was, was the realization that her ambitions and ideals were greater than
her mortal strength.
She was born in Stratford, Perth County,
Ontario, Canada on April 2, 1847 to Adam
Seegmiller and Eva Knechtel Seegmiller.
She was the seventh child of eleven
children.
Her father owned and operated a tannery.
He was a successful prosperous man. The
family lived in a nice home and had many
of the comforts available at that time.
Louisianna, or "Lucy" as she was called,
was of delicate health and this gave her
parents much concern. They provided her
with a personal maid to clean her room,
comb her hair, and what ever else she
needed.
She was educated in the manner given to
young women of that time and became
proficient in the art of needle-craft. This
skill plus her education later proved a means
to provide for her family when she moved to
Utah.
When she was seventeen she met and fell
in love with Andrew Heppler. He had come
to American with four brothers from
Germany. Andrew's training included work
Louisiana Seegmiller Heppler
in a foundry, (In the parish record in Germany he is recorded as an "Iron Molder"), carpentry skills, and a
possible knowledge of tanning. In any event he was apprenticed as a tanner by Adam Seegmiller.
Lucy told the story that for her sixteenth birthday her parents gave a large dinner to which all of the
apprentices at the tannery were invited. Among them was Andreas Heppler, who was a
young, handsome, high spirited man, who threw her a rose and cried out, "One day you will be my wife."
Lucy thought this quite impossible but their courtship and love continued to grow and one year later on
November 17, 1863 they were married.
This was much against her mother's wish, who felt her health would not permit her to assume the
duties of a housewife and mother.
There first residences was in New Hamburg where they lived for eight years. Four children blessed
their union. They were Anna Eva, John Edmund, William Henry (who died in infancy) and Amelia
Louisa. Andrew's skills enabled him to provide well for his family.
When Lucy's father died her brother, William H. Seegmiller returned to Canada to settle the
Seegmiller estate. This was in Stratford and Andrew and Lucy moved there. William had been converted
to the Latter Day Saint faith.
There are two different stories as to the conversion of William and Lucy to Mormonism. Lucy's
youngest son, Rosco, tells it this way. "She married father and then sometime after this marriage this
Seegmiller's four sons, -- the ones I remember were Uncle Adam, Uncle Charlie and Uncle Bill --- I can't
remember the other one. But Uncle Charlie and Uncle Bill got to sky-larking around and got down into
Kansas. They hooked up with a Mormon pioneer train going to Utah. When they got into Utah they were

35
converted. They went back to Canada and tried to convert the whole family. There were only two sisters
I knew. Aunt Anna (Anna Seegmiller Musser) I don't remember the other one's name but they were
converted. They also converted the other brother, and Lucy and Andrew."
The other is that four of Lucy's brothers has a quarrel with their father and left home to go to the gold
fields in California. They stopped to work on a farm in New York owned by a Mr. Crow. Mr. Crow was
a member of the church and converted the brothers and they went to Utah instead of California. At the
time of Adam Seegmiller's death William returned to Canada to settle the estate. During this time they
converted their mother and their sisters, Anna and Lucy and Lucy's husband Andrew.
Time has proven that both Lucy and Andrew had true conversions and spent the remaining years of
their lives in service to their Lord.
In 1872, Andrew, Lucy and their family and her sister, Anna Seegmiller, Musser, joined their family
and friends in Utah. It was a joyful reunion but their stay was short in Salt Lake and they moved on to
St. George. This was an arduous trip of many days over hot sandy rough roads. They lived there but one
year when Lucy's brother, William, was called to Richfield to serve as bishop. They accompanied him
back to Sevier County and settled in Prattsville which was about four miles east of Richfield and a mile
north of what they called Glenwood. Here their real pioneer life began. Their only shelter was an
unfinished barn which they shared with another family. Sheridan Jacobs had offered it to them until they
could obtain more comfortable quarters.
It was under these crude circumstances that she gave birth to her fifth son, Frank. It was stormy. the
roof leaked and pans were placed on the bed to catch the rain and keep it dry.
These were trying times. There was little or no work, and the pay was in commodities. Often
Andrew's lunch was a beet pickle sandwich eaten while listening to false representations of Mormonism
among the dissatisfied with whom he worked. Realizing how little he could give his loved ones, and
thinking of what he'd left in Canada, he almost wished to go back. Had it not been for Lucy's faith and
strong purpose to encourage him, they might have returned.
Prattsville started to irrigate the ground around Richfield and the area they were living in became
swampy. They moved to a cove on the mountain side near Glenwood. It was called Cove Mountain and
there is a small body of water there that still carries the name "Heppler Pond".
It was at this time that the United Order was organized and they joined. It offered security and with
their efforts and the aid of friends they built a two-room log house with a lean-to. Andrew had been
called here to run the tannery. They were to tan hides to make shoes for the community. This was in
1879. Lucy was called as a counselor in the Relief Society.
Another son, Andrew Martin, was born at Glenwood. That gave them six children. Andrew then
received a call to serve a mission to Germany and Switzerland. Lucy's wonderful faith and trust in God
helped her carry on. She secured the position of school teacher in the town, and spent the evenings
teaching fancy needlework to the young women. With the help of the children and friends she struggled
through, always relying on God to provide.
While Andrew was on his mission he met and converted a woman by the name of Katharina Zuercher
Rothlisberger. She had six children. When it was time to returned from his mission he requested and
received from Lucy permission to bring Katharina to Utah and marry her in polygamy.
This did not come easy for Lucy and it was only through her faith and an answer to pray that she gave
her answer in the affirmative.
Her son Edward recalls it happening this way. "Louisianna was stunned when she learned of
Andrew's plans and at first could not accept this condition. She went into the bedroom and fell on the
floor and pulled at her hair until blood stained her fingers, so great was her anguish." She, herself, said
that in her heart she was exceedingly jealous, but that this was the Gospel and their way of life, and that
she knew her husband was such a great man that she could see that this was the way it had to be."
Lucy had once confided to her daughter-in-law, Elmira Farnsworth Heppler, who also has lived as a
child in a polygamist family, the following.
"There had been a time in her life when things were very difficult for her and that her burdens seemed
more than she could bear. She went out in the orchard and prayed and seem to hear as it were a choir
from Heaven singing the forth verse of "How Firm a Foundation".

36
 "When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
The cup of thy sorrow shall not thee o'erflow.
For I shall be with thee, thy suffering to bless,
And sanctify to thee, thy deepest distress."

"As the music swelled around her, she felt peace come into her heart and strength and courage come
into her body and she went back into the house feeling that all was well."
Whatever Lucy's anguish may have been, apparently she was at peace when her husband and
Katharina arrived for Katharina wrote of the happiness with which the family accepted her.
"All the houses are the same, not built very sturdily, but they do look charming among the green fruit
trees. However, you do see some miserable shacks. They are all small but comfortable. The wheat and
lucern (alfalfa or feed-grass) are beautiful but when I see the land which is still bare and untilled, it
appears that it is almost impossible to grow something here, but they have a way to get water on the land.
There are no meadows, only a bush here and there. The land is dry and yet the wheat is green as
cabbage, but the Swiss alpine meadows are missing. Anyone who does not believe in religion and has
not a strong testimony of the Gospel and has money in Switzerland, will surely be homesick. However, I
feel happy here and was received in such a friendly way by the Heppler family. This is truly a happy
family and beloved, I believe, by all their neighbors. The whole village came to welcome us. Some
came along the road to meet us and some of the women kissed me. It is too bad that I cannot speak
English"
17 June 1881
Katharina had contracted "ship's fever" (Typhoid Fever?) during the voyage from Germany and could
not seem to recover from it. As she grew weaker and her life ebbed away Lucy's son Edward recorded
the following:
"Katharina was in great mental torment, knowing she was dying and would leave her infant children
alone in a strange land. They could speak no English and the distance from her home was too far to send
them to her parents even had there been the money. With her eyes she beseeched Louisianna, who knew
fine what Katherine was asking, but she hardened her heart. Katharina grew weaker and more anguished.
Finally one day as her life ebbed away she looked at grandmother with her eyes burning with agony and
cried, "Fraulein !" Grandmother burst into tears and putting her arms around Katharina, promised that
she would take the children and care for them and never let them be separated. Katharina sank back on
her pillows in peace and soon her life left her body. It was the 13th of July 1881, one year from the date
of her baptism."
It was no easy task to make such a promise. Now there were practically six pairs of twins, as the
orphans were about the same ages as her children. They were living in a near state of poverty with few
resources, and hardly room to shelter everyone. What could they do? She had made the promise. Her
faith told her God would provide.
Because of lack of doctors, sanitation, and proper care all twelve children contracted the fever.
During these months Lucy's strength often failed. She would call the elders and have them administer to
her and give her the strength needed to keep going.
At first the Heppler children had a hard time accepting the Rothlisberger children, referring to them as
those "Germans". But this was in the beginning and as the years passed an enduring bond of affection
bound the two families together.
One incident occurred that had a great deal to do with the forging of this bond. Lucy's health
worsened and she and her husband were frequently criticized for attempting to rear the six orphan
children when they could scarcely provide for their own. Eventually they decided to break up the family
and give up at least one of the children for adoption. A wealthy couple from Arizona wrote to Andrew
and ask to adopt Elisa, the youngest child. She was three years old. The couple could give her many
advantages. Andrew and Lucy discussed it and finally decided to let Elisa go.
"When the couple arrived Elisa had one dress and no shoes. The couple had brought her dresses, a
pair of shoes and a lovely doll. After she was properly attired in her new dress and shoes she was placed
in the carriage holding the doll. The road out of Glenwood leads north for about a mile and turns east
toward Richfield. As the carriage left the entire town came out to see Elisa off. Edward went into the
house and fund his mother (Lucy) in her bedroom kneeling on the floor and sobbing as if her heart would

37
break. "I was wrong to give Elisa away. I promised her mother that I would never break up this family."
Ed replied, "I will get the baby back for you." He ran out of the house and after the carriage and caught
up with it about two miles away. He ran along side the carriage and saw Elisa setting there in her new
dress and holding her doll. "You can not have her," he said. "I have come to take her back." He lifted her
out of the carriage and carried her a ways and then let her walk. The town's people were still out in the
road when they returned and they cheered and wept." Though many chances came to let the children go
to other homes, she kept her promise and all grew up as one family.
After the return of Andrew from his mission, Lucy gave birth to six more children. In addition she
raised a grandson, Julian. Her son, Edward, had married and his wife died in childbirth. Lucy's youngest
child, Rosco, said, "Julian was two years younger than me and we grew up like pals or brothers."
Andrew became one of the prominent citizens and was elected District Judge for several years. With
the united efforts of all, a comfortable home was built on the hill which was a real haven for a family of
eighteen children. It was a home where love, unity, and order prevailed. With the qualities of a general
in the management of the household, The parents gave each his specific responsibility and each did his
share in making the home happy. The amusements were wholesome. After the evening prayer and meal,
the children gathered around the organ in the parlor and sang. Molasses candy, popcorn and games were
enjoyed. Mother was always young in spirit and joined in the fun.
With all her family duties Lucy still found time to serve the Lord and her fellow men. She was a
regular attendant at all church functions, and an active Relief Society worker. She served as Stake
Primary President for 26 years, being released only when her husband's health failed. The towns were
far apart. Roads were bad.
The transportation was horse and buggy. Sometimes she was away from home for a week at a time,
and often held a baby in arms.
This was real work. She was always received with shouts of joy, for her very presence was an
inspiration, and her spiritual teaching and her practical advice has influenced thousands to better lives.
They would never forget "Sister Heppler."
Lucy was very progressive for her time and a great reader. She kept up on current events, religion,
politics, and social science. This made her life rich and full.
She found time to write for magazines, and two of her stories were published in the Juvenile
Instructor. With the prize money for one story, she bought her bedroom suite. She made many social
contacts with famous people such as Susan B. Anthony.

Amelia, her daughter, wrote this tribute to her mother.

I wish you could have seen Mother as I remember her--medium height, lovely blue eyes, and fine
black hair which she braided on top each night so it would fall in waves as she parted it in the middle
with a puff and a soft bob in back. Her lovely complexion and genial smile added much to her charm.
After her nap she always dressed up in the afternoon with white lace about her neck and white apron. I
see her now in her bonnet and cape as she went from home to her children, neighbors, and friends to darn
socks or mend for busy mothers. She was so welcome with wise council and rich experience, always
doing for others. She sewed her niche out of the earth and set therein her light of inspiration for all who
knew and loved her. Hers was a wonderful life--noble, unselfish and grand--and eighteen children are
proud to call her "Mother". She was chaplain of the Daughters of Pioneers at the time of her death,
which occurred at the home of her daughter, Amelia Hansen, March 12, 1926. Had she lived until April
2, she would have been eighty years old. "Aunt Lucy", as she was called by all, will live in the hearts of
Sevier county people forever.
Andrew had a stroke and was no longer able to work. He did a few things around the house but was
pretty much an invalid. This was followed by another stroke and he was confined to a chair. The older
sons took over and managed the farm.
As the children married or left it became increasingly difficult to maintain the farm and home. Lucy
sold it and moved to Richfield. Five years after moving to Richfield, Andrew died. This was November
of 1906. He had been an invalid for fourteen years.
In 1881, father returned from his Mission, bringing a widow with six children, converts, from
Switzerland. This widow was ill when she arrived, having contracted "Ship Typhoid, " on the voyage.

38
She died about two weeks after arriving at our home. She seemed in such despair and agony before her
death, and mother knew it was because of leaving her children, "strangers in a strange land". She asked
in German if mother would take care of then, and mother said "yes" to comfort her. The dying woman
was relived and died peacefully. It was no easy task to make such a promise. Now there were practically
six pairs of twins, as the orphans were about the same age as her children.
Poverty, no resources, hardly room to shelter all, what could they do. She had made the promise. God
would provide. After the mother's death, because of lack of doctors, present sanitation and proper care,
all twelve took the fever, including mother. During these months, mother's strength often failed. She
would call the Elders and have them administer to her and keep going. Though many chances came to let
the children go to other homes, she kept her promise and later on the children were adopted (I don't think
this true. rh) to my parents and all grew up as one family.
After the return of my father, mother gave birth to six more children, and raised a grandson whose
mother died at his birth. With all her family duties, she did much public work. She was a
regular attendant to all church organizations, and an active Relief Society worker.
She was Stake President of Primary for twenty-six years, resigning only when father's health failed.
This was real work with towns so far apart, bad roads, horse and buggy transportation, sometimes away
from home one week, and often with a babe in arms. She was always received with shouts of joy, for her
very presence was an inspiration, and her spiritual and moral teachings, her practical advice, has
influenced thousands to better lives. They can never forget "Sister Heppler. "
Mother was a great reader, so progressive. She had kept up with current events, religion, politics,
social science, which made her life rich and full. She found time to write for magazines, and two of her
stories were published in the Juvenile Instructor. With the prize money for one story, she bought a
bedroom suite. She made many social contacts with famous people such as Susan B. Anthony.
Father became one of the prominent citizens, was elected District Judge for several years. With the
united efforts of all, a comfortable home was built on the hill which was a real haven for a family of
eighteen children. It was a real home, for love, unity, and order were there. With the qualities of a
general in the management of the household, mother gave each his specific responsibility, and each did
his share in making home happy
Our amusements were wholesome. After the evening prayer and meal, the children gathered around
the organ in the parlor and sang. Molasses candy, pop corn and games were enjoyed. Mother was always
young in spirit and joined in the fun.
The last two sons to leave were Sterling and Rosco. Sterling was working in Salt Lake City as a "soda
jerk" in a drug store and was not home very much. His feet caused him considerable trouble and were
operated on. After this Lucy made arrangements for him to attend the LDS Business College and Rosco
finished the eight grade there. How she got the money to do this is not recorded. From this start Sterling
was able to later become a lawyer. Rosco recorded the following at this time:
"Mother didn't have any money at all to buy me decent clothes and I hated to go to school
because I looked so shabby. Never had any shoes to wear all summer and when Sunday came, why I had
to put shoes on to go to Sunday School. My feet hurt so I could hardly wait until I got home so I could
take them off. I was kind of half living there with mother working around on what ever kind of job I
could get. Mother wanted me to go back up to Salt Lake City to finish High School but she just didn't
have any money and so I didn't get any more schooling."
After the children were grown and married she spent her last years living in a small one bedroom
house.

39
 "I Remember Mama"
by Lucy's granddaughter Madge H Peterson
Bailiff, Peterson Reunion, Aug 1979, SLC, UT

I think this is a great story about Lucy's daughter. It shows the successes, activity and dedication in
the Church and the qualities of a mother that she must have learned from Lucy.
"Theirs was a happy life of family love and sharing and appreciation of the Gospel in church
assignments. Grandmother Lucy was Stake Primary President for many years and spent many hours
visiting the various wards from Remond on the North to Marysvale on the south, using her horse-drawn
buggy as transportation. Mama's parents [Grandma Lucy] were converts to the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints from Canada. Mama's father [Andrew Heppler] died before any of her children
could remember him, but Grandma [Lucy] came to our home often to lend a helping hand with mending
our clothes, darning our stockings, canning the fruit and all the while influencing our lives for good with
her philosophies of life and her fervent testimony of the truth of the Gospel teachings.
How important it is to have memories and histories of our forefathers that we might know we come
from a fine, stalwart heritage and to realize we have a tradition to carry on in our families."
"Six children were born to our grandparents [Lucy and Andrew Heppler] before Grandpa [Andrew]
went on his mission to Germany and Switzerland. Six children, with their mother, came back with
Grandfather from his mission and were adopted after their mother died. Mama was one of six children
born after Grandfather came home. Mama was the only girl of these six. Uncle Charl was her pal, and
they spent their carefree younger days in happy companionship in Glenwood. Mama had only two older
sisters. I don't remember Aunt Eva, but Aunt Millie Hansen, with her family, lived near us in Richfield.
Our families had a close relationship, spending many special days together and enjoying companionship
in school and church activities."
"Mama had a beautiful, natural, pleasing soprano voice and her services were requested for all sorts of
occasions. She had the opportunity of singing with the Tabernacle Choir during her stay in Salt Lake"
"Papa bought one of the first cars in Richfield from Uncle Charl."
"When Mama became pregnant with Juana, she felt that she should have a change of scenery. And
Papa agreed. People were whispering about her being pregnant again so soon. So she just decided to get
away from Richfield until the baby was born. So we took Grandma Heppler with us to San Diego, where
we had a little cottage close to the ocean. We spent about six months away from the snows and bad
weather, until Juana was born. It really was too lonesome without Papa, and Mama never wanted to go
away again when she was pregnant."
"Mama experienced a miracle at the time she was carrying her eighth baby. In the seventh month she
became very ill with a pain which was diagnosed as appendicitis. The doctor decided that the baby
would have to be taken, in order to save Mama's life; but she wouldn't consent to this. Papa called in the
Stake President, who was Mama's uncle, Brother Seegmiller [William Henry]. In the prayer it was asked
that whatever was hindering the progress of Mama's recovery might be removed, so that she could return
to her children who needed her. Soon after the administration, the baby was born normally and Mama
was soon well again. In those days this was indeed a miracle. Perhaps now, with the aid of medical
science, both mother and child could have survived."
"Just imagine a young girl in such a large family. Mama's family was not poor, neither wealthy, but
she knew few frills and seldom enjoyed what might be termed luxuries."
Her husband was called to be president of the Texas-Louisianna Mission and also as counselor to the
President of the Manti Temple.
"She was always praying for her posterity to come to a knowledge of the truthfulness of the Gospel of
Jesus Christ and to fashion their lives after the teachings of the Savior so that we all may be together with
her (and Papa) throughout eternity."
"Mama was a wonderful woman. Her religion and testimony of the Gospel and the dedication to
living its principles were ever her first priority. She loved all mankind and demonstrated this in her
relationships with her friends, customers, and even strangers, as she met her responsibilities each day.
She was loving and faithful and true to her companion in life and death. If you get the feeling that I
[Madge H Peterson Bailiff] think she was about perfect, you are right, because that's how "I Remember
Mama."

40
 One of her granddaughters remembers her thus:

"The predominating thing about Grandmother Heppler seems to be the influence for good her words
and actions had upon the people among whom she moved. Without exception they bear witness to the
things she taught them that have had a steadying and pacifying influence upon them."
Two of her sayings have been repeated time and time again by her grandchildren in times of great
stress. One was "Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof." The other "This too shall pass away."
"Grandmother never borrowed trouble. She met each day as it came, doing what she could to help her
fellow men. She prayed to the Lord continually and could talk to Him as though He were sitting in the
same room with her. Her faith in Him was boundless. She had been promised that she would see Christ
and just before she died she said to one of her grandchildren, "If I don't see him in this life I shall see him
in the next."
"I was seven years old when she died and one of the memory I have of her happened a few weeks
before her death. In the front room of the tiny little house where she lived until just a few weeks before
her death, was her large canopied bed. I was playing rather roughly one day and fell against the sharp
corner of one of the posts of the bed and cut my head. It couldn't have been very serious but it bled and I
howled. Mother scolded me for playing so roughly but grandmother spoke very quietly and although I
don't remember what she said her voice was very gentle."
"Grandmother was a little woman. She always wore a long black dress with long black
sleeves. I always thought she had only one dress but pictures of her prove she had several. They just
looked alike to me. She was very respectable and modest. She always wore a long necklace which was
either a strand of pearls or a gold chain. Her glasses were carried on a gold chain around her neck. She
had had her ears pierced as a little girl and wore little gold rings in them."
"Her face was soft and wrinkled like rose petals and her hair was silver white. She would
braid the hair over her temples each night in little braids. In the morning she combed them out and her
hair would lay in soft waves over her temples. She kept it in place with large boned
hairpins."

Obituary of Louisianna Seegmiller Heppler

On Friday March 12, 1926 Lucy was called home. She was eighty years old.

GRANDMA HEPPLER CALLED TO REWARD AT THE AGE OF EIGHTY

"I am not sick, only tired," Grandma Heppler said to the writer when he came about two ago to see
her for the last time. And tired she was, and had a right to be, for she has gone the journey of her life in
nearly eighty years and it was a path marked with deeds of kindness and cheer under pleasant as well as
under adverse and trying conditions.
Now she has left us-- and the mourners are not only the large family, not only the people of the city,
but nearly all of Southern Utah, and a large part of the state-- all those who knew Grandma and her most
wonderful life, and their numbers go into the thousands.
She died Friday evening, as peacefully as her entire life had been and resigned to the will of God as
she has been in all her years when she took all the decisions of her Maker in the spirit that she used to
express in the words, "It's all right, it's all right."
Funeral services were held Sunday afternoon at the Second Ward meeting house and it is safe to say
that never before and on no occasion a larger audience of mourners congregated in the chapel, or more
impressive or dignified services were held in the chapel, than when the community and a host of our
town people paid last tribute to this wonderful woman, which we, without fear of contradiction, can call
the most revered, the most respected, the most loved, in our part of the country.
Bishop Seegmiller being among the mourners, the services were in charge of First Counselor George
M. Cope. Forty grandchildren of the deceased preceded the coffin, carrying beautiful floral tributes that
had been sent from near and far.
The services were opened with the song, "How Firm a Foundation" by a double quartet composed of
Mrs. L.A. Poulson, Mrs. Vern Blomquist, Mrs. F.H. Gunn, and Mrs. I. L. Bean; E. H. Lewis, M.W.

41
Smith, Kenneth Hood, and C. W. Pearl.
Bishop Andrew Oldroyd of Glenwood offered the opening prayer, and a girls chorus led by Mrs.
Anna Callaway and Miss Ora Gledhill at the piano sang "Come to Me." Judge H.N. Hayes was then
called from the seats of the mourners to the platform and the following biography:
"In addition to caring for and rearing the seventeen children, with her grand son Julian Heppler,
making in all eighteen, she devoted an extensive part of her life time to religious and civic activities.
Perhaps it would be safe to say that she attended more religious meetings, funeral services, educational
and civic gatherings than any woman in southern Utah. She was a stake president of the primary
association for 27 years. Her work in all the activities named is too well known to thousands to make it
advisable to comment thereon." Judge Hayes, (son-in-law) also feelingly read a poem he had composed
when Grandma Heppler celebrated her seventy-fourth birthday anniversary in the midst of her family in
April 1920, at which time this excellent piece of poetry was published in our columns.'

To Mother, on her Seventy-Forth Birthday April 2, 1920

A wonderful woman's this mother of ours, Dear Mother! Sweet soul, sweet character pure,
A wonderful woman is she, What a memory we'll carry for ever,
To, in spite of the cares and labors of years Of your smiles, of your voice, your faith and your works,
Be yet smiling on you and on me. Which time nor experience can sever.

She has striven and toiled these years upon years Whether it be of the days now agony,
Which number now seventy-four, When you dwelt in the "Home on the Hill",
To teach by example and precept as well As queen with your king waiving scepter o'er all,
To sacrifice self more and more. Though in poverty bitter and chill,

She's passed through the Valley of Death Whether teaching in school or primary class,
Twelve times, that her children might be, Whether speaking in meeting or home,
In addition to this, mothered six children more, Whether cheering in sorrow or sharing in joy
So fearless and faithful was she. With your voice of such marvelous tone.

Those eighteen dependents she nurtured and tended Whether visiting children and knitting and patching
Never marking just which was her own, Or whatever your worthy endeavor,
In sickness and health, whether poor or in wealth, Your memory, your words, your expression of face
Partiality never was shown. Will dwell in our hearts forever.

Like a motherly hen, she extended her wings God bless you, dear Mother, and spare you to us
O'er the brood of her chickens, eighteen, Just as long as you care to remain
And the vision I have of that page in her life On this mundane sphere with us whom you love,
Is like a true and beautiful dream. Whether God shall send sunshine or rain.

I doubt if the history of heroines all And then when the summons shall come from the Throne
From Eve down to those of today, To beckon you to the fair land
Doth tell of a test that was harder to bear Where husband and children, loved ones and friends,
Than she bore; for just let me say: Will each grasp your magnetic hand,

The woman is rare beyond thought to compute, Remember the time shall never come round
Who can stand for her husband to share Though ages shall come and shall go
His love with a woman other than she, When your children forget the date of your birth
Then give her the burden to bear And the life you have lived here below.

Of rearing six children, not of her own, We'll honor the day that you, Mother, were born,
But of one -- her rival in love -- And cherish your priceless worth,
When Providence orphaned those innocent chicks Our God we will thank for ever and aye
By calling their mother above. For His gift of such choice, noble birth.

Our mother has daughters as noble and brave May returns of this day, if your heart so desires,
As the best in the world, I shall hold, Be many and happy and pleasant,
But just let the husband of either of them Is the wish of your children, your loved ones and friends,
Dare repeat the strange story I've told, Whether absent or personally present.

And see what would happen! God pity the man God bless you and keep you in days yet to come,
Who'd be lion enough to try it! As He has in the dear days of yore.
I'm sure if their husbands would squint at a girl, All hail to the Queen -- this Mother of ours
They'd have the good sense to deny it. Today, when she's seventy-four

42
 "The first eulogy was delivered by President John Christensen, who spoke of the unusually solemn
occasion of this gathering, referred to Grandma Heppler's life and her good example, worthy of
emulation, a life time spent in doing good and ardently working for the church."
Kenneth Hood sang the solo, "I'm a Pilgrim."
The next speaker, Dr T. R Gledhill, mad the introductory remark that frequently speakers in their
eulogize are inclined to exaggerate, but it would be absolutely impossible to exaggerate in the eulogizing
Grandma Heppler, for her's was a life of service and lover for her fellowmen.\
Madge Peterson, a grand child of the deceased, gave a piano solo, the old time "Maiden's Prayer,"
which always had been the favorite composition of Mrs. Heppler.
Patriarch H. H. Bell of Glenwood referred to his fifty years of acquaintance with the deceased and
touchingly related how Grandma Heppler, in spite of the fact that she had to take care of a large family,
took charge of the primary in the entire stake, never tiring, never complaining. After the song, "One
Sweetly Solemn Thought," beautifully rendered by Mrs. L. A. Poulson, Superintendent Ashman paid
eloquent tribute to the deceased, emphasizing most strongly her interest in culture and refinement, and
her most remarkable faith.
After a few closing remarks by Counselor Cope, the double quartet sang "I Shall not Pass Again This
Way," and Christian M.Peterson spoke the benediction.
A row of automobiles laden with flowers preceded and an endless cortege of cars followed the hearse
to the last resting place in the city cemetery where L. P. Hansen dedicated the grave. A faithful soul
went through the pearly gates. She was no only faithful to her church, but faithful to humankind, faithful
in believing it was her duty to do the will of her Maker to lend a helping hand in time of need. Her life
will prove a perpetual inspiration to all who knew her, and therefore, while sweet ties have been severed
by her going, much is left.
Her coffin was placed in her daughter's, house (Millie) for viewing. This was midway in the block
from the Second Ward Chapel. Her grandchildren stood in a double line from the door of the house to
the chapel. So many flowers were sent that each child was given a spray to hold.
Her coffin was carried by her sons through this double row of flowers to the chapel.
One of the grandchildren recorded that she had never since seen anything quite like this avenue of
flowers and the silent people following the coffin up the walk to the chapel.

43
44
 Chapter 6
Richfield

Heppler Home

This story was intended to record the events of five years of our family life, from the time Annivor
was born in 1924 until we moved to Tremonton, in Box Elder County, in 1929. I have tried to paint a
picture of the way of life our family knew when we moved from the Ranch to Uncle Ed's home in
Richfield, began our intercourse with society, first rural, then town.
We were frontier people coping with a burgeoning culture bringing a refinement which our
grandparents had known but which had been almost lost in the hard requirements of pioneer life in a
desert land. Richfield was a pioneer town, and the valley of the Sevier River in which it was located had
been brought under cultivation by United Order Pioneers, among whom were our Grandparents.
There was no suitable timber for building, and homes were built of home-made adobe bricks, baked
by the sun. These homes had to be small, the resources and energy of the people did not allow for large
spacious homes.
Brigham Young, the great Mormon colonizer, counseled the people to beautify their dwelling
places, and vines had been planted along the foundations of the houses so the climbing tendrils covered
the raw adobe exterior.
A flower, The Climbing Four-o-clock, with delicate bell flowers and fine perfume made these
pioneer homes little bowers. They were both beautiful and cool.
Later on, as the economy stabilized, the adobe bricks were covered with plaster. The plaster came
from the gypsum mill in Siguard. It was here that our parents first met. He working in the plaster mill
and she clerking in the company store.
The tiny vine-covered homes were found only in the poor part of town. The well-to-do people had
plaster houses. Fortunately, the Hepplers lived on Four-o-clock row. Our poor cousins whose fathers
were well-to-do business and commercial men had to live in the brick homes along Center Street.
The four-o-clock houses were small and, being the first houses, had little in the way of modern

45
conveniences, even by the standards of the time, and consisted mainly of a general room which served as
diningroom, parlor, and bedroom, with a small kitchen added and perhaps other bedrooms or attic space.
It was not uncommon to call on a neighbor in the afternoon and find the men of the family sleeping
on pallets on the floor while the women served refreshments to the visitors. They would , step carefully
around the sleepers for they had worked late in the fields. If their water turn came in the night, they were
up all night running the water into their fields. They needed sleep.
Most of these homes had two bedrooms, one added on, where the parents and younger children slept
in one room and the older children in the other. The boys usually slept in the attic space and in summer
in hammocks or day beds out under the fruit trees.
The remarkable things is that they managed to keep their homes so clean. Mother worked
incessantly to keep our home clean. She was a fastidious housekeeper. She not only had the house to
maintain, but she was responsible for the health of the family and infectious deceases were common and
widespread. One of the scourge of the pioneers was the bed bug. I remembered how my Mother raged a
continuous war against this mean little insect. Her main weapon was a can of coal oil and she drenched
the bedposts and springs and even the mattresses with this smelly oil.
Uncle Ed once remarked that she need not work so hard for nothing killed them. They just went up
on the ceiling and then when their victims were asleep and unsuspecting, parachuted down and made
their feast. They were blood-suckers, and as one rustic poet put it,"They had the morals of a weasel, and
where they stopped, they left a measle which itched. They were small, round, and flat, thus the
designation, parachuting down from the ceiling.
Many of the little pioneer homes had a free-standing room which served as a kitchen in summer
where the cooking fire could burn all day without making the sleeping rooms too warm for comfortable
sleep. Here all the cooking and hot water work was done in summer and meals were served on a trestle
table laid out under the fruit trees.
All the pioneers had fruit trees and lawns, for this was a colony organized by Brigham Young and
he so decreed that we have fruit trees planted in front of our homes, with lawns and flowers, and a
kitchen garden in back, and that berry bushes be planted over the pole and willow fences.
He also decreed that livestock be penned up and chickens confined so that one could walk among
the flowers and under the trees with comfortable secure footsteps.
Fences had to be straight and gates could not sag. And if no timber was available for fence posts,
then willows grew along the river banks and they could be woven into fences, and some of the little
towns were noted for the beauty and artistry of their willow fences.
There was to be a door stoop or porch for it was not neat to step directly from the mud and dust of
the road into the front room. Thus, vines were planted to hide the makeshift core of the house. All things
were to be done in beauty. And so they were.
The pioneers planted the tall, straight Lombardy Poplar tree to mark the lines of their property, lilac
hedges between the trees, and iris and wild roses grew along the fences.
The outhouses and stockyards were well behind the dwelling homes, behind a proper high board
fence. There were pines in the high mountains, sufficient for pole fences and slat boards.
Such rudimentary sanitation as availed was strictly enforced.
Irrigation ditches ran along the borders of the streets, and water cress and mint and catnip grew here.
Wild asparagus grew along the edges of the fields and we gathered this on our way home from school.
Each homestead had a pie plant, rhubarb, and we all had early spring beets and greens.
The roads were rutted and dusty in summer, but along their tree-fringed water borders, was a
pleasant coolness where the children played and made doll houses of mud with delicate furniture made of
hollyhock flowers. Black-eyed daisies and milkweed flourished here. These were really lovely little
towns for children to grow up in.
The Sevier River valley was fertile, in that while its climate was mild, snow remained on the high
Fish Lake and Pavant Mountains until late summer and the late snow melt for irrigation.
Culinary water came from deep artesian wells. Nearly every homestead had a well where water
flowed continuously, cold and clear.
I do not remember we ever had a drought, but I do remember one flood when the Sevier River
overflowed its banks and only the iron bridge on the County Road could be seen. Uncle King came to
stay with us then. He had a night job on the Richfield Reaper, the town newspaper, and the flood came

46
up in the night. I remember Daddy would drive him to the edge of the flood tide and then they rode on
horseback to the pastures where the cows were left. They milked the cows, but left the milk on the
ground for they could not have brought it back by horseback. Aunt Pearl and her children, Wanda and
Bob, would come to the edge of the flood on the other side and they would wave and yell across to each
other. That was an exciting time for us, running along the lip of the flood and yelling to Bob and Wanda.
There were lakes and streams in the mountains, grazing for sheep and cattle, and there was fishing
and wild game.
We were mainly outdoor people, camping in the covered wagon in the summer while Daddy and his
brothers and cousins fished. All the Heppler men loved to fish and in the summer they would close their
offices and go off fishing for however long they could last on what they caught and what provisions they
brought from home. Our mothers never knew when they would return, but they would be hairy, dirty,
and ravenous. That could be counted on. While we were camping, Mother cooked over a campfire. I
remember these magic evenings as a kind of ponderous enchanted land, the glow of the dying fire, the
high profile of the mountains blurring as the light faded, the wind rustling through the trees, (The old
men talking, the Indians said.). The older people sitting around the fire telling the old tales. Tales of
Nauvoo and Kirkland, the trek West, the Utah War, the Mormon Battalion, how it was in St. George and
Dixie and the old traditions of our people.
They never talked about Canada, and it was not until Uncle Ed was quite old and I have returned
from my proselyting mission and was gathering notes on the history of our family that I persuaded him
to talk of his boyhood in Canada and the members of his family who remained there. Later, these stories
proved of great interest to the descendants of the Hepplers in Canada who had no knowledge of their
emigrant ancestors.
Richfield was then a small town, with what was a very modern business and downtown area, but the
wasteland began as soon as the sidewalk ended. The surrounding land had been put under cultivation,
irrigation had made farming rather profitable and there was quite a bit of dairying. But within spitting
distance of main street, you were in the country.
Our home was not in Richfield proper and beyond our fields the sagebrush grew high. Beyond our
back yard was the "country. There were two or three holdings farther out, but we could see to the
mountains with hardly a fence between.
We did not have many chores, my father believed that women worked in the house and men worked
in the fields, so after we finished the household tasks and weeded the kitchen garden and fed the
chickens and gathered the eggs, we had little else in the way of "jobs". We were free to rove. Rhea did
not come with us on these ventures. She usually stayed in the house with our mother. Of course, after
Annivor came, Rhea became her little mother and tended her like a mother hen with one little chick.
Our Home in Richfield was by the standards of the time, a spacious dwelling. With this house, we
had several acres of ground, but let me tell you how it was. The little city of Richfield was laid out as
Brigham Young laid out Salt Lake. It had wide roads and neat little houses bordering either side. Except
that in Richfield, the road remained a wide space. The traffic, which was mostly farm wagons and
barefoot kid s or else kids riding on their old work horse, wore a rut in the center of the road. Weeds and
sage brush grew up all over the rest of the road right to the banks of the little irrigation ditch. From there
the footpath took over and then there was a picket fence. Thus, we had a wide expanse of wild
unoccupied land to play in. Our home was almost out of town
It was a rectangular building with the living quarters forming an "L" with the kitchen, larder, and
bathroom cutting across the parlor and bedrooms. It was a very moveable home, that is, it was easy to
move from one room to another, yet the rooms were not cut up with doors. And it had electricity and hot
and cold water and indoor plumbing. It was heated by a coal range in the kitchen and a coal stove to heat
the parlor was put up in the winter.
The bedrooms got their heat from the sun. Stringing in at the windows, and from the door left open
to the parlor. It was roomy and airy, at least I remember it that way, but I was quite small.
I do not know who built this house. It had a plaster exterior but was larger than the ordinary
adobe-plaster house. I thought for a long while Grandfather Heppler had built it, but this proved to be not
true. I could never find the original entry deeds for this property.
Brigham Young had had the land surveyed and gave out the property to the settlers and when Utah
became a state, the land was re-surveyed and there was some friction over property titles for a while. It is

47
possible that during the time of the Manifesto, when all Mormons were being very well behaved, on the
surface, that the original titles were destroyed as they would provide a clue to polygamous families.
Well, when we moved there Uncle Ed was in possession and our father took the title from him, but I
believe Uncle Ed purchased it from someone else.
Both the kitchen and the parlor had a door opening onto the front veranda where a porch swing
hung from the overhead of the veranda. This swing was off-limits for play but a wooden chair swing
stood out on the lawn. It was a rather unique affair made of wooden slats to form two facing chairs
mounted on a swinging platform. It was painted green.
We could play in this and we took many a long and perilous journey to Hawaii and Japan and all the
islands of the South Pacific on it. We had some cousins who had been on missions to Japan and Hawaii,
so we knew about these places. The swing reached high and far out during storms at sea and swung low
and close to land as we approached the safe harbor. We always got home safely in time for supper.
The parlor, a proper parlor, was the dress-up area of the home. Three doors led to the three
bedrooms, two across the end of the house and one parallel to the parlor. This last was the master
bedroom where Annivor slept in her crib until she was properly housebroken and then you shared our
bedroom.
The third bedroom was our play area. A door in the master bedroom led to the bathroom, and the
bathroom, in turn, had a door leading to the kitchen.
Another door in the parlor opened into the kitchen. From the kitchen, a door led to the larder, which
had a door at the far end leading to the root caller. And a back door from the kitchen to the back porch,
also covered, led out to the yards and kitchen garden.
The master bedroom also had a door leading to the outside as did the play area room. All of these
doors may have meant that a polygamous family once lived there. The many rooms, all large, and the
ease of access and exit could mean that. It was an integral house, not a series of rooms added or pulled
together.
Beyond the back porch was a two-storey building which we called the wash house. The old hand
pump washing machine was there and there was a drain in the center of the cement floor and a
wood-burning range for heating water. The upper story contained a heating stove and a bed and was used
as a guest house when we had overnight company, but its main use was storage of dried foods for winter.
We also played up here in summer when it rained.
Behind the wash house and the main house, outside the master bedroom was the large kitchen
garden.
Beyond the wash house was the high board fence that separated the homestead and the dwelling
area from the stockyards. Built into this fence, or the fence was built on either side, were two joining
little outhouses, each was a two-seater. These were for our use while out playing, and for the farm
hands and stock men as well. So the house originally did not have indoor plumbing.
In the square formed by the front lawn and the wash house and the stockyards was a rather large
wasteland area which had originally been the wagon yard. Mother used this for hanging out her iron
kettles on their tripods when she boiled the rough laundry or dyed materials, or made soap.
An old wagon bed lay forgotten out here, and when we went on a land journey, we traveled in this
wagon. The seat was gone but the whip and whip holder were still in place. I wonder who would leave a
whip for children to play with. We traveled the old pioneer trails, urging on the tired horses on as the
Indians got closer and closer, yelling their hideous yells and brandishing tomahawks. We snapped the
whipped, it was a real bull whip and often snapped around and swiped our bare legs, giving us a real
welt. Boy, that whip could hurt. It was the only time we every got whipped, we got spanked, but never
whipped.
The parlor floor was of hardwood, varnished and waxed to a mirror surface. It was covered by a
quality rug, not a hand-braided rug" but store-bought. Between the two back bedroom doors was the
upright mahogany piano, and here the Christmas tree stood during the Christmas time. A long library
table of polished mahogany stood under the large window overlooking the front veranda and the lawns.
This table was covered with a silk scarf and a vase of flowers always stood in its center. Real flowers in
summer and silk ribbon flowers made by our Mother in winter.
The piano also wore a silk drape and its vase of flowers. There were no family portraits around. The
parlor furniture consisted of a three-piece mission set. This was a wood sofa and arm chairs upholstered

48
in brown leather. The sofa was a divan bed and one chair had rockers.
Mother sat in the rocker with the three of us, Orpha on her lap and Rhea and I on either arm, and she
read to us from the "Child's Book of Bible Stories" which we received for Christmas one year. She read
to us every night before we went to bed.
Daddy sat in the other chair and read the paper, snorting about what the government was doing. We
were Democrats, whether by calling or by conviction it is hard to tell. By Mormon philosophy it was
good to have opposing political parties. The townspeople were originally divided up, part being
Republicans and part Democrats. We were Democrats.
The doll house which Daddy made from cheese crates stood in the corner by the library table,
behind the rocking chair. All the rest of our toys were in the play room.
We had few books, the Bible and Book of Mormon and a set of classical poems bound in red leather
which someone had given us as a present, but which no one ever read. After I learned to read, I begged
Santa Claus to bring me books rather than dolls. I kept these books in a box by the doll house in the
corner behind the chair where I could read them undisturbed. Everyone thought, and so said, that I was
indeed a strange one.
The bedrooms were large and airy and had closets built onto the walls. (Most bedrooms just had a
row of hooks.) They had large glazed windows which overlooked the lawns and orchards where birds
nested and we woke up in the morning to their songs. In the nighttime, one could see above the lilac
hedge and poplar trees marking the line of the field across the road, the full harvest moon so bright that it
seemed to be daylight.
All of the bedrooms and the parlor were wallpapered. The kitchen was finished in calcimine and
mother was proud of the new concept of having a stencil overlay in a leaf design around the top of the
wall, where, on a papered room, the fringe would be used to cover up the edges of the paper strips.
The kitchen was the largest room in the house and combined an office, the dining room and the
kitchen. The floor was completely covered with linoleum, laid down in three long strips. Inlaid linoleum
came later, and then asphalt tiles. But full linoleum in the kitchen was then very new. The wall facing the
lawn area had a large square window and there was a smaller window over the sink, so Mother could
keep an eye on what was going on outside and on her young ones who were playing somewhere out
there.
A tall, roll-top desk stood in the corner by the large window, and the oak dining table and oak
dining chairs stood in front of this window. A day bed stood along the wall dividing the kitchen from the
parlor. The kitchen range stood between the bathroom and the larder and under the small window close
to the stove was the sink, with real hot and cold running water. The stove had a water reservoir where
there was always warm water. Between the sink and the back door was the kitchen table where food was
prepared, and this table also served as the breakfast table, but we ate dinner and supper on the dining
table.
Mother was not only a marvelous cook , she loved to cook. She was a talented homemaker and very
innovative. She copied from others. If she met someone who could do something better or something she
did not know about, she soon found out how and added this to her own talent as a cook. She had eggs
and milk, cream and butter, honey, flour and the produce of the garden and orchard.
The dining table had expanding leaves and we often had company. It could seat perhaps twenty
people. We had eight dining chairs and six kitchen chairs. The dining table was cleared after each meal
and a scarf placed on the top and a vase of flowers or a bowl of fruit set in the exact center of the scarf.
The table was set" again for each meal and a clean cloth was used for dinner and used again for supper,
and then discarded. The dishes were always cleared away immediately and the floor swept. The kitchen
table had drop leaves and was covered with oil cloth. It serves as the breakfast table and a cloth was used
on this table also, but was not changed every day and often, unless we had had guests, the supper cloth
was used the next morning for breakfast.
Nola wrote that as a small girl, she noticed that in the homes of many of her friends the table was
always left from meal to meal. The same cloth, jam, honey, and butter were left in the middle and often
not even the dishes changed. I really never paid any attention to this at the time but as I got older, I
remarked that our table was always cleared.
By the back door stood the milk separator, and it was my particular job to keep this monster clean.
Cleaning the separator parts meant: First. Scrubbing with Dutch Cleanser and homemade scouring soap.

49
Second: Sterilizing with boiling water. Third: Placing the pieces out in the sun until mother felt all germs
were destroyed. All the pieces were then taken into the larder and covered with a clean dish cloth and
were never used for any other purpose. This was the precaution we took against contamination of the
milk using the milk utensils, the milking buckets, pans, and strainers. No one ever welcomed
pasteurization as I did.
The kitchen was not crowded for all that it contained, plus our family and assorted relations who
might be staying over the night, it being too late to return to their farms after a day in Richfield.
On rainy days, we roller skated around the dining room table. The day bed could be made up into a
full-sized bed. We also played jacks on the floor and cut out paper dolls. Somewhere in all this mother
had her sewing machine and we all learned to hem dish towels. We had to learn to darn, too, at an early
age. Although we had a lot of play time, mother kept us busy with useful character-building tasks. Later
on, as we got into school, we all did our homework around the dining room table.
The bathroom and larder were also roomy. The larder, we called it the pantry, and I did as well until
I lived in England, now I say "larder". Same thing. The larder had long rows of shelves where we kept all
the china and cooking utensils. The cooking staples were kept in bins, jars, and stone pots. There was
honey, sugar, white and whole wheat flour, salt, head cheese, mince meat, apple sauce, pickles and
catsup, all made by our Mother.
There were also the baked foods, bread, sweet rolls, cakes and pies. We could eat from this store as
much as we wanted so long as we cleared up afterwards. No food was ever locked up or counted in our
house. Daddy was a healthy trencherman and he liked to serve his guests with good food and Mother was
a good cook and enjoyed seeing people eat.
The root cellar, off the side of the larder, contained milk, the butter which mother made fresh daily,
and eggs. Here we crated the eggs which daddy sold commercially, and for which we were paid ten cents
per crate. The root vegetables, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, apples, and others were stored in an open shed
by the stockyard.
In addition to making butter, mother also kept a skimming pan of milk warming on the beck of the
range, making cottage cheese which often served as our supper meal, mixed with chopped spring onions.
Also warming on the top of the stove, the warming oven, was the yeast bottle which contained a
start of yeast and all potato water was poured into this bottle so we always had yeast for bread. If you
lost your yeast start, then you had to go borrow a start from a neighbor as commercial yeast was not yet
on the market.
The fire in the kitchen range burned all day long, winter and summer. Daddy made up the fire in the
morning and took out the ashes but we had to keep it going during the day. For this, we had a large wood
lot where daddy chopped enough wood each evening to keep us going during the next day, and we also
had a coal house but as I remember we only burned coal in winter, and we burned all burnable refuse so
we did not have large scrap heaps and, of course, much of the table refuse was given to the hens and
pigs.
Neither the back porch nor the front veranda were ever used as storage areas but were swept clean
every day. All farm implements, tools, harness, and outdoor clothing were stored in other closets. In
canning and harvest time the back porch became the work area. We peeled fruit, shucked corn and sliced
apples for drying and canning. Huge black flies swarmed all over the sticky juice on our bare legs.
Mother hung strips of fly paper from the overhead.
In addition to all this space, mother had the wash house. The washer and tubs were kept here.
Upstairs we stored the dried fruits and vegetables for winter and hung the Thanksgiving and Christmas
turkey. Here we picked the feathers from the wild game birds daddy brought in from the hills. Also the
annual deer which daddy also provided for our winter meat. Here our cousins told their gruesome ghost
stories as we all huddled together under the quilt on the bed, our blood curdling and hair standing on end.
Behind the wash house, between this house and the garden, was a narrow strip of earth where two
plum trees blossomed and bore fruit through the spring and summer. Mother made jam from the fruit in
fall. Here stood the ice box, two boxes, one above the other. I should say two frames for boxes.The sides
were made of wire screen and the whole affair draped with layers and layers of burlap. A large bucket
with a perforated bottom stood on top of the boxes and was filled with water from the garden hose. The
water dripped down onto the burlap sacking and kept the interior very cool. Here perishable foods were
kept in summer. On the steps of the porch we washed your diapers, as I have told further along in this

50
rambling story.
This strip of earth between the wash house and the garden continued along the main house. Outside
of the master bedroom was a sour cherry tree. No one ever made a better sour cherry pie than our
Mother. We used this tree as a ladder to climb up on the pitched (slanted) roof and slide down over the
back porch. Woe woz us when Daddy caught us doing this. But it formed one of our favorite sports. We
also would hang from the tree by our knees. Strange that none of us ever got hurt doing this other than
the spankings we got when daddy caught us.
The clothes lines were strung along this piece of earth outside mother's bedroom window. When we
had been swimming in the canal, lured by our friends whose father had one of the larger farms in our part
of the world. There huge black willow trees hung out over the water. We climbed the trees and crawled
out on the limbs and swung back and forth until we dropped into the water. When we returned home we
would hang up our muddy flour sack bloomers on the clothes line outside the windows of our mother's
bedroom. We were really very tidy children in our way. We had been well-taught and we never could
understand how Mother always knew when we had been in the canal. She told us she could see in our
eyes what we had been doing. So, nothing if not intelligent, we kept our eyes shut whenever we thought
perhaps we had misbehaved so she could not see into them our misdeeds. We often heard her laughing
softly to herself as she poked up the fire. We did not know why.
In the stockyard, behind the high board fence with the old German family Bible holding open the
gate, Daddy kept his cows in the now unused stables. I think I have mentioned that Daddy had no love
for horses. There was as an extension from the stanchion. (What that means I have no idea but it was
what we called this building). It contained loose boxes for horses things and had a hay loft overhead.
This was a another fine place for us to play. But whenever mother found us playing in the loose boxes,
forbidden, because of the sharp farm implements that were kept there. She would climb up the outside
ladder to the hay loft and make weird moaning and groaning sounds down through the cracks in the
boards. All of daddy's yelling and shouting could not drive us out like mother's moans. No wonder you
were afraid of the "twilight".
As an extension from the stanchion, was a long bowery type affair, made of pine pole uprights and
thatched with straw and here the sparrows had their nests by the thousands. As sparrows ate up the
wheat, we were encouraged to steal their eggs. This also kept us at home and not ranging out on the
alluvial plain to climb the cottonwoods after bird eggs as the rest of the neighborhood kids did.
The old stanchion was plastered and white washed on its exterior and a yard light hung from the
wall facing the stockyard. When we got a good pool of eggs we took turns trying to hit the light. The
result was the light remained serene and untouched and the whitewashed plaster wall took on a yellow
mottled color. What might be called vomit yellow. This never failed to wound our Father's artistic soul
and we often got spanked.
We never seemed to relate spanking to (1) throwing eggs at the yard light, (2) climbing the cherry
tree to swing from the roof, (3) falling from the willow trees into the canal, (4) opening the gates in the
irrigation ditches (5)playing hide and seek in the alfalfa the day before the cutters came and other
interesting amusements which we and the rest of the neighborhood kids enjoyed on long summer
afternoons. We just thought spanking was a part of our lives, especially when daddy seemed somewhat
grumpy.
I only remember one time when I related a spanking to something I had done, and that was one
holiday when I came around the corner of the house and saw before me Uncle King bending over the ice
cream freezer. I don't know why I did this. I was not a mean kid, but I suppose the target, so large and
enticing right there before me that it was irresistible, and I lifted my high button shoe and kicked him
right on target and he went right over the ice cream freezer. Strangely enough, I didn't get spanked for
this although daddy looked very stern. I noticed that mother, Wanda and Aunt Pearl had strangely
disappeared! I really wanted to be spanked then for I knew I had been really bad. Well, the ways of
grownups are not to be understood by small children.
To the far side of the cow sheds, daddy built three large hen coops and he started to raise White
Leghorn hens. We had to gather the eggs in large milk buckets almost as tall as we were. We would drag
them to the house. It was no small distance actually and it was no wonder that Mother stood ready to
open the door for us when we finally made it. I expect more concerned for the eggs than for our tender
backs. The buckets were heavy and we dragged them along between our legs straddled over them as it

51
were. We got paid for this task. But we placed no value on the money and always fought over whose turn
it was to do this chore..
My father farmed the bottom land along the Sevier River, and grazed sheep in the hills. The
thrashing crews did not stay at our holding, I imagine they were fed at Uncle King's. The shearing was
done down in front of our house. I remember that the wool was placed in long burlap sacks which hung
from a wooden frame, made of peeled logs. When the wool came to the top of the bag one of us children
was tossed into the bag to tramp down the wool. We took it by turns. Dad would throw us up in the air
and we landed in the wool. I remember how far away the top of the bag looked and how very small the
little bit of blue sky looked as I pumped my little legs up and down tramping the wool. But actually,
these bags were only about four feet long. He always had a wide grin on his face as he let us drop and
then lifted us out. Oh, we were having a great time he told us.
To the side of the house, downwind belowe the sheep pens and stockyard, we wandered far and
wide, well, actually, not all that far. We were quite small and our legs quite short. We probably were
never out of sight or hearing. Having no other children around us to follow or be influenced by we
became inventive and imaginative. We devised our own games and amusement which were not always
to the amusement of our parents. And if one of us got hurt, we all ran dead-on for the house, bellowing
all the way, the hurt and the quick in unison.
Mother planned little entertainments for us. We had picnics under the black willows with cake and
lemonade all of twenty yards from the house. Daddy incorporated the lesser farmyard chores into games
for us. Mother and daddy were still more lovers than parents.
Mother was also a joker. April Fool's Day, was her special day, when she could really let out all the
inventiveness in her soul. One year, Easter and April Fool's day came together, and I am sure even the
Lord regrets this particular circumstance for it has never happened since. Mother had taken eggs, (I will
say this for her. They were fresh and clean), and covered the raw eggs with chocolate and decorated them
with little flowers and swirls of icing sugar and put our names on them. Then handed them out, telling us
she would give a special treat to the one who ate her egg the fastest. One, two, three, GO! !Oh boy!
Chonk, cough, gasp, sputter, as the raw egg ran out of our mouths and down our chins. Mother laughed
and laughed. She had, unnoticed by us, put another egg down on the table. This was for daddy. She was
just "trying it out on us" may Heaven bless her memory. But you notice it and when she went to pick it
up the chocolate was all scarred with little groves of sharp teeth and the flowers were eaten off. We
enjoyed, you, Annivor, you were special to us, and also, no small event, you were the only one who ever
got the better of Mother on April Fool's Day.
In the front of the house, from the corner of the house along the front and curving out over the
veranda and running around to the back porch was a cement sidewalk. It was joined by a walk from the
gate to the veranda and a walk from the back porch to the wash house. We were able to enter the house
from either the front door or the back door with clean feet. We had a mud scrapper at the front door in
the best up town fashion.
The entire homestead, the dwelling house, the gardens and lawns, the orchard, the wash house, the
stockyard and the hen coops, covered one third of our property. The other two thirds of the property
formed the long arm of an "L" behind the stockyards. This was planted in alfalfa as fodder for the stock.
The alfalfa field was enclosed by a wire and pole fence which was grown over with burdock and
sage brush. At the near end of the field was a wooden stile (step gate) led to the open wasteland. This
stile was surrounded by blackberry bushes. Beyond this stile was the meadow where the Indians raised
their teepee village. Beyond this were the waste lands leading up to the hills.
Before we got the touring car, and daddy got affluent, we spend the evenings around the coal range,
popping corn, roasting pine cones, which we gathered in the canyons, or pulled molasses or honey taffy.
Daddy and mother told the same old stories and we never tired on listening.
But Daddy had no love for the noble horse and as soon as he got his first car horses were out.
Horses were for field work. The car was for a gentleman's pleasure.
One night when this gentleman was coming home from town in his car, he ran over a skunk, which,
I expect, was out about his peaceful nightly skunk business, ambling along the ruts of the road. He was
too low to be picked up by the head lights pointing up and around with the surface of the road and out
smelled by the gas exhaust fumes. A horse would have sensed the creature and veered away and the man
with horse would also have known it was nearby. Daddy ran it over and no car on earth, then or now

52
stands higher than the evidence of a slain skunk.
In the middle of the night, mother made daddy get up and move the car as far up the hill as it would
go, where the clear air could blow over it, or blow between the car and the house.
Daddy had to park the car down by the carrels for a long time, and rode a horse up to the house and
back when he wanted to use the car
But, a few misfortunes aside, Daddy never hurt for the good old horse and buggy days.
Amapola took us everywhere but into high society as they say and that wasnt a concern of ours.
Rhea was the oldest and she learned to drive in Amapola. Actually, Rhea "drove" from the time she
was about six.
As I said, my father thought legs were what you stretched out toward the fire on a cold night, and
my mother's brother-in-law had the first car agency in Richfield, or Sevier County for that matter, so
naturally we soon had a car.
It was one of these high chassed thin tired affairs with ising glass curtains that you rolled down (not
to be confused with rolling up glass windows now days) when it rained. I believe it also had carriage
lights on the side..
When daddy worked in the cheese factory and kept somewhat regular hours, every night after
supper we all got in the car for a ride. One of our favorite route was over to Sigurd and then through
Sigurd canyon which led into the Fish Lake canyon road or dug way as it was then called. These were
not roads. They were wagon tracks. I was always petrified with fear on these steep, narrow, rutted
winding roads.
Prudence demanded that you "honk" as you approached a curve, and if someone was approaching
from the other side, they "honked back. Whoevers honk sounded the farthest away, would pull off to
the side to allow the other car to make the curve first. Where two cars met on a curve, the tops of the pine
trees on the slope's below were sheered off.
I purely dreaded it when we turned off of the Sigurd road into the canyon road. Daddy would say to
Rhea, Do you want to drive? Rhea would leap into his lap and hold onto the steering wheel with both
little hands, as eager and bright eyed as a ground squirrel. She would toss her head and laugh as we
rounded a curve with the ground falling away almost in a sheer vertical drop both above and below.
Orpha would patiently wait her turn and then it was MY turn. Sick with fear, I would take my place.
Luckily, by then we would be back on what passed for level ground so my ordeal was lessened to that
degree. Being the eternal dumb bunny that I am, it never occurred to me to say, I didn't want to drive.
Daddy thought he was giving me a real treat.
Daddy could never understand that others may not share his enthusiasm in every way. Rhea would
be clamoring over me for her turn again and she got to "drive" the car into the home yard. She always sat
with a proud lift to her head when it was safely tethered along side the barn.
We didn't have garages, just an old piece of wagon tarp which was flung over the car if rain
threatened. The hens would roost all over it on mild nights. Even the cats and the dogs, and I expect a
few coyotes slept there from time to time.
Daddy pastured his cows out in the valley meadow. Every evening after supper we would all pile in
the car. It was a real touring car with a canvas top which left the car open but had ising glass blinds
which could be rolled down if a storm came up. It was a real Tintoretto with Rhea and mother and
daddy in the front and us kids in the back. We would drive out to the meadow and playe along the
irrigation ditch while Daddy milked the cows. Mother took you for little walks through the meadow
grass and picked flowers for you. The long rays of the setting sun warmed our bare wet legs and night
birds called softly as they flew toward their nests. The crickets started to chirp and the day went to sleep.
On our way home, we left most of the milk at the creamery, only taking what we needed for the
household. Then we would stopped at the Richfield Cafe and had an ice cream cone. We enjoyed our
slow, pleasant way of life. The family all together in the car eating ice cream cones. You asleep in
mother's lap, tired out after helping daddy drive the car all the way to the meadow.
We sang songs and daddy told us tales of the Indian Wars and the first Settlers. Where the family
was massacred by the Indians, which began the Wars. Where our old ranch had been. Showed us where
the Indians came down from the hills, swooping into the valley upon the sleeping white people, killing
them in their sleep.
Then tales of his early boyhood. Escapades with his nephews, LaConte Stewart, Julian Heppler, and

53
his cousin, King Seegmiller. They were all of the same age due to the large families the first settlers had.
On special trips, we would drive to Glenwood and see the old Heppler home, built by our
Grandfather. Then we would circle behind the hills through Sigard Canyon and go through the main
street of the little town of Sigard. See the old Co-op Store where mother clerked for her brother-in-law,
Will Gottfredson, Aunt Janeys husband. Then along the wooden bridge over the canal where the
willows hung down in the water. It was here that daddy courted mother and she promised to marry him
in spite of the fact that he was mostly "all nose".
We drove through the canyons. Sevier Canyon on a Sunday afternoon to see the "Woman Playing
An Organ" a natural rock formation that still stands.
Other times we would drive to Clear Creek Canyon, to hunt for Indian pictographs which Daddy
said they painted on the tops of the cliffs in their canoes as the land was then under water. Or to Fish
Lake where we stayed in the Heppler family compound, just like the Roosevelts and Kennendys at Port
Yanz, Hyannis. Only our homes were board cabins, a one room box with bunks for beds and outdoor
plumbing.
Once we made it to Bryce Canyon and slept out on the ground under the pine trees and watched the
sun come op over the canyon. On the Saturday before Easter, we went with all our friends and relations,
half the County, to the Indian Hills and rolled our eggs down these gently sloping red earth mounds.
I had always thought they were called Indian Hills because of their bright red and orange mottled
color, but later I learned that the name came because it was in these hills that the Indians massed together
before swooping down on the valley. (In her history of her father, J. M. Peterson, who married daddy's
second sister, Louisiana, Aunt Lou, Madge Peterson tells of her grandfather always looking anxiously
towards the hills. But I have no memory of any fearful remembrance of these times. But our people did
not come back into the valley until after the Indian Wars and when Brigham Young had decided it was
time to resettle here.
The street from the County Road (the main traffic artery into Richfield from the north) stopped at
our place. Beyond this was a rather hard trampled track which disappeared into the high sage brush.
There was one farm beyond our place where Reg Peterson and his young wife, Opal, lived. They were
really town-folk but I think Reg inherited this place from his father. He farmed with a sort of "gentry"
air, and always wore a white shirt and suit and polished shoes all day on Sunday. Opal was a beautiful
woman, much younger than our mother. They were very good friends. What I remember mostly about
Opal was that she wore lovely ball gowns and a beaded head band when they went out in the evening.
They often left their young son, Chad, for us to tend.
To the east and north of our place were two other farms. These were old farms, that is, the men who
ran them had been born on them. They were owned by Charlie Ogden, who had the willow trees over the
canal and Alex Jensen. He was a thin man with a round-shouldered stoop. His wife was quite large and
had a pronounced goiter. They had one daughter, Melba, who they brought up to be a lady. She played
the piano and never swung on the willow trees. The Ogden children were numerous and ran all around us
in size and ages. We learned a great deal from them. They had one daughter named Helen who was
somewhere around our ages. There were older daughters who attended the BYU and a whole passer of
boys of all ages, all very energetic. These two men were quite well-to-do. Still they lived as farmers, as
we did, rather than as townspeople.

Flash back to Richfield

After we moved to the Jensen home, our town home, in Richfield, daddy pastured his cows out in
the valley meadow. Every evening after supper we would all pile in the car. It was a real touring car with
a canvas top which left the car open but had ising glass blinds which could be rolled down if a storm
came up. It was a real Tintoretto with Rhea and mother and daddy in the front and us kids in the back.
We would drive out to the meadow and playe along the irrigation ditch while Daddy milked the cows.
Mother took you for little walks through the meadow grass and picked flowers for you. The long rays of
the setting sun warmed our bare wet legs and night birds called softly as they flew toward their nests.
The crickets started to chirp and the day went to sleep.
On our way home, we left most of the milk at the creamery, only taking what we needed for the
household. Then we would stopped at the Richfield Cafe and had an ice cream cone. We enjoyed our

54
slow, pleasant way of life. The family all together in the car eating ice cream cones. You asleep in
mother's lap, tired out after helping daddy drive the car all the way to the meadow.
We sang songs and daddy told us tales of the Indian Wars and the first Settlers. Where the family
was massacred by the Indians, which began the Wars. Where our old ranch had been. Showed us where
the Indians came down from the hills, swooping into the valley upon the sleeping white people, killing
them in their sleep.
Then tales of his early boyhood. Escapades with his nephews, LaConte Stewart, Julian Heppler, and
his cousin, King Seegmiller. They were all of the same age due to the large families the first settlers had.
On special trips, we would drive to Glenwood and see the old Heppler home, built by our
Grandfather. Then we would circle behind the hills through Sigard Canyon and go through the main
street of the little town of Sigard. See the old Co-op Store where mother clerked for her brother-in-law,
Will Gottfredson, Aunt Janeys husband. Then along the wooden bridge over the canal where the
willows hung down in the water. It was here that daddy courted mother and she promised to marry him
in spite of the fact that he was mostly "all nose". But these tales I have included in my history of our
family, all before your time.
In our rural home in Richfield, before we got the touring car, and daddy got affluent, we spend the
evenings around the coal range, popping corn, roasting pine cones, which we gathered in the canyons, or
pulled molasses or honey taffy. Daddy and mother told the same old stories and we never tired on
listening.
In my story of our family, I have tried to tell these old stores as I remember them; when we were all
together, happy and secure.
In our touring car, we drove through the canyons. Sevier Canyon on a Sunday afternoon to see the
"Woman Playing An Organ" a natural rock formation that still stands. The last time I came through on
the Trailways Bus, after visiting with my parents in Mesa, I told the travelers on the bus of this rock
formation. The bus driver stopped the bus and we all got out and the travelers took pictures. It seems
strange that now this wonder of the world is forgotten. But it is still there outlined against the sky just as
the road turns around the point of the mountain.
Or to Clear Creek Canyon, to hunt for Indian pictographs which Daddy said they painted on the tops
of the cliffs in their canoes as the land was then under water. Or to Fish Lake where we stayed in the
Heppler family compound, just like the Roosevelts and Kennendys at Port Yanz, Hyannis. Only our
homes were board cabins, a one room box with bunks for beds and outdoor plumbing.
Once we made it to Bryce Canyon and slept out on the ground under the pine trees and watched the
sun come op over the canyon. On the Saturday before Easter, we went with all our friends and relations,
half the County, to the Indian Hills and rolled our eggs down these gently sloping red earth mounds.
I had always thought they were called Indian Hills because of their bright red and orange mottled
color, but later I learned that the name came because it was in these hills that the Indians massed together
before swooping down on the valley. (In her history of her father, J. M. Peterson, who married daddy's
second sister, Louisiana, Aunt Lou, Madge Peterson tells of her grandfather always looking anxiously
towards the hills. But I have no memory of any fearful remembrance of these times. But our people did
not come back into the valley until after the Indian Wars and when Brigham Young had decided it was
time to resettle here.
In Richfield, we were still children and lived as children in our father's family, provided for by our
father and loved by our mother, a happy little family group. In Tremonton, we were grown up and about
our individual affairs. We still lived as a family, taking our vacations now at Yellowstone Park and
driving around the country in the evening. We entertained friends with popped corn, lemonade and layer
cake. But now, our family was lessened or increased by young men and married couples the age of our
parents, as our social life changed.
This was the home in Richfield where Annivor was born and where we lived for another four years
before selling this place and moving uptown when daddy became assistant manager of the cheese
factory. We lived uptown for perhaps a little over a year before moving to Tremonton, Box Elder
County, in the extreme north of Utah. In the extreme North Pole we thought that first winter. And these
were your family, your neighbors and friends. You were five when we moved to Tremonton.

55
 Odds & Ends

Father gets Conned

Then father really got conned. He was offered a job milking a herd of cows. All he had to do was
milk a few cows in the morning and at night (well, you are all laughing now, I can tell). He got a fine
home rent free, land for a garden, and it was really a bargain. Dad took the job sight unseen.
The farmer moved them out there and then left them (in a hurry I presume). There was only a litter
one-room shack made of boards. No interior facing or caulking between the boards. They did overlap
and there was a little lean-to for a kitchen. Mother was so pregnant that he could not move her back to
Richfield and they had no place to go anyway.
The cows were across the river from the shack, and the only bridge was a mile away. Father had to
hike up to the bridge and back, a trip of two miles, to milk the cows which he could have spit over from
the stoop of the shack.
There is no point in mentioning the fine fertile land he had for a garden, the soil was pure alkali, not
even sage brush grew around there. Anyway, it was in September. The only thing to do was to stick it out
until I was born, and as I took my time, father never quite forgave me the time he spent milking cows on
that cursed spot.
He moved back to Richfield and I do not know what he did them, but Orpha was born in a house of
sawed logs (a step up from unfinished logs).

Haunted Adobe House

The first house we lived in in Richfield was a little adobe house. I believe it had two rooms, a
bedroom and kitchen
Our neighbors were the Orricks on one side, with Beth about my age, and Rassumsens on the other.
He was the county marshal, a big man with a big western type hat. He had a teen-age daughter who was
very glamorous. She had a room of her own with flowered curtains and little cupie (sp?) dolls all over
and pictures on the wall. There was a rug on the floor in front of her bed.
We loved to go over and watch here get dressed for a party. She wore lacy, frilly under things,
painted her face, and curled her hair. We stood open-mouthed in front of such beauty. Mother was
always sort of no non-sense about artificial beauty. She believed in virtue and cleanliness. I must
confess that even at that early age I noticed that Miss Rassmusen was not too clean with all of her finery.
Beth was our boon companion. This house was large, sprawled out, full of people, unmade beds
and babies. There were several married sisters who were always visiting with their children. There was a
rather sad little orchard in the back of the Orrick place and an old bed stead where we would play.
Orpha reminded me of the time when we were trying to get the bed put up". These beds were
collapsible. (This was the pioneers equivalent of a roll-away bed). Well, we tried and tried to put this
bed up. Finally we all knelt down and prayed there in the orchard and lo the bed was put up.
We moved to a little cement stucco house close by the house which was to be our home for most of
our childhood. The little house was originally of adobe but had been stuccoed with rough cement. The
first houses in Richfield were log or adobe and later on these houses were covered stucco. Morning
glories were usually planted to cover the adobe and these beautiful lilies still have an attraction for me.
This house had two stories, two rooms downstairs, connected by a dog run and one room upstairs. It
had a basement root cellar and here the former owner had hanged himself. It was said that he haunted the
house. (Actually it was a moon shiner ----- but we didnt know this). We accepted the haunted story told
about ghosts and ----.
Our next house was the Haunted Home ". This was next to the house we finally lived in. Actually,
we were to live in Uncle Ed's house. He was going to move to California, but didn't. We ended up
moving around until we could get into our home. The Haunted House was haunted because a man and
his wife who had lived there hanged themselves in the root cellar. Reluctantly I will pass over the events
that happened in this house and our experience with the "ghost of the old men who came down the stairs
every night to search for his wife."
Father rented a small house in the Third Ward in Richfield. It was a little two-room adobe structure,

56
with something of a lawn in front.
We were not there very long but this little house was quite near to the business district in Richfield,
so we for the first time came into a town society and association with town children. We were soon part
of the neighborhood gang. Rhea started to school almost immediately and so from the start, had this elite
social association with the best families in town, as she started in Miss Ada's "A" Grade, which was
made up of the smartest kids and the ones whose fathers had the most money and highest prestige.
Orphan and I had another year of freedom and after we moved to our own house which was on the
outskirts of town our associations were with the kids of that neighborhood which was lower in social
status as far as the town society went. I make this distinction because I rather think it set Rhea apart from
Orpha and me as her first contacts with society being with the highest level and our first contacts being
with the more common classes. Rhea early on developed a certain elegance and social presence that I
never did attain, and that Orpha perhaps did not attain until high school. Her friends were always with
the children from the better families. Orpha and I continued on for that first year pretty much as we had
while on the ranch.
Richfield was then divided into three districts, corresponding to the three Wards. The First Ward
was to the south and comprised the trade people and small businessmen. The Second Ward, in the center,
was made up of the professional and wealthier trades people, well, the managers rather than the
salespeople, that class of people, and the Third Ward to the north, was the small holders and farmers and
ranchers, and the temporary or transitory unemployed, the miners, and the more humble tradespeople, the
blacksmith, the saddler, the freighters, the poor widows, the lower economic groups. The houses were
small and rather far apart as most people in this group had some kind of farmland where they raised hay,
some wheat, garden vegetables, and maintained poultry, cows and pigs. They were largely dependent
upon what they raised. They were honest, proud people and self-sustaining, but lacking those
advantageous which would have put them in the "high society"

Ranch

My first memories are of living on the "ranch. It stood on a little spur standing out from the
mountain and into the valley between Glenwood and Richfield, and covered with a black outcropping of
lava, sage and bitter grass.
These first memories of this ranch tie into the Flower Valley. This must have happened before
Orpha was old enough to walk. She would have to be at least two. (Of course, she walked before she was
two, but it is hardly conceivable that mothers would put her into the back of the wagon unless she was
fairly able to get about.)
This valley lives in my memory as the most beautiful place in the world. The sky is forever blue.
The earth was forever green and wild flowers were forever blooming. Alas for the stern realism of the
pioneers. Their minds did not run to the romantic and my Shangri-la was known as Sheep Valley and
we were going to the sheep herd.
The three of us, Rhea and Orpha and I, were in the back seat of a wagon crossing a little un-bridged
creek. The hills, tapestried with June, swept up on either side like a rich green carpet covered with
white and yellow flowers. In the distance were the mines and the cement plant. South were the canyons
leading down to Piute County. To the west was the Capital Reef area with rugged red table hills which
were deeply carved by wind and rain. To the east were the East Hills and they were the fairyland of my
childhood memories.
We were very tiny girls then, and mother had to take us out of the wagon while dad drove on down
the steep wooded trail. Then, so mother says, he yelled to her to come on down. But the wooded hillside
teamed with wild range cattle and mother, clutching the three of us, was afraid to come down. Dad had to
climb back up the hill to get us.
(Here is how it happens as Mother and Dad tell it)
So about that time my Uncle Ed, he had established himself with this big sheep ranch, (Registered
Ramble A U) He ran about five hundred of them. He wanted me to go out and work with him and
eventually become half owner in the ranch. So I was there on that ranch. I was working on the sheep
ranch and in the spring we would take the sheep to the upper pastures. It would take about three weeks to
get there. It was a full days job. You would hear the bells about three in the morning and out you would

57
go. Then you would have to stay with them pretty well all day long.
The little lambs would cuddle up under the big sage. The old ewes that didn't have lambs would
know where they were going and they would strike out. You had to have one man at the head of the
heard and one at the back. You had to get those little lambs up. They usually would only shade for an
hour or two. That is all they would stay there.
By the time I got there, why I would go right up and I would go to bed. I would be sound asleep
after having my mutton and my sour dough goggs (biscuits). The next morning I would eat a good
breakfast of more mutton and sour dough bread, get on my horse and make it back. I would make it back
in a day.
Well this one time I had just got home and here came a horse and rider as hard as he could come.
This relative of the caretakers sister was not expected to live and could I go back up there so he could
come down? I said, "Oh yaw I guess I will have too if they couldn't get anybody else." "No they couldn't
get anybody else."
Mother came down as I was saddling up my horse and she said, "Where are you going?" I told her
and she said, "Your not going to leave me here alone." "I have had enough of it."I said, "What am I
going to do?" You go get that little sorrow horse and hook onto that buckboard. "Me and the girls are
going with you." Well I didn't think you would want to go." And we didn't get away until six o-clock.
You know what a buckboard is don't you? We hooked up my horse and another riding horse so we
could travel fast. We trotted nearly all the way in this little buckboard. We put our bedding and what we
needed on the bottom of the buckboard and laid the little girls in there with a blanket and a quilt over
them. We got in the seat and away we went. Those buckboards came up and they just had a seat across it
and then it came down and had about that much railing around it. It was just something you used. It was
just like a pickup now. It was light to carry around.
We drove in the moon light and when the moon went down we couldn't see the road any more. We
were following a sheep trail road because that was the quickest way to get there. And that ain't a road,
that is just a trail. Oh some places it was a road and some places it was a trail and I didn't dare drive after
the moon went down.
We left the three little girls in the buckboard and we went down on the ground on a grassy spot
there in the quaking asps laying there on the quilt. We stayed there the rest of the night until it was light.
When Rhea woke up and saw one of those round groves of quaking asps she said, "Oh daddy can I go
over there and build me a little play house?" She was a sweet little thing. So I hitched up the team, took
the hobbles off, gave them a little to eat, laced the kids down and the way we went. We were on the road
again almost by daylight.
And we went, came down to what they called The Butchers Dugway and dropped down into
Seven Mile creek. We went down this way and then as we crossed the valley the creek was up on the
other side. We turned around and looked at it. I stopped the team. The whole mountain was waving
Columbines, purple and white Columbines. Prettiest sight we ever did see in our whole lives. We sat
there for quite awhile.
Finally we got up to the sheep herd about noon that day.
(Mother) Before that let me tell my little part. We got to this one place and you said, "Now you can
get out and walk the rest of the way ." And right before me was the biggest old ugliest bull you ever did
see just a staring me right in the face. And I said, "I'm not getting out before that old bull."Go on, you
can get out and walk." I said, "I won't do it." "I am not going to get out by the front of that old bull." So
finally he decided I could stay in the buggy.
(Dad) No mother that is wrong.
(Mother) Is that wrong? We went along and finally there was a place where the road dropped down
into a creek and the road stopped. There was no road. Of course we had crossed here before but with a
cat wagon. You had rough locks on your wheels. When you were ready you turned the horses loose and
hoped they landed straight up when they hit the bottom. That is when I made her get out. I made you get
out because I didn't dare let you ride.
I said, "Now all you have to do is take the kiddies down to the foot of the hill and I will wait for you
down there where the creek is." So I got the wheels all locked up and I got on and said, "Get up." And
those horses you know just slid down there on their haunches.
After I got down there and got things straighten up, I looked up and there she was standing right

58
where I had left her with the kids huddled around her.
I said, "Come on." She said, "I will not" "What's wrong?""I won't come with that big bull down
there." I said, "Hell! that big bull is more scared of you than you are of it."
(Mother) Do you think me and those three kids was going down there with all those wild animals?
I didn't go down there with the three kids all alone. The bull didn't come after me neither. I slept all alone
with those three kids in a tent. I mean I laid with them. I don't think I slept any. But they were beautiful
days. They sure were.
We slept in a tent, cooked over a campfire and had canned milk on our oatmeal, and I remember the
heavy sweet taste of this milk.
One of the sheep herders made little wooden dolls for us, which he carved out of a soft pine bough.
The wood was smooth and white and wonderfully scented. The arms and legs of these dolls were carved
separately and joined to the body and head with bits of wire. But first, the naked little body was held
against a red-hot iron until there-was a little round hole burned in the back (I remember hiding my head
in mothers apron while this was going on. I took my poor little hurt doll and wrapped him in my
petticoat and crooning to him so he would be comforted. Then a rod was fixed into the hole. When you
sat on a plank laid across the top of a barrel, and held the doll on the free end of the plank and struck the
plank with your hand, the little doll would dance a jig. How fascinated we were with this little toy made
for us by this old, one-legged sheepherder.
I do not remember his name, nor can I remember his face, but I have only to turn backward into
memory and the little wooden doll dances for me again.
We also had little wooden whistles carved out of the willow branches. We whistled through the
leaves of lilac bushes and through the leaves of the cottonwood tree. But these tasted bitter and had a
sticky feel, while the lilac leaves were cool and smooth against my lips. We whistled through our
thumbs, held close together against our cupped hands, and this was a long sad mournful moo sort of
whistle. I could never be sure I was going to produce this sound. I could never whistle with my lips,
although both Rhea and Orpha could. Rhea, especially, would whistle gaily as she worked.

Hepp Electrical Works

59
 Andrew Heppler family. Louisianna Heppler seated. Taken on her 74th birthday.

60
 Chapter 7

Early Histories
By Nola Heppler

#1

To begin, we were "born of goodly parents." Mothers people were colonial Americans, farmers and
frontiersmen. They were early members of the Church, and were at Kirkland, Nauvoo, and Winter
Quarters. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in the early 1850's and settled first in Springville, Kanab,
St. George, and Manti, where mother was born. Her father was the recorder of the St. George Temple
and then the Manti Temple, and mother grew up in a deeply spiritual home where the help of the Lord
was sought and obtained daily to meet the needs of their humble home. Mother was a deeply spiritual
woman with great faith and love of service to others.
Father's people were German. They had emigrated to Canada. There they joined the Church and
came to Utah in 1875. They were "called" to go to Sevier County to help settle that land which had been
devastated by Indian wars which had lasted for seven years. Mother loved father all of her life and was
his devoted slave until her health failed. Then in a rather surprising turn about, dad became the devoted
slave of mother. It was said that father would starve to death sitting by a loaf of bread and a bottle of
milk if there were no one there to slice the bread and pour out the milk.
Rosco Zar Heppler, Sr., was the youngest of the eighteen children of Andrew (Andreas) and Louisa
Anna Seegmiller Heppler. Andreas was born in Oefingen, Wurrtenburg, Germany, and Louisia was born
in Ontario, Canada. Her parents came from what was then Alsace in France and is now the Ruhr area of
Germany. Andreas came with his family to Canada when he was about eight years old.
How he met grandmother is not really known. There are a lot of romantic stories about it.
(Fathers version)
A man by the name of Seegmiller had a big tannery up there and father got a job there. This
Seegmiller also had a beautiful daughter by the name of Lucy, Louisianna,. Father fell in love with her
and they got married. This Louisianna had her own maid. She never even had to comb here own hair.
Her room was taken care of and everything else
(Orphas version)
Adam Seegmiller was a wealthy man. He owned and operated a tannery and also owned large tracts
of land. Grandmother Heppler told the story that on her sixteenth birthday, a large dinner was given to
which all of the apprentices at the tannery were invited. Among them was Andreas Heppler, who was a
young, handsome, high spirited man, who threw her a rose and cried out, "One day you will be my wife."
Grandmother thought this quite impossible, but only one year later they were married. Andreas was 10
years older than "Lucy" and if this event happened on her sixteenth birthday and he was then a new
apprentice, she said this was the first time she had seen him, he would have been age twenty-six which is
rather old to be an apprentice. I do not think we can accept that he was a new apprentice. He did learn
the tannery trade but it is probable that he was completing his apprenticeship rather than starting it.
They were converted to the Mormon faith and came to Utah bout 1870. Andreas was a very talented
man and a skilled artisan, and he was a molder of iron that is, he molded ornamental iron which was used
as decoration for homes. They lived in a town which had a big iron foundry and he made very good
money and was considered quite wealthy. I expect they thought to set up in Salt Lake City in the manner
in which they had lived.
The Seegmillers were a wealthy family as well, but their father had lost his money backing a
railroad which never was built, and they were left with very little after his fathers death. But they were
"raised" to wealth and grandmother had a personal maid until she married.
Grandmothers brothers and her mother (Anna Eva Knutchul ) had settled in St. George and she and
Andrew went to St. George, whether to settle or just to visit is not known, but the Black Hawk Indian
War was just ending and they may have been marooned there.
Mother and father were both high-spirited and fond of entertaining and loved crowds. There was
much laughter in the home and sorrow was brief and easily dispelled. The children were spanked as
much and perhaps more than the other children of the neighborhood, but they were loved equally as

61
much. They lived in a clean, comfortable home, with fire in the stove and food on the table and always
an extra place ready to be laid for the passing friend or stranger. There usually were guests for father was
a good provider and he loved a friendly group around him.
Father had a strong sense of responsibility toward his family and he worked hard and regularly and
spent his money at home. The children grew up in an atmosphere of security when honesty and
generosity were the standards. You could say they were a normal Latter day Saint family of that time and
place. Every man was his brother's keeper and quick to help when help was needed.
The first three children were Rhea, Orpha, and Nola. They can be thought of as a single unit since
they were born so close together and grew up in a rather isolated area. They had no other companions
until they were of school age, so it natural to think of them as one unit. However, from the very start it is
apparent that they were individual children with individual interests and motives.
Mother liked to have people think they were triplets. The family lived on a small ranch until they
reached school age and then moved into Richfield. Thus, they were practically newcomers in Richfield
although the family was well known in that community. Nevertheless, outside of the family, no one
would have known our ages and it satisfied some need of mother to have them appear as triplets. There
was very little in such a small community to set one person apart from another and she may have enjoyed
having people think she had given birth to triplets.
In any event, she dressed them all alike. They always got the same toys and in every way, were
treated as one individual rather than three.
Nola do not remember when she consciously began to rebel against this conformity, but was old
enough to notice how other people dressed and had come by some money. She had won a prize and was
determined to have her very own dress. She bought the material, a yellow plaid gingham (They were
distinguished by different colored trim on their dresses, Rhea wore rose-colored ribbons, Nola wore blue
and Orpha wore green ). This was her first step toward emancipation. She designed a little dress. Drew a
picture of it and mother made it up for her. She was very happy until she realized that mother had made
exact dresses for Rhea and Orpha but in different colors.
After this their personalities began to emerge but it was not until they were in high school that they
really began to show separate personalities. They grew apart in high school and it was not until World
War II that Rhea and Nola were together again. Even then, they were soon parted as she moved with
her husband and Nola went on to a mission and then to school. Rhea always wrote and told all about her
children and her affairs so they were always in touch.
Nola remembers one time when my father gave her a pail of milk just after the evening milking and
told her to take it to a family who had just moved into a small house down the street. She asked why
(nosey as always) and he just said, "We have more than we need and we are sharing it with these
people." He never said that they were very poor and that they had an invalid child who needed milk. That
the bishop had come and talked to him and asked him to supply this family with milk. He just said that
we had more than we needed, and we thought no more about it. We just carried the milk to this family
every evening. It was typical of father that he did not require that they come to him for the milk, he sent
it to them.
Mother supported father in this and all other such matters. In fact, mother dearly loved to visit the
sick and take them the results of her cooking. She was a wonderful cook and she loved to have people eat
and enjoy her cooking.
At this early age, the children were taught that they were to care for others and give of their excess.
And perhaps for this reason they never counted themselves as poor. They always thought they were
wealthy and as they grew older and thought things through, they realized that they were blessed rather
than wealthy, for there is a difference. This is a trait that they have maintained all of our lives. Give of
your excess, not in a spirit of charity but just simply because you have more than you need and therefore
can share with others.
They were also rich as to the material things of the world, although they never lived in a pretentious
manner. Both the maternal and paternal grandparents had been wealthy before joining the Church. They
really never had an opportunity to become wealthy again, nevertheless, they were accustomed to a
superior quality of life and they maintained these characteristics in their frontier homes.
The frontier was rapidly disappearing and a more normal community and social structure emerged
before these characteristics were dissipated. In fact, Richfield had high social pretensions.

62
 Though raised in almost total poverty, father had a taste for the good life. He and the family lived
well after he once got settled in Richfield. Before that, while they lived on the ranch life was quite
austere.
My father was born in Glenwood. Mother was born in Manti, Sanpete County, but, after her parents
died, when she was about 16, she went to Sigurd in Sevier County, and lived with her sister, Janet who
had married Will Gottfredson.
Aunt Janey was very elegant and so was Uncle Will but he was very droll and always had some joke
going. I remember once we were out riding with him. He had one of the first cars in Sevier County and
of course the roads were just back country roads and we came to a rise and could see nothing at all
beyond this rise and Uncle Will had us all believing that this was the end of the world and we would
drop off into nothing as soon as we got to the top of the rise.
Uncle Will managed the Sigurd Merc (general store). Sigurd was even smaller than Glenwood but
had a gypsum mine and my father was working at the mill where gypsum was processed into whatever it
is used for. It was a terribly messy job and father was always covered with white dust. Of course the
boys from the mill hung around the Merc, and my father met my mother. She was not all that excited
about him.
As my father left school, he was not able to find any kind of work, and finally had to"go to the
mines". This was considered a great disgrace as it was the last chance. He found work at the gypsum
mines in Sigurd, an even smaller community than Glenwood. He was very disconsolate at this time but
Grandmother did her best to cheer him up, telling him that everything would work out for the best, "...
you will see, Raussie." "Raussie" was the German diminutive of Ross and my father was always called
this until we moved to Tremonton.
But my father's advent upon Sigurd was the second act of the play. The first act concerned my
mother. Her parents had died in Manti, where she was born and attended school. She was just sixteen
when her mother died. As she then no longer had a home, she went to live with her married sister, Jane,
who had married Will Gottfredson. Uncle Will managed the Sigurd Mere (mercantile establishment, to
give it its full and dignified name) and mother clerked in this store.
Mother was a lovely girl. I think quite a bit like Rhea. She was very high spirited, fun-loving, and
pert. She received many offers of marriage from the customers of the "mere" including one from an old
Japanese farm laborer to whom she had been quite courteous. This was her way, of course, for she
seldom disliked anyone. Of course, the boys from the mines hung out at the "merc" and thus my father
and my mother met.
The Manti girls were very independent because after all, Manti had the temple, and the other towns
just had mills and tanneries and that sort of things. (They were mostly farmers) But my father had not at
this time heard too much about Manti, he hadn't roved that far, and he was a Richfield boy, and that
should satisfy any Sigurd girl.
They did start to walk out along the canal bank where the willows hung down and over the bridge
and soon they were married. Father always said they had a long courtship, but mother said it was very
short. She would always say that she would have preferred a long courtship but the reason she married
father so quickly was in order to get married at all. This used to make fathers very mad, but whatever, his
two Siamese twin pals, (who? Arthur and King) who were also his cousins, had early and speedy
marriages, so that although the three were married about the same time, the first children of these cousins
were older than us.
To set your minds at rest, mother and father were married June 10, 1914, and Rhea was born July
1915, all with time to spare. I was born in September of 1916, and Orpha in December of 1917.
My mother really loved to ride in a car and Uncle Will and Aunt Janey would often come and take
he and us for a ride. Uncle Will and Aunt Janey would sit in the front seat and mother and all of us
would be in the back. With wind blowing, hair blowing and skirts blowing, mother really loved it. I
expect we went almost ten miles per hour, and the roads were mostly like washboards with tall sage
brush along the barrow pits on either side. Mother would laugh and sing. We all thought we were having
fun. Mother always could convince us that we were having fun, regardless of what was going on. She
had a lovely alto voice and she would, sing, Oooooh, isn't this fuuuuuun. We would laugh and coo
alone with her. The three dumb little bunnies that we were.
At the time mother and father were married, the years of the First World War were approaching.

63
Father was not called up, but all of our lives were affected by this war. The economy in Sevier County
was rather poor. The second generation growing up could not find work and the land would not support
more families, so young men had to learn to take what they could find. I do not know how father came to
leave the mill, he hated it like poison for one thing and so did mother. It was so dirty, and he did not like
being inside. He worked as a tailor for a while and then took over a little ranch his brother, Ed, had in the
hills between Glenwood and Richfield. We always called this "the Ranch." Rhea was born in a little log
house in Richfield and I think this was when dad was a tailor.
Rhea was a happy little girl and remained a happy person all of her life. She had straight dark hair,
quite thick, and little buck teeth and as she was mostly smiling, her little two teeth were the first thing
you noticed about her. She was quite small and very slender and had small hands and feet, very tiny
bones (a Heppler trait). And she was quite musical, from her earliest days, she would hum or sing little
melodies, and she loved to dance. She was very loving and she was quick to sympathize with everyone
and rejoiced with others in their happiness.
Mother was no social climber. She had her own place and she was very comfortable in it. Her sister
Janie lived in the First Ward. Uncle Will had a car agency and a gas station and while he was well to do,
they did not belong to the first circle.
The Richfield men - high and low - loved to hunt and fish and we camped out. They would all
leave their business to go hunting or fishing. But the more responsible men, bankers, lawyers, judges,
doctors, and school teacher didnt have the freedom of the more independent men so they were in a more
settled, necessarily restrictive, society.
My fathers sisters, E---- and Lulu had married professional men. Uncle J.M. was a banker. Uncle
Henry a judge. Aunt Eva Mi--- was a well to do widow whose sons were all at the BYU. Uncle Sterling
was the county attorney. Aunt Lois and Aunt Hazel entertained lavishly. Aunt Milli just kept a
comfortable open house. Aunt Lu really entertained the VIPs who visited, SLC General Authorities of
the Church and political leaders. She always invited mother.
Dad, of course, preferred the camp fire and Uncle King and Uncle Frank still lived on their ranches.
But our town cousins frequently visited us as they enjoyed the open family like atmosphere of our
home. Uncle Sterling particulary liked to come out after his office was closed and just lean on the fence
and talk to daddy. He often brought his oldest son, Kendall, with him. Kendal and Rhea were the same
age and both were in Miss Adas class. Kendall was very fond of Rhea. He was more like a big brother
to her and in a sense he sponsored her into society. He always danced with her and looked after her.
These little masculine attentions that give a little girl so much self confidence.
Kendall, of course, came from one of the best families and so was a real catch. He was handsome,
well mannered, and had the advantage of a child of a prominent wealthy family. He and Rhea were
always the closest of friends all of her life. He would go out of his way to come and see her when
traveling near by. Thus she had the advantage of this more refined culture and had a natural inclination
of the social customs.
I was talking about an example of this in Tremonton when Rhea was a leader of our social group.
Well, we all went around together as a Gleaner Class but Rhea was one of the leaders and she set the
standard as it were of what was socially right and what was wrong.
As an example, one girl whose family was better situated financially and who had attended college
came back to Tremonton to announce her engagement. It was one of our social mores that we gave a
"shower" the bride. So we planned a shower for this girl, but when she came back to this week end to
Tremonton to show off her ring and all, she informed us that she really would not have time for our
shower as she would only be there the one day (Sunday) and her Sorority sisters were coming to an
engagement tea (to which we were not invited), but she could give us a half hour between dinner and the
time the sorority sisters came.
This really shook our little social group. We just though everyone would be delighted to have us
give a shower for them. And we reacted on a typical small town way: drop dead! But Rhea pulled them
together and they, following her, humbly went at the appointed time and left at the appointed time,
leaving their homemade gifts. All but me, I refused and swung as high in the old swing as it would go all
that afternoon. Rhea was very angry with me. Regardless of the reception we received, the correct thing
to do was to make the visit.
And I think this is a true picture of Rhea. She did that which was proper and she did it with a cheerful

64
and loving heart. She could never hold a grudge or discrimination, but held a loving
and compassionate friendship for everyone. This was her unique personality.
I cannot clearly recall Rhea in her early years. We lived on a small ranch near Glenwood and I
suppose parents always have a particular love for their first child. Rhea seemed much closer to mother
and father and I think she stayed closer to them than did the rest of us. I do not remember that she roved
about as Orpha and I did. Orpha and I were always roving about. We had most of Sevier County in our
back yard and we wandered all over. Orpha was absolutely fearless and very ingenious.
As I have said, we were very young when we moved to Richfield. My father worked for the Valley
Cheese Corporation. There were a number of small farming communities around Richfield, and these
farmers sold their milk to the Corporation. Dad drove the milk truck gathering up the milk. I often rode
with him on these rounds. Later, dad worked in the factory, making cheese, and we spent a lot of time
playing around the factory. I remember a great vat of melted wax in which the cheese was dipped to
protect it while aging, and we used to put our hands into this wax over and over again until we had
collected a deep enough coating of wax to make a glove. We always threw the gloves back into the vat
where they were soon melted down and I guess the cheese never minded.
The railroad ran close by the factory with a loading dock and a water tank, and we played along the
tracks, and put nails and other bits of metal which we found on the rails and the train, running over them,
would flatten them out and we would imagine little stories about the strange shapes that we found after
the train has passed over them.
My father became the assistant manager and then was transferred to Tremonton to manage the
factory there. The Sego Milk Company had purchased the cheese co-op but in Tremonton, the milk was
manufactured into pasturized milk. The cheese factory just went out of business somewhere along the
way, but it was once a very colorful place and a marvelous place for kids to play. I don't remember that
anyone ever chased us away or scolded us.
My parents with their numerous kin were great on outings in the hills. There were many canyons in
the hills around Richfield, and we spent a lot of time in these canyons, climbing the cliffs and wading in
the streams. We would have a picnic and there would be fried chicken, pork and beans, potato salad and
a freezer of ice cream.
One canyon had very steep cliffs on each side with a small stream at the bottom and a narrow
wagon track by the stream. Indian hieroglyphics were all along the tips of these cliffs, and it was said
that at one time the water reached the tops of the cliffs and the Indians made the drawings from canoes. I
do not know if this is indeed true.
Another big event was the county fair, and both mother and father were involved in this. Mother
with the Farm Home exhibits. She usually won many prizes with her fruits and preserves. Dad was a
judge with the livestock and had to do with the racing, horse pulling and other events of this nature. We
then spent our time around the concessions and the stables and carrels. We seemed to be very free to do
as we pleased. I marvel now that we had so much freedom. We were after all some distance from town
and we all came and went as we pleased. Mother always left a big pot of chile and we ate when we were
hungry. I doubt that we were ever supervised.
The story of Annivor started in the late fall of 1923.
Another big event was the arrival of fall and the preparation for winter. We had moved from the
Hill Ranch to Richfield when Rhea was old enough to start school and were living in what we always
afterwards called "our home". Daddy purchased this home and its grounds from his eldest brother, John
Edmund Heppler, who had moved to California
. It was the time of the "great annual vacation" when all of the men went into the mountains for the
winter meat -- free for ten days from the demands of their womenfolk; when the womenfolk, their men
out from underfoot, turned out the house for a final cleaning before bringing in the parlor stove. The
ornate metal plate covering the chimney hole There was a great deal to be done before this annual event
which separated summer from winter.
They were free for ten days from the demands of their womenfolk; while the womenfolk, their men
out from underfoot, turned out the house for a final cleaning before bringing in the parlor stove. The
ornamental metal plate was removed from the chimney hole in the parlor had been removed before the
men left. That was their part in this important event. The soot had to be cleaned from the chimney and
the house cleaned from the soot.

65
 Winter bedding was brought out from the storage trunks in the attic and aired and shook out and as
far as possible freed from the smell of moth balls. Curtains were taken down, windows washed, the
curtains cleaned and rehung. The carpets taken up, hung on the clothes lines and the summer dirt beaten
out of them before the onslaught of the winter mud tracked in from the roads and yards.
The kitchen was cluttered with drying clothing hung before the fire. Children were put into long
underwear. The summer was over, the harvest gathered in, vegetables and fruit dried and stored in clean
flour sacks hung in the airy loft. Potatoes and vegetables were buried in straw and dirt in the root cellar.
Apples laid out on the long shelves. In short, the house was made secured against the winter.
The bringing down of game from the mountains was the last event in this long chain of preparation.
Everyone took a deep breath and gave thanks for a bountiful harvest which would make it possible to
survive through another winter.
The heat of summer was over, the autumn winds blowing cold, the cattle were brought in from the
meadows and housed in the long stanchions. The hay stacked high in the loft.
With the men away for two blessed weeks. The women were in charge. And, faith, they needed the
rest, for there had been much cooking before the men went off. Women had few opportunities to show
themselves approved. Their kitchens were their thrones and their cooking their crown jewels. No wife
would send her husband off to the hunt without seeing that he was well provisioned with the riches from
her treasure house, bread, cookies, down doughnuts and cinnamon rolls. Beans provided the rest of the
nourishment. They expected to have game for meat.
Mother showed her independence and control of the household by cooking all of the food Daddy
didn't like and which we never had when he was home. Chief among the foods cooked were baked
beans, lemon pie and doughnuts.
Mother never cooked doughnuts when Daddy was home since the time after one particular hunt. We
were all over to Aunt Pearl's and Uncle King's for dinner and Daddy and Uncle King got telling stories
of the hunt. Daddy, with more enthusiasm than wisdom, told of one man, who had a very long nose,
whose turn it was to prepare the supper while the others took care of the horses and dressed out the game
while waiting for the main camp to come in.
This man laid down and went to sleep, lying on his back, mouth open and snoring heartily. The men
were rather put out for they were cold, tired and hungry. They woke him up by trying to ring his long
nose with Mother's doughnuts. Daddy and Uncle King laughed until tears came to their eyes. But
Mother's eyes got a little glint in them and that was the last time she made doughnuts except when Daddy
was out with the hunt.
One of her few concessions to Women's Lib for she was a loving and caring wife and mother.
But that was more than flesh and blood could stand and she took her time repaying him.
Now it was the time for the return of the hunters. The women kept a lookout from their windows for
the first sign of blowing snow coming down from the mountain signaling the coming of the heavy
horse-drawn sledges carrying the men and their kill.
Our place was the first stop on the homeward journey and the sledge runners cut deeply into the
snow. The men shouted and hollowed, their dogs barking in the excitement of homecoming.
We all ran out into the road, Mother, Rhea, Orpha and I. Rhea was eight, I was seven and Orpha six.
We all stood in the snow until the sled stopped in front of our gate. Daddy jumped out of the sled. The
men threw down "our" deer. Mother ran towards him when one of the dogs leaped at her. One of the men
cried out, "Watch out, that dog has rabies." Mother was generally fearless, but she turned sharply and
fled toward the gate and fell on the slippery snow-packed ice. She didn't try to get up just rose to her
hands and knees and crawled, paddling through the snow past the gate and right up to the porch.
By this time Daddy had reached her and helped her up. The dog had died, probably his lunge at
Mother had been mostly dying reflex. After seeing that Mother was all right, the men drove off, and we
could hear them laughing as they rounded the corner. Daddy was laughing, too, so, of course, we all
laughed. So did Mother as she brushed the tears from her eyes, embarrassed at being such a comic figure,
churning up the snow on her hands and knees. She really had cleared off most of the walk.
But she was badly frightened, she was carrying you, her first child in seven years and Daddy's
longed for son and heir. Her first instinct had been to protect her new unborn baby, Annivor.
Daddy held her tight and kissed her. We three settled down. First we had been frightened. Then we
had laughed. Now we were comforted. Never at all understanding what had happened, but when Mother

66
smiled and Daddy kissed her, we knew all was right with our world. We all went out of the gate again
onto the sidewalk to see the deer, "our deer, which "our" Daddy had shot and brought home for our
winter meat.
Of course the story went around the town, to be related at the evening meal in every house in our
neighborhood, and to become part of the hunting lore of the community.
The old women shook their heads and looked stiff-upper-lipped, and said Mother had marked her
unborn child. Mother laughed and Daddy swore and said there was nothing to that old wives' tale".
Eventually the whole thing was forgotten by our family, at least. That was until Daddy and his hunting
cronies settled down to storytelling. Then it was reviewed in great detail, the snow becoming higher and
Mother cradling faster each time.
But Annivor was always afraid of dogs and would come running into the house white-faced and
trembling whenever a neighborhood dog came into the lot. And we never kept a dog although the place
was overrun with cats. The result of three kittens we had found in a box under the sage brush during one
of our rambles. Until Ross and Max came along and we had moved to Tremonton: we never had a dog
on our place.
This was your introduction to the family which had been prepared to receive you as your little spirit
began its journey from Heaven to earth. Your actual birth into this family was just as exciting and with
laughter. The day of your birth was a day of great rejoicing and unbounded happiness. True, you were
not the son and heir we were expecting, but, then, we rather forgot about him. We had you.
We were just dotty over Annivor. She was "sugar 'n' spice 'n' everything nice". Rhea always treated
her like a little, or I should say "big" doll. Mother made really lovely little dresses for her, with
embroidered flowers and hand-stitched on lace edges.
But for all her piquant ways and tiny fragile appearance she was a little tom boy. She followed Rhea
around and imitated all Rhea did. Rhea would come in from the poultry house with a bucket of eggs in
each hand and kick the door and call, open the door, I've got the eggs, or stove wood or whatever she had
been sent for. Mother would open the door for her and then minutes later we would hear a little kick on
the door and the words, "Oppa-de-do" and there Annivor would stand.
Mother finally got tired of this and told Annivor she could open the door by her self. She wasnt
carrying any thing. Annivor turned away and mother closed the door. Soon we heard a soft kick and a
little piping voice: "Oppa-de-do, me dot sticks." And there was Annivor holding a tiny twig in each
hand. She always won.
We also had to wash Annivors diapers and we loved even this. Orpha, the military genius, devised
a quick painless way of dealing with the humble task. Out in the working field we set up the wash tub
full of clean water and the pail of diapers. Two of us would hold up a diaper like a sail, firmly gripping
the four corners and standing as well away as we could with our short arms. Our bodies curving away in
a continuing arc, while the third one squirted the diaper with the garden hose. When it was judged clean
enough, we threw it into the tub. Many hands made short work. We always ended up with a water fight.
You are perhaps wondering if we gave you the measles after your entry into our private world. No,
but later on we gave you other such goodies such as mumps, whooping cough and the seven-year itch,
which we got every year, as did every kid in the school. We all slept together and were only bathed once
on Saturday and put into clean underwear which lasted the entire week. Actually the entire neighborhood
had these ailments together as we all ran in a common herd.
We were then running a neighborhood theater in the old coal shed. We wrote the plays ourselves
and they had a lot to do with wandering sons, parted sisters, emotional reunions, and a great deal of
embracing and kissing. Our little theater probably helped spread these infectious deceases. But they
would have gotten us anyway as being quarantined was not in effect until the disease was firmly
seated.
Annivor of course, had her little part in these plays. She was the baby the wandering daughter
always brought home. We never questioned why in our world of melodrama the daughter always had a
baby when she returned home. We got ten cents per crate for crating egging and we spent this wisely on
the Friday night movies. We were well up on the world of Hollywood drama in the pre-talkie days of
movies.
I do not remember if you had mumps. We were rather old when we got those dratted things and I
only had them on one side. I do remember whooping cough. This was a dreadful disease and many

67
babies died from it. It caused coughing and strangulation and the little baby struggled, trying to breath.
You were walking when you had whooping cough, and mother did everything she knew how. We fasted
and prayed and you were given a blessing and recovered but I remember mother's anxious eyes as she
watched you. Whooping cough actually did not make one especially sick so we played about as usual
until the coughing seized us. Then we just stood where we were and coughed and strangled until the
attack passed over. We all survived and all the neighborhood gang as well.
We also had chicken pox. Those were the ages of childhood in rural pioneer Utah, measles, chicken
pox, mumps and whooping cough. Smallpox and diphtheria and typhoid were about but seldom caught
in a rural community, and appendicitis was quite common, Marion, died of appendicitis. There was no
treatment for this. How fortunate are the children of today that these are prevented. Of course polio was
not known but
We also had little visitors that lived with us always busy looking for new blood. These were bed
bugs and they were nasty determined little fighters. No matter what we did they still wanted to stay with
us. They were so sneaky. They would crawl behind the door frames, keeping out of sight until night then
wham? They were after that good Heppler blood again. Rolled-up newspapers were used as weapons to
no avail. Even swabbing with a brush full of coal oil would not win the battle. We fought and fought and
most times we relied on the thought, "There is no shame, if you battle.
We spent two weeks every year at Fish Lake, where we stayed in a little plank cabin belonging to
Aunt Elise. Dad fished and we roved and mother cooked and visited with other people up there. Uncle
King and Aunt Pearl had a cabin nearby and usually came up the same time. Uncle King and dad were
almost inseparable, and usually worthless when together.
Uncle King had a son, Robert, who was Orpha's age and he and Orpha were as close as Rhea and
Kendall, but Robert, while a good-looking lad, was all farm boy. He lacked the polish and sophistication
that Kendall had, but he was a courteous, well-mannered boy, insofar as a typical Huck Finn can be.
He and Orpha went wading in the river, fishing, and rowed a dangerous old scow out in the lake,
and minded not the wind nor the rain. Bob usually had his pockets stuffed full of worms, polliwogs, and
other useable bait items. Orpha had no pockets, girls wore dresses at all times then but she would pucker
up her skirts and carry her share. Rhea was not really the outdoors type, but she went along with us.
Rhea liked to dress up and go with mother to teas and luncheons and visiting relatives. She liked to
listen to the conversation and had many a tale to tell us when she returned. We had to clean up the
kitchen after supper and wash and wipe the dishes, and at this time, Rhea would relate to us all that had
happened to her. Mother was always very social and enjoyed visiting and her clubs, Relief Society and
Church socials. She sang beautifully and was often asked to sing in other Wards. She and my father sang
duets. Rhea was often taken along to play little pieces on the piano.
My father had a beautiful dream, and if but for me, he may have achieved it and how happy he
would have been. He dreamed that his three beautiful daughters each played a musical instrument and
that everyone admired them and envied him because of his three beautiful talented daughters.
He took his three beautiful, talented, daughters all over the county and they played beautiful music
for everyone. I spoiled the whole bit. Rhea and Orpha did their part, and somehow my father could not
dream of a duet, it had to be a trio. Too bad. At any rate, while dreaming this dream, he bought a piano
which stood in our parlor. Our parlor was a place well-lived in, and the piano, over the years, came to be
well-played.
Annivor was beautiful and musical, too, but she was too late for the dream. (She played the clarinet
in High School). We all took piano lessons, nevertheless, and Rhea became quite expert. She loved to
practice and spent long hours at the piano and loved to read music books. Aunt Janey's son, Dale, was
very accomplished, in fact he won prizes, and he let Rhea have his worn out books. She was very happy
with this collection and I expect still had most of them all of her life. So her piano occupied a great part
of her life.
Orpha was not too serious about the piano, although she had a great talent and a lovely singing
voice and later sang in many choruses, directed music in Church, and taught square dancing, all of that,
and her daughters were musically talented. She practiced her share but was usually glad to escape. I
practiced too, until in self defense, mother chased me out. Dale would nearly scream when he heard me
practice. I usually sang to my own accompaniment. I was too serious with my practicing, and in fact I
dreamed my fathers dream.

68
 On Sunday evening, after Sacrament Meeting, everyone in town gathered at the town square. This
was a vacant piece of ground close by the school house, and contained a squared piece of hard packed
dirt in the center where a little ornate bandstand stood and here the band would play music for an hour or
two and everyone would visit and eat ice cream and listen to the music and then go home.
Our family always went together but Rhea usually found friends and would go off with them, and
father had to find her to take her home with us. She always came willingly, laughing and calling to her
friends, and then would immediately start to tell us all about it. In fact, she was something of a
compulsive talker. She always had so many experiences and enjoyed them so much and had so much to
tell about them. She even then knew almost everyone in town and all about them.
Mother would take Rhea off with her to play for some group, mother was a great joiner, and she
made little dress-up dresses for Rhea and Rhea played at all the social groups. She played charming
little pieces like The Wild Flower Waltz and some simplified waltzes from Mozart and other simple
charming pieces. The people seemed to enjoy it and mother surely loved it. I think Rhea took it for
granted that she would lead the parade. Orpha and I sometimes went along and sang. I think mother
hoped to bring this to something but I do not remember that it lasted too long. I just couldnt match their
dream.
Mother dressed us in look-alike dresses, and with our innocent faces blue eyes, I expect we looked
rather charming. Orpha and I had golden hair. Rhea had dark hair, quite straight and until permanents
came into being, incurable.
We sang some real tear jerking songs. I remember some of them. We were real hams and we laid it
on, there was not a dry eye in the house. But then in those days, orphans and starving homeless children
were for real and many a family had a little orphan living with them. Also, many of these women had
lost some of their own babies, so tears were close to the surface, but we helped over flow.
Telephones had just become what you might say, common, and this song was a real favorite.

Papa, you're so sad and lonely, sobbed a tearful little child,

Since dear mother went to Heaven, papa, dear, you have not smiled.
I will call her just to please you, for I want her to come home.
Listen and you'll hear men tell her, oer the telephone:
Chorus:

Hello, central, give me Heaven, for my mothers there,

You can find her with the angels on the golden stair.
She'll be glad to hear me speaking. Tell her its her dear.
For I only want to tell her, we're so lonely hear.

When the girl received this message, coming oer the telephone,
How her heart did ache that moment, and the wires seemed to moan.
I will answer just to please her, "Yes, my dear, I'm coming soon."
"Kiss me, mother, kiss your darling, over the telephone"
Second chorus.

This really washed off the floor boards in the old Third Ward social hall. We put our hearts, soul,
and stomachs into it. After the handkerchiefs had dried out a little, we started our second gem.

The Orphan Child

Twas a party for the little ones, and ere they all could go,
They sang the song of "Home Sweet Home, the one we all love so.
Without an orphan child looked in, his face so pale and sad,
He never had a Home Sweet Home, so longingly he said:

If I only had a "home sweet home, someone to care for me,

Like all the other boys and girls, how happy I would be.

69
 A fond papa and a mama dear, to call me all their own,
This world would be all sunshine if I had a "Home Sweet Home.

They were not all sad. This one, depicting the time when if one child caught some decease, or
brought it home from visiting kinfolk, the entire neighborhood caught it:

"I've Got the Mumps"

I've not been to school now for most a week

I've got a big lump on my left-hand cheek
The teacher says not to go back again
Until the doctor makes it better.
Oh Jimmy Brown, he is so mad, I've set him down a peg
He's been putting on so many airs because he broke his leg
BUT

I've got the mumps, I've got the mumps.

I wish I could have them for years and years
Cook gives me jam till I get all smears
And mama don't wash me behind the ears
Cause I've got the mumps.

I've got a big sister who is good to me

Last night when we had lots of company
She didn't tell mama why she couldn't find the pie
Cook baked for supper
I try to be so nice to her, she nurses all my lumps
Last year I gave her the measles, and this year she'll get the mumps.
I've got the mumps. I've got the mumps.
No teachers or books till I well again,
Don't get up for breakfast till nearly ten
For a nickel I'd rub up against you then
You'll get the mumps.

This was my very favorite:

A preacher went a hunting, twas on a Sunday morn,

It was against his religion but he took his gun along.
He shot himself some very fine quail and a possum and a hare
But on the way returning home, he met a
GREAT BIG GRIZZLY BEAR!
The bear walked out in the middle of the road
Beside old preacher, you see
And preacher got so frightened that he crumb right up a tree
He looked down into the gleaming teeth of that bear's big ugly head
Then turned his eyes to the Lord in the skies
And these are the words he said:
O o o o oh h h h Lord Thou didst deliver Dan'1 frum the lion's den.
Also delivered Jonah frum the belly of the whale, and then
Three Hebrew children from the fiery furnace as the good Book do declare.
Now, Lord, if you can't help me, Please don't help that grizzle bear!

There was one about Little Miltaidies Peterkin Paul, which I have around somewhere but cannot ind
just now. I never quite believed this poem until some years ago when I was doing genealogy research. I

70
came upon the name of Miltaedies, and it really is a common Dutch name. So much for childish
scepticism. All of these we learned from our mother who learned them from her mother.

Mother taught us another little song which we sang with great enthusiasm at school games:
I'm a suitcase, I'm a suitcase, I'm a suitcase until I die.
But I'd rather be a suitcase, than a bag from MONROE HIGH (or Salina or Ephraim).

There were not that many high schools around in those days and these songs actually came f rom
Manti where mother grew up. We never heard anything like them in sophisticated Bear River High. I
expect they were Sanpete County songs.
Rhea and Bert were married in the Logan Temple. My father gave a very nice wedding supper in
Logan. Most of Bert's people were there and all of our family plus Rhea's friends. We went out and
painted up their car and hung old shoes and tin cans from the rear bumper. Rhea was embarrassed when
she saw it but Bert was really proud and he drove down the highway with his head up and all of the cars
they passed honked and the people waved and Bert smiled and smiled and waved back. Rhea just sat
with her head down but finally she started to smile and wave too.
They lived first, well of course, at first, Bert was in the war, and Rhea lived in Chicashak (Bert was
stationed at the base near by) and then in a small basement apartment in Tremonton. After the war, Bert
farmed some of his fathers land in Deweyville. I do not remember how long they lived there. They were
in Idaho while I was on my mission. Deweyville is along side the mountain, you will remember, and
Tremonton in the valley. The road was quite narrow and rutted then and wound down the banks of the
Bear River valley and up the other side. This was quite a hazardous drive and the bridge over the river
was really old and had been condemned. Rhea always said how frightened she was when she crossed this
bridge. She wondered if the bridge gave way how quickly she could grasp all of her kids from the back
seat and get out of the car before it sank. It was a narrow bridge, with only one-way traffic and if a car
were on the bridge, all other traffic had to wait as only one could cross at a time. There was a safer
bridge at the Honeyville crossing. That was some few miles further on so the people from Deweyville
just kept using the old bridge until the road was straightened out and a concrete bridge put across the
river.
The settlers in Tremonton always said that when they came to the valley, the river filled most of that
channel. After the dam was built at Beaver (the Beaver Dam) (I thought it was called Cutler Dam RH)
then the river became the small little stream we all know. (I always thought it was a big river and I was
quite old before I could swim across it. RH) But it was always a treacherous river, with deep holes and
currents, and quite a number of people have been drowned while swimming there. This is the Bear River
I am talking about. The Malad River is the river just out of Tremonton.
Bert first leased (I do not believe he purchased any of the land he had in Idaho, but I could be
wrong), He was very much against debt and would not invest money he didnt have. Most farmers lived
on bank funds from year to year, borrowing enough each spring to get them through the harvest and then
when they paid off the bank they had to borrow again to get started the next spring. It was really a losing
game. But an irrigation farmer is an irrigation farmer until he dies. Just as Earl will always be a dry
farmer. Bert liked to have cattle, that is, domesticated cattle, cows and chickens and milk and eggs and
butter. Earl never had a farm animal and Orpha has always purchased her milk and eggs and butter.
For my part, although this is not my story, I was born to be a ranchers wife, except there was only
one rancher and my friend was much prettier than I, blue eyes and blonde hair and could dance all night.
In the end she turned him down and he marred the school teacher (just like in all the Westerns) and she
married a handsome Captain in the army and I joined the Navy. End of my story. "Will There Be
Sagebrush in Heaven" is still my favorite song.
I don't suppose Rhea was born to be a farmers wife, but Bert was a farmer and she loved him, so
she took upon her his way of life. If we had stayed in Richfield, she probably would have married into
town society. I can see her coming down a curving flight of stairs, dressed in an elegant gown (actually
she did not have a turn for fashion, but did love beautiful things), but to continue, coming down the stairs
in her ball gown with a grand piano in a long drawn room with long windows opening out on a balcony.
There actually was no such a place in Richfield or for that matter anywhere in Sevier county, which
was just cow and pasture county for all its public relations. I doubt that Bert would have cared for such a

71
place, and Rhea probably never thought of it either, (I had all the imagination in the family) She accepted
Bert way of life. She was very active in our Church, with Primary and Relief Society, and served as
organists for almost every occasion.
I do not think of Bert as a hunter. He was such a gentle, pacific sort of man. But they always had
wild game in their freezer and Rhea would broil elk and antelope steak or serve a version roast. He did
see action in the War. (Note: He flew as a crew member in a C 46 or DC3 over the Himalayan Mts.
transporting supplies to troops in China.)
We picked a lot of berries when we were children. In Sevier County, we always had chokecherries
and a small orange berry called a bullberry. This berry grew on a long bush frond (leaf like palm or fern)
with grey green leaves and long, very sharp thorns, and daddy would break off the fronds and he would
beat the berries off into a canvas laid on the ground. This little berry made a wonderful tart jelly and was
a pale orange color. This bush did not grow in norther Utah but Orpha found it in Montana.
Orpha was the one who came up with delicious chokecherry syrup for waffle one time and when we
asked her how she made it, she replied sadly, I made chokecherry jelly that didn't jell. We picked a
berry called the pottawattamie, this was more of a cherry with a large pit, and was also orange but more
of a brown, and made a very good jam. Then we had greengage and purple plumbs, and my mother made
a mint jelly with apples, which she always served with roast lamb. Chokecherry jelly was always served
with version and apple sauce or fried apples with pork. We served cranberries with wild fowl.
I am more like the Orpha type of jelly maker except for fried apples. Take select firm Jonathan
apples and quarter and core but do not peel. Slice the quarters about 1/8 of an inch thick. Melt a generous
lump of butter in a skillet and stir in the apples and let them cook or stew until limp. The peel gives it a
beautiful pink color and the apples are quite tart and are wonderful all alone or with meat but we always
had this with roast pork.
We also had a delicious bread and butter pudding. Cut the crusts from slices of bread and then
butter generously the bread. Put a generous smear of butter all around a glass baking dish and then layer
the slices of bread in the dish, sprinkling with sugar and cinnamon and raisons for each layer. Let the
sides of the bread stand up along the sides of the dish. Beat an egg into a cup of rich milk and pour over
the bread. Bake at about 350 until the edges of the bread are browned and the milk becomes custard. The
bread puffs out something like a souffle. Serve with cream sweetened with sugar and cinnamon or serve
plain.
I guess I should mention another member of our family dearly beloved by Rhea. This was Amapola
(but not the Mexican poppy). It was our old Ford car. It was dark blue with a broad yellow stripe all
around its middle. I expect this strip was the reason daddy got her so cheaply. This was during the
depression, but even poor people have their pride. Not our father, to him, wheels were everything. Unless
he was carrying a gun and stalking game, he did not have much use for walking.
But it was with Amapola that Rhea got her driving license, and we were then in Box Elder County,
and we went all over the back end of this county and up to Malad and to Logan canyon. She was never
afraid of mountain or canyon roads but drove anywhere.
Daddy often took us, each with a friend, to a canyon or in the mountains, pitched a tent, left a sack
of supplies, and left us for the week end and came and got us the following Sunday. We had really
marvelous times together. We also drove to Logan and Ogden for concerts and to restaurants, the big
event for anyone in Box Elder County was to go to Ogden and have chow mein at the Bamboo. We got
as far Pocatello.
With daddy, we always went to Yellowstone Park every summer as a family, but we also went all
over just the three of us and usually some of our friends. This was really giving us a great deal of
freedom and I remember some shocked parents of one of our friends saying how could our parents let us
go around like we did without a chaperone, and Rhea replied, Our parents trust us and we respect that
trust. It never occurred to any of us to do anything that our parents would not have approved of.
Rhea had this strong sense of responsibility to our parents and to us as her younger sisters. She was
never bossy or preachy, she just always did that which was right and expected that others would do the
same.
We all wore silk then. It was quite inexpensive, coming from the Orient, and we wore really lovely
under things, filmy and lacy. We always had the soft soft feel of silk next so our bodies. Rhea loved
beautiful underwear and silk stockings and she gave beautiful gifts. I was skillful with a needle then and

72
made hand embroidered handkerchiefs for my friends, quite beautiful, in fact, and I remember one year
for my birthday Rhea gave me a beautiful handkerchief, store bought, and quite expensive and she
said, "There, that is as beautiful as anything you can make."
She was not jealous, she just liked to give as nice as she got.
During my Navy days, she sent me a black lace trimmed silk nightgown, wow, I still say "wow'
when I think if it. It really was a sensation around the barracks as we all slept in dungaree shirts
(borrowed from our boy friends) so that the shirt tails came half way to our ankles. Very comfortable, I
slept in them for years after my discharge, as long as I could get them. But we used to have at-home
nights in the washroom behind the barracks and we all dressed in our night finery, and I was always the
belle of the ball as it were in my black nightgown. I had to buy black underwear to go beneath it, as we
were most frightfully modest then. We would never wear see-through nightwear without proper
underwear beneath.
Rhea had a natural dignity and a sense of the fitness of things. She had all of the qualities of
leadership. If she had stayed in Richfield, she probably would have married into high society and would
have been a leader in that society and also in civic affairs. As it was, in the more limited life in
Tremonton she showed these same characteristics. She was always the leader in our little Social group.
She was always in the center of things. She was small, quick and vivacious. Orpha was more formal,
slower to react and more critical than Rhea but also very loving. Orpha was also larger than Rhea,
heavier boned, more like the Bulkley side of the family, Rhea had the small bones of the Hepplers and
their quick way of looking around and seeing and registering everything. Both Rhea and Orpha had great
musical ability. Orpha sang in the High School chorus, and they both danced beautifully.
Orpha was tall and stately and danced like a princess. When she began to date Earl, she made a
beautiful russet colored taffeta dress, with a full skirt and brown velvet ribbon trimmings. She had a
cream-colored petticoat with lace ruffles and when she whirled in the waltz with Earl, with her skits
whirling and her ruffles flaring, they were a handsome couple.
Earl was tall and handsome and they really looked wonderful on the dance floor and we all knew it
would just be a short time before Earl gave her a ring. She was the first of our family to marry.
We all cut our dance dresses a little shorter on one side than on the other so that our petticoats could
show as we danced. This is the way we were "naughty". Rhea also loved to dance. She was more
animated and vivacious and laughed and talked and would stop in the middle of a step to speak to
someone.
She had a beautiful turquoise crepe dress with large puffed sleeves of plaid taffeta. Her petticoat
lace was white with this dress, but Bert was quite sedate and did not lead her into the whirls to show off
her lace. Oh, well, you could always flounce your hips a bit, and even Bert could not tell what she was
doing. Earl and Orpha would dip and whirl and turn. They required quite a bit of room. Bert and Rhea
rather danced in the middle of a crowd.
Orpha was just 19 when she married. She worked first as cashier in J.C. Penney, and then in the
Post Office. After she was married, she and Earl went to live on Earls fathers ranch in White Valley
and Earl built her a very modern home id Tremonton.
Rhea first worked as a mother's helper in a home in Ogden and she was very much liked by this
family, especially as they had this perfect brat of a boy and Rhea got along fine with him, she took down
his pants and really spanked him, and told his mother - that was that - as far as she was concerned. But
the boy was quite impressed and they begged her to stay.
However, she soon returned home. Daddy was anxious to have her back, and we had small boys in
our family. She then became a dental assistant to Dr. Donald B. Green, and worked there until she
married and the Greens loved her as their own daughter and gave her a very expensive gift when she
married. Dr. Green always retained his great respect and affection for Rhea. He spoke at her funeral and
was always a great friend of our family.
As there were few dentists in our end of the county, almost everyone was a patient of Dr. Green and
so they all knew Rhea. She looked very pert in her white uniform. She had put a permanent in her hair by
now and wore it quite long and curled. Her hair was very thick and a dark glossy brown.
Dr. Green was also on the High Council of the Bear River Stake, and he would take Rhea with him
on his speaking engagements. Rhea's dearest friend, Maxine Buchannon, who later married Ernie
Hansen, Bert's army buddy. Maxine had a beautiful singing voice and Rhea played the piano for her. So

73
they were well-known all throughout the western part of Box Elder County (not a prestigious place to be
sure, but good honest people).
Before all of this, while we were still in High School, Rhea worked with Daddy in the office of the
Morning Milk Plant in Tremonton. She made out the milk checks and this was quite a responsible job. It
was all done by hand.
This plant closed down almost at the beginning of the depression and daddy bought a small shoe
repair shop. We all learned to work in this shop. We all became very skillful at repairing shoes.
When Rhea was living in Chicashak (near the army base where Bert was stationed) she took her
shoes to the shop for heels and it seemed that the shoemaker had an army contract and did not have time
to be bothered with civilians. Rhea finally got fed up. She had to walk to town wheeling Colin in his
buggy, and one day she just wheeled Colin into the shop and said to the shoe repairman, I see you have
an empty last in your shop. He admitted he did have an empty last. Rhea walked passed him, picked up
her shoes from the heap and putting them on the last, removed the worn heels and put new one on and
then asked him for the bill and paid it and walked out. That man just stood there with his eyes and tongue
hanging out. He never said a word. Rhea was so tiny and so determined with her little chin firmed up and
her eyes flashing and Colin cooing from his buggy. She marched out of the shop wheeling the buggy and
her shoes dangling from the handle bar.
In Richfield we all thinned sugar beets. I will say no more of this horrible experience, except that
Rhea had plenty of help from all of the swains in the area. In Tremonton, we all worked at the pea
cannery. I also would like to leave this painful era a closed chapter. However, Rhea enjoyed working
there. She was very quick and made good money and to be able to "make good money" in those
depression years was about as good as you could get. The pea cannery was, of course, the daily or I
should say "hourly" newspaper of western Box Elder County. If anyone came out of that place with any
kind of a reputation, it would be a marvel. But of course, this was part of the spice of life so no one got
very upset about it. Rheas seemed to always know everything about everybody. But she always had
some excuse to make for their divergences from propriety.
She was much like Grandmother Heppler, who always used to say "sufficiently unto the day is the
evil thereof." Rhea was that way, and so was my mother, and Orpha, too, Annivor and I were the eyes
and ears of the closets. And our father always enjoyed other peoples problems.
But Rhea was quick to see and excuse and she never had hard feeling against anyone. She had a
natural instinct for fine things of life, material as well as spiritual. She was orderly in her life. She always
did that which was correct and if Bert had had time to get his farm on a paying basis before her death,
she would have had a very charming and orderly home. I feel she would have been a strong influence for
the right in any community where she lived. She believed in virtuous womanhood and was neat and
modest in her dress and was never vulgar in any way. There was never any vulgarity about her. Even
Orpha would tell a little off colored story from time to time but I do not remember that Rhea ever did.
She was clean and pure in her thoughts and private in her married life and was totally concerned with the
health and happiness of her children. She gave freely of her talents wherever she was. She enjoyed
society and was always active and always did her share.
Her Patriarchal Blessing promised that "her table would always be set." This rather quaint phrasing
is indeed a wonderful blessing, and she was always ready to give freely of whatever she had. There was
no selfishness in her. She met life with a laughing toss of her head. She would say, "You Plumk!" which
meant, "shape up" and would laugh and put her arm around you.
Jane asked that I include a bit about myself in this little history and I have deliberately not included
me as it seemed to me to sound a bit like "poor little me", but as I think back now and reflect upon it, I
can see that I never did learn the social graces as did Orpha and Rhea. I did not have a close relationship
with my father, in fact, he felt quite a bit of contempt for me.
I was so far from his ideal and it was not until late in his life that he realized that I was really the son
he was waiting for. I loved to hunt and walk in the hills and fish, but as I grew older, perhaps because of
my war years, I could not bring myself to kill any living thing, except cockroaches and earwigs. And
simply could not catch a fish or shoot a little bunny rabbit or chizzlers (grand squirrel) or anything.
But I remember how astounded my father was when one day he realized that I really loved walking
through the desert and following the old trails, and all that bit, but then it was too late, I had made my
own life and I no longer needed him. Orpha was always very close to him, but Orpha married very young

74
to a fine, honorable man who loved her, and this makes a great difference. If you have only yourself,
then you have to be totally independent, otherwise, you get whiney and complaining and very boring.
Well, to get back to me and my unpropitious beginning in a small smelly little shack in a bend of
the Sevier River. I have always had a keen sense of appreciation for the beauty of this world, and have
never minded much being alone if I could be in some wild natural area.
Since my father had no sons, I did the jobs that a boy would have done, and that he felt he could
expect a girl to do. That is, I took the cows to the meadow every morning and did the general outside
chores. Although these were never undignified or demeaning, as I said, my father believed that women
worked inside the house, but my parents found it convenient, since I could not participate in musical
programs, to have me work in the kitchen.
I had a latent talent for painting and I suppose this drew me toward the beauty of the earth. I
remember Richfield as a place of high sharp red hills, clear and clean, against a turquoise blue sky with
white clouds floating by and a long dirt road bordered by popular trees going on and on. In times of
sadness and loneliness, I see this landscape and find comfort. I was not apt in school, and Rhea and
Orpha were unusually bright. I could not play any musical instrument nor could I dance. I could not learn
to drive a car.
There was no ready appreciation for the gifts that I had. I was "loaned"out to other families where
girls were needed, not an uncommon procedure in that time., While still quite young, I worked as a
cook's helper on a cattle ranch where I spent my free time riding horseback among the hills. I was not
unhappy. In fact, I was quite serene and happy but I did not acquire the social graces and skills that my
sisters did and as I grew older, this separated me from them.
The people I was close to where the ranchers and humbler folk, and while they lacked a sharpness
of refinement that the city folk had. They had an innate honesty and sense of propriety that I have always
felt fortunate that I experienced.
I remember one time when some cowboys had brought a herd of cattle down from a ranch in Idaho,
and as we were having a dance that night, they wanted to come. One of the cowboys took a shine to me
as they say and asked me to go with him. He only had the riding clothes he was wearing so he went into
Richfield and elected a nice suite of clothes. He had no money and causally told the shopkeeper that his
father would pay for it the next time he was down this way.
The shopkeeper called the rancher where I was working, who had received the cattle, and asked for
surety. I remember the rancher saying, Give that boy anything he wants and I will stake my ranch that
you will be paid. The boy got the suit and we all went to the dance and that was that. But I never forgot
that trust and responsibility that these people had and have always been grateful that I had this
experience.
Not only were these people very honest, but they were very colorful. We had some gay old times on
that ranch. I had a lot of help with the supper dishes, which usually were not washed until about 11:00 at
night, as I guess you all know. I was up at five to make the fires, take care of the milk, make the butter,
mix bread, cook breakfast, wash dishes, and then do the general house work and start the dinner. Then I
usually had a few hours of free time.
Wally, the rancher, kept a horse saddled for me at the correl as I could not saddle a horse. He always
had the milkman milk a cup full of milk for me from the cow as that is the way I really like milk. In fact
my father used to spray milk into our cups when we were small. We each had a little tin mug and we
would hold it out and dad would fill it with milk right from the cow, warm and frothy, and we really
loved it.

#2

This story is intended to record the events of five years of our family life, from the time Annivor
was born in 1924 until we moved to Tremonton, in Box Elder County, in 1929.
I have ranged backward and forward around this time, as events came back into my memory. I have
tried to separate fact from fiction, actuality from fantasy, perhaps I have not always succeeded. But I
have tried to paint a picture of the way of life our family knew when we moved from the Ranch to Uncle
Ed's home in Richfield, began our intercourse with society, first rural, then town.
Then in the newly prospering town of Tremonton, which, in its time and place, was also a frontier,

75
for at that time, the business and commercial affairs of the County were across the Bear River in
Brigham City. Tremonton was challenging this superiority by offering the services of a town to the
ranchers and farmers in western Box Elder County. This land, which had been the great B-M Ranch, had
just broken up and was being cultivated by immigrant from Sweden, and an inrush of new, young
business and professional men finding opportunities here.
It was into this raw, yet sophisticated society that we moved from the stable society of Richfield,
recently settled by our grandfathers, a moving back in time and a moving forward in business and
commerce, for the north of Utah had a restlessness of economy that had been lost in the south, the small
Mormon communities not having resources to hold the young people, and life was dying there. The
Depression and the War years of the 1930's and 40's determined our way of life and changed us from
ranchers to businessmen, all in one generation. These are my memories of this change.
I am hung up with this story, perhaps I am trying to tell a story I do not fully understand, or perhaps
I am writing a novel when I want to relate a straight froward account of a time that no longer exists, but
which I feel I much delineate, for how else can today's generation understand our innocence and naivety,
and see the contrast in the gentle compassion and generosity of the early Mormon people with the raw,
coarse ways of our speech and actions.
We were frontier people coping with a burgeoning culture bringing a refinement which our
grandparents had known but which had been almost lost in the hard requirements of pioneer life in a
desert land.
The last time I was in Richfield, when Orpha and I were en route to Mesa, Arizona where our
Mother lay ill in a hospital and we were needed to care for our Father, we stopped in Richfield and spent
a few hours following the old trails and memories.
We were astonished to see how small these early dwelling houses were, and, after living for two
decades in Box Elder County, how dry and faded the land was. We began to remember that Richfield
had been a pioneer town, and the valley of the Sevier River in which it was located had been brought
under cultivation by United Order Pioneers, among whom were our Grandparents.
There was no suitable timber for building, and homes were built of home-made adobe bricks, baked
by the sun. These homes had to be small, the resources and energy of the people did not allow for large
spacious homes.
Brigham Young, the great Mormon colonizer, counseled the people to beautify their dwelling
places, and vines had been planted along the foundations of the houses so the climbing tendrils covered
the raw adobe exterior.
In my time, the climbing Four-o-clock, with its delicate bell flowers and fine perfume made these
pioneer homes little bowers. I remember them as beautiful and cool.
Later on, as the economy stabilized, the adobe bricks were covered with plaster, the plaster came
from the gypsum mill in Siguard, and it was here that our parents first met, he working in the mill and
she clerking in the company store, (real soap opera), but it was real life.
Now the tiny vine-covered homes were found only in the poor part of town, the well-to-do people
had plaster houses. Fortunately, we lived on the Four-o-clock row. Our poorer cousins whose fathers
were well-to-do business and commercial men, had to live in the brick homes along Center Street.
This story deals with the people who lived in these Four-o- clock houses.
These houses were small and, being the first houses, had little in the way of modern conveniences, even
by the standards of the time, and consisted mainly of a general room which served as diningroom, parlor,
and bedroom, with a small kitchen added and perhaps other bedrooms or attic space.
It was not uncommon to call on a neighbor in the afternoon and find the men of the family sleeping
on pallets on the floor while the women served refreshments to the visitors, stepping carefully around the
sleepers, for they worked late in the fields and if their water turn came, they were up all night running the
water into their fields, and they needed sleep.
Most of these homes had two bedrooms, one added on, where the parents and younger children slept
in one room and the older children in the other, although boys usually slept in the attic space and in
summer in hammocks or day beds out under the fruit trees.
I think, now, the remarkable things is that they managed to keep their homes so clean. Our Mother
worked incessantly to keep our home clean. She was a fastidious housekeeper, for she not only had the
house to maintain, but she was responsible for the health of the family and infectious deceases were

76
common and widespread.
Ada Swafford loaned me this little comment on the scourge of the pioneers, the bed bug, and I
remembered how my Mother raged a continuous war against this mean little insect.
Her main weapon was a can of coal oil and she drenched the bedposts and springs and even the
mattresses with this smelly oil. Uncle Ed once remarked that she need not work so hard for nothing
killed them. They just went up on the ceiling and then when their victims were asleep and unsuspecting,
parachuted down and made their feast. They were blood-suckers, and as one rustic poet put it,"They had
the morals of a weasel, and where they stopped, they left a measle which itched. They were small,
round, and flat, thus the designation, parachuting down from the ceiling.
Many of the little pioneer homes had a free-standing room which served as a kitchen in summer
where the cooking fire could burn all day without making the sleeping rooms too warm for comfortable
sleep. Here all the cooking and hot water work was done in summer and meals were served on a trestle
table laid out under the fruit trees.
All the pioneers had fruit trees and lawns, for this was a colony organized by Brigham Young and
he so decreed that we have fruit trees planted in front of our homes, with lawns and flowers, and a
kitchen garden in back, and that berry bushes be planted over the pole and willow fences.
He also decreed that livestock be penned up and chickens confined so that one could walk among
the flowers and under the trees with comfortable secure footsteps.
Fences had to be straight and gates could not sag. And if no timber was available for fence posts,
then willows grew along the river banks and they could be woven into fences, and some of the little
towns were noted for the beauty and artistry of their willow fences.
There was to be a door stoop or porch for it was not neat to step directly from the mud and dust of
the road into the front room. Thus, vines were planted to hide the makeshift core of the house. All things
were to be done in beauty. And so they were.
The pioneers planted the tall, straight Lombardy Poplar tree to mark the lines of their property and
planted lilac hedges between the trees, and iris and wild roses grew along the fences.
The outhouses and stockyards were well behind the dwelling homes, behind a proper high board
fence. There were pines in the high mountains, sufficient for pole fences and slat boards.
Such rudimentary sanitation as availed was strictly enforced.
Irrigation ditches ran along the borders of the streets, and water cress and mint and catnip grew here.
Wild asparagus grew along the edges of the fields and we gathered this on our way home from school.
Each homestead had a pie plant, rhubarb, and we all had early spring beets and greens.
The roads were rutted and dusty in summer, but along their tree-fringed water borders, was a
pleasant coolness where the children played and made doll houses of mud with delicate furniture made of
hollyhock flowers. Black-eyed daisies and milkweed flourished here. These were really lovely little
towns for children to grow up in.
The Sevier River valley was fertile, in that while its climate was mild, snow remained on the high
Fish Lake and Pavant Mountains until late summer and we had the late snow melt for irrigation.
Culinary water came from deep artesian wells. Nearly every homestead had a well where water
flowed continuously, cold and clear.
I do not remember we ever had a drought, but I do remember one flood when the Sevier River
overflowed its banks and only the iron bridge on the County Road could be seen. Uncle King came to
stay with us then. He had a night job on the Richfield Reaper, the town newspaper, and the flood came
up in the night. I remember Daddy would drive him to the edge of the flood tide and then they rode on
horseback to the pastures where the cows were left. They milked the cows, but left the milk on the
ground for they could not have brought it back by horseback. Aunt Pearl and her children, Wanda and
Bob, would come to the edge of the flood on the other side and they would wave and yell across to each
other. That was an exciting time for us, running along the lip of the flood and yelling to Bob and Wanda.
There were lakes and streams in the mountains, grazing for sheep and cattle, and there was fishing
and wild game.
We were mainly outdoor people, camping in the covered wagon in the summer while Daddy and his
brothers and cousins fished. All the Heppler men loved to fish and in the summer they would close their
offices and go off fishing for however long they could last on what they caught and what provisions they
brought from home. Our mothers never knew when they would return, but they would be hairy, dirty,

77
and ravenous. That could be counted on. While we were camping, Mother cooked over a campfire. I
remember these magic evenings as a kind of ponderous enchanted land, the glow of the dying fire, the
high profile of the mountains blurring as the light faded, the wind rustling through the trees, (The old
men talking, the Indians said.). The older people sitting around the fire telling the old tales. Tales of
Nauvoo and Kirkland, the trek West, the Utah War, the Mormon Battalion, how it was in St. George and
Dixie and the old traditions of our people.
They never talked about Canada, and it was not until Uncle Ed was quite old and I have returned
from my proselyting mission and was gathering notes on the history of our family that I persuaded him
to talk of his boyhood in Canada and the members of his family who remained there. Later, these stories
proved of great interest to the descendants of the Hepplers in Canada who had no knowledge of their
emigrant ancestors.
Our Home in Richfield was by the standards of the time, a spacious dwelling. It was a rectangular
building, but the living quarters formed an "L" with the kitchen, larder, and bathroom cutting across the
parlor and bedrooms. It was a very moveable home, that is, it was easy to move from one room to
another, yet the rooms were not cut up with doors. And it had electricity and hot and cold water and
indoor plumbing. It was heated by a coal range in the kitchen and a coal stove to heat the parlor was put
up in the winter.
The bedrooms got their heat from the sun. Stringing in at the windows, and from the door left open
to the parlor. It was roomy and airy, I remember it that way, but I was quite small.
I do not know who built this house. It had a plaster exterior but was larger than the ordinary
adobe-plaster house. I thought for a long while Grandfather Heppler had built it, but this proved to be not
true. I could never find the original entry deeds for this property.
Brigham Young had had the land surveyed and gave out the property to the settlers and when Utah
became a state, the land was re-surveyed and there was some friction over property titles for a while. It is
possible that during the time of the Manifesto, when all Mormons were being very well behaved, on the
surface, that the original titles were destroyed as they would provide a clue to polygamous families.
Well, when we moved there Uncle Ed was in possession and our father took the title from him, but I
believe Uncle Ed purchased it from someone else.
Both the kitchen and the parlor had a door opening onto the front veranda where a porch swing
hung from the overhead of the veranda. This swing was off-limits for play but a wooden chair swing
stood out on the lawn. It was a rather unique affair made of wooden slats to form two facing chairs
mounted on a swinging platform. It was painted green.
We could play in this and we took many a long and perilous journey to Hawaii and Japan and all the
islands of the South Pacific on it. We had some cousins who had been on missions to Japan and Hawaii,
so we knew about these places. The swing reached high and far out during storms at sea and swung low
and close to land as we approached the safe harbor. We always got home safely in time for supper.
The parlor, a proper parlor, was the dress-up area of the home. Three doors led to the three
bedrooms, two across the end of the house and one parallel to the parlor. This last was the master
bedroom where Annivor slept in her crib until she was properly housebroken and then you shared our
bedroom.
The third bedroom was our play area. A door in the master bedroom led to the bathroom, and the
bathroom, in turn, had a door leading to the kitchen.
Another door in the parlor opened into the kitchen. From the kitchen, a door led to the larder, which
had a door at the far end leading to the root caller. And a back door from the kitchen to the back porch,
also covered, led out to the yards and kitchen garden.
The master bedroom also had a door leading to the outside as did the play area room. All of these
doors may have meant that a polygamous family once lived there. The many rooms, all large, and the
ease of access and exit could mean that. It was an integral house, not a series of rooms added or pulled
together.
Beyond the back porch was a two-storey building which we called the wash house. The old hand
pump washing machine was there and there was a drain in the center of the cement floor and a
wood-burning range for heating water. The upper story contained a heating stove and a bed and was used
as a guest house when we had overnight company, but its main use was storage of dried foods for winter.
We also played up here in summer when it rained.

78
 Behind the wash house and the main house, outside the master bedroom was the large kitchen
garden.
Beyond the wash house was the high board fence that separated the homestead and the dwelling
area from the stockyards. Built into this fence, or the fence was built on either side, were two joining
little outhouses, each was a two-seater. These were for our use while out playing, and for the farm
hands and stock men as well. So the house originally did not have indoor plumbing.
In the square formed by the front lawn and the wash house and the stockyards was a rather large
wasteland area which had originally been the wagon yard. Mother used this for hanging out her iron
kettles on their tripods when she boiled the rough laundry or dyed materials, or made soap.
An old wagon bed lay forgotten out here, and when we went on a land journey, we traveled in this
wagon. The seat was gone but the whip and whip holder were still in place. I wonder who would leave a
whip for children to play with. We traveled the old pioneer trails, urging on the tired horses on as the
Indians got closer and closer, yelling their hideous yells and brandishing tomahawks. We snapped the
whipped, it was a real bull whip and often snapped around and swiped our bare legs, giving us a real
welt. Boy, that whip could hurt. It was the only time we every got whipped, we got spanked, but never
whipped.
It pains me to tell this, but also out in the waste land and cow manure dust propping open the gate to
the stockyards, lay an old German Bible. It just lay there, propping open the gate. I have often wondered
if it held any secrets to our German ancestry.
Back to the house. The parlor floor was of hardwood, varnished and waxed to a mirror surface. It
was covered by a quality rug, not a hand-braided rug" but store-bought. Between the two back bedroom
doors was the upright mahogany piano, and here the Christmas tree stood during the Christmas time. A
long library table of polished mahogany stood under the large window overlooking the front veranda and
the lawns. This table was covered with a silk scarf and a vase of flowers always stood in its center. Real
flowers in summer and silk ribbon flowers made by our Mother in winter.
The piano also wore a silk drape and its vase of flowers. There were no family portraits around. The
parlor furniture consisted of a three-piece mission set. This was a wood sofa and arm chairs upholstered
in brown leather. The sofa was a divan bed and one chair had rockers.
Mother sat in the rocker with the three of us, Orpha on her lap and Rhea and I on either arm, and she
read to us from the "Child's Book of Bible Stories" which we received for Christmas one year. She read
to us every night before we went to bed.
Daddy sat in the other chair and read the paper, snorting about what the government was doing. We
were Democrats, whether by calling or by conviction it is hard to tell. By Mormon philosophy it was
good to have opposing political parties. The townspeople were originally divided up, part being
Republicans and part Democrats. We were Democrats.
I always voted straight Democratic ticket as Daddy told me until I want with the Navy and when I
voted by absentee ballot at Livermore NAS It was the first time I had ever voted independently. Not then
being an original thinker, I voted straight Democratic.
The doll house which Daddy made from cheese crates stood in the corner by the library table,
behind the rocking chair. All the rest of our toys were in the play room.
We had few books, the Bible and Book of Mormon and a set of classical poems bound in red leather
which someone had given us as a present, but which no one ever read. After I learned to read, I begged
Santa Claus to bring me books rather than dolls. I kept these books in a box by the doll house in the
corner behind the chair where I could read them undisturbed. Everyone thought, and so said, that I was
indeed a strange one.
The bedrooms were large and airy and had closets built onto the walls. (Most bedrooms just had a
row of hooks.) They had large glazed windows which overlooked the lawns and orchards where birds
nested and we woke up in the morning to their songs. In the nighttime, one could see above the lilac
hedge and poplar trees marking the line of the field across the road, the full harvest moon so bright that it
seemed to be daylight.
All of the bedrooms and the parlor were wallpapered. The kitchen was finished in calcimine and
mother was proud of the new concept of having a stencil overlay in a leaf design around the top of the
wall, where, on a papered room, the fringe would be used to cover up the edges of the paper strips.
The kitchen was the largest room in the house and combined an office, the dining room and the

79
kitchen. The floor was completely covered with linoleum, laid down in three long strips. Inlaid linoleum
came later, and then asphalt tiles. But full linoleum in the kitchen was then very new. The wall facing the
lawn area had a large square window and there was a smaller window over the sink, so Mother could
keep an eye on what was going on outside and on her young ones who were playing somewhere out
there.
A tall, roll-top desk stood in the corner by the large window, and the oak dining table and oak
dining chairs stood in front of this window. A day bed stood along the wall dividing the kitchen from the
parlor. The kitchen range stood between the bathroom and the larder and under the small window close
to the stove was the sink, with real hot and cold running water. The stove had a water reservoir where
there was always warm water. Between the sink and the back door was the kitchen table where food was
prepared, and this table also served as the breakfast table, but we ate dinner and supper on the dining
table.
The dining table had expanding leaves and we often had company. It could seat perhaps twenty
people. We had eight dining chairs and six kitchen chairs. The dining table was cleared after each meal
and a scarf placed on the top and a vase of flowers or a bowl of fruit set in the exact center of the scarf. A
new cloth was used for each meal. The kitchen table had drop leaves and was covered with oil cloth. It
serves as the breakfast table and a cloth was used on this table also, but was not changed every day and
often, unless we had had guests, the supper cloth was used the next morning for breakfast.
By the back door stood the milk separator, and it was my particular job to keep this monster clean.
Cleaning the separator parts meant: First. Scrubbing with Dutch Cleanser and homemade scouring soap.
Second: Sterilizing with boiling water. Third: Placing the pieces out in the sun until mother felt all germs
were destroyed. All the pieces were then taken into the larder and covered with a clean dish cloth and
were never used for any other purpose. This was the precaution we took against contamination of the
milk using the milk utensils, the milking buckets, pans, and strainers. No one ever welcomed
pasteurization as I did.
The kitchen was not crowded for all that it contained, plus our family and assorted relations who
might be staying over the night, it being too late to return to their farms after a day in Richfield.
On rainy days, we roller skated around the dining room table. The day bed could be made up into a
full-sized bed. We also played jacks on the floor and cut out paper dolls. Somewhere in all this mother
had her sewing machine and we all learned to hem dish towels. We had to learn to darn, too, at an early
age. Although we had a lot of play time, mother kept us busy with useful character-building tasks. Later
on, as we got into school, we all did our homework around the dining room table.
The bathroom and larder were also roomy. The larder, we called it the pantry, and I did as well until
I lived in England, now I say "larder". Same thing. The larder had long rows of shelves where we kept all
the china and cooking utensils. The cooking staples were kept in bins, jars, and stone pots. There was
honey, sugar, white and whole wheat flour, salt, head cheese, mince meat, apple sauce, pickles and
catsup, all made by our Mother.
There were also the baked foods, bread, sweet rolls, cakes and pies. We could eat from this store as
much as we wanted so long as we cleared up afterwards. No food was ever locked up or counted in our
house. Daddy was a healthy trencherman and he liked to serve his guests with good food and Mother was
a good cook and enjoyed seeing people eat.
The root cellar, off the side of the larder, contained milk, the butter which mother made fresh daily,
and eggs. Here we crated the eggs which daddy sold commercially, and for which we were paid ten cents
per crate. The root vegetables, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, apples, and others were stored in an open shed
by the stockyard.
In addition to making butter, mother also kept a skimming pan of milk warming on the beck of the
range, making cottage cheese which often served as our supper meal, mixed with chopped spring onions.
Also warming on the top of the stove, the warming oven, was the yeast bottle which contained a
start of yeast and all potato water was poured into this bottle so we always had yeast for bread. If you
lost your yeast start, then you had to go borrow a start from a neighbor as commercial yeast was not yet
on the market.
The fire in the kitchen range burned all day long, winter and summer. Daddy made up the fire in the
morning and took out the ashes but we had to keep it going during the day. For this, we had a large wood
lot where daddy chopped enough wood each evening to keep us going during the next day, and we also

80
had a coal house but as I remember we only burned coal in winter, and we burned all burnable refuse so
we did not have large scrap heaps and, of course, much of the table refuse was given to the hens and
pigs.
Neither the back porch nor the front veranda were ever used as storage areas but were swept clean
every day. All farm implements, tools, harness, and outdoor clothing were stored in other closets. In
canning and harvest time the back porch became the work area. We peeled fruit, shucked corn and sliced
apples for drying and canning. Huge black flies swarmed all over the sticky juice on our bare legs.
Mother hung strips of fly paper from the overhead.
In addition to all this space, mother had the wash house. The washer and tubs were kept here.
Upstairs we stored the dried fruits and vegetables for winter and hung the Thanksgiving and Christmas
turkey. Here we picked the feathers from the wild game birds daddy brought in from the hills. Also the
annual deer which daddy also provided for our winter meat. Here our cousins told their gruesome ghost
stories as we all huddled together under the quilt on the bed, our blood curdling and hair standing on end.
Behind the wash house, between this house and the garden, was a narrow strip of earth where two
plum trees blossomed and bore fruit through the spring and summer. Mother made jam from the fruit in
fall. Here stood the ice box, two boxes, one above the other. I should say two frames for boxes.The sides
were made of wire screen and the whole affair draped with layers and layers of burlap. A large bucket
with a perforated bottom stood on top of the boxes and was filled with water from the garden hose. The
water dripped down onto the burlap sacking and kept the interior very cool. Here perishable foods were
kept in summer. On the steps of the porch we washed your diapers, as I have told further along in this
rambling story.
This strip of earth between the wash house and the garden continued along the main house. Outside
of the master bedroom was a sour cherry tree. No one ever made a better sour cherry pie than our
Mother. We used this tree as a ladder to climb up on the pitched (slanted) roof and slide down over the
back porch. Woe woz us when Daddy caught us doing this. But it formed one of our favorite sports. We
also would hang from the tree by our knees. Strange that none of us ever got hurt doing this other than
the spankings we got when daddy caught us.
The clothes lines were strung along this piece of earth outside mother's bedroom window. When we
had been swimming in the canal, lured by our friends whose father had one of the larger farms in our part
of the world. There huge black willow trees hung out over the water. We climbed the trees and crawled
out on the limbs and swung back and forth until we dropped into the water. When we returned home we
would hang up our muddy flour sack bloomers on the clothes line outside the windows of our mother's
bedroom. We were really very tidy children in our way. We had been well-taught and we never could
understand how Mother always knew when we had been in the canal. She told us she could see in our
eyes what we had been doing. So, nothing if not intelligent, we kept our eyes shut whenever we thought
perhaps we had misbehaved so she could not see into them our misdeeds. We often heard her laughing
softly to herself as she poked up the fire. We did not know why.
My we did have fun when we were young. Poor kids of today with only computer simulated games
to keep them amused. They should come down the Bothwell hill on barrel slats for skis and see a real
wire fence ahead knowing that you either went over the fence or the fence went over you, scraping all the
way. Now, that was a thrill.
In the stockyard, behind the high board fence with the old German family Bible holding open the
gate, Daddy kept his cows in the now unused stables. I think I have mentioned that Daddy had no love
for horses. There was as an extension from the stanchion. (What that means I have no idea but it was
what we called this building). It contained loose boxes for horses things and had a hay loft overhead.
This was a another fine place for us to play. But whenever mother found us playing in the loose boxes,
forbidden, because of the sharp farm implements that were kept there. She would climb up the outside
ladder to the hay loft and make weird moaning and groaning sounds down through the cracks in the
boards. All of daddy's yelling and shouting could not drive us out like mother's moans. No wonder you
were afraid of the "twilight".
As an extension from the stanchion, was a long bowery type affair, made of pine pole uprights and
thatched with straw and here the sparrows had their nests by the thousands. As sparrows ate up the
wheat, we were encouraged to steal their eggs. This also kept us at home and not ranging out on the
alluvial plain to climb the cottonwoods after bird eggs as the rest of the neighborhood kids did.

81
 The old stanchion was plastered and white washed on its exterior and a yard light hung from the
wall facing the stockyard. When we got a good pool of eggs we took turns trying to hit the light. The
result was the light remained serene and untouched and the whitewashed plaster wall took on a yellow
mottled color. What might be called vomit yellow. This never failed to wound our Father's artistic soul
and we often got spanked.
We never seemed to relate spanking to (1) throwing eggs at the yard light, (2) climbing the cherry
tree to swing from the roof, (3) falling from the willow trees into the canal, (4) opening the gates in the
irrigation ditches (5)playing hide and seek in the alfalfa the day before the cutters came and other
interesting amusements which we and the rest of the neighborhood kids enjoyed on long summer
afternoons. We just thought spanking was a part of our lives, especially when daddy seemed somewhat
grumpy.
I only remember one time when I related a spanking to something I had done, and that was one
holiday when I came around the corner of the house and saw before me Uncle King bending over the ice
cream freezer. I don't know why I did this. I was not a mean kid, but I suppose the target, so large and
enticing right there before me that it was irresistible, and I lifted my high button shoe and kicked him
right on target and he went right over the ice cream freezer. Strangely enough, I didn't get spanked for
this although daddy looked very stern. I noticed that mother, Wanda and Aunt Pearl had strangely
disappeared! I really wanted to be spanked then for I knew I had been really bad. Well, the ways of
grownups are not to be understood by small children.
The American Farm Bureau was encouraging stock improvement. Uncle Ed had raised Rambouillet
rams and thoroughbred Hirsch. Uncle Frank raised race horses but we never much discussed the horses
or the races. Good Mormons didnt bet on the races.
To the far side of the cow sheds, daddy built three large hen coops and he started to raise White
Leghorn hens. We had to gather the eggs in large milk buckets almost as tall as we were. We would drag
them to the house. It was no small distance actually and it was no wonder that Mother stood ready to
open the door for us when we finally made it. I expect more concerned for the eggs than for our tender
backs. The buckets were heavy and we dragged them along between our legs straddled over them as it
were. We got paid for this task. But we placed no value on the money and always fought over whose turn
it was to do this chore..
In the front of the house, from the corner of the house along the front and curving out over the
veranda and running around to the back porch was a cement sidewalk. It was joined by a walk from the
gate to the veranda and a walk from the back porch to the wash house. We were able to enter the house
from either the front door or the back door with clean feet. We had a mud scrapper at the front door in
the best up town fashion.
The entire homestead, the dwelling house, the gardens and lawns, the orchard, the wash house, the
stockyard and the hen coops, covered one third of our property. The other two thirds of the property
formed the long arm of an "L" behind the stockyards. This was planted in alfalfa as fodder for the stock.
The alfalfa field was enclosed by a wire and pole fence which was grown over with burdock and
sage brush. At the near end of the field was a wooden stile (step gate) led to the open wasteland. This
stile was surrounded by blackberry bushes. Beyond this stile was the meadow where the Indians raised
their teepee village. Beyond this were the waste lands leading up to the hills.
The street from the County Road (the main traffic artery into Richfield from the north) stopped at
our place. Beyond this was a rather hard trampled track which disappeared into the high sage brush.
There was one farm beyond our place where Reg Peterson and his young wife, Opal, lived. They were
really town-folk but I think Reg inherited this place from his father. He farmed with a sort of "gentry"
air, and always wore a white shirt and suit and polished shoes all day on Sunday. Opal was a beautiful
woman, much younger than our mother. They were very good friends. What I remember mostly about
Opal was that she wore lovely ball gowns and a beaded head band when they went out in the evening.
They often left their young son, Chad, for us to tend.
To the east and north of our place were two other farms. These were old farms, that is, the men who
ran them had been born on them. They were owned by Charlie Ogden, who had the willow trees over the
canal and Alex Jensen. He was a thin man with a round-shouldered stoop. His wife was quite large and
had a pronounced goiter. They had one daughter, Melba, who they brought up to be a lady. She played
the piano and never swung on the willow trees. The Ogden children were numerous and ran all around us

82
in size and ages. We learned a great deal from them. They had one daughter named Helen who was
somewhere around our ages. There were older daughters who attended the BYU and a whole passer of
boys of all ages, all very energetic. These two men were quite well-to-do. Still they lived as farmers, as
we did, rather than as townspeople.
So, Annivor, this was the home where you were born and where we lived for another four years
before selling this place and moving uptown when daddy became assistant manager of the cheese
factory. We lived uptown for perhaps a little over a year before moving to Tremonton, Box Elder
County, in the extreme north of Utah. In the extreme North Pole we thought that first winter. And these
were your family, your neighbors and friends. You were five when we moved to Tremonton.
I have referred in this story to the differences in our home and those of some of our neighbors. This
is not to the discredit of our neighbors, but, even as a child I noticed a difference in the way some of
them lived from the way we lived. As I think about this now, it occurs to me that we were second
generation in Utah and most of these people were convert immigrants from Europe. Our grandfathers had
held the land before we held it and had developed it and brought it under cultivation and made it
productive. These newcomers were still adjusting to living in an alien and desert land. They were gentle
kindly people and we lived together in a close neighborly society.
All of the children played together in one large group. The older ones looking after the toddlers. We
all herded cows in the pastures. We rode as many as could pile onto the one or two horses ridden by one
of two boys. We wheeled old tires along the dusty ruts in the summer roads to see who could make the
biggest dust cloud. (our Mother loved us when we played that little game). We played kick the can, run
sheep run, and baseball in the trampled roadway in front of our house. We went bird-nesting hunting
together and swam in the canal during lunch breaks while thinning beets. We all thinned beets. We made
play houses out of the sage brush thickets. We were still living the United Order way. Each one having
the watch and care over the others. Each one giving of his excess to those who had less.
In moving into town, we moved from a rural society into a town society. If Mother had less room in
her town house, she also had less heavy work to do for electrical appliances were coming in. It was in
this house that we got our first refrigerator, iron and washing machine. (The washing machine we had in
our rural home had a gasoline motor). We did not have an electric kitchen range until we moved to
Tremonton and had built our modern home on South Tremonton Street We did not have a central heating
system until we built this house. Up until this time we slept in cold bedrooms in the winter taking blanket
wrapped in hot bricks to bed with us. Waking up to see the Jack Frost paintings on the windows. I was
almost old enough to vote when we had warm beds to sleep in during the long winter months.
The Depression had made it necessary for all of us to find work. We wanted to leave school and
work full-time but Daddy was against this, as was Mother. We went to school and worked part-time.
During the summers I worked out on the Faust Valley Ranch in the hills west of Tremonton, where
Thiokol now is. Rhea became a dental assistant to Dr. Donald B. Green, the dentist, newly established,
and later, Dr. Ficklin. Orpha worked first in the J. C. Penny store as a cashier, and later in the Post
Office.
After I graduated from high school, I worked as a telephone operator at the Bear River Valley
Telephone Company. As this was shift work, I was not able to go with the family on their annual
vacation to Yellowstone National Park.
Daddy had started his own business. First the shoe repair shop where we all worked after school.
Then he branched out into sporting goods and mother began working there also. Thus started the breakup
of our close little family as is right and normal.
Ross and Max did their bit to push you off your throne. They were as enchanting as you had been
and as quick and charming. You were with them more and more, taking the same place with them that
Rhea had had with you.
Rhea, Orpha and Nola, were interested in dating, MIA, little overnight trips to Salt Lake City to hear
concerts, and the Gold and Green Balls. These were all part of the social activities of a small town.
Daddy was drama, dance and music director of the MI A. He and mother were very interested in all of
this.
At first, we all piled into the car after supper, and went on long drives through this wide flat new
home land of ours. Here fruit fell unpicked from the trees and melons ripened in open fields. Here signs
were posted on the gate, Come and take away, because the farmers could not handle all of their

83
produce. We could not believe such an abundance and mother canned and canned.
One time, on one of the first drives we went on, daddy stopped the car at a melon patch where
people were buying melons from the farmer right in the field. We had never seen any melon but
watermelon which were trucked in and purchased from the trucker in Richfield. We were very curious
about this new activity. Daddy asked the farmer how much he wanted for the melons, and the man said,
Two for a quarter. Daddy gave him a quarter and told the man to put the melons in the trunk of the car.
The man began throwing melons into the trunk and daddy watch in astonishment and finally ask, How
much did you say they were? The man spelled it out, two dozen for a quarter. So we went home with
twenty four melons and did we ENJOY them.
The War years came (Sec. World War) and we all went away and we never really came back. Rhea
and Orpha were married. I want with the Navy and you with the Army (civilian status and wonderful
uniforms). Ross and Max were starting to tip over outhouses on Halloween and get involved in their own
lives and friends. We rarely came back now all at the same time. I wrote of one of our last gatherings in
my Christmas Story, the Story of the Christmas Stocking, which you should have.

#3

We were born in Sevier County in the years of the I World War, coming from a almost primitive
frontier environment into the aftermath of a war and the subsequent effects on the individual just coming
into the labor market. My parents were married in this time, when a man had to take what work he could
find and what housing he could find.
Our family, born over a long period of time, nearly twenty years, during which our nation changed
from the horse and buggy age to the jet age, and the children over a long period of time.
I was eight when Annivor was born and she was six when Ross was born. We have moved in that
time from a small ranch to a thriving metropolitan area in a small but centrally located town which
served as the industrial and commercial hub of a large farming ant ranching district. Father had
progressed from a small shareholder to the owner of a competent business and held positions of civic and
Church as well as social leadership.
Our family was held together by a strong bond of love and friendship and a feeling of family
responsibility, that has tied us together again almost as the small little unit into which we were born. All
of this makes it difficult to write a complete story of your mother and I have to rely on contemporary
happenings and then say that she was a part of these events.
I look back now and see that I lived a very different life from that of my sisters. Perhaps I was
somewhat brain-damaged when I was born. My life has been a challenge with what appeared to be a less
than normal body. The most challenging of these problems has perhaps been my inability to be fully
coordinated. I could not follow any rhythm, dancing, marching, sports, even singing. This put me
outside the family circle. My father was a fine musician and a great sportsman. Rhea and Orpha had
these talents and so were closer to him and to mother. More than this, since I could not enter into the
family activities, I filled a position that was more of a service nature than an entertainment nature. I
drove the cows to the pasture. Took care of the kitchen garden. Did the outdoor tasks that were not in
themselves objectionable, in fact I really loved this work, but it kept me from participating in the social
life of my family.
I can see now that I grew up without learning the social graces or developing a social presence
which Rhea and Orpha acquired very early in their childhood. Later, I sensed this lack and by observing
others taught myself the social moors, but never had the instinctive awareness of the correct social
behavior. I always felt out of place in the parlor, as it were, and would retreat to the kitchen or the garden
where I felt more comfortable. Therefore, as we grew older, I grew more separate and thus I do not have
an intimate association with Rhea who was a very socially adept young lady.
Almost immediately after the war, I served a mission and then attended the University, while she
went with her husband to Idaho, but in the few years between then and her early death, we developed a
close friendship and a deep affection which still endures.
Our first family, Rhea, Orpha and Nola, was born into an almost frontier setting, Richfield was the
metropolitan center of the central Utah counties, between Provo and St. George, Richfield was the only
town of importance, with a commercial economy rather than an almost entirely agricultural economy.

84
 The first World War was being fought in Europe, but the impact of this war had its effect upon even
our tiny community as the men of the county were called up and as they returned with an awareness of a
life beyond the county borders which was like nothing they had ever heard about.
It was a time of rapid change and my mother and father, born into an austere pioneer economy, had
to adjust to this rapidly changing society in which the solid security of the United Order gave way to
opportunists, exploiters, and lessening moral very codes much the same as we are experiencing today.
Richfield was a remote town, almost a two-day journey from Salt Lake City. People traveling
between the two points planned to camp out one night or stay with relatives. Although airplanes were
used in warfare, travel was still accomplished by horse and wagon or buggy if you were wealthy, and
news was still announced by ringing the schoolhouse bell. Men still rode on horseback through the night
for the doctor. Families brought their dinner in baskets to Church. Their homes was too distant to return
to for dinner and then back for evening services. Homes were heated by wood-burning stoves and meals
were cooked the same way. They were illuminated by kerosine lamps, and children walked to school,
carrying lunch pails.
Young people married, moved into whatever kind of housing they could find. The young husband
found whatever kind of work he could find. They adjusted their lives to their environment. There was no
thought of setting goals or directed activities. There were no grey areas. You were rich or poor, bright in
school, or dumb, sane or crazy, healthy or sickly, high or low, and once in the mold, you never deviated
from it.
I think people were generally happier, more satisfied, more neighborly. There was little to make
them discontented. The poor outnumbered the rich. They were secure in their numbers. They had no
feelings of jealousy or discontentment. If the eldest son of the rich man turned out less than perhaps the
town expected of him, they could say to themselves, looking at their own stalwart son, well, that is what
money does for you. They were secure with the security of kitchen gardens, laying hens, milk cows, with
butter and eggs to cook with, cured hams and bacon in the larder, dried fruits hanging in clean white
sacks from the rafters and vegetables in the root cellar.
As I said, we were a long ways from Salt Lake City. Store-bought clothing we did not need as
homespun materials were virtually indestructible and one dress could serve an entire generation as each
succeeding daughter came into its size.
But all of this was rapidly changing. The land was limited. As the second generation grew up there
was no land for additional farms. The land that had been allotted in United Order days was only meant to
sustain one family. There was little industry and very little opportunity for work other than the mines.
(And this was considered working for the devil himself). The merchants, bankers and professional men
employed their own children. School teachers were imported as few children could be educated to that
degree. The land could not support its population. Yet, the idea of moving away from the home farm was
not even considered.
My mother's people were frontiersmen, that is, they knew how to survive on the frontier. They were
colonial Americans, in America before the Revolutionary War. After this War, they moved west seeking
new lands. They were still living in comparative frontier circumstances when they were converted to the
Mormon faith. They moved on west to Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois and then to Utah. In Utah they were
sent out to colonize the border lands. My mother's father, Moses Franklin Farnsworth, had for the time a
remarkably good education. He was a storekeeper and an accountant. In Utah he taught school although
he was not trained for this profession, but he could read and write. When the first temple was dedicated
in St. George, he was called to be the recorder. He devised the system of keeping records that was used
until the computer age. If you study these old temple records, you will se e that they are written in his
own handwriting, a beautiful "copperplate" penmanship. He was a polygamist, and during the
persecutions moved for security reasons to Manti. There he became the recorder of that temple which
had just been completed. There he remained until his death.
So my mother grew up in an atmosphere of a deeply spiritual household and she kept this
atmosphere about her all the days of her life, and we children grew up in this influence as it was a part of
our home.
In Utah they reverted to farming again as that was the main economy. They had settled in St.
George and I do not know whether they intended to remain there. Grandmother Heppler's brothers and
her mother were living in St. George. They may have just gone there temporarily. I have not been able to

85
find too much about them in this area.
About this time the Black Hawk Indian War was ending. It had raged through west, central and
southern Utah for seven years. It had desolated almost every community in central Utah. Brigham Young
wanted to get these regions settled again. Scouts and explorers were sent out and they discovered a large
spring of water. This probably had already been discovered as this area was quite well settled prior to the
Indian wars. But this spring played an important part in the settlement. It was located back in the hills
and formed a large pond or lake with a large stream of water flowing out of it.
The meadow surrounding this spring was back of the hill and out on the crest of the hill and the
town was at the foot of the hill. There was this rather high steep escarpment which formed the face of the
hill. The stream flowed through the meadow and over the escarpment in a lovely fall and then the stream
continued along the bottom of the escarpment and the town was located at the foot of the hill along the
stream. The land then spread out into the Sevier River valley.
Richfield was on the other side of the river and the hills forming the western boundary of the valley.
Along this stream above the escarpment, a number of mills were located. A saw mill, a woolen mill, a
shingle mill, and a tannery.
Grandmother Heppler's father had been a tanner in Canada and his sons had learned this trade. One
of Grandmother's brothers came to Glenwood as the tanner for the United Order community. Our
grandfather came with him to manage the tannery. Grandfather was not a tanner, but he managed this
tannery.
After the United Order was dissolved, he purchased a farm in Glenwood and built a large two story
frame home. Later, he became the county clerk and then the county probate judge for Sevier County and
he moved into Richfield.
My father was the youngest of the 18 children of this family, and his father was an old man and a
paralytic when my father was just a boy. He did not have the companionship of a father nor did he have
companionship with his mother. She was forced to support her family as well as take care of her invalid
husband.
Nor did he have companionship with his older brothers. His close friends were his cousin, King
Seegmiller, and his nephew, Julian Heppler, whose mother had died at his birth and who was raised
along with the rest of Grandmother's brood. I have not been able to sort out the stories told of the early
days of this family in Richfield.
After grandfather died and his sons were grown and self-supporting they purchased a little home
where grandmother lived until her death. Before that time grandmother had purchased a larger home
where her family lived until they all married.
My father's oldest brother, John Edmund, owned three quarters of an acre of land on the perimeter
of Richfield and on this he had his home. It was a three-bedroom home with farm buildings, a large
kitchen garden and orchard, and two fields where he raised hay and alfalfa. The other fourth of this acre
was owned by someone else. A small house stood on this property. It was rented by a series of temporary
families, itinerants who came and went over the years.
I do not know that Grandfather Heppler owned this land but have always understood that he entered
the land and had the original title. That Uncle Ed received the land after Grandfather died. My father
received this land from Uncle Ed. The early deeds of Sevier County are very fragmentary and I have not
been able to prove the actual ownership of this land.
Between Glenwood and the Sevier River was a little spur of a hill and along this spur Uncle Ed had
a small ranch. Further along this same spur, his brother Frank, had a fish hatchery and a farm.
The road ran from Richfield, crossing the Sevier River, and onto Glenwood in almost a straight line,
about five miles.

86
 Chapter 8
Rosco Zar Heppler, Sr.

This is an edited transcript of a tape recording made by Rosco Sr. as told to his son, Rosco Zar
Heppler Jr. He was in his late 70's when it was made.
I have edited it to make it easier to understand. I have only correct the really serious errors. I have
placed my corrections and comments in parentheses. Quotes are used to show when questions were
asked.
My father, Andrew Martin, and four brothers came to America. There was Andrew. Then there was
John. I don't know who the other two were. But father, he was a tanner and he went to Toronto. He
worked in Germany as a tanner. His name was Andrew Martin. When he came here, he went up around
Toronto.
(Nola) Martin was never part of his name. It
was just added by custom. There is also confect as to
just if and when he became a tanner but it us true that
he worked in a tannery in Canada and later in
Glenwood.
A man by the name of Seegmiller had a big
tannery up there and father got a job there. This
Seegmiller also had a beautiful daughter by the name
of Lucy-- Louisianna. Father fell in love with her
and they got married. This Louisianna had her own
maid. She never even had to comb here own hair.
Her room was taken care of and everything else. She
married father and then sometime after the marriage
this Seegmiller's four sons--the ones I knew of were
Uncle Charlie, Uncle Adam and I dont remember
the others.
But Uncle Bill and Uncle Charlie got to
skylarking around and got down into Kansas. They
hooked up with a Mormon Pioneer Train going to
Utah. When they got into Utah, they were converted
to Mormons. They went back to Canada. There were
only two other sisters I knew of, Aunt Anna--I don't
know her other name - just Anna and they we
reconverted. They tried to convert the whole family
and they did convert the other brother but I don't R Z Heppler Sr. 1913
remember his name.
They converted Louisianna. They converted Anna. And they converted father (Andrew). They
came to Utah. Anna stopped off in Salt Lake. It was easier for Anna to accept religion because she was
married to a drunkard by the name of Pete McCollough. She left him and came with them and settled or
stayed in Salt Lake.
Mother and Father went down into
what they called at that time Plattsville. It was a town about four miles east of Richfield and a mile north
of what they called Glenwood. They lived the United Order with the other Mormons down there.
Father was called on a mission to go back to Germany and he went.
Were there any children?
There were six children. Ed, Edmond.
Was he the oldest?
No, Eva was the oldest.
Was she the first born?
No. They had one before that but she died.
Did they name it?

87
 I don't know.
But the first living was a girl named Eva? Yes.
Then Edmond
That would be the first boy? Yes.
Then Millie, (Amillia), Andrew Martin, named after father, and Frank. Frank Heppler - that's all I
ever knew him by. And Arthur Lewis. I think that is six of them. That is what they had in Plattsville.
They must not of had all of these when they first came to Plattsville.
Then Plattsville got to irrigating the ground up around Richfield in those high ground and it became
swampy. They moved up into a cove up in the mountains and they live in a town called Glenwood.
They moved up there into a log house. When they lived in Plattsville they lived in a log stable and
they shared the stable with another family. Then they moved up to Glenwood.
While he was on his mission, he met a woman that had left her husband on account of drunkenness
and she had six children. There was Fred, John, Emma, Elisa, and Annie Rutlesburger (He couldn't
remember the name of the sixth child).
She had these six children and she wanted father to take her to America and live in polygamy. He
said he would have to go home first and talk to Lucy. (This was done by letter. He only made one tripe to
Germany.)
Lucy said that she went through her Gethsemane. She laid on the floor and wept and wrung her hair.
But finally she consented. So this woman came with her six children.
Right after she got here, she died from typhoid fever and on her dying bed she requested that Lucy,
mother, take care of those children. To raise them and keep them together until they were either married
or became of age. Mother did and she adopted those kids.
She had six of her own and with these that made twelve? Yes.
They took the name of Heppler. (Some of them did. Thy were never legally adopted.)
They were like six pairs of twins. They took the name of Rutlesburger-Heppler. Annie was deaf and
never did get married.
Then father got a job as district judge. I don't knowhow he got it but he got it. And in Glenwood he
had a farm. Forty acres right on the south end of Glenwood.
It was in this cove. The mountain came running around this big cove country and went way out into
what was this ranch that I worked on with Ed. The mountain ran like this and over here was a big black
mountain that ran out into the valley and had this cove in it. Up where the mountain began there was one
mountain or hill that came out like this and on that side there was a low valley and a wash. And on the
other side was a valley and a wash.
So father could keep his boys busy with two little teams of horses, a plow, and a scraper and he cut
this point of the mountain down. He moved it over into this wash and that wash and he had a beautiful
lay.
Then he built his house out of white adobe. On that side was a vegetable garden, potatoes and corn
and on the other side there was a beautiful orchard. It is still there today. This home was one of the
biggest homes in Glenwood. It was a great big double tee. On one side was a kitchen and a bedroom and
on the other a bedroom and what we use to call the old parlor. In the center of it was a great big room
and that was the dining room and living room. Then on the front of it was a porch and on the back of it
was a screened in porch.
On the screened in porch there were two big wooden boxes (for fire wood) and it was my job to
keep them full. The older brothers had to chop and saw the wood. They would go into the mountains and
haul in this pine wood. What we called Balsam pine wood and that was used in the heater stove.
We had a great big long stove. It was four feet long. Not very high but it could hold the big logs.
And that was in this big living room. That kept the house warm. In the other room we has the kitchen
range. We chopped cedar wood for the range to cook with. After the older boys had chopped this wood,
it was my job to wheel it down in a wheelbarrow that father had made. For the wheel he had used the
wheel from an old washing machine. For the body of the wheelbarrow he used an old barrow stave. He
put that on two-by-fours and that was my conveyance to wheel this wood down and fill those boxes
every night.
And one night I was playing around and a storm came up and it snowed. And I thought - oh father --
he will get the fire started some way. I won't haul the wood down. I think he use to get up about six

88
o-clock. Anyway he grabbed me out of bed and he shook me like this-- I can remember that as well as if
it were yesterday -- Are you awake? Are you awake Rossy? Are you awake? I said, Yes. Go do
your chores. I can't build a fire until you get some wood. By this time there was five or six inches of
snow on the ground and I had to wheel the wood down in it. Father has a job for everyone.
You haven't told me when you were born.
Well lets go back. Well then there was after Frank, Arthur L., Charles Monk, Louisianna (Lue),
Columbus Lamar, Sterling Conecto, and after him came Rosco Zar. That was all from Louisianna. That
made eighteen children.
(Elmira) There were nineteen.
Then Uncle Ed got married and his wife died at childbirth and left Julian. He was two years younger
than me and mother took him and raised him with me so there were nineteen of us. Julian and I were just
like pals or brothers.
Well we lived up on this place and made it beautiful. There was this big beautiful lawn and it came
from (the front) of this house down to the road, two or three acres. All the sheds and stables were made
out of rock and plaster. The stable for the horses and cows was up by this hill and they made a dug-way
so that when they brought the hay in they could shovel it down into the hay yard. Wood, even the wood
was put off from the wagons down into the wood pile.
I remember one night father coming home, he drove a big sorrow horse with a two-wheel cart and it
only had a place for a seat on it. I remember one night he came home from Richfield and he had a big
sack and he brought it in. He emptied it and it was clear full of "stoggies". That was a heavy shoe with
no laces. Just a buckle across like an overshoe. We all rushed in and picked out a pair to fit. I don't know
where he got them from.
Lamar came down. Evidently he should have had his chores done a long time ago. He had to keep
the horse stalls clean. Lamar have you got your work done yet? No, I haven't father. Well get out of here
and he booted him clear out the door, just like I used to boot you guys. He went out and finished up
doing it. He should have had it done early in the day.
And that's the way he was. Each had his job. Charles had his work. Sterling had his work.
(Ann) Where did you put the stuff from the stables?
We hauled it out on the farm. We had about six head of cows we milked.
And then father had a stroke. Then he had to quit work. He was pretty well an invalid. He did do a
little work around the house. This was in Glenwood. Then he had another stroke and he became an
invalid in a chair. But of course Ed and the older boys took and ran the farm. He had taught them. He
was a dictator. A German dictator. He had a system for everything around the house. There was no such
thing as your home. Everything worked systematical.
Then after he became sick the family moved away one by one. They got married off.
When mother was raising these adopted kids I remember one story that was interesting. Lisa was the
baby girl. (Rutlesburger) Cute little tot. People were moving from Utah down to Arizona. And of course
they thought it was awful that mother would try to raise these children because so many people wanted
to take them and adopt them. And she would not let them go. She had made this promise and was going
to stick by it.
But they tell this one story that there were some people from Utah that were moving to Arizona and
they came past. They stayed at our place. Mother would take everybody in. They had a covered wagon.
They fell in love with this little tot Elisa and they prevailed upon mother to let them have her. Finally
mother consented and they put her upon the wagon. All the clothes she had were put in a red
handkerchief and a rag doll was all she had to take with her. She set up there so happy with this rag doll
and she said good-bye to mother and the wagon pulled out of the gate and down the street. Mother went
in the house and started to cry. She had broken her promise to keep the family together.
Edmond said, Mother don't you want that child to go?
No, I don't. Go get her.
He ran about two or three miles before he caught up with that wagon. He climbed up and took her
down and they walked all the way home. That was the only temptation she had of splitting the family up.
After father became sick and the children moved away, mother sold the place. Sold the farm and
moved to Richfield and bought a home over there. A big home. Then it was too big because they all left.
There was nobody home but me and Sterl and Sterl wasn't home very much.

89
 He lived in Salt Lake City working as a soda squirt. He got
to working in the drug stores. He got fallen arches so he came
home and was a cripple.
Then they operated on him and they only made it worse.
So mother took him back up to Salt Lake to the LDS Business
College and I had to go along. So I finish the eight grade in the
old Hamilton School in Salt Lake. And then we went back the
next year and I went to the LDS High School. We went back
the third year and I got into the sophomore year. Sterling
finished his course there.
Then there was this fellow by the name of Hayes. He
married Emma, the oldest girl of the Rutlesburgers. He became
a judge. Through his pull he got a job for Sterl with Senator
Wellington. Sterl went back to Washington and worked for
him. He went to the university and became a lawyer. Then he
didn't have to walk on his feet any more.
He came to Richfield and put out his shingle and was a
darn good lawyer. Then they called him on a mission and he
went. They promised him if he would go on the mission and fill
it his feet would get well. He came back and his feet did get
well enough so that he could walk around on them pretty good.
But he in his law business, for instances my bishop in the Hepp 1913
third ward, they came to him (Sterling) to collect these bills
from the bishop and especially from the stake president, Pres.Young. Bills for collection you know and
nobody would collect them or even touch these bills. But my brother Sterling said, "Nuts to you church
guys." "You have to pay your bills as well as anyone else." He brought these guys into court and
collected these old outstanding bills. But he lost out to the church and he quit going to church. He just
didn't fit in any more after that.
Then this California oil thing came along and in the meantime I went to work for my brother, Ed,
out on his sheep ranch. He had a sheep ranch out in Plattsville four miles east of Richfield. And then he
got into this oil business. This guy Steeples from California got them down there and took all their
money away. My brother Sterl and my brother Ed went down there (California) and sold the ranch and I
moved into town. I was living out there on the ranch. We had three little girls all about the same size,
Rhea, Nola, Orpha.
And then I came into town and my brothers went down to California and lost their money. And my
brother couldnt pay me what he owed me on the ranch and so finally he sold his home in Richfield to
me from what he owed me. He moved to Salt Lake, Ed did, and Andrew he went up to Canada.
Frank went into the sheep business. He was herding sheep. Well Andy and him both became sheep
herders and they would go out herding sheep. Finally they wanted to buy a herd of sheep and get their
own start. Frank and Andy they wanted to by this herd. They were working for a man by the name of
Killian. They were up in the mountains with the sheep and he came up there to make the deal. When he
talked with them, they didn't have enough money to buy the sheep. They wanted to buy them on time or
something and he definitely decided that they couldn't handle it. They invited him for supper before he
left. They had mutton and sour dough bread. He said that he would enjoy the meal very much. As they
set down at the table he started into eating and they said, "Just a minute." "We always say grace around
our table and thank the Lord for the days care." And they said a prayer and then they started to eat. And
this Killian sold them the sheep. He said if they were good enough boys to say the blessing on the food
that way they were good enough to buy the sheep.
Then Andy became separated some way from Frank and went up to Montana. Frank continued on
to herd sheep and he became one of the wealthiest men in southern Utah. But he left the church and all
mother's teachings. And he says he has become an atheist but I don't think he ever was. But he said there
was no God. There couldn't be a God with all the cruel cruelness on the earth. Andy became a drunkard,
an alcoholic, and died an alcoholic.
Uncle Bill, (Seegmiller) mother's brother, came to Utah and stayed there. Uncle Charlie went down

90
to St. George. Lavell went into Kanab. I don't know what became of the other brother. Whenever you
hear of any Seegmillers around Kanab or St. George, they are our relations or cousins.
One day Uncle Bill was talking to Frank and kind of chastising him for taking the attitude that he
had. And he said, "Frank if you don't turn around and pay your tithing you will lose ever mortal thing
that you have. And you will become as low as a snake in the grass." Frank gave him some smart answer.
Well he did lose the sheep and everything else. He became a very poor man. He hardly had enough
money to keep his kids in school. He settled in sort of a fish farm out there in the Black Hills. He kept
staying with it and staying with it until it broke him.
Well then La Mar, Art, went into Salt Lake and became a good salesman selling furniture. Charles
ran around wilder than a rattlesnake and finally he became manager of the phone company there in
Richfield. Sterling, I've told you about him and what he became. And I just went along. I was just the
baby.
Mother didn't have any money at all to buy me decent clothes and I hated to go to school because I
looked so shabby. Never had any shoes to wear all summer and when Sunday came, why I had to put
shoes on to go to Sunday School. My feet hurt so I could hardly wait until I got home so I could take
them off. I was living there with mother. Kind of half living there with mother. I was working around on
whatever jobs I could get there in Richfield. I went the third year of school to the LDS High School.
While I was in Salt Lake I got a job or helped my cousin clean the pipes in the organ in the
Tabernacle. Some of the pipes are so big I could crawl into them. Then I came home and mother wanted
me to go back up again to high school. I couldn't because she didn't have any money and I didn't have
any.
I would get good jobs and it just looked better so I didn't go back up to school. That's all the
schooling I had. I was just working around there and kind of living with mother half the time and I
became a soda jerk. I was working in a confectionery store. I dont remember how I lost my job. How
did I lose it? I lost my job anyway about Christmas time.
(Mother) He went bankrupt too.
So then after Christmas why there was a plaster mill down in Sigard seven miles north of Richfield.
Anyone could get a job down there because nobody wanted to work there and you could get a job any
time you wanted too. They would hire anybody. So I went down to make some money the best way I
could to work in this plaster mill.
Elmira was living with her sister. Her husband, Gottfredson, was manager of the company store, the
mill store. He had given her a job clerking. Her mother died. She came from a polygamist family,
Farnsworth, he was a temple clerk. I guess he was dead too.
(Mother) He died when I was ten.
(How old were you when your mother died?)
Fifteen or something. I was working in a co-op and I went home to Sigard for the funeral. I worked
from the time I was ten years old. And I mean it was full bore.
(Dad again) She was working down in this store and I went down there to work in this mill. Of
course I went next door to buy candy and stuff and there was this cute girl behind the counter. And I
thought; "Well, that's an attractive little girl in there."
I had the pick of all the girls in Richfield and everything I wanted but nothing seemed to appeal to
me. This little girls behind the counter, she was quite attractive so I spent quite a bit of time in the store.
She didn't take much notice of me. I found out she was secretary of the MIA so one Tuesday night I
dressed up and went to MIA. Sure enough there she sat up there at the desk. After MIA her friends said,
"Oh did you notice that cute little guy that came in?" She said, "My heavens girls, where did you look?"
Well so this friend came and told me about it. And I thought, "Well I will show her." So I did.
I had worked in a tailor shop and the cleaning shop so I knew cleaning and I was pretty good on
tailoring. I had made vests and I had made pants in the tailor shop. So there were two guys in Richfield
who started to run, open up a cleaning place. So they came down to me and I quit my job and went up to
Richfield. I would drive back down to Sigard to see her on Sundays. By this time I had fallen in love
with her.
Finally one time they had an excursion up to Manti. I don't remember what it was for, but we all got
on the train and went up there. We came back about one or two in the morning. I thought now is as good
a time to pop the question as any. So I ask her if she would marry me and she said yes. So I grabbed her

91
up in my arms and gave her her first kiss. Now she says I don't kiss her long enough. We set the date for
getting married on the tenth of June and we stuck with it.
(Were you married in Richfield?) Yes.
She wanted to go to the temple to be married. I went to the Bishop. He was my cousin and I ask
him. I said that my wife wanted me to take her to the temple to marry her. Could I get a recommend? He
said, "I will let you know tomorrow."The next day he came to me and he said, "You haven't paid any
tithing." I said, "No." He said, "I can't give you a temple recommend until you pay some tithing." And so
I said, "Go to Hell! I didn't want to go to the temple anyway.
So then we got married. We got Bishop Dastard of Sigurd to marry us down in my brother-in-laws
home. His name was Gottfredson. We had quite a bit of a party and stuff.
(My father failed to mention that at the time he was smoking and was not worthy to go to the
temple. A few years later he quit smoking. He said, "That one day he looked at the cigarette and thought
I am not going to let that little white stick be my master." " I threw it away and never smoked again."
As to his remark about tithing, by the time I remember him he had gained a very strong testimony of
tithing and was a very stanch believer in it. As far as I know he was a full tithe payer until his death.)
Then we had three children right away real quick - in twenty-six months. There was Rhea, Nola,
and Orpha. Everyone that came was bigger than the first so that they all three were the same size.
One day the bishop came and said that they were going to have an excursion to Manti. That meant
that the whole ward was going up to the Manti Temple. He said, "He would like for me and my wife to
get ready and come and go with them.
We had moved into another ward. I said, The Bishop of the other ward wouldn't let us go to the
temple when we got married. He said, Well youre quite changed since then. I had started to go to
church. I told him where we lived. He said, Well your worthy to go if you want to go and take her. I
went back and told mother and she said, Well lets get ready and go. So we went on that excursion.
And can you remember Mother after they took us through the temple and we went into the sealing
room they brought in our three girls. Do you remember what Orpha did? We were all dressed in our
white temple clothes and Orpha walked around us about three times. She was the youngest one but she
was also the biggest one. She finally stopped and said, "Well hello there Dad." And I grabbed her up in
my arms. Then they took and sealed the three of them to us.
Well I worked in the tailor shop but that didn't last very long. They went busted. And then I got a
job any where I could again. In the meantime we now had three girls and I worked on construction work.
Then I got a job from my brother-in-law, a banker, a rich rich bitch. He had married Lula. J. M.
Peterson.
Amilla married a fellow by the name of A.K. Hansen and he was a rich sheep man. Eva married a
man by the name of Stewart, a lawyer, and she died of typhoid fever.
And then I got this job as a custodian of the bank and kept his lot up. He had a big acre lot. I was to
keep that up. Mow the lawns
(Mother) He did everything for thirty dollars a month I think. I got forty. Anyway we got along on
that. We moved into a little two-room house and lived in that.
Then this fellow came along and wanted me to move out on his farm. He would pay me seventy-
five dollars a month. That was good money. It was a diary farm. We moved out on the farm into another
two room log house. But he was nutty as the devil and oh how he was slave driver. I just couldnt work
long enough hours to please him. So I quit and came back into town.
Then I got a job in a garage keeping books for them. They were a couple of alcoholics and they
went busted. So about that time my Uncle Ed, he had established himself with this big sheep ranch,
(Registered Ramble A U) He ran about five hundred of them. He wanted me to go out and work with
him and eventually become half owner in the ranch.
So I was there on that ranch. I was working on the sheep ranch and in the spring we would take the
sheep to the upper pastures. It would take about three weeks to get there. It was a full days job. You
would hear the bells about three in the morning and out you would go. Then you would have to stay with
them pretty well all day long. The little lambs would cuddle up under the big sage. The old ewes that
didn't have lambs would know where they were going and they would strike out. You had to have one
man at the head of the heard and one at the back. You had to get those little lambs up. They usually
would only shade for an hour or two. That is all they would stay there.

92
 By the time I got there why I would go right up and I would go to bed. I would be sound asleep
after having my mutton and my sour dough goggs (biscuits). The next morning I would eat a good
breakfast of more mutton and sour dough bread, get on my horse and make it back. I would make it back
in a day.
Well this one time I had just got home and here came a horse and rider as hard as he could come.
This relative of the caretakers sister was not expected to live and could I go back up there so he could
come down? I said, Oh yaw I guess I will have too if they couldn't get anybody else. No, they couldn't
get anybody else.
Mother came down as I was saddling up my horse and she said, "Where are you going?" I told her
and she said, "Your not going to leave me here alone." "I have had enough of it."I said, "What am I
going to do?" "You go get that little sorrow horse and hook onto that buckboard." "Me and the girls are
going with you." "Well I didn't think you would want to go." And we didn't get away until six o-clock.
You know what a buckboard is don't you? We hooked up my horse and another riding horse so we
could travel fast. We trotted nearly all the way in this little buckboard. We put our bedding and what we
needed on the bottom of the buckboard and laid the little girls in there with a blanket and a quilt over
them. We got in the seat and away we went.
Those buckboards came up and they just had a seat across it and then it came down and had about
that much railing around it. It was just something you used -- it was just like a pickup now. It was light
to carry around.
We drove in the moon light and when the moon went down we couldn't see the road anymore. We
were following a sheep trail road because that was the quickest way to get there. And that ain't a road,
that is just a trail. Oh some places it was a road and some places it was a trail and I didn't dare drive after
the moon went down.
We left the three little girls in the buckboard and we went down on the ground on a grassy spot
there in the quaking asps laying there on the quilt. We stayed there the rest of the night until it was light.
When Rhea woke up and saw one of those round groves of quaking asps.
She said, Oh daddy can I go over there and build me a little play house? She was a sweet little thing. So
I hitched up the team, took the hobbles off, gave them a little to eat, laced the kids down and the way we
went.
We were on the road again almost by daylight. And we went - came down to what they called 'The
Butchers Dugway' and dropped down into Seven Mile creek. We went down this way and then as we
crossed the valley the creek was up on the other side. We turned around and looked at it. I stopped the
team. The whole mountain was waving columbines, purple and white Columbines. Prettiest sight we
ever did see in our whole lives. We sat there for quite awhile. Finally we got up to the sheep herd about
noon that day.
(Mother) Before that let me tell my little part. We got to this one place and you said, Now you can
get out and walk the rest of the way. And right before was the biggest old ugliest bull you ever did see
just a staring me right in the face. And I said, "I'm not getting out before that old bull."Go on, you can
get out and walk. I said, I won't do it. I am not going to get out by the front of that old bull. So finally he
decided I could stay in the buggy.
(Dad) No mother that is wrong.
We went along and finally there was a place where the road dropped down into a creek and the road
stopped. There was no road. Of course we had crossed here before but with a cat wagon. You had rough
locks on your wheels. When you were ready, you turned the horses loose and hoped they landed straight
up when they hit the bottom. That is when I made her get out. I made you get out because I didn't dare let
you ride. I said, Now all you have to do is take the kiddies down to the foot of the hill and I will wait for
you down there where the creek is. So I got the wheels all locked up and I got on and said, "Get up."
And those horses you know just slid down there on their haunches.
After I got down there and got things straighten up, I looked up and there she was standing right
where I had left her with the kids huddled around her. I said, Come on. She said, I will not, What's
wrong? I won't come with that big bull down there. I said, Hell! That big bull is more scared of you than
you are of it.
(Mother) Do you think me and those three kids was going down there with all those wild animals?
I didn't go down therewith the three kids all alone. The bull didn't come after me neither. I slept all alone

93
with those three kids in a tent. I mean I laid with them. I don't think I slept any. They were beautiful
days. They sure were.
(Mother) When I was on the ranch, I was sure glad when company would come. I got so tire of no
one to talk too. I nearly talked the men to death that came out there to work. I would stand there by the
hay stack and talk and talk to them. They didn't know me from Adam and I didn't know them.
She came down there while we were shearing sheep and we finally ended up making you tromp
wool. Didn't we put you in the stand? Yes, I got up and tromped wool. I didn't care I wasn't going to stay
up there alone. So I have done a lot of things in my life. I am a real good old time pioneer.
Ya but we were happy. I don't care what you say. We had those three little girls. Just the five of us.
You would make sandwiches and take the girls out under the trees and entertain them all day long.
We had some pigs you know and we had a swill barrel. Do you know what a swill barrel is? That's
where you put all your trash and stuff from the table including the dish water. Then you added some
hops, that is some bran, that made your pig feed, choice pig feed. I came home one night and there were
these three little girls daring each other to duck their heads down into the swill barrel. It was a half barrel
and low enough so that they could duck their head down into it. They came into the house with this stuff
all over their heads.
(Mother) Rhea was supposed to have slipped and fell in. She was the one blamed as the guilty
party or instigator.
We had to carry water and heat it to bathe them. We had a big spring that came out the side of the
mountain and oh boy was it good water. We carried the water to the house.
Watercress grew there. We had watercress to eat. The girls were down their playing. I guess they
got to reaching down and bitting it off like a sheep or cow would do. They were lying down on their
stomachs and reaching over and eating it. All at once I heard Rhea let out the darn est scream. I heard her
way down in the hay field. Just the darn est screech you ever heard in your life. I tied the horses up and
broke and ran up to the house. Rhea was running up to the house. She had her tongue sticking out about
that far. It had one of those little shrimp wriggler on it. It was a bug that lived in the watercress and had
gotten onto her tongue. I nearly keeled over from laughter when I saw that little wriggler on her tongue.
She ran up there and mother caught her in her arms and cleaned her up.
(Mother) So those were the good old days.
We were happy though, I remember that. Then Ed, he went on this California oil deal and lost the
ranch. Then I came into town and we moved into another two bedroom home. We didn't have any
electricity. We headlamps. It was in the fall and I couldn't get any work at all unless I just worked for
produce like potatoes and vegetables and flour and stuff. But I could get all the work I wanted too and I
had a vegetable pit outside the door and I had that clear full. There was enough stuff and flour to last me
all winter. I had brought a cow from the ranch and hay.
I had a cousin, another Seegmiller, son of Uncle Bill, who ranched, a dairy farm, a farm down there
by our sheep farm. I got to know him quit well and he was one of the directors in the old Sevier Milk and
Produce and Cheese Plant there. It was expanding and they had to put on another truck to haul the milk.
He got me that job. I worked there for a while and finally they took me in and made a cheese make out of
me.
Then I came home every night so wet I started to get rheumatism and my bones started to ache so I
went back out on the truck.
Well Sego Milk finally came down and bought out the plant from those farmers. There was a fellow
by the name of Ogden who was foreman of the plant. He was running his farm and he just came and
made out the patrons checks and the little ledger keeping what there was and then he would go back on
his farm. He was only there about five days a month. Two of those was when he made out the checks.
We guys practically ran the whole plant.
A man by the name of Fred Whitehead was the head cheese maker. They expanded and expanded
and we had four vats of milk and was running three trucks gathering up this milk. I was running my truck
and I came in one morning with a load of milk and a cheese maker came up to help me unload. I ask him
what all the brass from the city was doing down here? Oh they have come down to can (Ogden?) and
they want someone to be foreman of the plant. I wanted to know about Fred, why he didn't take it. They
have asked Fred but he can't take it. He can't figure butter fat, in fact he can't figure anything. He hasn't
had any education.

94
 By the time I got that load of milk off I decided it was a dam sight easier pushing a pencil than it
was pushing those cans of milk. So I parked the truck off to one side and went in. I said, I understand
you are looking for a foreman." They said, Yes they were. We wanted Whitehead to take it but he
doesn't know how to figure butterfat and he doesn't seem to have enough education to run it.""We don't
know what to do." I said, I would like to apply for the job. They said, Can you keep books? I said, Yes
sir. They said, What seniority are you in the plant? By this time there were six of us working there. I
said, I am next to Whitehead. So they yakked awhile. Finally they called us in together and they decided
to make Fred foreman and I was to be his second foreman. I was to do all the bookkeeping, shipping of
the cheese, figuring out the milk sheets, figure up the butter fat, and make out the patron's checks. They
showed me how to draw my draft out of the bank and then they left.
Well I got along all right until I went to make the first payroll. They had these four vats and four
great big sheets of paper about two feet long with the patrons names on them. It was a record you know
of the pounds of milk received every morning, their tests on it, and the amount of cheese or butter they
had taken from the plant. Anyway I had to figure that out. This amount along here and that amount down
there had to balance out to an amount here. Then after you got that you had to make a recap on another
piece of paper. After that you could figure out how much money you had to have. Then you would draw
your draft and make out your checks for your patrons. You gave it to the milk haulers and they would
take it out to the patrons.
Well I worked night and day and I couldn't get it to check at all. But I did get enough to know how
much money I had to have. I drew out my draft and made out my checks and sent them to the patrons.
Then I folded the whole thing up and sent it to the office. In about two days here they came back down.
A fellow by the name of Mr. Allen said, Who the hell told you, you could keep books? I said, I could
keep books. I had kept books for the garage you know. I said, But that was a new system. I have never
had anything to do with it. He said, It was their system and that he guessed that he should have showed
me more. He stayed with me until the next payday and showed me how to do it. After he did that we got
on to it and did ok. I only had about ten days work out of every month. It was the easiest job I ever had
in my life.
We were going along fine and Sego Milk bought out a butter plant in Tremonton. It was another
co-op. They had a fellow up there kind of half setting around managing it. So they shipped me up there
to manage that plant. That's how I got to Tremonton. After I had been up there a while I increased the
capacity of that plant double. It was just cream. I got to the farmers and bought their cream.
In the meantime, this Fred Whitehead, they left him in charge down in Richfield but he didn't know
enough. All he knew was to open the doors, make the cheese, and go home, and to hell with the patrons.
Of course that was all right as long as that was a co-op because they gave them a dividend check each
month. They would steal it from them on their butterfat and then give it back to them at the end of every
year as a dividend check. So of course they wouldn't leave the plant.
When Sego Milk bought out the plant all that stopped and they didn't owe the plant anything all of
the farmers started to quit. So they wanted me to go down there to Richfield and run the plant. Mother
and the girls didnt want to go. I told them I would go down for a twenty-five-dollar raise. They said all
right. I went down and took over the plant and they didn't pay me my twenty-five dollars.
The depression came and men were being laid off all over the place. Finally I got my Dutch up and
told them I wanted my twenty-five-dollar raise and first thing you know I didn't have a job.
I came back up to Tremonton and was going to take the family back to Richfield and start out in a
feed and grain station. I think I would have done good on it. Anyway there was this shoemaker living
above a barbershop and a shoe shop in this business building. I had got quite friendly with him while we
were living there. I had gone deer hunting and duck hunting with him and had done quite a bit of shoe
work for him at nights when he was rushed. He offered to sell me his shop. In the meantime another
shoemaker had come over from Germany and put in a shop up the street.
This guy wasn't making any money and that was the reason he wanted to sell the shop. I ask him
how much he wanted for the shop and he said six hundred-dollar. I told him I only had fifty. He said well
give me that. So I did. Then my hell the bills that started coming in. He owed everybody in town and
everybody out of town. I told him to take the dam shop back. I wasn't going to pay all those bills. Finally
it ended up in court. I knew the judge quite well and he said to me, Have you got the shop opened? I
said, No, it is closed up. You get back there and open up that shop. Don't worry about it. We will

95
straighten everything out. So after arguing a day in court that is all I ever heard of it.
So the shop only cost me fifty dollars. After I bought the shop and he was to stay with me for
another six months and teach me the business. I never saw him again. There I was with a shoe shop and I
didnt know how to repair shoes. Well I was in an awful mess.
Finally this German came down. He wasn't making too much money either. He said why don't we
put our stuff under one roof and cut out the rent. Maybe we can make it go. We said all right and he said
he would teach me the business. He brought his machinery down and we went into one shop and he was
really good. He was a good shoemaker and he taught me and that is why I was such a good shoemaker.
But the depression came on and we didn't make any money. There wasnt any money coming in.
We were nearly going hungry. The kids were going hungry. Meanwhile, you (Rosco) and Max had come
along. I remember we were living in a little house over there. The snow was so deep that winter that they
plowed out the sidewalks. It was so high that you as a little toddler would get out in the walks and we
couldn't find you. We would call out the girls and we would all go in different directions until we found
you.
When spring came, I called the finding company, Western Leather, and said, How much do I owe
you? They said, I owed about fifty dollars. I ask them if the machinery would pay the bill and they said it
would. They wanted to know what I was going to do. I said, I was going some place to get a job. I had
to feed my family. They said, Where are you going? I said, North, East, South, or West or someplace.
If I find a job, I will have my family follow me. They told me there was a good opening for a shoe shop
down in Richfield but I didn't want to go back down there. So they agreed to take my machinery.
The next morning the German said he would take his machinery and go to Richfield. I told him he
didn't have to go but he said I had a big family to feed
and he would go. By this time Roosevelt was elected
president and started the WPA and all those fellows
started to bring their shoes into to have them repaired.
The first thing you know I was covered up with work.

Tell us about your family Mother

Well I guess I don't know too much about them. My

father was polygamous. He had five wives but only
two at a time. My mother was the third wife. Father
died when I was ten-year-old. The town was
quarantined with small pox so we had the funeral in
our home. Very few people came to the funeral. He
was wonderful man. He had worked in the temple in
St. George and then was transferred up to Manti. He
worked in the temple practically all his life.
(He was a secretary wasn't he?) Yes. Every
morning they would come for him in this big buggy.
We called it a 'Hack'. It had seats on both sides. They
would pick up the temple worker in this and drive
them up to the temple on the hill. I would ride with
him to school as far a main street and then get off. He
would take me with him every morning. I would get
off at main street and then walk abut two blocks to
school. I was always early because it was too early for
school to start.
My oldest brother was Moses Frankland Jr. Then
there was my sister Lavina Jane (Janie). Then there
was Leona Madora, Watson Gray, Elmira B. (for Hepp
Buckley). After me there was Roxanna and then
Larence Carey. That was our family. Seven. Aunt Clara, that's what we always called her, lived in the
other part of town. She had seven children too. He would stay there for two weeks and then he would

96
come to our place for two weeks. And the wives would try to out do each other so father had a wonderful
time.
I was the twenty-fifth child. That was pretty good from one man wasn't it? He had five wives. There
were five more after me.
After he died, I was hardly home at all. I worked out and went to school from the time I was ten.
First I stayed with my mother but that wasn't very long. She died of cancer.
One thing I want to tell you. We would gather Sunday eggs to build our chapel. I was one of the
girls on our beat that went out every Monday to everybody's house on the block and received the eggs
that were laid on Sunday. Then they sold those eggs to build the chapel. My name is in that chapel in
Manti because I helped gather eggs, Sunday eggs. It was all put in a box and put in the corner stone of
the chapel. Everybody's name that had ever done anything was in there. I was pretty proud that mine
was in there.

Rosco Zar Heppler Sr.

By Nola Heppler

Father was born 24 April 1892, at Glenwood, Sevier County, Utah, the twelfth son of Andreas and
Louisianna Seegmiller Heppler.
He married 10 June 1914 at Sigurd, Sevier County, Utah, Elmira B Farnswoth, the daughter of
Moses Franklin Farnsworth and his third wife, Lovina Jane Buckley.
Father was know by most people and all his friends as Hepp and used the name of Ross instead
of Rosco with other people. He was the youngest of a family of twelve children." His Aunt Annie
Musser lovingly called him, the scrapings of the dough pan".
He was a shy child, and his recollections of his father are vague. He remembers him as a very strict
man with a ferocious temper whom all of the children feared. This fear of their father is verified by other
members of the family, and none of them seemed to have any clear memory of their father.
Andreas Heppler suffered a paralytic stroke and was an almost helpless invalid for the last sixteen
years of his life and the terrible temper displayed towards his family may have been the prelude to this
stroke. Father could only say of him, "He was a sick old man. I never knew him as a father." This does
not coincide with other memories he has of his father, but unfortunately it is too late write much of his
father.
Andreas Heppler would have been at least 55 years of age when Ross was born, and he died in
1906, and if he were an invalid for 16 years, then he would have suffered this stroke around 1890, or
before Ross was born. This cannot be correct for he could not have been totally invalided at that time, as
my Ross does have some memory of him as the head of the home and actively supporting his family. The
germane fact is that Ross did not have a boyhood companionship with his father, nor did he seem to have
a close relationship with his older brothers. The second to the last, Sterling, was three years older.
Father's close companions were his nephew, Julian Heppler, and his cousin, Marion King
Seegmiller, and this friendship continued throughout their lives. Julian was the son of his oldest brother,
Ed, whose mother died at his birth. He was "raised" with Grandma's brood and father thought that Julian
was his brother. The three boys grew up together, and many a merry escapade they had. As I remember
them they were a happy and carefree trio until Julian moved to California and we moved to Box Elder
County. All of their lives they had a strong bond of love one for another.
Father had another nephew close to his own age for whom he felt a strong affection. LaConte
Stewart whose mother also died when LaConte was a baby and who came to be one of Grandma's brood.
Marion was always called "King," and the story is that he was the first boy in a large family of girls,
and his mother is supposed to have exclaimed, "At last I have gotten a little King." Ross and King had
quite a bit in common, including a dislike of any kind of discipline (which may explain in part his
father's frequent attacks of ill humor toward him) and a love of nature. With Julian, they hunted sage
hens and fished and avoided school and work as much as was possible.
Father grew up in Glenwood. It was a sleepy, peaceful little place. Above it was the steep little
ledge which led to the meadow with the large spring which fed the Mill Ditch and then tumbled down
into the town in a sparkling little waterfall. Both father and Uncle Ed said they loved this little waterfall
and each would steal away as often as possible to play along its banks. It must have been very pleasant in

97
a Hucklberry Finn sort of way.
It was a progressive little town during the United Order days, with a surprising amount of industry.
There was a grist mill, a shingle mill, and a woolen mill along what was known as the "Mill Ditch".
Father was baptized in the Mill Ditch.
He never liked to be "shut up" inside, being too restless and too oriented to nature to endure long a
close and stuffy room. His attendance at Church was due more to the strong influence of his parents than
to his own inclinations.
Fathers early life was similar to that of other boys in the town. He had allotted tasks which he slid
through as quickly as possible. One was to keep the chip box full, and on this account, he and his father
had many of their strong clashes. A fire could not be made
without chips.
His father was called as a missionary, and during this
difficult time, the older boys became men and took over the
duties of their father. The care and protection of their mother
fell upon their shoulders as well. The strong love and
affection the older boys, who were indeed men, when Ross
was born, had for their mother may have cheated him of
some of the closeness to his mother that should have been
his..
Father become a very sound and careful craftsman and
a perfectionist in all that he did. But he never outgrew his
love of the open country and the freedom and call of the
fields and streams and the thrill of hunting and fishing. He
was an adventurer forever, and would travel any trail and
follow any road just to see where it went.
In his early life, he attended grade school in Glenwood
The family then moved to Richfield and he finished grade
school there.
His father made a little wagon for him, made entirely of
unpainted wood with logs for wheels, and it had a little
square box painted red which sat upon the wagon, and Ross
pulled this wagon along, picking up empty beer bottles and
selling them to the saloons. This was his first business
venture. Hepp
He then went to Salt Lake City to attend the LDS High
School. Here he stayed with a Mr. John Toronto at A Street and First Avenue.
During this time, he had a job cleaning the pipes of the great organ of the Tabernacle. He would
crawl through the pipes with a broom and brush out the dirt, something like a chimneysweep. A rather
dirty business. Mr. Toronto was the caretaker of the Tabernacle, or of the organ itself, and this is how he
came by the work.
The girls he dated lived at the end of the tram line, then about Ninth South. He and Chad would take
her home after a dance. (They danced "on top of the Lion House.) When thwy got home he would linger
until he heard the clang of the bell of the last tram. Then with a hasty goodnight he made a quit sprint for
the tram. This often resulted in a long walk back home, having lingered a little too long with the hasty
goodnight.
Ross's father had died before this time. Ross would have been 14 in 1906 so his father would have
been dead for some time before he attended High School. His mother was anxious for him to have an
education although she had no money to help him.
Stirling had gone to law school and she wanted Ross to be a dentist. He was lonesome and homesick
in Salt Lake City and was not enamored with the idea of hard work and sacrifice and returned to
Richfield where he could hunt and fish.
All of the Heppler boys were great sportsmen and they lived in a natural sportsman's paradise. The
steams and lakes and ponds were alive with fish. (These were the first white families to live in this area
and the land was still primeval.) Game abounded in the hills. In fact, wild game always provided a

98
substantial part of the winter food supply. Father was away "hunting" all during the winter and how fun
and exciting it was when he returned with his dog and gun and the game across his horse or else in the
sledge. Father did not allot the dirty part of the hunt, cleaning the game, to the women as many men did.
Mother helped prepare the meat and did the cooking of it, but father always did the flaying and cleaning.
Opportunities to earn hard money were not abundant. Backbreaking agricultural labor was all that was
offered. Father worked in the hay fields in the summer and thinned and blocked beets. He was in great
demand as a blocker as this takes some skill. But the open fields and hills always called to him and he
would go off in a white-tipped buggy or a spring wagon for as long as two weeks or a month. King and
Julian were his companions on these trips.
After leaving Salt Lake City and the bright future as a dentist behind him, he had a number of jobs.
One at the sugar factory, testing the formula for sugar content and water content. One at the Teluride
Power Plant at Fish Creek Canyon, and this must have been the work he enjoyed most. It was quite
isolated in a little canyon running off of the Clear Creek Canyon between Cove Fort and Richfield, and
he had free time. A man named Pat Divine had a mine in this canyon and Pat took him skiing in the
winter. They would ski all day through the pine trees and over the tops of the mountains. He was
working as a a tailor when he married.
He met his wife while working at the gypsum mills in Sigurd. Here is when love felled his gay and
free nature. Father hated going to work in the gypsum mills for this was considered the lowest of jobs
and the absolute end. He could find no other form of work so he had to take this job. It was not the actual
work, but the low esteem in which the work was generally held. As he said, The day he was to report to
the mill, he was so very low in spirit and he stood behind the stove.
(Stoves were placed out in the room about three feet away from the wall for safety, and the little
space between the stove and the wall was a very warm, comfortable place. It was a favorite hiding place
for young children when strange visitors came and there was no other place to hide. In fact it was about
the most comfortable place in the house in those cold drafty days.)
So he stood behind the stove feeling low and his mother tried to cheer him and said, "Now, Roussie,
(they used the old German diminutive names for their children) it will all turn out for the best, you will
see."
Not the most hopeful of the Hepplers ever envisioned this "turning out for the best" would be
meeting and marring mother. But so it was, and mother was warmly welcomed by her husband's family.
She was young, lovely, sweet and pure.
Mothers parents had died and she was living in Sigurd with her sister, Jane, who was married to
Will Gottfredson. He managed the Sigurd Mercantile. Mother was clerking in the Mercantile.
Now mother was a small little girl, with a gay laugh and long thick chestnut colored hair. She had
been a runner-up in the Miss Utah contest (Fourth of July). Miss Utah was always the most beautiful girl
in the county. Thus mother could pick and choose who she wanted and was in no hurry to marry. But all
unnoticed, love snuck up on her.
The Richfield boys naturally, coming from the great city of Richfield, felt themselves superior to the
county boys and thought that any county girl would be overwhelmed with joy to be chosen out to dance
with one of them. Of course, the county girls held a very different opinion, and paid little heed to the
grand Richfield boys. One of their favorite ditties goes as follows:

Rootie-toot-toot
Rootie-toot-toot,
We are the girls from the Institute.
We don't drink and we don't chew, and
We don't go with the boys what do!"

The city boys thought they were quite sophisticated and would leave the dance to go out behind the
barn and smoke or have a swig of home bred.
Mother was born in Manti, the Temple City, and her father had been the temple recorder. Why
would Manti girls have anything to do with Sevier County boys. Well here came father. He was tall,
slim, handsome, and with his blue eyes. Except for his large nose, he was truly dashing figure.
Unfortunately, he had just come from the plaster mill and was covered with mill dust like he had a

99
sheet over him, all but his nose. Mother laughed and laughed and said, "All there is, is dust and a nose,
who would go out with a nose." The gauntlet was cast! The challenge taken, and soon they were
"walking out" along tile canal banks under the black willows.
Father's regular sprints for the last tram in Salt Lake City had not taught him anything about getting
a girl home from a dance at a proper hour. This brought him to grief with mother's sisters, Leona and
Roxy, who all shared a tiny one-room apartment over a store. Roxy came home one night from her own
date and found father and mother still occupying the sofa. (Which made out into their bed.) She grabbed
the broom and cried" Are you still here? Don't you ever go home?" and chased him out the door. As
Aunt Roxy relates the story, "The dust is still hanging over his tracks." Being a Richfield boy, father was
not too popular with the Farnsworths.
The people in these scattered and far-flung county settlements were really chauvinistic. Especially
those who had been the first settler and who had faced the hazards of co-existing with the Indian tribes.
Salina was considered beyond the pale because of its economic dependence upon the mines and the
prevailing moralistic disapproval of the mining community. Snow Academy had been established in
Ephraim and this caused a great dissatisfaction among the people of Manti. Thy thought that because of
the Temple, Manti should be the center of cultural and education.

Mother used to sing a little song to the tune of In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree"

In the shade of Academy Hall,

All the Ephraimites play basketball.
In the gravel and mud, they scramble and fall,
For they can't afford them a hall.
They have challenged our team to play ball,
And we are so bored with it all.
We're the best in the West! and we'll prove every test!
In the shade of Academy Hall!

And they sang to the tune of Clementine

I'm a suitcase, I'm a suitcase, I'm a suitcase till I die, but

I'd rather be a suitcase than a bag from Monroe High."

Father had a couple of favorite sayings

My friend did come

And I did trust him.
I lost my friend
And lost his custom

To trust is to bust
To bust is hell.
No trust, no bust,
No hell

They had six children. The four oldest were girls born in Richfield. They then moved to Tremonton,
Utah where the two boys were born. When they retired they moved to Mesa, Arizona. The last few years
of their life they spent in a senior care facility in Brigham City, Utah.

100
 Rosco Zar Heppler Sr.
By Orpha F Heppler Stohl

Rosco Zar Heppler was born 24 April 1892 in Glenwood, Sevier County, Utah, the youngest child
of Andrew and Louisiana Seegmiller Heppler. The Hepplers and Seegmillers were of German descent
and moved from Germany to Ontario, Canada where they were converted to the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints and then came to Utah.
There were eleven brothers and sisters as well as six adopted brothers and sisters in the family when
Rosco was born. His mother was taking care of a nephew and a niece also and made the remark that
"twenty called her Mother". Rosco was the youngest of them all. He was at first small of stature and
rather thin, and some of his fond aunts called him "the scrapings of the dough pan."
His mother, Louisiana, was President of the Stake Primary and she would get in a buggy with a
horse to visit the various wards of the stake and be gone for as long as two weeks at a time, knowing that
the household would be well-run while she was away.
She would call them all to dinner by ringing a large hand bell. It was a well-organized family with
each child assigned to certain tasks.
She was a small woman who was occupied with her many children, her home, and her church work,
and sometimes her tongue was very sharp.
Rosco's father, Andrew, was ill for many years, having what was called a "Paralytic strokes". He
could walk around somewhat and Rosco remembers the family carrying his chair out into the sun where
he would sit for hours with a big grey cat on his lap. He remembers the feelings of frustration his father
experienced when he felt useless and the cause of much trouble. At those times he would call the young
boy to his side and they would sit by the side of the small creek near their home with their arms around
each other, not speaking for hours.
Rosco remembers being disobedient at times and being punished in a typically "old country"
manner. He ran away from home once because he didn't want to eat milk toast for breakfast. He stayed
all day, playing with his cousin Francis King (Seegmiller) on the banks of the Sevier River. They got
some tobacco from somewhere and became very sick using it When Rosco returned that night he had to
get down on his knees and beg forgiveness even though he was ill from the tobacco and hungry from not
eating all day. Then he was allowed to have his supper which was bread and milk,
When he began raising his own family, he was at first very strict, expecting his children to jump
immediately when he spoke, and spanking them when they disobeyed. He changed his mind when the
younger children came along and found better methods of disciplining them. (A boot in the rear)
As he grew older, he regretted the spanking and what he felt was his to strict discipline. He
counseled his children in the raising of his grandchildren, telling them to find other methods that did not
include physical punishment.
After many of the children had gone to homes of their own, Louisiana moved the family to
Richfield and lived in a rented house while their new home was being built, This was a small home built
of bricks on property given to them by a son-in-law, Judge Hayes, and adjacent to the Hayes property,
It was in this new home about five years later that Andrew had a last fatal stroke. This left only
Louisiana, Sterling and Rosco at home, They moved to Salt Lake City so that Sterling could attend the
University two years and were he studied to become a lawyer and Rosco finished the eighth gable and
one year of high school. For his second year of high school, he lived in the home of his Aunt Clara
Seegmiller Toronto in Salt Lake so he could attend school. This high school was called the Academy,
Rosco did not want to go back to school after two years and began to work at various jobs in
Richfield and the neighboring communities. He was working at the cement plant (plaster) in Sigurd
when he went into the Sigurd Mercantile Company store one day. There he met Elmira Farnsworth who
was a clerk.
He was immediately struck by her and tried to date her, She countered by inviting him to MIA that
evening and he went to meet her. Three months later they were married. The ceremony was performed in
the home of William and Janey Farnsworth Gottfredson, sister of the bride and owners of the Sigurd
Mercantile, where she worked. At the time of the marriage Rosco was working as manager of a tailor
shop in Richfield and had to drive a horse and buggy to Sigurd to court Elmira, five or six miles each
way.

101
 The newlyweds moved to Richfield and set up house and their first three children came very fast.
Rhea in July 1915, Nola in November of 1916 and Orpha in December of 1917, The First World War
was raging at this time, but Rosco was not called to go to it. They had spent part of this time working for
Rosco's brother, John Edmund on a sheep ranch about four miles from Richfield.
The First World War was raging at this time but Rosco was not called to go. The family had spent
part of the time working on a sheep ranch about four miles from town. Then they moved back to
Richfield to work for a cheese factory there
Then they moved back to town to work for the Sego Milk Company cheese factory, and bought a
little adobe house. Rosco remembers the cracks in the wooden floor and the way Rhea would shove
everything small including the family combs down through the cracks where they were irretrievable.
In March of 1921 they took the three little girls to the Manti temple where they were sealed as an
eternal family in the holy ordinances there.
John Ed moved to Salt Lake City, and Rosco bought his property and moved the family there. This
was a very nice three bedroom home. The property was almost all of a city block. It lay on the outskirts
of town and included corrals, chicken coupe, a large barn or "stantion" and various other sheds and
buildings. There were several acres of alfalfa hay and fruit trees and shade trees, The garden spot was
very large and they raised almost all of their food.
Rosco had a very green thumb all of his life and could always find a way to make something he
wanted to grow no matter where he lived. He managed to care for three or four cows, some pigs, lambs,
and thousands of chickens and the large garden as well as to drive the company truck to all the outlying
towns and in Richfield to pick up the heavy ten gallon cans of milk to deliver to the cheese factory, He
also had other duties in the factory--testing milk and helping make the cheeses,
There was still time for fun and family picnics and once a year a special vacation to Fish Lake,
Rosco loved music and sang in the Ward Choirs as well as many other musical groups all of his life, He
owned a Model T Ford during this time, one with the ising glass windows which could be rolled up to
protect from the weather, It was his pride and joy.
In 1924 Annivor was born and not too long after, Rosco traded his property for some nearer the
center of town.
In 1929 he was transferred by his company to Tremonton, Utah to manage the Sego Milk Company
plant there. There were no homes available in Tremonton so the family lived in a rented home in Garland
two miles away for their first winter in Northern Utah. It was a very cold winter and the family had to
learn to live with two feet of snow. He carried in two large scuttles full of coal to burn in the two stoves,
one in the living room and the other one in the kitchen, every day.
Soon an apartment in Tremonton was located. The family moved there, over a business on Main
Street. This was very different from the uncrowded existence of their life in Richfield.
The first son of the family, Rosco Zar Jr. was born March 8, 1930.
Rosco was very successful in building up the business of the Sego Milk Co. with another plant in
Garland and stations as far away as Stone, Idaho. Then he was called to return to Richfield and take over
the management of the factory where he had formerly worked as a truck driver. He left the family in
Tremonton so that the children could finish school. But before they could be moved back to Richfield the
economic pressures of the Great Depression caught up with the family. Sego Milk Company sold out to
Western Creamery who used their own personnel and Rosco was let out of his job.
The economic pressures of the Great Depression had caught up with the family. Rosco returned to
Tremonton and determined to stay there, thinking it was a more prosperous region.
He withdrew all of his savings from the bank ($50) and bought a Shoe Repair Shop. He had to
learn to repair shoes, having had no experience before.
There followed a period of much work and worry, as happened to so many people during the
Depression, but he managed to keep the family fed and in good health, although many days he did not
know where the money to buy groceries for the next day would come from.
Rosco always believed very strongly in paying his tithing and he attributes his blessings to the fact
that even in troublesome times like these he always paid a full tithing.
Max Ronald was born in November of 1932.
Rosco obtained money from the newly created Federal Housing Administration and built a home for
the family on South Tremonton Street. The first he had owned since leaving Richfield. He helped with

102
 Hepp Shoe Shop Cir. 1940

much of the construction, digging sewer trenches and laying sewer and water lines each morning before
opening up the business to work here for ten hours each day.

Heppler Home 1935 Rhea Nola Orpha

Max Annivor Rosco
103
 After the new home was finished and the family moved in, he still worked on the lot each morning,
and had one of the most beautiful lots in town with many different flowers and trees and shrubs.
He continued his love for fishing and hunting and was active in the Wildlife Federation.
He was also very active at this time in the MIA acting as drama or dance director. He was renown
for the quality of the plays he directed and they were always presented in several of the various wards of
the stake as well as in Tremonton. He was also a Stake Dance Director for some time, and when square
dancing and round dancing became the rage, he was in the lead there.
After the girls were gone to work or marriage, Rosco sold the home he had built and bought his own
building on main street for the business. He remodeled an apartment over it for
himself and Elmira and the two boys.
Rosco Jr. and Max did much of their growing up while living in the apartment. They also helped
with the shop and business a great deal.
As the depression eased Rosco added the sale of sporting equipment in the business now called
Hepp's Shoe and Sport Shop. Later toys were added to the business making the pre- Christmas week very
hectic.
After the boys were married Rosco and Elmira began spending their winters in Mesa, Arizona. They
eventually turned their business over to Max and made Mesa their permanent home. They were very
active in all of the social activities of the Mobile court where they lived..
In 1971 Elmira suffered a pulmonary embolism and was critically ill for many weeks. She
recovered, but was a semi-invalid from that time on. Rosco cared for her with the greatest tenderness and
love, learning to do all of the housework and cooking even though he had very serious surgery during
this time. When his health began to fail and the burden of her care became too great, the family moved
them to the Pioneer Memorial Nursing Home in Brigham, Utah in the Spring of 1976.

Family Plans Observance Of Golden Wedding Date

Mr. and Mrs. R. Z. Heppler will be honored at a family diner in Ogden to celebrate their Golden
Wedding anniversary.
Mr. Heppler was born April 4, 1892 in Glenwood, Utah a on of Andrew and Louisianna Seegmiller
Heppler. His wife, Elmira B. Farnsworth Heppler was born July 16, 1895 in Manti, a daughter of Moses
Franklin and Lovina Bulkley Farnsworth. They were married June 10, 1914 in Siguard. Their marriage
was later solemnized in the Manti Temple.
They have both been active in civic and church affairs, serving both ward and stake M.I.A., he as
drama and dance director in Sevier and Bear River Stakes. Mrs. Heppler has been active in Relief Society
and MIA in both stakes. She is also a member of Daughters of Utah Pioneers.
The Hepplers moved to Tremonton in 1929, when he was an employee of Sego Milk Co. He later
established Hepp's Shoe and Sport Shop, which he operated for years before selling to their son, Max.
They are the parents of six sons and daughters, five of whom are living. A daughter, Rhea, Mrs. Bert
Wheatley having died in 1954. They are Mrs. Earl H. Orpha Stohl and Max R. Heppler, both of
Tremonton; Nola Heppler now filling a mission in England; Mrs. George M. (Annivor) Job, Napa, Calif.
and Dr. Rosco Z. Heppler Jr., San Diego, Calif. They also have 32 grandchildren and three great
grandchildren.

Rosco Zar Heppler Sr. Elmira B Farnsworth

104
Genealogy of Rosco Zar Heppler Sr

Born 24 Apr 1892 in Glenwood, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 2 Apr 1978 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Buried 6 Apr 1978 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Elmira Bulkley Farnsworth, daughter of Moses Franklin Farnsworth and Lovina
Jane Bulkley on 10 Jun 1914. Elmira was born 16 Jul 1895 in Manti, Sanpete, Utah Died
on 2 Nov 1977 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah. Buried Nov 1977 in Tremonton, Box
Elder, Utah, USA.

Rosco Zar Heppler Sr. & Elmira Bulkley Farnsworth had the following children.

Rhea F Heppler Born 1 Jul 1915 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 9 Sep 1954 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.
Buried 13 Sep 1954 in Deweyville, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Bert Moss Wheatley, son of Thomas Leslie Wheatley and Rhoda Mahala
Moss on 19 Dec 1941 in Logan, Cache, Utah. .

Nola F Heppler Born 25 Sep 1916 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 25 Jul 1992 in Roy, Weber, Utah, USA.

Orpha F Heppler Born 5 Dec 1917 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 21 Jul 1996 in Grand Junction, Mesa, Colorado, USA.
Married Earl Hunsaker Stohl son of Heber Nelson Stohl and Trude Lauretta
Hunsaker on 10 Dec 1937 in Logan, Cache, Utah, USA. Earl was born on 17 Apr
1911 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

Annivor Heppler Born 4 May 1924 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Married George Maim Job Sr son of Walburn T. Job and Emma Esther Malm on 4
May 1947 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA. George was born on 18 Jun
1924 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA. He died on 10 Aug 1985 in Seattle,
King, Washington, USA. .

Rosco Zar Heppler Jr Born 8 Mar 1930 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah
Married (1) Shirley Adelle Burns, daughter of Frank
Truman Burns and Annie Elizabeth Hansen on 2 Mar. 1950 in Logan, Cache,
Utah, USA. Divorced 1975. Shirley was born on 30 Oct 1930 in Belle Fourch,
Butte, South Dakota, USA. She died in Jan 1998 in Provo, Utah, Utah .
Married (2) Buena Lorain Pearce 17 Jan 1981 in Mesa,
Maricopa, Arizona, USA. Buena was born on 18 Jan 1928 in Linden, Navajo,
Arizona, USA.

Max Ronald Heppler Born 4 Nov 1932 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah,
Died 8 Jan 1998 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Ruth Elaine Fillmore, daughter of Verne Browerton Fillmore and Olive
Merril 21 May 1956 in Corinne, Box Elder, Utah, USA. Ruth was born on 27 Feb
1938 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

105
 Heppler House Temonton, Utah Cir. 2000

106
 Chapter 9
Elmira B Farnsworth Heppler
By Nola Heppler

Elmira B Farnsworth was born 16 July 1895 in Manti,

Sanpete Co., Utah, Manti is a small town rather high in the
mountains of central Utah It is dominated by the beautiful
temple on a hill where it can be seen for miles. The weather is
rather cold in the winter, but there is not usually a lot of snow.
Elmira was the fifth child of seven children of Moses
Franklin and Lovina Jane Bulkley Farnsworth. She was born at a
time when righteous members of the Church were we
commanded to live in polygama and her father, Moses Franklin
had five wives. Lovina Jane was the third wife.
Elmira remembers only one other wife whom she called
"Aunt Clara". Her father would live with Lovina Jane for three
weeks and then with Aunt Clara three weeks. It was a time
when Federal authorities were harassing polygamists and she
remembers her father being in hiding at times and dying his
beard or styling his beard a different way to escape detection.
Elmira attended school in Manti and completed eight grades
and one year of high school. She was naturally left-handed and Elmira B Farnsworth
when the school teachers tied her left hand behind her and
forced her to use her right hand, she became ambidextrous. She could write with both hands at the
same time, right to left with the left hand, or "looking glass writing". She used to amuse her
children and their friends doing this when she was a grown lady. It was easy for her to do
household chores like ironing because she could use both hands equally well. She was always very
skillful with her hands and very artistic in tying a pretty bow on a package, or arranging a
centerpiece for a table or tatting or crocheting.
Moses Franklin Farnsworth die in 1906 when Elmira was only 10 and her mother, Lovina Jane
died when she was 17 in 1913.
The family was broken up at this time and she went to live with and work for her sister and
brother-in-law, William and Janey Farnsworth Gottfredson in Sigurd. They owned the Sigurd
Mercantile Company and she clerked there or did housework. It was here she met Rosco Zar
Heppler for the first time. He came into the store after being at work in the cement and plaster
factory in Sigurd and was covered with white dust. She said that all that she noticed was "his big
nose which was the only thing on him that wasn't white. He attended MIA to find her there and
when he walked in some of the girls near Elmira asked "oh who is that handsome stranger?" and
she replied "Where do you look. Nevertheless, she began to date him and they were married three
months later. They lived in Richfield about 15 years and then moved to Tremonton, Box Elder
County, Utah.
Elmira was a very good cook and studied whatever nutritional information she could find,
always insisting on a balanced nutritious diet for her family. She made butter from the cows that
they kept in Richfield and sold it to the grocery for re sale. Each pound had her name on a
specially printed wrapper, She was very proud of her work and always kept her house and herself
very neat and clean, She was skilled at sewing clothes for her children and she loved to sing in the
choir, a rich true alto.
Much of Elmira's life she worked as a saleslady at Gepharts Clothing Store as well as keeping
house for the family, When her husband began his sporting goods business in conjunction with the
shoe repair shop, she clerked and kept books for him for many years.
Elmira was quick to plan a practical joke and always had some surprise for the family or
guests on April Fool's day. She could entertain crowds in their home or in the cabin at Bear Lake
with ease. She made each childs birthday special each year.

107
 "Smiling Elmira," my Aunt Millie said as mother came into the room. And I have often
thought how appropriate this remark was, for I cannot remember my mother other than as always
smiling.
Four things characterize my mother:
(1) Her strong love; loyalty and devotion to my father,
(2) Her zest for life,
(3) Her eternal youth,
(4) and her sense of humor.
All life was an adventure to mother.
Mother never missed the chance for a practical joke. Halloween and April Fools Day were
always observed in our home. When well passed fifty, mother was discovered leaning out of the
window of our apartment, pouring water on the heads of small boys who came to soap the windows
of our shop on Halloween. She enjoyed every kind of a joke and often her sense of humor overrode
her duty as a mother, to the great dismay of her children.
Two events remain in my mind of childhood indignities that nearly caused my mother to burst
sides laughing.
The first occurred when we were living in the Moonshiner's House As I recall the event, I
was being chased by our cow. The "why and wherefore" escapes me now, but I remember that it
was a beautiful day, the sky was blue and a few clouds were resting on high. The "Moonshiners
House" was a small dingy, white building with two rooms down and two up. (It was also haunted)
We moved into this house while waiting for Uncle Ed to go to California. Then we could live in
his house. The ground floor of the house consisted of two rooms in line. In the south room mother
and dad slept, and in the north room was the kitchen and living room and whatever else had to be
done. We children all slept upstairs in the south room and the north room upstairs was haunted.
The kitchen had a door on the east and the west side and as I recall, there was a porch, unroofed, in
front of the east door. It was on this porch that mama stood and laughed while I ran around and
around the house with a cow following close at my heels. Every time I bore down on the porch and
as I dashed by, I screamed, Mama, save me!" Mother just laughter and laughed. Eventually I was
saved. The cow go tired of following me. I demanded of mother why she hadn't come to my rescue.
Her surprising reply was, Why hadn't I ran into the house, since both doors were wide open? As
evidence of the great fetish children have in their parents, it seemed to me that when danger was
near, it was up to them to do something about it. It never occurred to me to save myself. Dad said
later that the cow was used to following him and if I had stopped running it would have stopped
too. Small consolation.
The other event concerned me only indirectly, since I was the cause but not the recipient of
the joke. This was when we lived in Uncle Ed's house. This house was just west of the
Moonshiner's House, on the same block. In fact, these two houses were the only homes on the
whole block. The rest of the land being taken up by a small farm and orchard. Behind the house
was our correl. One of the buildings was a shed, a long low affair built to shelter the cows. This
shed was loosely roofed with raw unfinished planks and covered with straws In among the holes
and cracks of the planking, sparrows nested, and one of our great events was to rob the nests of the
tiny little speckled eggs. These eggs played a great part in our life and more about them is recorded
in The Tale of the Wanderer. Two children were needed for this exciting act, one to actually put
her hand into the nest and the other to hold secure whatever rickety combination of boxes, crates,
etc. that we had piled up to enable us to reach the roof. Orpha was robbing and I was holding. I
was ever the dreamer and to dream I had to loosen my hold on the boxes and Orpha tumbled off
and landed without thrust arms, elbows deep in fresh cow pie.
In an emergency like is this there was only one thing to do, run to mama. This was done with a
great flow of tears and loud crying laminations. Thus, forward we went, Orpha beating the path
and I following at a slower pace. Mother was out in the garden with a hoe in her hand and one of
dad's old straw hats over her beautiful dark chestnut hair.
The sight of my poor sister, with tears streaming down her face, arms dyed a rich green, and a
smell only a cow could love, sent my mother into spasms of laughter.
She laughed so hard that the old hat, shaking and jumping, parted asunder; its rim coming loose

108
from the crown and falling down around her chin. I was all bewildered, since I expected to be
spanked. Mother leaning on her hoe, with the hat brim around her chin, laughed and laughed while
she wiped the tears from her eyes. Afterwards she would repent and give us special loves and
treats, but sometimes I wondered if she took this business of motherhood seriously.
Another time when I did not appreciate my mother's sense of humor was when we lived on
our house in Tremonton. I was working at the telephone company and had the late shift. I arrived
home about 10:30 in the evening and had small pickings in the kitchen with was usually quite bare.
On this night when I came home, I found the house in darkness, everyone in bed and the dog
asleep. But, wonder of wonders, on the kitchen table was spread a whole plateful of chocolate
fudge rolled in coconut. Without pausing to think that this night was the last night of March and
tomorrow would be the first day of April, I chomped down a chocolate. It was made of mud rolled
in Epsom salts. I didn't speak to mother for a whole day.
On another April Fool's Day she coated raw eggs with chocolate, decorate them with flowers
and had our names written on them. She then she gave each one of us our egg and proposed a
contest to see who could take the biggest bite. Rhea won. She having the biggest mouth. I suspect.
Mama thought this was real funny.
One time she proposed a contest to me, to see who could hold their hand against a bucket of
ice the longest. I nearly froze my hand and was writhing in agony when I discovered that mother
was holding her hand near the bucket but not actually on it. I suppose she should be forgiven. It
was not her fault that I was so dumb, trusting, and gullible. I am not sure she ever succeed in
teaching a thing, but she really tried.
When mother and dad were first married, she made a meat pie. This has always been a favorite
food in our house. She burned it and had to make another one. When father came home with
unexpected company, mother couldn't resist. She set the burned pie on the table thinking dad
would say something. But neither he nor the guest did. They just ate the pie and mother was
robbed of her joke. We had the good pie for supper.
On anther occasion, we, my three sisters and I went over to one of our neighbors, Charlie
Ogden, who had a dairy farm north of our place. There was a large irrigation ditch and along its
borders grew tall trees with large overhanging branches. I do not know what type they were. We
would climb out on the branches and bend them down into the ditch and swing up and down on
them. This was before the Tarzan Movies, but I suppose it was the same idea. At any rate, we often
fell off into the ditch and our clothes were covered with mud. We went home and found that
mother was not yet home, so we took off our clothes, washed them out and hung them on the line.

Moses Franklin Farnsworth Lavina Jane Bulkley

109
We were clean and neat and well behaved when mother came home. The first thing she
asked us was how we had gotten so muddy. This surprised us and we cried, Mother, how did you
know?" ''I can tell by looking in your eyes, she said. But the real reason was that we had hung our
half-washed muddy flour sack bloomers and petticoats on the clothes line outside mother's
bedroom window.
One Christmas mother told us she could tell what we had for her for a present by looking in
our eyes. To our great astonishment she did. We were greatly agitated by this, for Christmas
presents were suppose to be a deep secret. Actually, we had all purchased our gifts at the same
place on the same day and they were all wrapped together and put on one bill. We had burned the
wrappings but left the bill on the table and mother just happened to guess which gift belonged to
which check. But we were greatly impressed by her wisdom. And we never let her look in our eyes
if we had something on our consciences.
It was in this home and on these three acres that I spent my happy carefree childhood days. I
will always remember the blue of the sky, the white of the clouds and the pale red of the dusty
trail, that between tall rows of poplar, led over the wasteland and up to the foothills.

Elmira B Farnsworth Heppler

By Orpha Heppler Stohl, her daughter.

Elmira B Farnsworth was born July 16, 1895 in Manti, Sanpete County, Utah. Manti is a
small town rather high in the mountains of central Utah. It is dominated by the beautiful temple on
the hill where it can be seen for miles. The weather is rather cold in the winters, although there is
not usually a lot of snow.
Her father was a recorder in the Manti Temple when she was born. Elmira was the fifth child
of seven children born to Moses Franklin Farnsworth and Lovina Jane Bulkley. Her parents had
been married at a time when righteous members of the church were commanded to live in
polygamy and her father had fives wives. Lovina Jane was the third wife.
Elmira remembers only one other family, that of the woman she called Aunt Clara. (Mother
told me that at that time only two of his wives were living.) Her father would live two or three
weeks with family of Lovina Jane and two or three weeks with the family of Aunt Clara and her
children.
It was at a time when the Federal Authorities were harassing polygamists. She remembers her
father being in hiding at times, or dying his beard or cutting it in a different style to escape
detection.
Elmira attended school in Manti. She finished grade school and one year of High School. She
was naturally left-handed. When the school teacher tied her left hand behind her to force her to use
her right hand she became ambidextrous. She could write with both hands at the same time. She
would write looking glass (mirror) writing with her left hand and regular writing with her right
hand. She use to amuse her children and friends writing with both hands at once.
Many household tasks were easy for her because she could use both hands equally well. She
was always very skillful with her hands and artistic in making small articles, sewing clothes for her
children, tying a pretty package, tatting or crocheting.
Moses Franklin Farnsworth died when she was ten years old in 1906. Elmira was living in
Sigurd and working for her brother-in-law William Gottfredson when Lovina Jane Bulkley
Farnsworth died in 1913. She traveled back to Manti for the funeral of her mother and then
returned to work in the Sigurd Mercantile Company Store.
Later she and two of her sisters, Roxy and Leona, lived in a small house behind the
Gottfredson residence. It was while she was working in the store in Siguard that she met Rosco Zar
Heppler for the first time. He had been at work in the plaster mill and was covered with white
dust so that all she noticed at first was his nose which was the only thing on him not covered with
dust.
He attended MIA that evening hoping to find her there. When he walked in all the other girls
said, "Oh who is that handsome stranger?" She replied, "Where did you look?" Never the less she
began to date him and they were married three months later.

110
They live in Richfield, Sevier County, Utah for about fifteen years. Four girls were born there:
Rhea in 1915, Nola in 1916, Orpha in 1917, and Annivor in 1924. Then they moved to Tremonton,
Box Elder County, Utah. Two boys were added to the family: Rosco Zar, Jr. in 1930 and Max
Ronald in 1932.
Elmira was a very good cook and home maker. She studied what ever nutritional information
was available, always insisting on a balanced diet for her family. In Richfield she made butter in a
wooden churn from the cream of her cows and sold it in the grocery store. Each pound had her
name in a specially printed wrapper and she was proud of her work.
She was always very clean and neat with her house and herself. She loved to sing in the ward
choir and had a nice alto voice. She always made birthdays very special occasions and sewed many
fancy costumes for Halloween or school function. She sewed neckerchiefs for the whole scout
troop.
April Fools Day at her house was always observed with much wariness as there were bound to
be many tricks.
Much of her life she worked as a sales lady as well as keeping house for the family. When her
husband began his sporting goods business in conjunction with the shoe store, she clerked and
worked for him for many years.
Non of her children knew that in her later life she had a bad heart. Even so she was an active
member of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers and enjoyed Relief Society very much when ever
she was able to attend.
She had a beautiful singing voice and was active in the Ward Choir and a group called the
Agony Song Birds There were very popular and in much demand.
They built a beautiful cabin on the shores of Bear Lake and they spent most of their weekends
there. Elmira entertained many friends and relatives in this beautiful setting. She was always a
source of much fun. She loved flowers or anything beautiful and would sit and gaze at a new scene
of flowers or scrubs when ever the occasion afforded
itself.
Her later life was spent in Mesa Arizona where
she and her husband lived in the Country Cousins
Mobile Home. They organized and directed much of
the social activity of the court such as square dancing,
cook-outs, barbecues, bingo, family nights, and many
other activities.
In 1971 she suffered a pulmonary embolism which
was nearly fatal. This farther damaged her heart and
she became a semi-invalid. Her husband cared for her
with great love and tenderness, doing all the house
work, laundry and cooking for five years, even though
he had to have major surgery during that time.
In 1976 his health failed to the point where his
children realized that they would be better off in a
nursing home and they were moved to Brigham City,
Utah to the Pioneer Memorial Nursing Home.
Elmira died in November of 1977 and was buried
in the Tremonton Riverview Cemetery. Many friends
and family were there to honor her memory. She was
the last to die of the thirty children born to Moses
Franklin Farnsworth.
The following is the tribute written for her funeral
by her daughter Nola Heppler.
My mother's grandfather died at Council Bluffs in
1851, and it was said of him that he was as a grain
"ripe in the ear". I have often thought of this Elmira Agony Song Birds
expression and reflected upon the explanation of death

111
in Ecclesiastes: "To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose ... a time to be born,
and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted ... When the
grain is ripe in the ear and the stock begins to wither and can no longer hold up the head, and the
root can no longer give nourishment, then is the time to die.
Our mother brought to us a glorious heritage, a royal bloodline, which from all ages of
recorded time, have fought for freedom and the standards of our Savior, in whatever time they
have lived.

Obituary Elmira B Farnsworth Heppler

Tremonton

Elmira Bulkeley Farnsworth Heppler, 82, died Wednesday, Nov. 2 1977 in the Pioneer
Memorial Nursing Home in Brigham City of causes incident to age.
She was born July 16, 1895 in Manti , a daughter of Moses Franklin and Lovina Jane Bulkeley
Farnsworth.
She married Rosco Zar Heppler on June 10, 1914 in Siguard. The marriage was later
solemnized in the LDS Manti Temple.
She was reared and educated in Manti, a member of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers and a
member of the LDS Church.
She had been a ward choir member, active in MIA and a member of the Relief Society
presidency in Richfield.
Grave side services will be conducted Monday at 11 a.m. in the Tremonton Riverview
Cemetery.

Daughter of the Colonial Dames

Daughter of the American Revolution
Daughter of the Utah Pioneers
Life member of the Relief Society
Recipient of the 15-year Award Pin in MIA.

Annivor Elmira Nola Orpha Rhea 1924

112
Rhea Nola Orpha Annivor
Rosco Jr Rosco Sr Max Elmira 1934

Orpha Rhea Hepp Nola Elmira Annivor Max Rosco

Cir 1944

113
 Rosco Jr Max 1934

Elmira Fransworth Brother & Sisters

114
 Chapter 10
Rhea F Heppler Wheatley
By Nola Heppler

I edited this quite a bit. Nola never used periods. While it is written about Rhea, it is primarily
another history of their early family life. RH

Rhea F Heppler Wheatley

Born 1 July 1915 Sevier Co. Utah

Died Sept 1954 Salt Lake City, SL Co. Utah in the LDS Hospital
Buried Deweyville Cemetery, Box Elder Co. Utah
Married to Bert Moss Wheatley Logan Temple Logan, Cache Co. Utah

Rhea Heppler Wheatley was born in the uncertain time

of social and economic transition that attends the move
from a purely agrarian economy to a more urban way of
life. The United Order community of Glenwood was
breaking up and children of these families were seeking
work outside of the family circle. Under the United Order,
there was work for all. Individually, the people could not
find support from the land in Sevier County.
The frontier was receding and urbanization taking its
place, but the social and economic life of the community
was not yet stable. My father, the youngest of the eighteen
children of Andreas and Louisa Anna Seegmiller Heppler,
was thinking in terms of something more fulfilling than
milking cows and harvesting sugar beets. Cut adrift from
the family land, he having a hard time finding work which
would enable him to marry and support a family.
The land could not support more families and the
young men did not want to work it. The First World War
was sweeping Europe. While America had not yet entered
the war, the resultant economic unrest was affecting our
lives.
The small houses built of adobe or logs, with a Rhea F Heppler
summer kitchen connected by a "dog-run" were disappearing and more substantial houses of
lumber and brick were being built. Towns were expanding and farms were receding. Young men
were leaving the farms and seeking work in the towns but there was little work to be had.
Electricity was replacing the coal-oil lamps. Grocery stores were replacing the kitchen garden.
Not totally, but people were beginning to by buy their meat instead of slaughtering their animals.
Family cars were replacing horse drawn carriages. Trucks were replacing the draft horse. Women
still churned their own butter and kitchen gardens supplied most of the food. Trucks were now
bringing in fruits largely unheard of such as bananas, oranges, and pineapple. Pre-sliced store
bread was preferred to home made bread. Eggs were sold to the processing plant and milk to the
creamery.
Lovina Jane Bulkley married Moses Franklin Farnsworth, who was a direct descendant of
Matthias Farnsworth. He came to America in ____? settling in Groton, Mass, and was living there
at the time of the fierce King Phillip Indian wars.
Descendants of Matthias Farnsworth were among the Minutemen at Lexington and with the
army of the Revolution. The Farnsworths family remained in Massachuset until after the War of
1812 and then Reuben Farnsworth moved to the Ohio Valley. He settled first at Athens, Ohio, and
then moved to Indiana.

115
 Here he married Mary Laymon, a widow of Henry Runyn. They had one child, Moses Franklin
Farnsworth, the grandfather of Rhea Heppler Wheatley.
The Farnsworths in Indiana were well-to-do store owners. When they were converted to the
Church and determined to move to Utah with the Saints, they did so in a well-equipped train.
Moses was deeply disturbed over the plight of the main body of Saints with whom' they traveled.
When he arrived at Salt Lake, the sight was so bleak, after his Hoosier home in Indiana, that he
almost turned back.
He was a member of the Utah Militia during the occupation of Johnston's army and
participated in the events at Echo Canyon. He was at the historic picnic at Brighton when Porter
Rockwell brought the news that the United States Army was marching upon Salt Lake City.
Moses was first called to help colonize the settlement at Kanab. Later he was called as recorder
in the St. George Temple, and then the Manti Temple. He was a man of rare ability, and the
methods he instituted of record keeping are still used today. His old desk with its silver inkstand is
still at the Manti Temple. (She wrote this several years ago. I dont know if this is true in 1997).
He became imbued with the spirit of genealogy work and left to his descendants his strong
testimony of this work.
The history of the Heppler Family has not yet been written. Andrew Heppler, the paternal
grandfather of Rhea Heppler Wheatley, was the only member of his father's family to accept the
gospel and come to Utah. His father, Johan Martin Heppler, had left his home in Oefingen, Baden,
Germany, where the family had lived since 1650. They had survived the Thirty Years War and
the Napoleonic Wars and emigrated to Canada in the summer of 18 _.
His reasons for leaving are unknown and he was the only one of his family to come. Andrew
Heppler was eight years old when he came to Canada with his family and little is known of his
early life.
The Hepplers were evidently industrious and capable people. Andrew had many talents,
combined with a strong pride, which enabled him to create a comfortable living home wherever he
moved.
He married Louisiana Seegmiller, the daughter of a wealthy farmer and tannery owner in
Stratford, Perth County, Ontario. They lived there until converted to the Gospel in 1876, when they
moved to malt Lake City, leaving behind them a wealthy comfortable home.
Perhaps they did not expect to live much differently in Utah. Salt Lake City was now a
thriving place and there were many homes. But Andrew was called to help settle St. George and
then called to manage the United Order tannery at Glenwood, Sevier County, Utah. Here they had
to live in very primitive conditions.
They lived first at Prattsville, which was then a thriving community, founded by Helamon
Pratt. The people were just starting to move back to Sevier, Pratt.County after the Black Hawk
Indian War. Since the community was new and raw, Andrew had too settled his family in a horse
stable, and one of his children was born there. He then built a little log cabin for his family at
Prattsville, and would walk the five miles to Glenwood to his work. Later he moved the cabin to
Glenwood, and after the collapse of the United Order, became a farmer in that community. He built
a large house under the side of a hill. There he managed his large farm with thrift and expediency.
He was appointed Probate Judge for the County of Sevier and moved his family to Richfield, where
he remained until his death.
This couple had 12 children of their own and six adopted children. They also raised two
grandchildren. Andrew was stricken with a paralytic stroke and lived for 16 years as an invalid. It
is now difficult to learn more because of this long period of inactivity.
He was held in the highest respect among the people who knew him. Elder Robert Young,
President of the Salt Lake Temple, said of him, He was one of the finest men whoever lived.
He was a man of great wisdom, but he never gave his advise unless he was asked. His advise,
when sought, was usually the final word on any project which concerned the community in which
he lived. Had he chosen to do so, he could have held many prominent positions, but he was content
to remain in the background. He was an accomplished musician, playing many instruments and
leading the Glenwood band. He was a skilled carpenter, and excelled in everything he tried
He was a man of education, and read the Bible and Book of Mormon continually. He was a

116
devoted member of the church, making every sacrifice that was asked of him.
The Seegmiller Family was well established in Canada when the Heppler Family moved there.
Adam Seegmiller had come from the Pflaz (sp?) In Germany with two of his brothers, reportedly to
escape from the German military service. They lived first in Paris, France and then emigrated to
Canada.
He became very wealthy and owned much land. Through bad investments, he lost most of his
money, and died before he had a chance to rebuild his fortune. His three sons, Charles, William and
_____, with their mother, Anna Eva Knechtel, emigrated to Utah in l8 _ and settled in St. George,
Utah. Great-grandmother Knechtel lived in St.George the rest of her life. She was a devout woman
of great strength. The Seegmillers were able to make a good living for themselves wherever they
lived. The worked hard and were far sighted. They managed their affairs well and also the affairs of
others. The Seegmillers were prominent leaders in the Southern Utah affairs and are a respected
and honored family.
Louisanna Seegmiller Heppler, was a woman of great ability and courage. She possessed great
depth of wisdom, humility, and compassion. Her life in Utah was hard in the extreme and the story
of her great fortitude is an inspirational one. All who knew her loved her. She devoted her life to
helping others. Even in her old age, she would go about the town helping young brides learn to
manage their homes. She strove to bring beauty into the world. She was an accomplished
needlewoman. It is said of her that hardly a home in Sevier County did not show the results of her
teaching in the beautiful needlework that decorated the homes. She tried to teach women to
beautify their homes and make them pleasant lovely places and not just the harsh log and adobe
cabins of the area.
She worked with the youth, working in first the Retrenchment Society, later the YMMIA and
then in the Primary. There, she served for 25 years as stake president. During this time she traveled
alone in a little horse drawn buggy over the roughs wagon roads from Richfield to Glenwood, over
the Paanht (sp?) mountains and into the Grass Valley to Koosherman, Burrville and Rabbit Valley.
Then she returned back home through the canyons of the mountains to Richfield. Even today in a
modern car this is a strenuous trip. In those days, with little water to be found, no ranch or village
along the way, and Indians still prowling about, it was a long arduous trip. Grandmother Heppler
was one of the great women of Utah.
Rhea F (That is the letter F and there is no period after it.) Heppler Wheatly was generously
endowed with the noble traits of her ancestors. From her mother, the gay laughing Elmira
Farnsworth and her father, Rosco Zar Heppler, she inherited a cheerful, gay, fun-loving spirit, a
beautiful musical talent, a warm, friendly personality that drew all to her. She was surrounded by
friends and loved to be in the midst of events. Small, slightly built, her frail little body could not
keep up with her energetic spirit and her time on this earth was short. She was deeply affectionate
and loved her family strongly. She never forgot a birthday and corresponded voluminously. She
spilled out the gay laughing events of her life and smoothed over the rough spots. Though often in
poor health, she was uncomplaining, always planning for a bright future, and living the --- (Page
missing) ---
Rhea was born 1 July 1915, at Richfield, Sevier County, Utah, the first child of her parents.
And she was a little different from the rest of the children. Her hair was dark and straight, while the
rest of us were tow-headed and had a sort of fuzzy hair that handled gently. Well, there is a
tradition that one of our grandmothers wore moccasins, and perhaps Rheas hair came from her.
Her natural ability as a leader asserted itself early in her life. She was always the boss of our
family. There were three of us, myself the second child, and Orpha the third. Rhea never lent
herself to housekeeping and never learned the various household skills taught to all of us by our
immaculate mother.
Mother was first or all a homemaker. Her house was spotless and her table laden with superbly
cooked and prepared food. It was artistically done and tastefully arranged. Rheas table was always
laden and her door was always open but she never mastered the knack of housekeeping. Well, she
had seven children in about ten years, so perhaps this was still to come.
Where I took to housekeeping as a duck to water, and Orpha did it through sense of duty, Rhea
just laughed and said. You do it for me. You do it so much better. And I can still see the

117
pitiful little stitches all awry when she
attempted to make a trousseau. In those
days everyone made a trousseau. I
remember my impatience with her
because she could not get it right. You
do it for me. And I did.
A present for Rhea at birthday time
or Christmas was never a problem. I could
always give her handwork. One year she
gave me a beautiful embroidered
handkerchief for my birthday, and said to
me, This is one of the most beautiful
pieces of needle work you will ever
have. She always felt that she had to give
me special gifts because I had so many
talents she did not have.
Rhea had a strong sense of duty and
sense of responsibility. She always acted Wheatley Family in front of Hepps Shoe Shop
as a little mother to us. When Annivor
came along, and dad brought her into us, (We had had measles or chickenpox or something.) and
said, How would you like this big doll? (Babies were all born at home then.) I hate to get
sentimental, but I still remember that beautiful doll with large blue eyes looking at us like as if to
say, Well, so here is where I have gotten to. She had just come from Heaven, you know. There
were little blue bows on her nightdress. (They were expecting or wanted a boy.) In those days,
mothers spent their time in waiting, embroidering a wardrobe for their child. Rhea was eight years
old. She held out her arms said, Put her in bed with me. Annivor always slept with Rhea from
then on. Orpha and I battled it out together for all the nights of our childhood. Two more
incomparable bedfellows as could ever be found. But Rhea and Annivor fitted into each other like
two little bugs in a rug.
Rhea was the leader in our family. In the first grade in school she made Miss Ada's A class
which was the elite class. Miss Ada was one of the loveliest school teachers in Southern Utah. I
went into Miss Nancy's B group.
Rhea made the Pep Club at high school. She was into everything gay and exiting. No one
noticed that she flunked at sewing and cooking. Orpha was the literary bug. She was on the Bearfax
staff, (school year book) while I muddled along getting "A"s in dressmaking until I had a fight with
my teachers for designing my own patterns. That was the end of the "As on my report card. Rhea
made the Honor roll. She had straight "A"s. Orpha made "Valedictorian.
Later we moved to Tremonton.
In Church life, which was the then social life of our community, Rhea also excelled. She was
the first Golden Gleaner in our stake.

This is another page I found about Rhea

My earliest true memory of Rhea is when mother made her a little outing suit, tan pongee.
(The word "beige" is recent in our vocabulary.) shirt, long sleeved, cuffed rounded collared, a pair
of knickers which caught with a wide band below her knee, and a wide-brimmed, softly draped, felt
hat. This was all cut out from mothers own camping clothes. With this little suit, Rhea wore long
tan cotton ribbed stockings, and brown and tan oxfords. She really was dressed "swell. " The envy
and admiration of all the Third Ward Beehive Girls.
The occasion was the Third Ward's annual outing to Maple Grove.Rhea got to go in the back of
the truck, importantly open to sun, dust and wind, with the big girls. Orpha and I, dressed in
everyday gingham, our black "Seegmiller" stockings* and laced boots, had to ride in the back seat
of the Ford, along with blankets, coats, food, extra gas, water, spare tire, tire changing tools,

118
vulcanizing equipment (for patching inner tubes), dad's shotgun, and the ice-cream freezer. This
was when I became aware of the fact that Rhea was "older. "
I only saw her once at Maple Grove. This was when Mary Seegmiller contrived to sprain her
ankle, a great and wondrous event. I had never seen anyone hurt before. There was Mary lying on
an Indian blanket, with everyone gathered about her. They were like the high, tight walls of a well.
I remember seeing Rhea there with some other girls whom I did not know, and I wondered why she
wasn't standing with Orpha and me.
Above Mary and the wall of people, the feathery trees swayed back and forth past each other
and through them I could see the high line of the red hills, and then the blue, blue Utah sky. I
looked at Mary and then at the sky, and it was all important to me.
(The rest is missing. Maybe she never got any farther. RH)

Rhea F Heppler Wheatley

A history written for Rhea's children by her sister, Nola F Heppler, 29 September 1979

Note: Nola wrote many different pieces about our family. She had this insatiable quest to tell
us not only of our Mother but of the Hepplers and all of our ancestors as well. This writing is
mostly from the history that she wrote in Salt Lake City, Utah, 29 September 1978. I have edited it,
adding to it a few of her other writings and have made a few corrections of my own discussing
some of the events with my Father. I have prayerfully tried to be true to Nolas intentions in
providing this writing. I am grateful to my wife, Maurine for typing it on the computer. Karl
Heppler Wheatley, Fayetteville, North Carolina, November 2001.
Rhea F Heppler was born in Richfield, Sevier County, Utah, 1 July 1915, the first child of
Rosco Zar and Elmira Bulkley Farnsworth Heppler. She had the blessings of righteous responsible
parents - a father who directed his energies to providing for and caring for his family, and a mother
who all of her life supported and sustained her husband, and who devoted her time and care to the
welfare of her family. Love, friendship, hospitality and charity dwelt in this home, together with
joy, laughter, and the love of the good life.
Rhea was the eldest daughter of this home and her own home reflected this childhood
atmosphere. She was cheerful, courageous, hospitable, compassionate, not given to criticism or
recrimination, quick to help, warm to love, slow to censure. She had a natural dignity and sense of
propriety and she moved with serenity wherever she lived. She loved and cared for her husband
and children. She was concerned with their welfare, especially when she felt her strength waning
and her body failing, she was concerned with them and who would care for them after she could no
longer take this responsibility. She served her fellow men and her Church with all the talent she
had. Her door was always open -her table was always set, her smile warm and welcoming. Her
eyes sparkled with laughter in which a hint of mischief lurked for she loved a good joke although
was not of herself the initiator of a joke, as was our mother who could easily see the opening for a
prank and followed it through to the furthers possible stretch. But she was fun-loving and laughed
easily and was never offended if the joke turned on her. There was no malice or vindictiveness in
her makeup. She was singularly free from envy and always rejoiced in the good fortune of others
and was compassionate in their sorrows. She was a good listener and never betrayed a confidence
and many came to her for comfort or advice or just plain woman-talk. She did not gossip but
knew every thing that went on in the community. She found reason for all the peculiarities of
people and belittled rather than enlarged upon their faults. These characteristics made her beloved
by all who knew her.
In stature she was small. Physically she was weak. Our parents gave us all the advantages they
could, but the harsh exigencies of pioneer economy drained their own bodies and they could not
provide us with strong bodies. Our mother herself was not physically strong but her courage and
high standards enabled her to override her weak body. There were no medicines and anti-biotics,
you lived out your life the way you were born. Medicines were herbs and family remedies and faith
when things were really serious. Sage tea and sassafras tea were dependable. Mother all her life
sought ways to make us healthy, she attended lectures on child care and home economics and such

119
dietetic information as was available. She tried with all that was in her to save us and give us
healthy and strong bodies. In their time, cod liver oil and spinach were daily doses. We had our
tonsils out and our teeth "braced." Lemon juice replaced vinegar marinades and fresh salads
crowded out sauerkraut. Mother tried everything that came to hand. But she had a fine wisdom
and discernment and was never taken to quackery. Nevertheless, we were the guinea pigs for all
the health foods of the day. Of course, we had eggs, milk and butter unlimited, and fresh
vegetables in the summer and preserved fruits in winter. We also had chilblains, seven-year itch,
and every childish ailment. Lice and scabies we did not have. We were bathed every Saturday and
put into clean
underwear. We wore white hose on Sunday and black on weekdays. We did have bedbugs - like the
plagues of Egypt. My mother raged constant war against these horrors, but they were so
entrenched in the very timbers of the community that it was a losing battle. Someone would always
pass by, leaving there vermin whenever they stopped, and mother would get out the formaldehyde
and sulphur candles and kerosene and the battle would be engaged again. But in our childhood
years, we were untroubled by all of this a bit. This belonged to the world of adults. Rhea
developed a heart murmur when very young and often complained of a pain in her side after
running or playing games or hiking, but as she grew older and became more interested in music and
less in our tomboyish games, she ceased to complain and we forgot about her early illnesses. She
was often ill during her childhood and during her school years. However, she was also very fun
loving and eager to be with the crowd and did not give up easily. She had gone down to visit
friends in Richfield after we had moved to Tremonton, and was staying with Aunt Millie Hansen
and suffered what was called a nervous breakdown. Aunt Millie phoned us and told us to just leave
Rhea with her and she would take care of her. When Rhea returned, she seemed very strong and
immediately took up her full spate of social and civic activities and there were no doctors to
counsel in those days. I do not want you to think she was neglected. But children were left to
make their own way and very little care was given to them as long as they stayed on their feet. Our
parents were concerned with our health but there was so much that they did not understand, nor did
anyone else. Today, it would have been a different story.
Our parents were very musical, and father bought a piano quite early in our lives so we could
all take piano lessons. Rhea soon excelled at the piano and she practiced continually and became
quite competent although never brilliant. She had neither the training nor the encouragement for
that matter. We did not live in a high culture area, in fact we were little more than farmers and
ranchers, but she served the needs of our home very well, for often in the evening we would gather
around the piano and Rhea would play while we all sang. Mother and father sang well together, in
fact they sang duets at ward and social functions and with the ward choir. Orpha had a lovely voice
as did Max. Annivor played the clarinet. Only Ross and I were excluded, but we would sometimes
join in on the comb-and-tissue-paper. I would be banished to the kitchen to fix a lunch, and Ross
would comfort Mitzie our dog, who was also kicked out of the act although her heart and voice
often lifted with others. And so we spent many happy evenings. Often we had guests. My father
was a convivial man and nothing pleased him so much as to have friends and family gather at our
home for an evening. The Hepplers were great story tellers and love to tell over and over again
stories for family -- the conversion of our grandparents, their trek to Utah and subsequent troubles,
stories of their childhood, memorable escapades of various family members which had passed into
the realm of tradition, more recent escapades of present members of the family, events of the
community, past and present -- all told and listened to with great interest and hilarity. Even today
we recount some of these old tales and laugh again.
It pleasured my father that Rhea played so well and she would soon go to the piano where she
played old sweet German songs, Traumeri, Liebstrom, Loreli, and other, and the old American
songs, Long Long Trail, Old Mill Stream, Red River Valley, songs of the Civil War, and songs of
the western trails, Red Wing, Silvery Colorado, and, of course, the old Church hymns. I do not
remember that we ever sang popular songs. I suppose money was a factor and perhaps we were just
not conditioned to buying popular sheet music. We had a Victorola and popular dance records, but
we sang the old songs at piano. Rhea's first pieces of music were given to her by our cousin, Dale

120
Gottfredson, who became a quite accomplished pianist, and she treasured these, pasting them
together when they were torn, and always handling them with love and care.
Hers was a useful talent, and she gave of it unstintingly. Her world was really the world of
music insofar as our community allowed. She accompanied many vocalists in Tremonton and they
were her particular friends. She was a dental assistant to Dr. Donald B. Green, and as he was also
on the Stake High Council, she often went with him on his speaking assignments to play or
accompany vocal numbers. And so she was well known throughout the western part of Box Elder
County.
Most of our social life revolved around Church affairs, particularly MIA. Rhea loved to dance
and as she was very vivacious and always carried on several conversations with other couples
dancing. Her dancing was a bit jerky, but she did not mind as she always enjoyed having a good
time. She was always teased because of her smallness - the tall boys liked to hold her off the floor
so that she would dance on the air, and one very tall boy would hold her so that she was dancing on
his knees. She always obliged and these pranks were a part of our social life.
She had dark straight hair, what was called "Indian" hair, without a whisper of a curl, and until
permanent waves came in, always slept in rag curlers. Her eyes were bright and sparkling,
reflecting good humor. She was a little knock-kneed, and had little buckteeth, and with her bright
eyes and little front teeth, looked somewhat like a little woodland creature. Our father had braces
put on our teeth to straighten them and we went through agonized years with these braces. Mine
were not successful at all. Rhea really emerged with lovely straight teeth, but she went over to
show her "new" teeth to a neighbor and it happened that they were just finishing a batch of
molasses candy. Rhea chomped into the candy and pulled her teeth right out again. Our father
went right up the wall. And that was the last we heard of corrective dentistry. He sold a cow to
pay for the work. Rhea went through life with her buckteeth although she worked for a dentist she
never again had any corrective work on her teeth.
She spoke in a soft, humorous voice and her vocabulary was peppered with tender little
scolding words which were peculiarly her own. She never used profanity or risqu talk, she never
told unclean stories. "You plunk" was the extreme exasperation in her vocabulary, and that said
torrents.
Rhea was intelligent and learned quickly. I do not remember that she studied overmuch but
seemed to comprehend what was taught to her. She did not read much, indeed, she never read
much fiction, most of her leisure time was with her music. She was always in the top level of her
class, starting with Miss Ada's "A" first grade (I followed in Miss Nancy's "B" class, and Orpha in
the "A" class). Rhea would quickly do her homework and be at the piano while Orpha and I were
still struggling with sums and spelling. Orpha was disadvantaged because of her birth date, which
was in December and put her back for the next year. After we moved to Tremonton, she skipped a
grade and moved up to her normal peer group. I stayed in the B grades until the higher educational
advantages of High School allowed me to take my place in the C group. Rhea was "A" Honor
Student in her graduating class, and Orpha was Valedictorian. As I said, Rhea had a natural dignity
and sense of the fitness of behavior and she meshed well with society. She had a particular friend
all through her school years in our cousin, Kendall Heppler. Kendall was the first son of our uncle,
Sterling Heppler, who was the County Attorney, and he therefore came from a well-to-do
privileged family (money and social position went hand in hand in Richfield). Kendall was not
only privileged, but he was handsome and likeable and was very popular. He had a deep lasting
affection for Rhea and always looked after her at the school dances and games, these little
attentions that make all the difference in school life. I think this gave her an early poise and
confidence. She early had a strong sense of responsibility for the rest of us and while she was not
overbearing or bossy, she easily controlled others and set the pace and defined the standards of our
childhood society. She never slighted any other child; everyone was welcome in her world. I
expect now that we Heppler girls called the tune in the community and Rhea called the tune in our
home. She set limits to our childish pranks. She was just that little bit older and that little bit more
responsive to our parents and they early trusted her to keep the home going when they were away.
This was quite often as father was in the Bishopric and mother in the Relief Society Presidency and
there was much to be done in a small isolated community in these pre-welfare days. Also, our

121
parents were very social minded and had many social
groups and entertained a great deal. Rhea saw to it that
the house was put in order (more or less) and that we
were in our beds and the house shut up against the night
all in good time. And as we were all quite creative and
imaginative, keeping us in hand was no small chore.
Rhea was born in this little house of rough logs,
but they soon moved and I do not know why. Father
had no employment skills in particular and work was
not easy to find, and he took a job milking cows for a
farmer who promised him a home to live in and other
amenities (mostly air) located out in heaven knows
where along a bend in the river and father moved
mother and Rhea out there, sight unseen, as it were, and
I was right there, too, to add to the hardships, although
not in the flesh until too late to get out of there that
winter and father pure hated that place, which was
really unbelievably bad, but he could not move mother
out until spring so had to stay there. He never really
forgave me. Bert Moss Wheatley
Now we come to the little house of sawn logs
where Orpha was born. Shortly after this, father went to work for his oldest brother Ed Heppler,
who had a sheep ranch against the hills between Glenwood and Richfield. The ranch house was set
up on the hill overlooking the Sevier River valley and the meadowland and some farmland, but the
sheep were back in the hills. Father raised hay and grain in the fields below the house. The land
was irrigated so he was always out in the fields but always in sight of the house. Mother was very
lonely here, but we three had a charmed life with the entire mountain as a playground. The summer
that Rhea was six, we moved into Richfield, first into a small red adobe two-room house close in to
town and then into Uncle Ed's farm home located on the perimeter of the town in a small farming
community, half in and half out of Richfield, within walking distance of the shopping district but
not of society. Uncle Ed had sold his interests in Richfield and was moving to California and father
purchased his house. It was not ready for us that summer and we first moved into the little red
adobe house with a neglected garden and orchard in back, and then into a small house close by
Uncle Ed's home, on the same lot, and we lived here until we moved into what became our "home."
This was a large comfortable home to us, at any rate, with large lawn and gardens. Here we had
electric lights and indoor plumbing for the first time. We loved this home. The house had three
bedrooms, a parlor with piano, a large combined kitchen and dining room, the bathroom, and a
pantry. We lived on three-fourths of a lot (1 acre) the little
house used up the other 1/4 acre. There were numerous outbuildings, fruit trees, a kitchen garden,
lawn and flowerbeds, swings and hammocks. Real Tintoretto. I have written of our adventures in
each of our homes in my family history of the Hepplers so I am not repeating these things here, but
it was here that we grew up to town ways. We attended the elementary school, Jr. High School, and
Rhea started High School in Richfield. We had a great deal of social life here, we had heretofore
little contact with humanity other than relatives who sometime found the track to the ranch, now we
were a part of the neighborhood gang and I doubt they were much more civilized than today's
desperados. As we were related to half the county,
Family gatherings were frequent and huge, and we would go like a caravan into the hills for all day
outings. We gathered pinecones, berries, and the men fished. We almost lived in a wagon in the
summer. We went to Fish Lake for two weeks each summer and after we moved to Tremonton, to
Yellowstone, always as a family unit until the war years broke up our family, but we always
maintained a strong feeling of family solidarity and love and we were always in contact.
Rhea finished High School in Tremonton, Bear River high, where she had a high scholastic
average and was a member of the PEP club. She was very active in Church and social affairs in
Tremonton and throughout the valley. She had no especial training for work, but became a dental

122
assistant to Dr. Green until she was married. In her little white nurse's uniform, with her dark thick
hair curled around her head, her friendly smile and perky way, she was a great favorite with the
entire county.
The great depression was just ending as we graduated from High School and began our
working years, I in the Telephone Company and Orpha at J.C. Pennys and then in the Post Office,
we were called to divide our Ward in Tremonton, I should say, the Ward was called to divide and
form a second ward and build a new chapel. This was a great task and a great challenge as there
was so little money, but we all pitched in with our mites and built the beautiful second ward chapel
property two lots from our home. This really put our family into the heart pulse of the Ward. We
were the strong right arm of the ward maintenance - always ready with a spare loaf of bread if the
sacrament bread was forgotten, calling members to the phone, giving up the entire furniture of our
house for ward plays, housing ranching families "snowed out" for the night. But we loved the
excitement and the social life and the people on their way home would stop for punch and cake and
for a friendly chat. We had a dartboard and this and the piano made our evenings gay affairs
attended by half the town.
Rhea was in the midst of all this entertainment. She was the first Golden Gleaner of the Bear
River Stake and was Queen of the Gold and Green Ball that year. It was on a stake assignment that
she met Bert Wheatley, a quiet, gentlemanly returned missionary from the Deweyville Ward. She
liked him for his quiet manners and pleasant friendly personality. Well facts are facts, and in our
peaceful pleasant town there were a few problems, one of which was the marriage market. There
were more girls than boys in the valley and the boys knew they could pick and choose and they
were quite lordly in letting the girls know who and who was not acceptable (I wasn't so excuse the
green eyes) but as I said facts are facts. They were farm lads with loud voices and brawny muscles
and proprietary ways (I sometimes felt some of them had
difficulty in differentiating between their livestock and their women). For all her good humor and
love of life, Rhea was small and fragile and these boys did toss her around a bit, tuck her under
their arm, that sort of horseplay. She appreciated the gentleness in Bert and his calm unhurried
manner. She was soon in love but despaired that he would ask her to marry him. He had just
returned from a mission and his was a large family with little money to spare and he was needed at
home. Then, too, he lived in Deweyville and these were one-car family days.
Young lads did not have their own cars and if more than one boy in the family was courting, he
had to wait his turn for the car. In a family of many boys this did not come often and Bert's
brothers seemed to find their girls in Honeyville and Deweyville and Brigham City. But never
discount the power of ole Dan Cupid. One of Rhea's close friends, Maxine Buchanan, was dating
Ernie Hansen from Deweyville, and he and Bert teamed and this eased the situation. Eventually in
his own good time, Bert produced the ring. It was a tasteful ring, a small chip diamond, but in a
very nice gold setting, and Rhea was overjoyed. Soon our whole family was engaged in trousseau
and wedding plans. Rhea was so small that mother made her temple clothing and wedding dress.
Mother also embroidered her temple apron, which Elaine now has. When Rhea died I was in art
school with very little money but our family wanted to buy her burial clothes and as I had just
finished my own temple apron, I contributed this. Mother then gave me Rhea's wedding apron and
I gave it to Elaine when she was married, so, while it is a bit old fashioned, it has a history of love
and affection from mother to daughter to sister to daughter again. They were married in the
beautiful Logan Temple, which is our family temple, that is, we have a special feeling for this
temple. Father gave a big wedding supper for her, with our family and the Wheatleys and many of
Rhea's friends. Temple weddings were held in the evenings then, not in the morning. While toasts
were pledged and happiness wished, I and some of Rhea's unmarried friends were outside busily
painting Bert's car and tying toilet paper ribbons and tin cans and old shoes. Rhea was really
horrified when she saw the car and demanded that Bert clean it up. He, however refused, one of the
few times in their married life, he was very proud actually and happily drove off, right down the
middle of the highway so all the traffic had to slow down for him, and they all honked and waved
and Rhea sank down to the floorboards in embarrassment. But she soon emerged and began to wave
back and accept the Homage --she could never resist a party.

123
 Our lives parted about this time. After their marriage, Bert rented, I believe a small house and
some land close by his father's farm in Deweyville, but I have a hard time now sorting out time and
events. Rhea often visited with mother, driving over from Deweyville, and I do not remember just
when or where Colin was born. The War years were gathering and I had gone to be an aircraft
mechanic in the army air corps, which was a romantic and exciting unit. I was stationed at the Hill
field, anything but romantic or exciting, a flat expanse of literally nothing but hangers and barracks
and I could not adjust to the rough element of people who came to work there. However, we were
in the Army and it was wartime and there was no turning back. The man I worked for was an
alcoholic and an adulterer and in my whole life I had no
experience in coping with this sort of problem. My parents were concerned too, and many of the
girls who were at the Hill enlisted in the W.A.C., Woman's Army Corp, but I was not attracted to
this organization. About this time, the Navy formed a woman's corps, and I joined it and was sent
to Cedar Falls, Iowa for boot training and then to Norman, Oklahoma for technical training in
aircraft mechanics. Rhea now surfaced at Chickasaw, about fifty miles from Norman, and out of
bounds to us a bit I didn't worry about this as she lived in a private home, which offered protection
to military personnel on authorized leave.
Before America entered the war, that is, before Pearl Harbor, there was a general mobilization
of men who could serve in a local levy of troops. Bert was called up along with most of the men
from Box Elder County and was sent to Texas for training. Rhea lived on in Deweyville, she had a
car and could come and go, but I do not think these were happy years for her as she was very near
to her mother-in-law, and they did not co-exit too happily. Rhea was used to the easy come and go
way of life of the Hepplers and the somewhat sophisticated society of Tremonton, and Mrs.
Wheatley was a very conscientious farmer's wife, careful of many things. Perhaps I can best
explain this by saying that while our Father always raised a
large and bountiful kitchen garden, he also allotted equal space to the flower garden. He was a
gentlemen farmer and raised the produce for the family table. What we did not eat, or what we did
not want, we gave away or threw away, but the choice produce always went to our table. The
Wheatleys were farmers and they raised produce to provide for their income and so, of course,
nothing was given away or, horrors, thrown away, and they ate what was left after the choice crop
had gone to market. Rhea used to come "home" and father would give her vegetables and fruit for
her own table. Mrs. Wheatley was perhaps too careful in her supervision of her new daughter-in-
law, and Rhea had been used to total trust and confidence from her own parents.
The war came swiftly, one beautiful sunny summer-like Sunday morning in December, and
Bert was officially drafted into the Army and at some time thereafter was assigned to a hospital in
Chickasaw. He served as the mess sergeant; he was not actually connected with the hospital. I
believe he was then a tech sergeant, which was a rapid promotion from PFC in that short of a time,
just a few months. At any rate, in spite of his short stature, he looked very handsome in his uniform
and was always neat and well turned out. He was a very competent man in this position, responsible
and trustworthy. Of course, I always had the difficult sentry and watch duties on the fact that I was
a Mormon and was always sober, and he may have had the same advantage. At any rate, he held a
position of responsibility all of the time he was in the service.
Colin was born during Bert's absence from Deweyville and as soon as possible Rhea went to
Oklahoma to be with him. I was quite disturbed at her going as she just went second class on the
train with Colin and all of his baby luggage and her own cases and I really urged her to buy a
sleeping compartment, in fact, I offered to pay for it because I knew what war travel was. But, not
to refine this point, the Wheatley's were not in the habit of spending money on unnecessary
luxuries and she went second class. Colin proved to be a true Heppler at this time, howling all the
way. He at least would have preferred the sleeping car. I do not want to make too much of the
difference in philosophy of the Heppler and the Wheatleys, but it was there and Rhea had a difficult
adjustment to make at a difficult time when Bert was away and she was having babies. Bert was a
loving husband and father, but he, like so many others, was caught up in the tides of war when he
would have much rather been establishing his home and family. None of us had had any previous
experience with wartime living and we all reacted to our true natures. She was happy to be
with her husband and they had quite a normal life in Chickasaw,

124
as military life goes. Their accommodations were not too pleasant, but then nowhere in the United
States, even in permanent military areas such as San Diego and San Francisco were the towns
prepared to accommodate a large military personnel influx. The people of Oklahoma were friendly
hospitable people and, by and large, the military people meshed together.
Bert found accommodations in a large, two-story, rambling wooden house, which had been
hastily partitioned into five apartments, and the five families living there all shared a common
bathroom (common is about the most complimentary term I can give to this structure) which was a
partitioned off area across one end of the outside porch in the rear of the house. The other families
were not overly given to cleanliness. At this time, when all able-bodied men were called up, there
were vast numbers of men who were classified as 4-f, unfit for combat duty but who could be
making a meaningful contribution to their country by sweeping floors, carrying out garbage, that
bit, and service as hospital orderlies was one area where such men were assigned. Thus it fell out
that Bert was about the only non-commissioned officer at
Chickasaw who had the full compliment of physical requirements; that is, only one head, both eyes
looking in the same direction, five fingers on each hand, a left and right foot, etc. It was quite
unnerving at first, and the odd thing was that all of these strange appearing men had such sweet,
cheerful dispositions and really lovely wives and families. Rhea got along well with all of them and
it was her nature to make the best of any situation, but the bathroom area got her and she took over
the policing of it. She tacked up a little sign suggesting that cleanliness was next to godliness and
lets all do our part. This called forth some really clever little verses by others giving their
viewpoints. I thought it was quite funny, but she was rather indignant. Eventually they came
around, in the main, to her way of thinking, at least they all live amicably
together.
There was one other Mormon family at Chickasaw, a lieutenant, and the two families held
Sunday school and Sacrament meetings each Sunday. Bert had many friends among the Latter-day
Saint men during his training periods and he kept in contact with them, so they had close contact
with the Church even though there were no organized units. They always lived by the strictest
Latter-day Saint standards.
Colin was a little doll. Rhea wheeled him about in his pram and all the neighbors got to know
him. One incident occurred which I think demonstrates Rhea's personality. She was patient and
tolerant up to a point but when that point was reached, then look out. By way of background, our
father had had a shoe repair shop which he developed into a sporting goods shop, but in the early
days, during the depression, we all worked at "the shop" as we called it, a dignified name for a
cobbler's shop, but not as dignified as the name Max gave it when he took over the business, he
called it "Pierre's Salon," and any shoes that came out of his shop looked like new. So these were
our standards. Rhea took a pair of her shoes to the cobbler in Chickasaw and as time went by
became restive because the cobbler just did not get them repaired. She went each day, with Colin in
his pram, and the cobbler always put her off. He had an Army contract and was not interested in
civilian work. One day Rhea had had it. She just parked Colin in his pram in front of the store,
walked behind the counter and picked up the leather apron, found her slippers in the pile, put on the
last and resoled them, polished them, hung up her apron, swept up her litter, and then asked the
startled cobbler how much? I don't remember how much he charged her, but he did offer her a job.
Rhea just put the slippers on
top of Colin and marched off down the street, pushing the pram ahead of her, her tiny bottom
wriggling with exasperation. "That plunk! was the way she summed up the whole affair.
Their happiness together in Chickasaw did not last long as Bert was called overseas. I believe
he was a supply sergeant and he flew the "Hump" (over the Himalayas) keeping the Burma Road
supply line open. He flew along side Mt Everest (some people really luck it) and saw quite a bit of
China and Burma and that theater of war. Rhea returned to Tremonton and had a small apartment in
what is now the Marble Motel. Karl was born before Bert went overseas and he received
compassionate leave to come home and see his new son. He blessed Karl in the hospital on a
Sunday morning, with just our family and the nurses there, and the Bishopric. He had to leave
before Rhea was out of the hospital, and she did not see him again until the war was over.

125
 Karl was really chipper right from the start. His back was straight and he held his head up and
looked at everything with bright little eyes. This was at the hospital at Tremonton, but Rhea was
entitled to service at the military hospital at Brigham City, Bushnell, and she did go there, but I
think she did not care for the casual military service she got. Dr. Ficklin has his offices in the same
building as Dr. Green and he was very fond of Rhea and he served her while she lived in
Tremonton. Dr. Green always had the fondest feelings for Rhea, and he and Dr. Ficklin between
them really watched over her.
I was home on leave at this time, probably before shipping out for Hawaii, and did some
babysitting for Rhea. Colin was talking by then, and quite capable, but Karl was still a small baby.
But it was raining and Colin wanted to go out and play and I kept telling him it was too cold and
wet. Well, Karl hurt his hand and started to cry and I told him to stop crying or I would take him to
the hospital and have his hurt hand cut off so it would not hurt any more (all lovingly of course, I
am not that mean) and Colin immediately ran and got their coats and said, "Well, Let's go!"
I do not remember just when Bert returned. Some snatches of memory put us all together in my
father's home. Orpha has always had rather large children, soft and cuddly, and Rhea's were tiny
and wiry. One day Rhea's came around the corner of the door wearing training pants and Orpha
shook her head sorrowfully and commented on how small Rhea's children were and how soon she
could train them.
We were all at Orpha's ranch near Ashton on time, I do not recall how well all came to be
there, I think mother and father and I had been to Yellowstone and Rhea probably well, Bert was
still not home, and she had Colin there, but we were up at this meadow high in the mountains, and
Colin just walked off into the creek. This was just-melted snow water, swift and cold. It was not
deep but very swift and he was immediately knocked over and carried away. I saw him go down
and ran into the water after him but the water kept turning him over and I could not grasp him.
Finally I caught hold of his overalls and pulled him out. Rhea was running along the bank, calling
to him. It was a very tense moment, but Colin seemed to be unharmed, a little resentful of the
treatment he was getting, amateur resuscitation when he really didn't need it. [Karl vividly recalls
the same thing happening to him, but they may be two separate events because Karl recalls being
very grateful to be rescued]. I remember mother saying afterwards that Rhea had been so afraid that
she would not have two perfect sons to present to Bert when he returned home and was so
concerned with her stewardship over them. This must have been after I had returned but before Bert
came home, but I cannot place the time now. It was while Orpha was living in or near Ashton, and
the creek was called Bitch Creek.
Bert came home to very little. It is difficult now to recall how tight our economy was then. He
had served honorably, always steadfast in keeping the covenants he had made in the Temple to his
wife and to the Lord. There was no incident in his army life that was untoward or needed to be
explained or forgiven. He was a clean, honorable man when he left and he returned the same way.
He had not been home from his mission long enough to make his way in life and the war years
had taken his youth, and with a wife and two children to support, he had a rather gloomy prospect
immediately ahead of him. I believe he lived in Deweyville for a while and then took some land
near Carey, Idaho. These were hard years and Rhea's health failed. I do not know too much about
this time as I was away on my mission. Rhea and I were always very close and corresponded
regularly, she would tell of her children and their progress and her affairs and I my travels. She
enjoyed my letters and I enjoyed sharing my experiences with her. After she died, I did not write
any letters to anyone for a long long time as I felt I had no one to share my experiences with, she
always enjoyed so much the happiness of others. After her death,
Orpha and I became closer together, but we were always close as a family.
She never complained or refined upon the harshness of her life. She really was not a farmer's
wife, and she did not have the strength to accomplish all that is required of a farmer's wife. I
remember one time we drove past a farmhouse with lawn and flowers and she said that you could
tell the farmer's wife had done this work because men did not have the time to raise flowers, and I
think she regretted that she could not make her home beautiful.
It is pointless to refine too much on the past. From the seemingly affluent lives we now live,
these times seem bleak and hard, but you must remember that they were sweetened and softened by

126
love, and people were not used to too much luxury then. So we are not justified in making
judgments now. Rhea and Bert were very much in love. They were faithful to each other. Earl Stohl
once commented that they were "two little bugs in a rug." This is from an old poem about as snug
as a bug in a rug.
Rhea was so proud of her children. She would write to us about them and their doings, they
were really her jewels. If her health had been better and if Bert had had more time, if there had not
been the war years - we do not live on "if."
It seemed that her health failed suddenly, but actually this had gone on for a long time, but she
was so courageous and had such love of life and would not complain that we did not realize how
seriously ill she was. She was so very tired, and she was so concerned about leaving her husband
and children, but our Father in Heaven saw with different eyes than we who would have kept her
here. You must remember that she loved you and that you were always first in her thoughts and in
her plans. She would write so much about your talents, was always so proud of you. These are sad
words to write. Her life was a bright flame, burning briefly but brilliantly and her soul lives on in
the lives of her children. I see her in all of you and am grateful to each of you and the happiness
you have brought to me. Your mother gave of her frail strength
generously and willingly and lived fully for the time she was here. Her patriarchal blessing
promised that her door would always be open and her table always set, and this promise was
fulfilled for she welcomed all into her house and set her table before everyone, not only of her
material possessions but the precious gifts of her spirit were given freely to everyone she met.
Her health steadily deteriorated and she was admitted first to the hospital in Hailey, Idaho and
eventually taken to the LDS hospital in Salt Lake City. I felt that I could not write of the last days
of your mothers life, but I feel that I should tell you of these events as they have great beauty as
well as deep sorrow. Mother came from Tremonton and stayed with me, and we were with her and
Bert those last few days. Before Mother came down, I was alone with her and visited with her
every day.
Bert was so terribly anguished. He called Elder S. Dilworth Young, a general authority who
Bert knew personally through the Boy Scout program and begged him to come and bless Rhea that
she would live and be well. Elder Young brought his brother with him but the blessing revealed that
Heavenly Father wanted her home rather than remain with us. That last night, when we were all in
her room and the elders that were assigned to the hospital came to bless her, I knew then that she
would not live. It was as if an angel came into the room and put an arm around me and told me that
she had lived a full life and accomplished all that the Lord had for her to do on earth. I quietly said
to Bert, Let her go. but he would not be reconciled.
I think something died in Bert when Rhea died. My mother and father were heart broken; some
of the light went out of our lives, too. I would often come across my mother silently weeping.
Before Rhea died she beseeched Bert to keep you children together. After she was gone many
childless couples came forward begging to adopt you. At the time it seemed that Bert was
incapable of taking hold of the situation and my father reflecting on the experience of his own
parents, stepped in and said, no, they should stay together.
You are her children and the recipients of her love and you all possess the wonderful qualities,
which she had. You were born of righteous parents and inherit the rich blessings, which they earned
for you. I cannot write of your father for I really did not know him well, but his parents and
grandparents were true pioneers and courageous colonizers. They settled and conquered the
northern counties of Utah as the Hepplers and Farnsworths settled the southern and central
counties, and their history is just as rich. I hope this account of your mother will enrich your lives
and give you much joy rather than sorrow, for she was a happy, joyful person who enriched the
lives of all those who journeyed with her along the roads she traveled.

127
 Rhea F Heppler Wheatley

(Nola): This is a verbatim transcript of the taped recording Ross made with mother and dad,
and I have not made any corrections to the story, but have added some explanatory notes and
comments to give continuity to the story.
(Ross): This is a transcription of a taped conversation of the memories of Rhea Heppler, my
oldest sister, made by our parents. It was in my home in Los Gatos, California, on August 5, 1972.
Those present were myself, Rosco, my wife Shirley, my son Greg, and Rheas oldest son Colin. It
was made at the home of Rosco Zar Heppler, Jr., Los Gatos, CA, 5 August 1972
I have edited Nolas transcription to make it easier to read and placed (Nolas) name in front of her
comments. She was not present and I do not know how she got a copy to transcribe.
(Nola): As to the various locations, Richfield is located in a valley of the Sevier River.
Glenwood is somewhat to the east of Richfield, against a low mountain range. Glenwood was
settled as a United order colony, and daddy's parents were members of that Order. After the Order
dissolved, Grandmother moved to Richfield where her children built a small home for her.
Richfield was then divided loosely into three areas following the boundaries of the three wards, the
First, Second, and Third. Aunt Janey, mother's sister, lived in the First Ward, and Aunt Millie,
daddy's sister, lived in the Second Ward, and Grandmother's home was just by Aunt Millie in the
Second Ward. Uncle Ed lived in the Third Ward, and our family lived almost all of our time in
Richfield in the Third Ward.
The town was also divided socially and economically into these three divisions, the
professional class living in the Second Ward (Uncle J. M. was certainly not a millionaire, and he
was a kind, affectionate man, but daddy seemed to resent him for causing him to work as a
custodian in the bank, but daddy did not really have a record of stability at that time, and work was
very scarce, the economy of the area was farming and unless you had land or a profession, it was
very difficult to find work. (My opinion is that Uncle J..M. probably made this job for him.)
The people of the Third Ward were in the main small landholders, located mainly on the
perimeter of the town, with four or five acres of land on which they lived and farmed. The people
who were non-farming were all connected with farming, blacksmiths, wagoners, etc., and then the
poor of the community lived in little homes of one or two rooms, but it was a very respectable area,
not a shanty town, a comfortable middle income class of people. After daddy became the foreman
of the cheese factory, he moved up into the town, that is, up in society of the town, in a better class
of residential area, but still in the Third Ward.
During the United Order time, Glenwood was a very prosperous town, the largest community
in the county, and running out from the mountain against which Glenwood lay was a spur of
mountain, separating the two communities. It was on the west, or Richfield, side of this spur that
Uncle Ed had his land, we called this "the Ranch". A road, unimproved, left the County Road,
between Richfield and Glenwood, and went north from Prattsville along this spur. A little track led
from this road to our "Ranch".
Daddy's brother, Frank, had taken up land along some lakes or ponds at the end of this road,
and he had a fish hatchery there. Uncle King Seegmiller, Daddy's cousin, had a farm along the
County Road, between Prattsville and Richfield.
Sigard, where mother was living when she met daddy, was along the mountain, north of
Glenwood, north of the County Road. This County Road, which connected Glenwood and
Richfield, was the main road in the valley after the State Highway which ran north and south from
Salina, and Richfield, to Monroe and down into southern Utah. This is now Highway 89.
The ranch where I was born was somewhere along the Sevier River between Prattsville and the
"Ranch". Daddy once took me there but I doubt if I could find it now. When I was there, the little
shack was still standing, and it was worse than daddy makes it sound.
Chronologically then, they lived first in Richfield where Rhea was born, then on the little
ranch on the river where I was born, then in the little house with cracks in the floor in the First
Ward, across the street from Aunt Janey, where Orpha was born, then on the "Ranch", and then in
Richfield, first in the little adobe house just on the boundary of the Second and Third Wards, with
Grandmother in the Second Ward, and then permanently in Uncle Ed's house in the Third Ward,

128
and lastly for a short time in the brick bungalow "up town". We lived for very short periods of time
in most of these places, only a few months in some cases, and we always thought of the "Ranch"
and Uncle Ed's home as our homes.
Most of these places have been torn down now. Daddy sold Uncle Ed's home to Will Jensen,
Aunt Janey's brother-in-law, and the last time I was in Richfield, the Jehovah Witnesses had
purchased it for their hall. The land daddy had is now a motel and camp ground, this is where the
Indians camped on our property. Aunt Millie's house and Grandmother's house have both been
demolished, and Uncle J. M.'s large home became a social center. The house Grandfather built in
Glenwood still stands and is occupied and I believe it has been made a historic building now, at
least it is recognized as a historic site.
Nothing at all remains of the "Ranch". Only some old, almost ancient, black willow trees are
still standing by the little spring where the house was.

The transcription starts here.

Ross: Rhea was my oldest sister?

Dad: She was born July 1, I don't remember the year.
Mother: 1915 We were married a year. She was born the year after we were married.
We were married in '14, and she was born in '15.
Dad: She was our first.
Shirley: I did not know that.
Ross: Where was she born, in a hospital?
Dad: She was born in our home in Richfield.
Mother: Aunt Millie was the midwife. (Amelia Hansen, dads sister)
My sister-in-law came up to take care of me.
Ross: How much did she weigh?
Dad: Not very much. She was a little baby.
Mother: She must have weighed about eight pounds.
Dad: When her mother got out of bed, she lost all of her feed (milk) and in those days it was hard
to get feed for babies. We tried everything but we could not find anything that she could
take. Finally we got malted milk and she could take that, just a little bit at a time, and we
raised her on that. But she did not grow very fast on this food and finally she got so she
could take bread and milk and we fed her bread and milk and she did better.
Mother: When Aunt Millie came up to take care of me, sometimes she did not get there
until late in the afternoon and so when the afterbirth came, the smell was so bad that
people thought something was dead in the house, but it was me that was stinking.
Dad: You shouldn't have put that in.
Mother: Well, it is the truth. That is what happened. It is the truth anyway.
Dad: She grew up a little sweet baby, awful sweet for her condition, and she seemed to have a
desire to help. We were really in poor condition, financially, and I was working . . . when
we got married. I had a good job in a tailor shop which went busted, and not on account of
that I took care of the money, but . . . Then I had to work from job to job, that was all that I
had, just labor. We lived in a little two-room house and we couldn't pay the rent so we
finally got kicked out. We went down into another little two-room house in the south end of
town and lived there.
Mother: We had a good garden, a corn garden there.
Dad: Well, yes, it had a big lot and I had a good garden, I raised a big garden, but I didn't raise
the corn there.
I went to work for my brother-in-law, J. M. Peterson, a rich millionaire banker, for $35 a
month as custodian and guardian in the bank. Then a farmer came and offered me $70 a month
if I could go out and milk cows on his ranch. We went out there and lived in another little two-
room shack with no water or any other conveniences in the house, just the bare walls, and then
Nola came, our second baby.

129
 Then, after I worked for this man for a while, I found he was a crazy nut, and I could not do
enough to please him, so I quit and went into town again and my brother got me a job as a
bookkeeper in a garage. Then I worked in this garage and this garage went busted . . . well
(everyone was laughing at this) . . . well.
Ross : (This particular episode in his life when he milked these cows always rankled him and he
could never speak of it without getting positively livid over this "crazy nut" he worked for)
Dad: Then my brother came along, and he had a sheep ranch on the east side of town and he
made me a deal that, (this was my brother Ed), if I would go out and run the sheep ranch, I
would eventually acquire part of it, I don't remember the terms.
We went out there and Orpha was born. I don't remember just when Orpha came along. We
moved from the Hansen place out to my brother's farm. I can't think when Orpha came.
Ross: 5 December 1917.
Dad: I bought a little home, another little two-room home, and that is where Orpha was born.
Aunt Janey lived across the road and she came and took care of mother.
Mother: She "mid-wifed me"
Dad: And then my brother came and got me and we moved out on that farm, and we had the three
children. We leased the house I bought. We never got any rent for that either. In this home
that I bought was a board floor and cracks in it so that Rhea could put a hair comb and any
object that size in the cracks every morning when she straightened up the place.
Mother: Hair pins.
(Nola):(Dad makes a distinction here between a "hair comb" a comb a lady combed her hair
with, and other types of combs, wool carding combs and curry combs, that were used for farm
work)
Dad. She put them down these cracks. She was always straitening up and helping around the
place and working a little around the place.
(Nola) : It was probably here at the ranch that she threw her new slippers in the irrigation
ditch. This valley was irrigated and a small ditch ran along the edge of each lot in town
and carried the irrigation water, so every house had this little ditch between it and the street.
Daddy bought Rhea a pair of little slippers. Children usually wore heavy shoes from the time
they could walk, but he loved her so much he bought these little patent leather slippers. They
had a little strap across the instep and buttoned to the side. I was just a baby, sitting in my
jumper, and Rhea gave me the slippers to hold. I sucked on the buttons and probably slobbered
on them. She she took them out to wash them off. (I am assuming this is what happened. She
was so tidy.) Well, the men coming home from the fields would stop on the little bridges and
slosh the mud off of their boots before coming into the house and she probably saw this and
took her slippers out to wash them off. At any rate, she lost them in the ditch and dad hunted
up and down the banks but he could never find them again. But he did not hold this against
her. He was always very proud when he told this story about Rhea throwing her new shoes in
the ditch.
Dad makes much of Rhea tidying up when she was so little, but Wendy (Maxs daughter) did
this. I remember once when Max had been out hunting in the boondocks and came in and just
took off his dirty clothes and took a bath, Wendy picked up these dirty, wet clothes and neatly
tucked them away in his drawer on top of his clean shirts. Max just said, I have a very tidy
daughter. Rhea's Jane was always "tidying" up, swinging around with a heavy broom,
sweeping the floor and knocking everything off of the tables and cabinets,, and looking up
with her big eyes, so proud that she was "helping". Rhea would laugh and say, Oh, I can't
scold her. She is so helpful and likes to help me.
Dad: Even at that time she helped her mother straighten up the house and worked around the place.
Then we went out to my brother's place and took the three children, and worked there for about
five years. (Actually it was less than three. Orpha was walking when we went there and we left
when Rhea was six). Then we came in to Richfield and Rhea was old enough to go to school.
She was six years old..
Ed had gotten mixed up in some oil business in California and lost his ranch and everything
and all that he owed me. We came in and rented another two-room house. This was a bigger

130
 house, though. It had two big rooms. It was an adobe house. We lived there and little Rhea
kept on helping her mother. I remember her sweeping the floor the best she could.
(Nola): Jane loved to sweep, and Wendy was just a tot when Mrs. Fillmore gave her a
little Bissel Sweeper for Christmas and she was so happy with it.
Dad: Rhea liked to make the beds, and I remember when she was only six years old she would
tidy up the bedroom and make the beds. She was always doing something about the house
and always as cheerful and happy as she could be.
At one time she was washing the dishes and I came in and I saw her and I laid my hand on her
head and said, "You are a beautiful little girl", and she started to cry because I had
complimented her. And she washed the dishes and she helped . . . she was six years of age.
She did almost a woman's work as much as she could do of the housework.
Then I got this job in the cheese factory and I acquired five acres of land that my brother, Ed,
had in the town and we moved up into that house. First we moved in with mother
(Grandmother Heppler). Mother made us a deal that if I would come up and take care of her
place, she would give me the house when she died. We went up there with the two children
(Nola): Three, there were three of us then and we all slept in one bed., a double bed, Orpha in
the middle and Rhea on the outer edge and me on the side against the wall. I hated that wall
that closed me in - even then I had claustrophobia..
Dad: And then I bought my brother's place and I moved up there.
Then Annivor came and little Rhea took Annivor away from her mother and raised her. (Rhea
was not quite nine, Annivor was born May 4, 1924). She would come home from school and
she could hardly wait to take this baby. One night she came home and she had a heart
palpitation, awful bad. We rushed her to the doctor, and doctor said, "Do not let her have any
responsibility at all". So we took the baby's crib out of her room and put it in ours. That night
we heard her sobbing like her little heart was going to burst out of her little breast. We went in
there and she said, "I might as well die if I cannot have Annivor with me." So we put Annivor
back in her bed and she raised her . . . she practically raised Annivor.
And then we sold that farm and bought a bungalow down in the town.
(Nola): Dad is talking about directions when he says "up" and "down". We went up north to
Salt Lake, and down south to St. George.)
Dad: We lived there and she continued to be the smiling little girl she always was and continued
in her work. And now she had gone to school. She came home one night and I was
smoking cigarettes, awful, I was almost a chain smoker, and she said, "I wish my daddy
would quit smoking. All my girl friends say, Your daddy smokes, doesn't he?" So I quit
smoking.
Then we were moved to Tremonton. The Company moved me up there and we sold our home
and went up there.
Rhea at this time was in the first year of high school and somebody had given her mother a
coat with a big fur collar . . .
Mother: You bought it for me.
Dad: Oh, go on, we didn't have the money to buy a coat like that, it was given to you.
Mother: Then when did I get my fur coat ?
(Nola): (Dad did give mother a fur coat, but it was long after we were all out of school)
Dad: She (mother) cut it down and made it into a coat for Rhea and I took her up to register her
in the Bear River High School. I was just as proud as I could be of her. She took hold of my
hand and we went in and I met the Principal, President Smith. He was president of the
Stake. (This was President Clarence E. Smith), and he took us into the classroom and I
remember him saying, "We are proud to have this little girl enter our school. Why?
Because her father took the time to bring her to school."
She continued on in school and she was an "A" student. Not only that, she continued to take
care of the family. Mother went to work and she went to school and she did her work when
she got home. Then when she was a senior she went out and got a job selling hot dogs and
popcorn in a junky little place. This married man, he was a former married man,, was wanting

131
 to take her home every night. She had a hard time getting away from him. He would buy hot
dogs and then he would want to take her home. She would have a hard time getting home.
Then she got through high school and went to work for Dr. Ficklin as a receptionist and Dr.
Ficklin decided she had appendicitis. She had a pain in her back, a gnawing pain, and he
operated on her and took her appendix out. Her appendix were just as well as anything you
ever saw, and did I tell that doctor off.
(Nola): (This part is unclear. I think she had her appendix out but I dont know. She did have
some surgery.)
: Then she went to work for Dr. Green and that is where she met Bert. She was receptionist and
assistant at the chair for Dr. Green, who was the dentist. When Dr. Ficklin came to Tremonton,
he took offices in the same building, just across the hall. She acted as receptionist for him, but
she was the dental assistant to Dr. Green. Dr. Green was a stake High Councilman, and Dr.
Ficklin later became the Stake President. They both had a very fond affection for Rhea all of
her life.
: There was a story about Dr. Ficklin when he first came to Tremonton that he had performed
an operation for a healthy appendix. There was quite a bit of animosity stirred up against him.
He was a convert to the Church from the mid-western part of the United States, I believe, and
he was a very fine looking man, tall and fair-haired, handsome and clean-looking. At that time
there were only three doctors for the entire western part of the county and they also took
patients from southern Idaho. They were Dr. White, who was our family doctor, Dr. Luke, both
having offices in Tremonton, and then a doctor in Garland. All of these doctors were older
men, and of the horse-and-buggy school. They would go anywhere at any hour of the day or
night. Dr. Ficklin set up a modern office in Tremonton and there was some resentment against
him at first. I personally do not believe he ever performed a false operation. It was also said
that Dr. Green would make a dollar when he could by pulling a sound tooth. These were
depression days and no one had any money at all.
Dad did not really have faith in doctors. He suffered from quinsey (tonsilitis) for years before
we could persuade him to have his tonsils out. He really had a thing against doctors. He also
liked a good story. I do not think we should promulgate this story. Dr. Ficklin was very fond of
Rhea, she worked for him, and he was concerned about her health, much more than daddy was
for all of his love of her. He forgot that she was an ill-nourished child.
Dad: She went out with Bert Wheatley and fell in love with him and he fell in love with her, and
finally she brought Bert to me to ask for her hand.
(Nola): Earl had not "asked" for Orpha's hand and daddy was really miffed about this. Rhea
remembered this so she "brought" Bert to him. Asking for the hand of a daughter in marriage
was an obsolete custom at that time. In those depression days, fathers were glad to get their
daughters married off.
Dad: In the meantime we had built a little home down on the south side of town, and I was sitting
and reading my paper and she came in with Bert and she said, "Daddy, Bert has something
to say to you". And I said, "OK, Bert, spit it out". And Bert couldn't say a word. And he
sat there for a long time, and I said, "How are all the family, Bert?" "Just fine." "How many
cows are you milking now, Bert?" "About eight now." And it went on like that and I waited
between sentences and questions. Finally little Rhea said, "Oh, for heavens sake, daddy,
why don't you make it easy for him."
And I said, "Yes, Bert, you can have her hand. We are glad to give her to you. So they got
married and had a big dance in Deweyville. All Deweyville came out and they had a good
time.
(Nola): My father is not exaggerating here, all the back end of the county came. They were all
patients of Dr. Green or Dr. Ficklin, and Rhea was very well liked.)
Dad: I do not know what caused Bert to move to Carey, Idaho. He got a bigger farm.
Colin: He had a bad back and could not do the row farming he was doing in Deweyville, and there
was not a healthy situation with his parents.
Dad: But before they left, he was called into the War, and Rhea lived with us for about a year.
Then she wanted her own apartment, so we rented her a little apartment. She and her baby,

132
 Colin, lived in this apartment. When they lived with us, I was trying to rock this baby,
Colin, to sleep. The harder I rocked, the meaner he got. He was about as stubborn a kid as I
ever saw. I finally had to give up and Rhea had to come and rock him to sleep. But when
she lived up in the apartment I got along fine with Colin.
Bert came home and they bought a little home on a farm next to his mother. Then they got into
trouble with the family and they moved up to Carey, ID.
When was it that Karl came? I don't remember when Karl came, before they moved or after,
and then Keith was born. We went up to see them on Christmas. As we went to leave, why she
just herded us out the door. She was going to the hospital and then Keith was born. She had
Keith and that is all I remember now.
Dad: Mother had a friend. They were married about the same time. She married Bill Barron.
She had a baby boy about the time we had Rhea. And they grew up together. When they
were little toddlers, Rhea could never remember his name and she called him "Bare Lane".

The following was added by Nola.

This was a long-standing joke in our family and his. His name was Lane Barron. We had a
picture of our cousin, Kendall Heppler, all naked and sitting on a rug. She associated the two ideas,
"bare" naked, and "bare" Lane.)
I am a little vague about this. The war started on 7 December 1941, and Rhea was married on
the 19th of December 1941, and Colin was born in February of 1943.
Bert was called out in the general conscription but I thought this was just before the war. He
was in training in Texas and I thought they were married at this time, and I don't remember when
Colin was born. I had gone into essential industry at Hill Field, and went into the Navy in March
of 1943. I went down to Oklahoma, the Naval Training School at Norman in April and Rhea and
Bert were at Chickashaw then, with Colin. Rhea went alone with Colin to be with Bert. She
traveled by train, second class, and I remember that I tried to buy her a first-class bedroom ticket
but she would not let me. Afterwards she wrote and said what a horrible journey it had been. I
always felt guilty that I had not just made her take that bedroom with Colin. But she was happy
with Bert in Chickashaw. Then Bert went overseas and she came home.
Karl was born in June of 1944, in the hospital in Tremonton, and Bert was still in the United
States. He had compassionate leave and came to Tremonton and gave Karl a Father's Blessing in
the hospital and as I remember, he had to leave that same day as his unit was going overseas. Rhea
did not see Bert again until the war was over and he returned home. But both Colin and Karl were
with her in the little apartment she had in Tremonton.
Keith was born on the 2nd of January 1948, and we had been there that day, or the day before,
and Rhea did push us out of the door and as soon as we had gotten clear of the lane, she and Bert
went to the hospital in Hailey and Keith was born very shortly after that. Of course, mother and
Dad would have stayed there if they had known that she was going into labor. In fact she was
already in labor before we left. She had a stubborn streak, too. We got the news the next day that
Keith had come along, and mother was really upset about it.
That was the night I slept in a sleeping bag on the floor and I had a long pink satin nightgown
and Karl thought that was so nice. He kept coming down with his cold bare feet and shoving down
into the sleeping bag with me to feel the satin, and nearly freezing me with his cold feet. Then he
would push out and go back to bed and soon he would be shoving down by me again, I couldn't get
him to stay, and I'll never forget those little cold feet.

Letter written by Nola Heppler to Colin Wheatley (No date)

Dear Colin:

As I wrote to you earlier, it is good that you are going into the mission field, and that your
field will be in Germany, where our family originated. Now I would like to tell you a little bit about
your family and its part in the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and

133
in the history of America, for our ancestors were among the American colonists, and among the
early converts to our Church. I should also like to tell you something about your mother, and of her
faith and belief in the Lord Jesus Christ, for as the oldest member of your family, it is your
responsibility to keep the records of the family, and preserve for your children, the heritage of our
fathers.
Rhea Heppler Wheatley was born 1 July 1915, at Richfield, Sevier county, Utah the daughter
of Rosco Zar Heppler, Sr., and Elmira B Farnsworth.
She married 19 December 1941, at Logan, Cache county, Utah, Bert Moss Wheatley, the son
of Thomas Leslie Wheatley and Rhoad Mahaila Moss. She died 9 September, 1954, at Salt Lake
City, Utah, at the age of 39, and is buried in the Deweyville Cemetery, at Deweyville, Utah.
She was the mother of eight children, Colin, Karl, Keith, Michael Joseph, Ronald Dale, Mary Jane,
and Rhoda Elaine.
We descend from righteous ancestors. Through the Bulkely line we descend from Charles the
Great. Two members of this noble family were signers of the Magna Carta. The Bulkely, Newman
and Farnsworth families were colonial Americans, and participated in the early Indian Wars and the
Revolutionary War. When the history of the Draper family is known, it is likely that they too will
be among the colonial families of America. At present, we know only that they were early settles in
Ontario Canada.
It is likely that the Mosier family well trace into the Loyalists families of Ontario, those whose
consciences prompted them to defend the King and the British law at the time when men had to
declare their thinking, whether they stood for one side or the other.
In Canada the Drapers accepted the missionaries, and came into Kirkland, moving to Nauvoo,
and then to Utah. The Bulkley family was converted on the Pennsylvania frontier. They also joined
the Saints at Nauvoo, and moved west to Utah.
The Farnsworth family was converted in Indiana, and came later to Utah, some well-to-do,
educated people, who were appalled at the low economic standards of those with whom they had
cast their lot.
In 1847, when the first white settlers into Utah were getting underway, the tailor, Johann
Martin Heppler, left his home in Germany, and emigrated to Canada, settling near Waterloo,
Ontario. His son Andrew married Louisiana Seegmiller, whose father had come from Bavaria some
years earlier. These people joined the Church in 1873 and moved to Utah, settling first in St.
George, and then moving to, Glenwood, in Sevier county.
Elmira Farnsworth had come from Manti to live with her
sister, Jane Gottfredson, in Sigurd, and this is where our story
begins.

Letter written Jane & John 29 December 1977

Dear Jane and John:

I was surely happy to receive your sweet remembrance at

Christmas time and wanted to reply, but my office keeps me
fairly chained down at Christmas and it usually is well into
January when I get my Christmas underway. (Reason #114
for early retirement)
Well, yes, as a matter of fact, I have fallen recently. Did
a quite thorough job this time, right big toe, left ankle, right
knee, left hip, right rib cage, left elbow and both wrists. I got
carted off to the Emergency Clinic and X-rayed 245 times
from every possible angle and some impossible ones (but they
managed it'd). They told me to go home and rest up a few
days, no harm done. I must stop running down the street.
So I was just off crutches when mothers died. We had a Rhea Bert

134
very brief funeral. It is too bad you could not come as Karl would have flown in if he had known so
many of you were to be there. Elaine showed up with wee Aaron (a perfect doll-like child) and I
was so happy to see her come in. Burt and Ellen brought her, they came to Salt Lake City, picked
her up at the airport, took her to Preston, brought her to the viewing and took her back to the
airport. It was so very nice of them. They also offered to take dad up to their farm for a few weeks,
but he wanted to go back to the nursing home. He feels secure there. Keith and Teressa were there
with their little ones for the viewing. Amy climbed up in dad's lap and sat with him. It was very
nice that he had her. Elizabeth ran about under everyone's knees (she is so tiny) and finally found a
little flower stand about ten inches high. She grabbed this, just her size table, and ran around with
it. She was really cute.
We had a family get together at Maxs home. We had really thought it would just be our
immediate family, my brothers and sisters, but we couldn't locate Orpha. They had just left Ashton
for Mesa and were en route to Tremonton. We thought they would surely be there that evening, but
two days went by and they didn't show. We had no idea where they were. Actually, they were
camped in the back garden of some friends in Rexburg.
Finally I called Marco in Los Angeles to see if by chance they had passed Tremonton and gone
on to California. Marco had not received any word but she gathered up Sara and Barbara and John
(Barbara's brand new husband) and they came to Tremonton. Annivor came down from Seattle,
Ross and David and Ann from Provo, and Steve (Ross's eldest son, who is living in Corvallis,
Oregon) also came. Wendy and Brad (Max's two oldest) were home from college, so we really had
a large gathering. It was really nice to be together again. We never seem to do so unless there is a
funeral, and then we all have a grand ball. The Hepplers can never be sober for long. We have
enjoyed life too much and our mother enjoyed it more than any us (Yes, Orpha and Earl finally
showed up). So we told the old tales again and laughed and enjoyed being together.
The viewing was very nice. We did not realize so many people would come because mother
and dad have not lived in Tremonton for about twenty years and they have not been well at all, and
really have outlived almost all of their friends. But we had some very touching moments. For one,
when we first moved to Tremonton, we just didn't know anyone. We had come from Sevier County
which was practically populated by the Hepplers and Seegmillers and so we knew everyone and
were related to every other one. We always went around in a huge caravan of Heppler and
Seegmiller cousins, uncles, aunts, etc., so we felt very isolated and venerable. Mother
was confined with Ross who was born just about as soon as we got our suitcases unpacked. Mother
shared a room in the hospital with a Mrs. Gladys Holmgren who had a girl the same night that Ross
was born and they were the first friends we made there. Well, they moved away and we lost touch,
but this little grey haired lady came up to me, leaning on a cane, and said, Don't you remember
me, Gladys Holmgren, we had our babies together." Well, there were so many really tender
moments like that. One of my missionary companions came up from Farmington and one of the
girls I worked with from the old telephone company came from Ogden,
We just had grave side services. None of us felt like putting a funeral together and we didn't
think dad could take very much anyway so it was brief but nice. There was a very cold wind
blowing, I had forgotten how that wind sweeps down from Idaho. Dad was grateful to get back to
the nursing home. The people there were waiting for him and were so kind and loving to him.
I did not weep for my mother. She was 82 years old and had lived a full and rich life and was
steadily getting weaker. She had really been much improved since they came to live in the nursing
home. They received such good care that I am sure her life was prolonged. She suffered a stroke
and seemed to rally, although she was partially paralyzed and could not speak. But could recognize
us and understand what we were saying to her. Four days later her lungs began to fill with water
and she died within a few hours. She had exhibited symptoms of Parkinson's Disease about two
years ago. This was the real reason we brought her to Utah. We had signed a paper saying we did
not want life support, so she was allowed to die quite peaceably. I suppose that if we had not
signed the paper the doctors could have kept her alive for a few more months but we could not see
this.
Dad is making a marvelous recovery, he gets such good care at the home, and is used to it. He
knows where his bed is and who is attending him and what they can do for him, so he really is quite

135
happy. Ross and I go up to see him at least once a month and take him out and buy him a taco for
dinner. Max visits him about every two weeks and Keith and Teressa visit him with their children
quite often. So he has company, and we are quite happy and assumed that he is doing as well as
possible.
You asked me about your mother, and I will try to tell you what I can. I have been gathering
notes for some years, hoping to get a history of our family written. As we three were all so close
that to tell the story of one is to write the story of all of us. But this will be a little bit for you right
now.
Our father, Rosco Zar Heppler, was the youngest of the eighteen children of Andrew Heppler
and Louisa Anna Seegmiller. They had come from Canada to Utah about 1870, I do not have details
here and you perhaps are not so concerned with actual dates.
Andrew was quite wealthy in Canada, he was a molder of ornamental iron and was very
talented and skillful. They were baptized into the Mormon Church here in Salt Lake City, and
expected to live there. However, Louisa Anna had a brother in St. George and they went down
there.
About this time the Indian wars in Utah were settled and the lands which had been devastated
were reopened for settlement. A colony was established in Sevier County, at a place then called
Glen's Cove or Glencoe, but later called Glenwood. Andrew was asked to manage a tannery that
had been built along the stream which flowed out of a large spring back in the hills behind
Glenwood. His brother-in-law, one of the Seegmillers, I never have quite sorted them out, there
were the four brothers, had started this tannery and grandfather went to Glenwood to manage it.
My father was born in Glenwood. My mother was born in Manti. After her parents died, she
was about 16 then, she went to Sigurd in Sevier County to live with a married sister, Jane and Will
Gottfredson. Uncle Will managed the Sigurd Merc (Mercantile Company) and mother clerked in
this store. This is where she met father who was working in the gypsum mill at Sigurd.
My father was what you might call an itinerant worker. He rather moved around. Farming and
sheep raising were the main economies of this area. You had to have a little capital to get into the
sheep business and father would not have been good at that any way. He was far too convivial to
ever stay the summer months on top of a mountain with a herd of sheep.
After their marriage, my father left the mills and worked as a tailor in Richfield. He rented a
little log house, and your mother, Rhea, was born there. She was born on the 1st day of July, 1915.
My mothers birthday was on the 16th of July.
Rhea was a happy little baby, and remained a happy person all of her life. She had straight
dark hair, quite thick, and little buck teeth. As she was mostly smiling, her little two front teeth
were the first things you noticed about her. She was quite small, very slender, and had small hands
and feet (the Heppler trait). She was quite musical. From her earliest days, she would hum or sing
little melodies and loved to dance. She was very loving. She was quick to sympathize with
everyone and was happy when others were happy.
She really doesn't come into my memory much until our sister, Annivor, was born. We were
then living in Richfield. My father was now steadily employed. Worse than that, getting
promotions so that he was more and more tied to a job instead of roaming the woods and forests
and fishing and hunting as he loved to do all of his life. But my father was a responsible family
man. He always provided well for us and we always had plenty to eat. He kept cattle and poultry
and a fine kitchen garden and we always ate the first of the produce. He gave away the seconds and
sold the thirds. Father felt that if people could not raise their own food they did not deserve
anything better.
As I said, we had a very comfortable home in Richfield. It had first belonged to my
grandfather, Andrew. The land had been his and he had made a personal treaty with the Indians that
they could always camp on a portion of his land. It had been along the old Indian migration trail.
No Indians lived in this area, but they hunted there and traveled through the valley between winter
and summer hunting grounds. You see how old our family is in Utah? The Indians were still
hunting the hills and valleys.
Then my father's oldest brother took the land and built the house. It had three bedrooms, a
large parlor, a larger kitchen, a large pantry and a bathroom. There were also a summer kitchen and

136
a wash house, separate but part of the home. There were stables and barns and a poultry house. It
was quite a large bit of property.
Father was now working as a pick up driver for the Sevier Valley Cheese Company and drove
a truck around collecting the milk from all of the farms in the valley. He also worked his own piece
of ground and we always had flowers and fruit trees.
My father said that men worked in the field and women worked in the house. Thus, we never
had to work in the fields other than weed the kitchen garden. Of course, my father would not let
anyone touch his precious flower gardens.
We built a little brush house along the creek bed and played there. We also played in the barns
and in an old shed above the root cellar. There we had a little theater and wrote and acted our plays
for the neighbor children. We charged things like apples, and interesting pieces of wood, whatever
the kids brought. I was always the villain (because I like to wear boots). Orpha was always the
pure hero. Rhea was the innocent young maiden. I wrote the plays. They always ended with Orpha
embracing Rhea and kissing her. Our imagination did not go further than that.
Rhea was not particularly handy around the house or in the garden either for that matter. She
was musically talented and my father bought a piano and she took lessons when she was just a
child. She loved to practice and seemed to really understand what she was doing. She pleased my
father very much with her music and her sweet smile and loving personality. She was his ideal, the
perfect daughter. The fact that she couldn't cook or sew, escaped his notice. She was the eldest and
took the position of leader of the three of us. I don't remember that she was bossy or domineering,
she just rather set the pace and we followed.
As in the matter of our ages, she was first in everything, just that much older so that she had
the first silk stockings; the first patent leather slippers; the first permanent wave; all of that, and we
followed along in our turn. She started school first; started in the 4-H's first; graduated from
Primary first. All through our childhood, she was first and we followed along. Ours was a happy
cheerful family.
My mother was a great prankster. She would invent the most outrageous tricks to play on us
and we were so trusting and innocent. We never ceased to trust her, even when she played some
really dirty tricks on us. We went everywhere together as a family and spent our holidays together.
We did everything together. Except when dad went deer hunting. Then it was the "women's" turn in
the house and we did and made everything dad did not like, like lemon pie, chili, and slumber
parties. All the things that irritated him. We did them when he went hunting and our mother was
out in front of all of us.
We three slept in one bedroom. Rhea had one bed to herself and Orpha and I had a bed
together. And more incompatible bed mates would be hard to find. We slept together until she was
married. I will never forget her wedding night. It was the first time I had the glorious privilege of
sleeping alone in all my life.

Annivors arrival

One night, I was about ten years old, so Rhea would be about eleven, we were sent to bed
early. We were just getting over the chicken pox so we did not argue. We did not go to sleep but we
went to bed. We told stories and talked. After a while my father came in with this beautiful baby in
his arms. She was dressed in a little white nightgown with blue ribbons and ruffles. (It was to have
been a boy.) She had great blue eyes and dark brown curls, and my father said, "Would you girls
like to have this doll to play with?" We swept over the bed like an ocean wave and grabbed her out
of his arms. Rhea got there first and she picked Annivor up and put her in bed with her. Well, it was
a bit confusing, but Rhea put Annivor in her bed and they shared a bed for the rest of their
childhood until Rhea got married. We all loved Annivor so much. She was very beautiful and had a
very sweet and unspoiled spirit all her life even though she had people at her feet all the time. Rhea
must have loved her the most because she was like a little mother to Annivor. And that is the first
separate memory I have of Rhea.
I remember that she was always winning prizes in school. Mother would make a new dress for
her and the whole family. We would get scrubbed up and dad would shave again and we would all

137
go off to the school auditorium or the ward chapel. This was where big events in our town were
held. We would sit together and all be very proud of her.
Later Orpha began to win prizes too and we were all together being proud of her as well.
Actually, Orpha was the valedictorian of her High School graduating class, and Rhea was an
honor student, an "A" Honor Student, it was called.
These were big events and were on separate nights so they both wore the same new dress. This
was during the depression and we didn't have the money for new dresses just any old time. The
dress in case was actually my new dress. I had just made it. I was somewhat like you, Jane, I could
design dresses and draft the patterns and sew them, and this was my latest triumph. You can
imagine how I reacted when Rhea came out on the stage to get her prizes. Instead of swelling up
with pride like the rest of the family, I yelled right out, "That's my new dress." Mother and dad both
sat on me. And then it was all repeated when Orpha got her prize. I don't think I ever wore that
dress. It was a beautiful blue silk. "Alice Blue was the color it was called. Then we all wore silk
dresses.
Rhea was very spiritual. She was active in Church affairs and was the first Golden Gleaner in
our Stake. We then lived in Tremonton. She was the Gleaner Queen that year. It was the first year
they had had a Golden Gleaner. That was the Gleaner who had earned the greatest number of
merits. These included many activities, such as leadership' administration, service to others, natural
talents, etc. Fortunately, cooking and housekeeping was not a part of this. I don't wish to seem
mean, but Rhea really was not talented in those fields. But then girls were expected to keep house
so no one paid much attention to skills in those areas. She received a little gold pin and when she
died this was pinned to the lining of her coffin. I do not know what happened to it after that.
In her MIA activities, she met your father, Bert, who was a Master M-Man. This was how they
got acquainted. Bert had just returned from his mission. He lived in Deweyville and went to the
Box Elder High School in Brigham City. We went to Bear River High and although they were in
the same Stake they had not met until after Bert returned from his mission. They fitted together like
"bugs in a rug'' my brother-in-law, Earl Stohl said.
After Rhea left school, where she had a very high scholastic record, and was a member of the
school PEP Club, the shortest member ever, she started to work with Dr. Don B. Green, the dentist.
She was his assistant and although had no formal training in this field, this was not required then,
she was a natural for it. Because of the empathy she had for people, she was very well liked
throughout the entire county. Dr. Green was also on the High Council of our Stake and so he went
to the different little wards speaking on Sunday evenings. Rhea went with him to play the piano.
Her best friend, Maxine Buchannon, had a lovely singing voice and Maxine sang and Rhea played
for her. Thus, they were well known all around in all the little towns of west Box Elder County.
Her wedding was really a big event. Do you remember how a wedding dance was a social
event and everyone came and brought a present? Well, this one couple came from some ranch out
in the back country and put down their gift. Then they went to meet the bride and groom and the
woman said, "Rhea, are you getting married?" and then she said, "If I had known it was your
wedding, I would have brought a more expensive gift."
We were recovering from the depression but the war years were closing in on us. Rhea and
Bert lived on a small farm just by his father's in Deweyville. Bert was called in the "conscription"
and went to Texas and then to Oklahoma. He was at the medical base in Chicashaw, and Rhea went
to live with him. Colin was just a tiny baby then. They lived in a huge house that was made into
tiny apartments for service people. I think five other families lived in the same house and they all
shared the bathroom. Rhea had two rooms. I was then in the Navy and stationed in Norman at the
Navel Technical Training School. I was training to be an aviation mechanic and although
Chickasaw was more than fifty miles away and out of limits for me, I used to get on the bus and go
out to see them for a weekend. I slept on their lumpy sofa and really enjoyed being with them. I
suppose this was the closest I ever was to Rhea after her marriage.
Orpha was married and living in Idaho or perhaps Montana with Earl. I would have to really sit
down and work it out. Rhea and I became very close and Bert tried to find a husband for me. Each
effort failed and Rhea would always put her arms around me and say, "He really wasn't for you,
Nola, you wouldn't be happy with him."

138
 Bert then went to China and Burma and flew over the Hump (Himalayan Mt.) and the Burma
Road. Rhea went back to Tremonton. Karl was born there and Bert got special leave to come home
and give Karl a name and a father's blessing. Then he returned to China. I was home on leave then
and Colin and I got very well acquainted as I used to baby sit when Rhea went visiting. I don't
think she ever worked outside the home after she was married. She had so many friends and she
love to be with people and enjoyed visiting with them.
After the War, Bert got a farm in Idaho, near Sun Valley. I cannot think of the name of that
place, Cary. Yes, Cary. This was a very poor place. They did not have water and the house was not
finished. They soon moved to a better place in the same area and here they lived for the rest of
Rhea's life.
I went on my mission right after the War and then lived in Salt Lake. I used to spend my
school vacation ( I was then at the University of Utah) visiting with Orpha in Montana and then
with Rhea in Idaho. I did this every year until I finished school.
Rhea was a great little traveler, and she would come to Tremonton and to Salt Lake to visit us.
But her health became very poor and then we remembered that as a small girl she had had a heart
condition. I expect she always had this, but we did not go in much for doctoring then. She was so
eager for life and always wanted to lead the parade. She never complained, so we had forgotten
about it.
She came down to the LDS Hospital in September of 1954, and in a few weeks, she died. I
remember that I went to see her. She was very cheerful as she had always been. As I had had no
experience with death, I was not alert to her true condition.
There was a young woman in the next room who had a lovely short negligee. Short nightgowns
and negligees were just coming into style. They had been long sleeved, high collared, toe length,
you know, and Rhea was really fascinated with this gown. The woman would walk up and down the
corridor and Rhea thought it was so beautiful. I said to my self that when she got up and was
around again I would buy one for her. Bert was really having a hard time then. By now they had a
large family, all of them little angels, but quite a few all the same, and he was paying for his farm
and trying to build his house. I had a good job and so I thought I would just buy this gown for Rhea
when she was up and around again. Of course she never got out of bed again and I was left with my
money saved for this gown. It is one of the saddest days of my life that she never had the little
gown she wanted.
Rhea loved all of her children and really cared for them. She would drive the car around Idaho,
that bumpy country, with all of them in the car. They were all singing and talking and loving her
and all. I used to wonder how she could take it all. But it never bothered her. She loved to have all
of her children near her. She worked hard to keep them clean and well dressed. Colin was very
particular about his clothing and liked to be clean. She was ironing his shirts and I asked why she
didn't get some knit pullovers for him that didn't need to be ironed. She replied that he didn't like
then because they made him seem skinny, so she ironed all of those shirts.
I traveled around a great deal during the War with the Navy and on my mission. I would write
great long letters to her telling her what I was doing. She was always very interested. She did not
get to travel herself but she really enjoyed hearing about my travels.
After she died, I stopped writing letters and keeping a diary because it seemed to me that now
there was no one to share them with. I grieved for a long time after Rhea died. She was my friend
and my buddy, my rock of refuge in the storm. She was always so interested in everyone and so
quick to extend sympathy or laugh with you.
Our family always had a lot of fun. We didn't have much money but my father managed so that
we had good times. We went to Fish Lake in Sevier County every year and then we went to
Yellowstone Park until the War. Then we bought our cabin at Bear Lake and we always had a good
time together.
I am glad now that Bert and Ellen can travel a bit and have some fun. Bert has had to work
hard all of his life. He had just returned from his mission and then went to the War. He spent such a
long time, that valuable time of his youth, fighting for his country. Then with very little money,
just started to buy his farm and Rhea died. They had little time or opportunity for luxuries.

139
 Rhea would always send a gift to everyone at Christmas time. She said even if it was just a 5
handkerchief, it was a reminder of love. She would always send gifts, little things she would make.
She wrote to everyone and told us all about what the children were doing. She always stayed very
close to mother and to all of us. We all loved her very much.
Dr. Green spoke at her funeral and I remember he said, The spirit of a righteous mother lives
on in the lives of her children. I know this is true for you are all so very dear, so kind and good, so
honest, and so beautiful. I know that she stays very close to all of you and still loves and cares for
you.
Perhaps I can fill this out a bit later. But for now I hope this will tell some of the things you
want to know. But you must ask me what you want to know. Also ask Orpha for she will be glad to
tell you. She was always there while I was away so much of the time.
Rhea never spoke evil of anyone. She was never mean or unkind. She enjoyed people and
enjoyed hearing them talk about their problems and their joys. People liked to be with her. Sitting
in Church, or at dances or any kind of gathering, she would always listen to what they had to say.
Thus, she had many friends all around the county.
She was very accommodating. She would help wherever she could. She was the perfect Relief
Society President. But she did not to my knowledge she did not hold a position in Relief Society.
Rather, she was the ward and stake organist. She was the Stake MIA organist and in this calling she
met Robert Cundick who was then a member of the Church Music Committee and is now the
Tabernacle organist. Brother Cundick was one of the Church visitors to Cary at a Stake MIA
Convention, and she met him and he always remembered her.
I got to know him quite well, he went to London to play the Organ in the Hyde Park chapel
after it was built and free concerts were given every day. I knew him there. Now he is the
Tabernacle organist and is a member of the Musical Instruments Selection Committee which selects
all of the musical instruments which the Church buys. My boss is the chairman of this Committee
and I am its secretary, so I see Brother Cundick quite often. He is a gentleman and very talented
and of course I am proud of our friendship. I thought that you might like to know that your mother
also enjoyed his particular friendship.
Rhea was quite small. I don't think she ever wore clothes larger than a size nine dress. Her hair
was thick and glossy and dark brown. She did not have any grey at all in her hair. She was very
neat with her person and very clean. I have said that she could not sew. That is to say that both
Orpha and I were very skilled with a needle. Rhea did sew and she did a lot of embroidery work.
She tackled anything but I usually would finish it for her. It did not come easy to her. But she was
skillful in making little objects for decorations. She had very quick and clever hands. I doubt that
she ever weighed more than 100 pounds. I was working at the Relief Society offices when she died
and we had them make her burial robes. I remember one of the sewing sisters remarking that this
was the smallest burial dress she had ever made.
Rhea was the first of us to learn to drive a car and she always drove after that. She had a
natural talent for leadership. She was tolerant of others. She was very much in love with your father
and made the best of her life that she could. As I said, right after the War, years were hard, and Bert
had not had time to put anything aside. He had to start from scratch and he was very careful about
going into debt. If she had lived longer, they would eventually have had a nice home and all of the
comforts that other people take for granted now.
As you said, it does not do to dwell on the past, but the happiness of the past should stay with
us. Your mother was a happy, loved woman. She was very honest and quite guileless (is that a
word?). There was always the bit of a child in her. She believed everyone was noble and kind and
true. She would be very shocked when someone she knew did something that was less than
honorable. In a way she was blessed in retaining that childlike wonder and innocence. But she was
a woman who was loved and who loved and we all had to work hard in those days and make do
with what we had. The sadness is that just as things were getting good her life was ended. It came
to me as we stood around our father at the grave of our mother how fortunate we are to have a large
and loving family. How blessed our parents were to have had children to care for them in their last
years. Without wanting to appear trite, but I am quite old and have seen quite a bit of life, a loving
family is really the most precious blessing we can have here on earth.

140
 As one thinks over these things, other thoughts come in, and I should perhaps fill in some of
the bare bones, and give you a more complete image of your mother. It is not really easy now to go
back that far and see her as a vital living person. We have thought of her for so long as someone
who was very dear to us, was beloved, but whose personal image is now clouded and dimmed by
time and other events more pertinent to our daily lives.
Until we moved to Richfield, when Rhea was six years old, her birthday was in July and school
started in September, so in that summer, we moved from our ranch into Richfield so that Rhea
could attend school. I expect that our father was not too happy as a rancher, and mother was
certainly very lonely out there so far from any other kind of society. I have heard her say that she
once cooked an enormous dinner for a tramp who was passing by. She was so glad to see another
human being. I feel that Rhea would have done the same. She always liked to be in a crowd. As I
said, we were quite remote on this little ranch, not in miles certainly, but in geography and in
society, few people had occasion to pass by. My father had a brother who had a ranch even more
remote beyond ours, but the road to our holding branched off some miles from Uncle Frank's place,
and the road ended there, at Uncle Frank's, that is, it just went to his ranch. The "county" road from
Richfield to Glenwood, went due east in almost a straight line, and Glenwood was the end of this
road. The road continued on in a loop around the mountains and come back to the valley through
Sigurd. This road only went to Glenwood in the sense that the only people who used it would be
going to Glenwood or one of the small holdings along the way. The road to Uncle Frank's ranch left
the county road some distance from Glenwood, on the west side of a little spur of the mountain.
The road to our ranch left this road, winding up into the actual hill, our ranch was mostly on the
hill, some distance from Uncle Frank's place. So unless someone got lost or really wanted to visit
us, no one every traveled this road.
As I started to say, until we moved to Richfield, when Rhea was just six, we had very little
contact with other children, or other human beings for that matter. My father had a cousin, King
Seegmiller, who lived on a farm along the county road. His house was just alongside the road and
Uncle Frank lived further along beyond our place. Dad had a car, an old Model T, which made
the trip to Richfield. But it seems that if we were going to Uncle Franks we went by wagon drawn
by horses. I do not remember that my father ever rode a horse. Until we got our car, we traveled by
buggy or in a wagon.

Rheas Death

I felt that I could not write of the last days of your mother's life, but now I feel that I should
tell you of these events as they have a rich beauty as well as deep sorrow. She was at the LDS
Hospital, and mother came from Tremonton and stayed with me, and we were with her those last
few days. Before mother came down, I was alone with her and I visited with her every day.
So great was her courage and love for life that I never realized how near to death she was and
when I finally realized this and sent telegrams to our family, they arrived too late to see her.
Those last days are precious to me and also deeply sad for I loved her very much. As I sat by
her this one day, she began to talk of her life, and her family, and then she named over each of her
children and recounted their particular little weaknesses or the places in which they were
particularly individual, and said, as if to herself, (I dont think she knew that I was there), who will
love my children and understand them and help them when they will need help." It was so
heartbreaking that I would like not to have to recall this. I tried to assure her but as I said, I do not
think she was aware of my presence, I think she was entirely within herself.
She was so good in the hospital, doing all that the doctors asked of her, because she wanted so
much to live, but one night when mother was helping her get ready for the night, she said, Am I
going to die?, and mother, bending over her as if she were still my mothers first baby, said, Yes.
I think she then gave up the struggle, and it was only a few days later that she died.
Bert was so desperately anguished. He asked his mission president, Elder S. Dillworth Young,
to bless your mother and Elder Young came to the hospital and gave her a blessing, but he gave no
hope, and that last night, when we were all in her room and the elders who were assigned to the
hospital came in to bless her, and I knew then that she would not live, and I wanted to ask the Lord

141
to take me instead and leave her here because I had nothing to leave and she had so much, but it
was as if an angels came into the room and put an arm around me and comforted me and told me
that I had to stay, and that she had lived a full life and accomplished all that the Lord had for her to
do on earth, but I still had a work to do, and I was strangely comforted and wondered why the
others were weeping.
I am only writing these things because I feel you might like to know of them, not to harrow up
sorrow because every day life offers us a full table and we have only to eat of the good portions and
leave the sadness, but without the bitterness we would never really appreciate the sweet
The next morning as I went to work, I had to be there so early and the woman for whom I
served as secretary was particularly unfeeling and would not allow me any extra time away from
the office, but became more and more demanding, well, the Lord has dealt with her and she soon
had her cup of sorrow to drink but by then I had left her service and could not be of helps to her, we
all make our own road. I was so sad, and I walked through Temple Square, in those days, before the
great in roads of tourists congest this once peaceful Square, there was a beautiful rose garden where
the Visitors Center now stands, and I loved to walk in this garden, having no properly of my own to
plant roses in, and I walked towards this garden, but my feet kept turning in the opposite direction
and I could not go into my garden, I kept turning towards the temple.
In those days the square was open and the gates to the Temple were not closed and locked and
you could walk right up to the Temple itself and I loved to stand at the foot of those vast bulwarks
and feel the massive granite beneath my hands and look up to the towering ramparts and think, this
building will stand when all else in this valley is destroyed, and I loved to feel those great granite
blocks beneath my hands.
I had to walk towards the Temple, and a voice said to me, lift up shine eyes, and I looked and
just then the sun came up from behind the mountains and its rays caught the statue of the Angle
Moroni and gold shown like a flame, and I thought, this statue if of a man who lived on this earth
and died and was resurrected and visited this earth again, and suddenly, blindingly, I understood
the Resurrection, and I knew that Rhea would always be with us, and that death was just another
stage in our eternal life.
I thought of the wonderful hymn of praise in the Book of Job, and I was strangely comforted. I
have felt the spirit of your mother close on many occasions, and I know that she still watches over
you and loves you. I hope this will be meaningful to you as it had been hard for me to write these
things, and they are not for the world but only for you, her children. In these days of seeming
affluence, it is difficult to really understand the poverty of the Depression years, perhaps this is
because we did not count our riches by material possessions but by the spiritual blessings which we
had and therefore did not feel impoverished only in that we lacked certain things that are counted as
essential to day. We knew such bounteous friendships and had such a spirit of caring, not only for
our immediate families but for others.
There was simply no money. Not that the value of money was debased, but that there was no
money. What you had in your purse was all the money there was, and what you had on your shelves
was all the food there was, what you had in the coal bin was all the fuel there was, and what you
had, you shared with others. In a way, it was a wonderful time. But children, approaching marriage,
did not think in terms of the future as they do today. They fell in love, got married, took what
housing and employment they could find, and the future fell into the present and each day was lived
for itself. Nola Heppler

Genealogy of Rhea F Heppler

Rhea F Heppler Born 1 Jul 1915 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 9 Sep 1954 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.
Buried 13 Sep 1954 in Deweyville, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Bert Moss Wheatley son of Thomas Leslie Wheatley and Rhoda Mahala
Moss on 19 Dec 1941 in Logan, Cache, Utah, USA. Bert was born on 7 Mar 1915 in
Collport, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

142
Rhea F Heppler & Bert Moss Wheatley had the following children:

Colen H Wheatley Born 9 Feb 1943 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Gail Irene Hayashi daughter of Tom Shigeo Hayashi and Helen Elko
Uchida on 17 Jun 1968 in Logan, Cache, Utah, USA. Gail was born on 13 Sep 1943
in Denver, Denver, Colorado, USA.
Karl Heppler Wheatley Born on 9 Jun 1944 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah.
Married Maurine Marks on 26 Jun 1967 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah, USA.
Maurine was born on 4 Apr 1947 in Richland, Benton, Washington, USA.
Keith H Wheatley Born 2 Jan 1948 in Halley, Blaine, Idaho, USA.
Married Theresa Lea Devoe on 26 Jan 1971 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah,
USA. Theresa was born on 26 Mar 1950.
Joseph Michael Wheatley Born 7 Apr 1949 in Carey, Blaine, Idaho, USA.
Married Trudy Evans daughter of Keith Clark Evans and Minnie Etheleen Bugg on 1
Aug 1972. Trudy was born on 26 May 1952 in Lehi, Utah, Utah, USA.
Mary Jane Wheatley Born 9 Mar 1952 in Carey, Blaine, Idaho, USA
Married John Norman Mendilik 10 Aug 1947. Divorced
Rhoda Elaine Wheatley Born 23 Feb 1953 in Halley, Blaine, Idaho, USA.
Married Gerald Bruce Gouch or Witters son of Duane Simon Witters and Joan Daphne
Chambers on 8 Sep 1972. Gerald was born on 1 May 1950 in Salem, Marion, Oregon,
USA.

Bert Moss Wheatley & Rhea F Heppler Wheatley Family

143
 Odds & Ends

Aunt Emma and her family lived in the house next to us and she and Mother took turns with chores such
as caring for milk and eggs. As the eldest in both families, I was often given the responsibility for the
children when their mothers were away, so I plenty of experience at baby tending. Maybe that is why I
have never since wanted to tend anyone else's babies.
As I remember, now, our cousin, Naomi Pepper, once told me that she got so tired of washing diapers.
But as I remember, we three happy little souls very cheerfully held up the diapers to the stream of water
and waved them back and forth. We usually dramatized everything, and there were the three of us, each
with a very active and ingenious mind.

We had little visitors that lived with us always busy looking for new blood. These Cimex Lectularius
(bed bugs) were nasty little fighters. No matter what we did they still wanted to stay with the Heppler
Family. They were so sneaky. They would crawl behind the door frames, keeping out of sight until night
then wham? They were after that good Heppler blood again. Rolled-up newspapers were used as weapons
to no avail. Even swabbing with a brush full of coal oil would not win the battle. We fought and fought
and most times we relied on the thought, "There is no shame, if you battle.

Bert Moss Wheatley WWII Colen Rhea F Heppler Wheatley

144
 Chapter 11

Nola F Heppler My own story..

In this modern age, very little remains that is real. Night has been banished, so have the cold, the
wind, and the stars. They have all been neutralized: the rhythm of life itself is obscured. Everything goes
so fast and makes so much noise, and men hurry by without heeding the grass by the roadside, its color,
its smell, and the way it shimmers when the wind caresses.
Gaston Rebuffat

"Memories are like shadows, they may be illuminated for fleeting moments in blushing recollections,
or fade and become obscure in the darkness of time. Shadows and memories often become distorted when
viewed from different vantage points. Individuals cast different shadows on the pages of time. For some,
their memory will continue to enhance the present. For others, memory has been lost in the nighttime of
forgetfulness."

Ada Thomas Swafford

Our slat and tar-paper shack built up against the hill,

overlooking acres of grey sage and green tumbleweed, the
irrigation canal and fields of row crops, the clump of black
willows -- "The Hepplers of Sevier County". But this was real life
and our isolation was not due to acres of plantation but to lack of
roads and difficulty of travel. Because of our isolation, we were
almost incredibly innocent and naive, playing happily in our little
corner of the Garden of Eden, untroubled by the wicked serpent
of knowledge.
But this part of the story is only setting the stage for your
entrance, (Annivor) and in Richfield we had the same
far-reaching spaces, the same unfenced horizons, and, well, yes,
the same sagebrush and tumbleweed, and we led you along the
same paths our innocent feet had taken us on the Hill Ranch worn
deep by our total freedom and our fertile imaginations. Your own
imagination was fertile enough without our sowing and planting,
Nola F Heppler
but where the three of us connived together, you were more
solitary, watching us and then going about your own development of the action we had introduced, going
the "extra mile" as it were. I expect you didn't heed much teaching and you certainly developed a knack
for quick improvisation.
You were also a born con artist, which we never recognized but which our Mother quickly found out
and capitalized onto her own ends, you taught her a thing or two and she was a past master at the practical
joke. She had three innocent, trusting little babes in the woods at ready-at-hand victims of her merry
pranks, and now you came along to aid and abet and often to be one up on her.
She was not prepared for someone who fought back and often won, but she quickly brought you over
to her side, as I will relate further on. She was, now, more of a wife and mother than a big sister, and
Daddy was more the business manager than the high school dropout. You came along at the right time.
Our place was surrounded by fields or waste land. Our nearest neighbors were a block or more away.
We were members of the Third Ward, a Ward comprised of farmers or small property owners. The
Second Ward included the business and professional men, and the First Warders were the tradesmen.
These Ward limits also defined the social and economical structure of the town. As children, we were
only concerned with the Third Ward. Our Heppler cousins all lived in the Second Ward and our
Farnsworth cousins in the First Ward. Our friends were the children of our neighbors.
Where the Denver & Rio Grande Railway crossed the outskirts of the town, the old Sevier County
Co-operative Milk and Dairy Plant stood. This plant now manufactured cheese, and here Daddy found
employment, first driving the milk truck, collecting milk from the farms in the County, later he became a

145
cheese maker and then, when the Sego Milk Company bought out the old Co-op, he became assistant
manager. He was transferred to Tremonton as manager of the Sego Milk plant in Tremonton. You were
five years old when we moved to the far north of Box Elder County.
Uncle Ed owned all of a city block except a small corner on the southeast. This lot had a small home
and stock yards, but was often vacant. The original owners had died there in their old age and from time
to time the house was rented to transient families but never for very long. Once, for a few exciting weeks,
it was the night pick up station for a gang of bootleggers. We had lived there for a short time until our
"home" was made ready for us, for Daddy had the home completely painted and papered and calcimined
before we moved in.
Our home, the dwelling house, was on the southwest corner of the lot, the home, the kitchen garden,
the orchard trees, the lawn and flower gardens, and back of the house were the yards, the storage sheds,
the cow stanchion, the old stables, all behind a tall close-boarded fence which separated the home from
the yards. The rest of the property, to the north, was planted in alfalfa as fodder for the stock. Daddy built
three large hen coops east of the stables where he raised White Leghorn hens. He sold the eggs
commercially. Mother also made butter which she sold. We used most of the produce from our garden for
Daddy was an epicure and so we ate the choice of our produce and sold or gave away what we did not
use.
North of the alfalfa field was an open meadow where the Indians camped. The Indians had anciently
lived in this valley but within the memory of man, they migrated through, north in spring and south in the
fall and had always camped on this particular piece of ground where there was water and grazing for their
stock. When the white men took up the land, the Tribal Chiefs met with them and an agreement was made
that this land would be left for the Indians and as long as long as I can remember, it was never fenced or
plowed, but twice each year the Indians would erect their teepee village right on the edge of our field. A
KOA camp now occupies this land where the tepees once stood. But the Indians had a part in the story of
your birth.
Our home on the ranch was a rather hung-together affair, built almost into the side-of the mountain,
two rooms of board siding separated by an enclosed dog run which was the kitchen, all atop a rock cellar.
We said, It was the bed bugs holding hands that kept the walls from falling down.
Sevier County had been selected for colonization because of a large spring of water in the eastern
hills and the Sevier River flowing through the valley. The Black Hawk Indian War, or the Walker War,
began in Sevier County when a war party massacred a white family traveling from Richfield to Glenwood
without military escort. All of the settlers in the valley were then ordered to move out and during the
seven years of this war the valley was devastated. At the end of the war the settlers began moving back
and a United Order colony was established at Glenwood. Our Grandfather, Andrew Heppler, was "called"
from St. George to manage the United Order tannery. He built a substantial home in Glenwood and
continued to live there after the Order was dissolved, but Richfield had become the commercial center of
the valley and the County Seat. Most of Daddy's brothers and sisters moved to Richfield after marrying.
When Andrew died, they purchased a home in Richfield for their mother. Andrew had served for some
time as County Clerk and County Probate Judge but he drove from Glenwood to Richfield each day and
back again each evening.
Daddy was the youngest of Andrew's eighteen children, "the scrapings of the ash pan" Aunt Annie
Musser called him. Being the only insolvent member of this large family, he was working in the gypsum
mill at Sigard. This is where he met our Mother, Elmira Bulkley Farnsworth. Our Mother was a daughter
of the first Utah Pioneers. Her father, Moses Franklin Farnsworth, had been until his death the Recorder
of the Manti Temple. She was the granddaughter of the Mormon Battalion soldier, Newman Buckley. Her
grandmother was Jane Draper, of the Mormon Draper family. The Bulkleys and Drapers had been at
Nauvoo. Her sister, Janey, had married Will Gottfredson, the son of Peter Gottfredson, one of the Black
Hawk Indian War veterans. Uncle Will managed the Co-op store at Sigard and Mother had come to
Sigard and was clerking at the store. Here she met our father.
The Hepplers were a German family, our great-grandfather, Martin Heppler, had immigrated to
Canada when Andrew was about eight years old. This family had lived in the village of Oefingen, Baden,
since the 1600's. Andrew's wife, Louisiana Seegmiller, was the daughter of a wealthy landowner and
tanner in Stratford, Ontario, who had also Emigrated to Canada from the Saarland. Andrew and Louisiana

146
came to Utah as converts to the Mormon Church, but they cannot be called Utah Pioneers as they came by
railway rather than by wagon train. A considerable difference if you are worried about such things.
Mother descends from Colonial Americans, Peter Bulkley and Matthias Farnsworth who settled in
Massachusetts in the 1630's, and from these lines, you are eligible to be a Colonial Dame, and also a
Daughter of the Utah Pioneers, and probably also a Daughter of the American Revolution and the United
Empire Loyalists of Canada, but we have not been able, to my satisfaction, to find the connecting link
into the Colonial Drapers. Our Drapers moved from New York to Canada in 1800, and we have not
located them properly among the Colonial families of New York or anywhere else prior to that time. You
also descend from your mother's blood lines in England from the Magna Charta Barons.
If you are getting ideas of grandeur from all of this, you are the daughter of a Box Elder County shoe
maker and a Sevier County cheese maker. But the Heppler and the Farnsworth names have always stood
for honor and integrity. In fact, once, back in Indiana frontier days, someone was asked to recommend
one of our forefathers and after thinking for a while, said, "well, dammit, he is a Farnsworth, that should
be good enough for any man." Just so.
At the time our parents were married, Sevier County had attained the official mile post of western
civilization, a stable economy, that is to say, a second generation, and while in a pioneer society every
man had to be first of all a farmer, the Hepplers were by nature and heritage business men. Daddy
detested the gypsum mill and had moved to Richfield where he had several jobs. He did not own
property, and each of us, Rhea, Nola, and Orpha, had been born in a different rented house. His eldest
brother, John Edmund, Uncle Ed, had a sheep ranch along the foot of a little spur of the Glenwood hills
and here he was experimenting raising Rambouillet sheep (a French merino bred for high quality mutton
and wool). The Utah Farm Bureau was encouraging the Utah farmers to improve their stock. Uncle Ed
also raised thoroughbred horses, and he had been elected to the Utah State Senate, his children were
growing to school age, and Aunt Elinor was sick of ranch life, as our Mother became in her time. He had
purchased a home and three lots in Richfield and moved his family there. Daddy took his small family
and moved out onto this ranch where we lived until Rhea was old enough to start school. Uncle Ed was
now planning to move to California. Daddy wanted to move into Richfield. He bought Uncle Ed's home
and property and we moved to Richfield in the summer of 1921.
Actually, we were fortunate to have this house in Richfield for Uncle Ed had been an excellent
manager and a very progressive thinking man. He had improved the property and put in indoor plumbing
and electricity. But we were still far out in the country.
The business area of Richfield had been expanding but to the north and the south were still small
farms. In Mormon colonization, the people all lived in the town and only worked their farms. Thus, most
of the farmers in Richfield still lived in small homes in town and went each day to their fields. The area
where we now lived was of this type, and we had perhaps the largest home and property in that part of
Richfield. There were three farms beyond our place where the owners lived on their land. Otherwise, all
of our neighbors lived in rather small houses with small lots around them.
The Main Street of Richfield ran north and south. The County Road ran east to Glenwood, beginning
at the north end of Main Street. Where the County Road crossed the Sevier River just east of town, the
state highway from Provo joined the County Road, followed this road into Richfield, continued down
Main Street and emerged again as the state highway to St. George, or points south. As it does today.
Richfield was the largest commercial town between Provo and St. George. It was in the area between the
Sevier River and Main Street, two blocks north of the County Road that our home was located, and at the
end of the street. The road ended at our front gate in an open space where trampling stock had worn away
the sage brush. A track led off from this open space through the sage brush to pasture and meadow land
and beyond that the alluvial plain at the foot of the high red hill.

Rosco remembers Nola

I remember very little about my sister. She was six-teen years older than me and left home while I
was very young.
She was very artistic and was constantly drawing or doodling with a pencil. While she was at home
she worked for the local phone company as an operator. When she moved to Salt Lake she worked as a
secretary in the Church Offices.

147
 When we moved up town and lived over the shoe shop, we kept a bedroom for her in the front of the
old apartment where Max and I had our bed room. She had left her bedroom suite at home..Eventually, I
move into her bedroom and use it as my own. On those occasions when she would come home, I slept
with Max. I was around seventeen at the time.

Thus the following incident occurred.

We had a canary in the town and all the young men worked in it during the canning season. That
included one of my best friends. He live about four miles away and would catch a ride back and forth to
work. He worked the night shift until 2 a.m. If he couldnt get a ride home, he would come and crawl in
bed with me. The next morning he would walk home. Many morning I woke up finding him next to me.
One weekend, Saturday, Nola decided to come home and I moved in with Max. My friend didnt have a
way home and decided to sleep with me.
About three in the morning all hell broke loose. My sister, by now, having some of the traits of an old
maid, woke up to find a young man in his shorts about ready to get in bed with her. She began shouting at
the top of her lungs. Neither one knew what was going on. In a very few minutes my father showed up to
see why there was so much commotion. He finally got everyone settled down and moved my friend to the
couch in the living room. When I got up the next morning he was long gone.
She joined the Navy as a WAVE during WW II and was stationed in Oklahoma.
She was buried by the military in the military part of the Salt Lake City Cemetery.

She wrote this about navy life.

After boot camp I was transferred to the training school at the Naval Air Primary Flight Training
Base at Livermore California. I first worked on the flight line, having four aircraft under my charge, to
keep in flight condition at all times. I loved this work. We were out in the open all day. The weather was
clement and pleasant, and there was a compatible and friendly group to work with.
About this time, the Base Captain felt that this work was too hard for women, and we were all put
indoors, some to the engineering and repair hanger, and some to the squadron clerical offices, where I
worked as a jacket yeoman, keeping the cadet training records. I met many fine men, pilots and
mechanics, and had many exciting flights in Navy aircraft, so I felt compensated for having to be a
mechanic.
Following the end of the War in Europe, all of the primary training bases were consolidated into
three, one at Ottumwa, Iowa, one at Memphis, Tenn., and one at, horrors, Norman Oklahoma, and,
weeping bitterly against my fate, I was transferred back to Norman.
The Flight base was really a rough place. The Navy was overstaffed in all fields with men coming
back from combat. Lack of incentive caused by the war now going in
our favor, lack of satisfaction in their occupation. Plus the scarcity of
many items which we considered essential, and the resultant black
markets, these and many other causes contributed to a general
demoralization of the base personnel.
I was glad to "put in" for overseas duty when this area was
opened to service woman, and was assigned to the Naval Air Station
at Kaneohe Bay on the Island of Oahu. We embarked on the USS
Rixy, a converted hospital ship, a small iron vessel, hopelessly
crowded, and tossed by heavy seas. It was a miserable journey, but
sufficient, and we arrived at Pearl City in July of 1945. We were
welcomed by almost the entire Island military personal. I felt I had
never seen such a large crowd of men, all looking at me (and of
course, the others) but it was an odd feeling.
At the end of war, service women were separated as quickly as
possible, those overseas being separated first and in October of 1945
we left Pearl Harbor for San Francisco on board the US Rescue, also a Nola F Heppler USN

148
hospital ship, carrying a large assignment of ambulatory patients from the South Pacific Arena. This was
a larger ship and more pleasant, but the weather again was stormy, and pea-green complex ions were the
order of the day. I was mustered out of the Navy in November of 1945, and returned to Salt Lake City,
where I hoped to make my home.
I secured employment with the Auerback Company Advertising Department, but this was not my
forte, and I soon left, with beautiful relief on all sides. Soon after I enrolled in the LDS Business College.
Then was employed by the General Board of the Sunday School Union, being recommended by President
Kenneth L. Bennion, who has always been a very close friend of mine
After returning from my Mission, I worked for the General Board of the Relief Society for two years,
but because of a personality conflict with my employer, I left and for a short while worked as bookkeeper
at the Larkin Mortuary. This was a most interesting job, and I have always maintained close relationship
with the Larkin family.
However, book keeping again was not my field, and I then worked for the Victor Adding Machine
Company. Clyde Chekcetts was the manager, and while this work was very different from any I had done
before, I enjoyed it. I was appointed Office Manager after a year with this company, and a few months
after that the Home Office directed that women were to be removed from executive positions and men
installed.
My former Bishop, William Wolf, was then directing the Sound Engineering Department of the
Church Building Department, and he had once asked me to come and work for him. I now sought him and
asked him if the job was still open. He said it was not, but he could find other work for me, and thus I
started working for the Church.

Nola Remembered
By Marsha Copier Vandermyde

You wanted some stories about Nola. I worked with Nola at the Church Office Building. I
remember when she was the secretary to Bill Anderson of the Building Division. She was a very efficient
secretary. One interesting story that I remember about her is when we were located on the 10th floor of
the new Church Office Building and Nola had her desk on the left side right by a big window facing the
new ZCMI center. One day we all heard a big scream and we looked over to see what the outburst from
Nola was all about. She had some binoculars and she was watching the workers work on top of the new
building. The reason she had screamed is because one of the workers was on top of the building in an out
house, using it, and he didn't close the door and she could see what he was doing. It caught her off guard
and she just screamed and was still holding the binoculars to her eyes as she was explaining what was
happening. We all just laughed cause we had never heard an outburst from her like that before.
When I decided to go on a mission in November of 1974 she was very excited about it. I told her in
confidence and asked her not tell anyone that I had submitted my papers and was waiting for my call, I
then went to lunch. When I came back from lunch she had a big sign on her desk with words, "Bets on
where Marsha Copier will be called on her mission". She let people put money on where I was going and
then whoever got it right got half the pot and I got the other half. She had put that all together in less than
a half hour. When I was on my mission she wrote to me and before I left she gave me some heavy winter
clothes to keep me warm because I was going to Minnesota and Wisconsin. She was very supportive of
my going on a mission. She was very independent, but I was glad she let me into her world as a friend.
I hope that this helps. Good luck with your project.

149
 Obituary of Nola F Heppler

Published: Monday, July 27, 1992 12:00 a.m. MDT

Nola F Heppler died of illness incident to age on July 25, 1992 in Roy, Utah.
She was born September 25, 1916 in Richfield, Utah, the daughter of Roscoe Zar and Elmira Farnsworth
Heppler.
She spent her early life in Tremonton, Utah and graduated from Bear River High School. During World
War II she served in the WAVEs, being stationed in Oklahoma and Hawaii.
She served a mission for the LDS Church to Western Canada, also a work mission in England.
She was employed by the LDS Church Building Department, working in England, Germany and Salt
Lake City.
She compiled volumes of family history. She was an accomplished artist and enjoyed attending the Utah
Symphony.
She is survived by two brothers, Dr. Ross Heppler, San Diego, California and Max Heppler, Tremonton,
Utah; two sisters, Mrs. Earl (Orpha) Stohl, Grand Junction, Colorado; Mrs. George (Annivor) Job,
Clinton, Washington; and by many nieces and nephews.
Preceded in death by a sister, Rhea Heppler Wheatley.
Grave side service Tuesday, July 28, 1992, 2:00 p.m., Salt Lake City Cem., 4th Ave. and N St. Friends
may call at Larkin Mortuary, 260 E. South Temple, Tuesday 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.

These are odd and ends that Nola jotted down and I didnt know where best to fit them in.

Emma accompanied her husband to Michigan where he took a law degree at the University of
Michigan at Ann Arbor, and one child was born there. They eventually returned to Richfield and made
their home there for the rest of their lives. Rosa married and lived in Salt Lake City, and John moved to
Magrath, Alberta, Canada. Fred settled in Venice where he died after a long life of service to his
community and church. I do not know where Anna lived. She was deaf and did not marry. I knew her at
Aunt Millies, but I believe she lived with her own sisters in Richfield. (Fade in my own memories of this
family) They were very poor. The children only had one piece of clothing each. When the clothing was
laundered, it had to be taken off of the child, washed, dried and put back on. One time they all suffered
from malnutrition and developed a form of scurvy. Grandmother put a jar of mustard on the table. The
children scrambled for this mustard, eating it with their hands and cramming it into their mouths.
Apparently the vinegar in the mustard was what was lacking in their bodies as they all recovered from the
scurvy.

Glenwood, schools under the United Order, was the largest and most important city in Sevier
County. At the dissolution of the Order, its economy deteriorated and it became quite small. Richfield
then became the larger city and eventually became the county seat. This could account for the seeming
reversal of conditions in the two communities. Glenwood probably never had more than a grade school.
Richfield had the six elementary grades and a Jr. High of the seventh and eighth grade. A high
school was later built at Richfield, enabling the children from the county to achieve a high school
education..Burrville was a very tiny settlement, south of Koosherm. It was in this area that the most
terrible of the Indian battles were fought. Elise must have had to live in with the settlers, as it is not
probable that any kind of accommodations were available. <

Mother got carried away with good will and gave all of our new made cookies to the Indian kids. But
out of this, we learned that when we went visiting we were to behave.
By the way, we got spanked for throwing rocks. We never mentioned un-hobbling the horses.
Our journeying in and out, as a rule, were quite tame, regardless of how fiercely ran the blood in early
spring.

I remember one spring when a gang of us crossed a muddy plowed field with one pair of galoshes
and a wooden plank, Who came prepares with the galoshes, I cannot remember. But one put on the

150
overshoes, and carrying the plank, crossed a few feet of mud. Then, while standing on the plank, threw
back the overshoes. The next one put on the overshoes and crossed to the plank. When we were all
standing on the plank, number one donned the boots and taking up the plank, progressed another few feet.
Why we had to cross this field, I cannot now imagine. Probably because it was in front of us.

We were forever boiling an egg, putting it in a paper sack and going off on a picnic.

Another thing we had that children today don't seem to have was privacy in which to become
creative. H. Allen Smith, in his book, Where did you go? Out. What did you do? Nothing," states that
parents are the natural enemies of children.
Perhaps, but our parents cleared out early. They were off to choir practice or some other meeting.
People met in the evenings. They worked in the fields in the daytime. Baby sitters were yet to become a
part of the American way. Older children tended the younger ones. A ten-year-old girl was as adept at
bathing, drying and feeding a baby as her mother.

It was in the long peaceful evenings, when mom and dad were off to something or other, that our
creative powers reached their greatest heights. There our dreams were unfolded in the parlors. We re-
enacted the Friday night movies; the stores we heard from our parents and others; and the common gossip
of the day were transformed into heroic dramas at night. We moved the furniture round, took down the
curtains, rolled up the carpet and used them for costumes and props. Finer families never threw anything
away. We always had a trunk of old clothes dating back to the Civil War, so we were prepared for any
scene. I don't remember that we ever wrote a part for Annivor. ....

Wall-to-wall carpeting was unheard of in Sevier county. As a matter of fact, wall-to-wall flooring did
not always exist. Floors were made of sawed planks laid down on the ground. The cracks between the
planks provided a primitive lend-lease program with the earth. Dust, dirt and whatever went down and
mice, snakes, and whatever came up.

These Seegmiller Stockings were the blight of our young lives. They were sold by some cousin,
hence the appellation Seegmiller stockings. They were guaranteed to wear forever, and they did. We each
had three pairs, black, brown and grey. All of our cousins had three like pairs. We all hated them with our
entire souls. They were so heavy that they dragged our pantywaists right off of our sloping shoulders,
They were long-handled underwear that came to the top of our legs. They gathered burrs, horse tails, and
other weeds, and forever looped about our ankles. We wore them right through our childhood. I read a
story about a man who purchased some heavy sort of durable material for shirts for her sons. When the
boys rejected this material, she made some work aprons for herself out of it. Eventually it ended up that
she strangled a mountain lion with the apron strings. It occurred to me then, that these Seegmiller
stockings would come in handy in just such an emergency. Should it ever occur that a mountain lion
invaded our bedroom at night and no other help was at hand, we would only need to reach out for the
Seegmiller stockings, and that would be the end of the mountain lion.

Mary Seegmiller was our cousin but we did not know her. Her husband was Chariton Seegmiller,
and he was a cousin to my father, but I never thought of him as "Uncle" Chariton. (Whereas Uncle King
Seegmiller was as familiar to me as my own father). They were rich, and lived in a big, two-storey frame
house, painted, with a porch and steps and its own lawn, back from the road, and a fence around the lawn
so cattle and chickens didn't graze on the lawn, and I do not remember that I was ever in this house, nor
do I remember that the occupants of this house ever came to visit us. There was also an artesian well out
in back, and the clear water flowed through a pipe into a trough in a big, round, sparkling stream. We
used to hold our heads under this stream when we went to play with Wanda and Bob. There was also
Marion here, but he was still in dresses when I first went to play there. I think it was he who pulled a
bucket of starch down over his head, and became the first "paper mache"' Seegmiller in history

The only other time I remember Mary was when she took the song book away from me at Sunday
School. This was after she could walk again, and I was proud of having a cousin who had sprained her

151
ankle. After the hymn book episode, I never had more to do with her. She was younger than I was, short
and pudgy and had straight yellow hair. So did we, but mother curled ours on rags so it fluffed out around
our faces.

Aunt Pearl had a pie cupboard in her kitchen. This was made of tin and there were designs of stars
and flowers made on it by holes punched in the sides. A colored picture of a lady in a big hat with flowers
was pasted on the front. In her parlor was a beautiful picture in several sections of two people, a beautiful,
lovely lady with lots of soft dark hair curling and puffing about her face. She had a wide ribbon around
her hair and a soft flowing sort of dress. The other was an elegant man in a white collar. He had dark hair
and a moustache, and was smoking a pipe. I early discerned that he was bad because of this pipe, but in
the picture the woman seemed to like him. The first picture showed these wonderful people reading a
book together and sitting in the same chair. There was a rug over the lady's legs, and I had the impression
that she was sickly. Then they were in a Church, not at all like the Third Ward meetinghouse, and they
were getting married. Next was their honeymoon, with a big moon and lots of water behind them. The last
picture showed them with a beautiful baby in a ruffled crib. I loved this picture and when no one was
watching me. I would climb up on a chair and look at it. I always got spanked for climbing up on Aunt
Pearls chair with my dirty shoes. I had probably been wandering about in the correl or a along the river
bank.

The entrance to the house, through the dog-run, faced the hillside. Here, in front of the door, on a
narrow level cleared space, daddy parked his beloved car. We kept horses in the yards. When we went up
to the sheep camp in the Fish Lake Mountains we went by horse and wagon and horses were used in the
fields. But Daddy had no love for the noble horse and as soon as he got his first car horses were out.
Horses were for field work. The car was for a gentleman's pleasure. One night when this gentleman was
coming home from town in his car, he ran over a skunk, which, I expect, was out about his peaceful
nightly skunk business, ambling along the ruts of the road. He was too low to be picked up by the head
lights pointing up and around with the surface of the road and out smelled by the gas exhaust fumes. A
horse would have sensed the creature and veered away and the man with horse would also have known it
was nearby. Daddy ran it over and no car on earth, then or now stands higher than the evidence of a slain
skunk.
In the middle of the night, mother made daddy get up and move the car as far up the hill as it would
go, where the clear air could blow over it, or, at least, blow between the car and the house. But, a few
misfortunes aside, Daddy never hurt for the good old horse and buggy days.
The ranch was not far in distance from Richfield. The Sevier Valley is quite narrow. But by pioneer
transportation, "on footor by horse we were quite isolated and had few visitors. Thus we became a
close little family unit. The spaces around us were vast, the horizon far-reaching, the blue sky arched
above and the air clear and pure.
To the side of the house, downwind, were the sheep pens and stockyard, and here we wandered far
and wide, well, actually, not all that far. We were quite small and our legs quite short. We probably were
never out of sight or hearing. Having no other children around us to follow or be influenced by, we
became inventive and imaginative. We devised our own games and amusement, not always to the
amusement of our parents. And if one of us got hurt, we all ran dead-on for the house, bellowing all the
way, the hurt and the quick in unison. Mother planned little entertainments for us. We had picnics under
the black willows with cake and lemonade all of twenty yards from the house. Daddy incorporated the
lesser farmyard chores into games for us like tossing us into the wool bags to tramp down the wool at
shearing time. He always had a wide grin on his face as he let us drop and then lifted us out. Oh, we were
having a great time he told us. Mother and daddy were still more lovers than parents.

152
 Chapter 12
Orpha Heppler Stohl My own story 1977

I was born the fifth day of December 1917, in Richfield,

Sevier County, Utah, the third child and also the third daughter of
Rosco Zar and Elmira Farnsworth Heppler. My parents were
of "goodly stock" having been born of Pioneer ancestors who
were willing to give up the comforts of their homes and property
to cross the Plains to Utah for the sake of their religious
convictions. Father and Mother were very young yet and just
getting started on their lives together. They already had two little
girls: Rhea, born July 1, 1915, and Nola, born September 25,
1916. Father worked at various jobs in a tailor shop, then on his
brother's sheep ranch about four miles from town and then for the
Western Creamery Company in the cheese factory in Richfield.
My first memories were of living in the home Father had
bought from his brother Ed. The property consisted of almost all
of a city block on the outskirts of town. There was a large hay
field as well as the house, large yard, garden spot, wash house,
stanchion, corrals, bar, and chicken coops and runs. There were
three very large box elder trees in front of the house, and several
apple trees to the side. There were always three or four cows,
some pigs, and many, many chickens. Orpha F Heppler
The house was of two large parts, one for two bedrooms and
the other for a large kitchen, bathroom and pantry. These two parts were joined together by a smaller one
consisting of a parlor and our parents' bedroom. At first there were just we three girls and we slept
together in the small bedroom and had the large bedroom for a playroom. When Annivor was born May
4, 1924, and grew large enough to sleep with Rhea, Nola and I had a bed to ourselves. The kitchen had a
large coal range at one end with doors to the bathroom and pantry on either side. We each had to mop a
part of the floor every Saturday. One girl had to do the pantry and the narrow strip by the sink, one had to
do the large center strip by the stove, and one had to do the bathroom and the third strip. I always spoke
for this one because it was the least dirty, even though it was the largest floor space. We had to scrub on
our hands and knees and it had to be done well or done over.
Once when Rhea and Nola belonged to a 4-H Cooking Class they each had to make six batches of
bread of six loaves per batch. The third of the floor by the sink was especially hard to clean at this time.
They made pretty good bread, but they would forget to put in the salt, and I remember Father saying that
he would surely be glad when they had finished the twelve batches. In fact, during our growing years, he
complained several times that his stomach wasn't going to stand up long enough for all of us to learn to
cook. I remember the bathroom. It was very large and had a tub with claw feet and a hot water
tank, which was heated by pipes which passed through the wall and into the stove in the kitchen.
The pipes would thump and rumble when they became partially filled with sediment from the hard water
of Richfield, and then I was afraid to take a bath until Father cleaned out the pipes again.
Once we caught the "itch". We would plaster ourselves all over except the face and neck with a
mixture of sulfur and lard. Then we would put on our long-legged, long-sleeved underwear and keep it
on for a week. When Saturday came there were three very yellow naked bodies in the big tub at a time.
After a while the "itch" went away and we reverted back to true color.
Off the large pantry was a kind of cellar at least we went down a few steps and it was always cool
down there. This is where we washed and crated the eggs from our many chickens. We got fifteen cents a
week and were expected to take care of all the buckets of eggs each day after school. But they would pile
up and then on Friday nights we would really have to work to get them all finished and get our fifteen
cents apiece, because that was the night of the serial at the movies and we couldn't miss that. There were
serials of Rin-Tin-Tin, the Wonder Dog, and Renfew, the Magician, and somebody of the Northwest
Mounted Police and many others. Most of them were about daring cowboys or aviators. These were silent

153
films, which doesn't mean that the theatre was without sound. There was always an organ going, very
loudly and vigorously while the villain was being pursued and more quietly during the tender scenes.
Also it wasn't amiss to scream and stamp your feet during the exciting parts.
It was very exciting when "Talkies" were invented. The first ones would be part sound and part silent
with the captions printed at the bottom of the picture. Then there came one to our town that was one
hundred percent talkie. Everyone in town had to see that. Nola and I would walk alone to the theatre
about a mile and walk home afterward. Most of this way was on a state highway that passed through the
town, but it never entered anyone's head that anything bad would happen to two young girls out alone
after dark. How different it is now.
We had many freedoms that young people cannot enjoy today because there was so much less crime. I
think that such crimes as there were, were more easily detected and proven and punished. Criminals were
speedily shut away from society and couldn't repeat their crimes.
We were punished frequently also, not harshly, but swiftly and surely. There was a cherry tree,
which grew to the side of the house and over part of the roof of our parents' bedroom. This roof was
almost flat and if you could get up on it you could pick all the cherries you could ever eat. One Sunday
afternoon Father came home to find his three girls and a number of friends up on the roof eating cherries
by the handful. He didn't care about the cherries, but we had been told to stay off the roof, because the old
shingles would break when we walked on them and then the roof would leak. So he stood at the foot of
the ladder, and as each child came down he administered a spanking, whether it was a daughter or a
friend.
None of us thought to defy him, or try to hide, or tell the friends' parents that he had spanked them
too. We had done wrong and we were punished and
everyone forgot it and went to play something else. How
simple it all was. While I am a strong believer in discipline,
I don't mean to imply that I approve of the method of
demanding instant, unquestioned obedience from children
as my parents did. Children must be allowed to learn the
"why" of an issue, and to communicate with their parents.
Their emotions should be allowed to expand so that they
can learn to control them. I merely said that it was simpler
then, and it was.
When I started school I went only half a day for the
first two years. My cousin, Bob Seegmiller, who lived on a
farm several miles from town, would ride the school bus in
each morning and stay at our house, have lunch with us, and
then he and I would go to school together in the afternoon.
We had lots of fun together all morning even though the
games were all of his choosing. I was bigger than he was, so
that he felt justified in calling me "Chub," a name that stuck
for years. But I could never get him to play with dolls or
dress-up or anything girlish. So we would roam the farm,
rob sparrows' eggs from the many nests in the top of the
open barn, wrestle in the hay (for which we were spanked)
and even smoke birch bark cigars (for which we weren't, as
no one, not even Nola, knew about this). Orpha
Mother always made a special event of birthdays and
one time I had invited the whole class home for a party after school. I started out leading the group to my
home, but soon Bob led the boys going a different street. It became a contest between the girls and boys
to see how many different ways they could go and still end up at our house. The house was two blocks off
the highway and pavement, but the path was graveled with ashes so that we didn't get too much mud if we
went home the usual way. But all the different routes we had followed weren't improved and we were all
red clay mud to our ankles when we arrived at the house. I don't know how Mother had the courage to let
us in, but she did and we had a wonderful party.

154
 In the summer we would spend time out at Bob's home near the Sevier River. Here again we played
boys' games and it was here he taught me to fish. We also always had a one-week vacation at Fish Lake
every year, usually with Bob's family. We would stay in a rented, coldwater cabin and we could feed
chipmunks, catch polliwogs, play at the lake shore, or explore the mountains around the lake. Fish Lake is
one of the really beautiful places of the Utah Mountains, and to get there we had to climb some steep,
twisting grades. The Model T Fords would have to stop frequently to add water to the boiling radiators
and cool off. This was fun, too, because everyone would hail you as they passed and then you would hail
them when it was their turn to stop and you could pass them.
There was a tribe of Indians who would camp each summer at the outskirts of town just over the
fence from our hayfield. The men would sit on a blanket and gamble much of the time. One would keep a
silver dollar in his ear. The women would keep house in the tents or deerskin teepees. They carried their
babies on their back using papoose boards made of willows and deerskins. Most of them dressed in
modern clothes, but some of the older members of the tribe wore deerskins. They would come to our
home regularly to beg for food. We knew that we were to give a mother with a baby or an old
grandmother a loaf of bread and some fresh vegetables from our garden, but Mother would not let us give
anything to the men, saying that they could go to work and earn it if they wanted it badly enough.
They did not speak English very well and we never played with the Indian children. In fact, there
weren't many children, not as many as you would expect in a group this large. Sometimes we would dare
each other to tease them, and once we took the hobbles off their horses. We were sneaking back through
the tall sagebrush to see what had happened when we almost ran into a squaw with a very long knife in
her hand. We didn't wait to see what she intended to do and we didn't go back to tease them again at least
not that year.
We spent a lot of time in the summer at the swimming pool. It was a large double pool, called the
Natatorium. It was maintained by the city and free to the public. The small pool was for the children, of
course, and it was quite a day when we were brave enough to go into the big pool. The water was very
cold, but no one seemed to mind. I never had any lessons, but seemed to learn to swim and dive all right.
The pool was about a mile from home and we frequently rode there on the milk truck. One of
Father's duties at the cheese factory was driving a flatbed truck to collect the ten-gallon milk cans from
the farmers. He started early in the morning making a run through all of the small communities and farms
surrounding Richfield, arriving at the factory in time to unload just before coming home for dinner. After
eating he would rest for fifteen minutes and, if we could get the dinner dishes done in that time, we could
catch a ride on the trip which led up near the swimming pool. The dishes were never done so fast.
Everywhere he stopped for milk cans he would also get some small passengers with swim suits and
towels in their hands, until it seemed as if there was a child perched on every can. It was all very much
fun and quite dangerous, but it didn't occur to anyone that either Father or the company should have
liability insurance. People didn't run to lawyers for every small injury and try to get something for
nothing, the way they do today. No one was ever hurt from falling off, but sometimes there were skinned
knees and elbows as some youngster who was late was hauled aboard by friends after the truck had
started.
School was easy and fun and we always got plenty of exercise going to and from it. We lived at least
a mile [from the school] and would walk there and home for dinner and back again for afternoon session.
Mondays after school was Primary and Tuesdays was religion class. It was my favorite because the
lessons were exciting stories of Pioneer families always with a moral, of course. We always sang "Have I
Done Any Good in the World Today?" and "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel." I guess the leaders didn't
know too many songs, but I got awfully tired
of those two and don't like them very much to this day. Our home was one where children were always
welcome and Rhea and Nola and I nearly always had a friend or two there. I'm sure we had lots of work
to do, helping with the washing, gardening, churning or polishing the stove or making soap. Mother had
special butter papers with her name printed on them for her butter. She would take many pounds to the
grocers to trade for groceries and was very proud of her butter. But mostly I remember the play times.
Nola and I would climb the apple trees and build tree houses. We were outdoors most of the time summer
and winter in the mild climate of Southern Utah, and I don't remember being ill except for the regular
childhood diseases.

155
 Once when the whole neighborhood had whooping cough we went to a birthday party for a friend
about our age. Everyone there was in some stage of the whooping cough, but we got along fine until we
were served ice cream. Today, we know not to give milk products when there is congestion in the lungs,
but this mother didn't know it. Some one of the children started to cough, and soon there was ice cream all
over the floor. Rhea and I ran into the parlor and shut the door so we couldn't see the other children who
were in trouble, and we were the only two of the guests who kept their lunches. We thought it was some
kind of an accomplishment and were proud of ourselves.
As we grew older, we would go out to thin sugar beets in the summer. Mother would make kneepads
to tie on our knees and we would crawl down the rows of beets astraddle the small clumps that had been
hoed out for us ("blocked"). We were to pull out all but the one largest beet from each clump. We got five
cents for a short row and ten cents for a long row. At noontime we would eat lunch and probably swim in
the canal before crawling over some more rows. The kneepads helped, but our knees got awfully sore
anyway. In this way we would earn enough money for our Fourth of July outfits. Mother would make the
dresses with many ruffles and laces and maybe a lace-trimmed petticoat. We would buy a pretty hat and
some patent leather pumps. "Really spiffy," Father would say.
The Fourth was the really big celebration of the year, excepting Christmas, of course. It began with a
trip to the cemetery for speeches and a program, mainly patriotic, and twenty-one gun salutes over the
soldiers' graves, this by the veterans in their uniforms and with much marching and military precision.
Then there was a parade downtown. There were many beautiful floats, but two were special. One was for
the Statue of Liberty. This was a horse-drawn hay wagon, much decorated and carrying a beautiful young
lady in a long white flowing gown and holding a torch. There was a similar one for Miss Utah. The horses
were white matched teams, as beautiful as the girls. There were firecrackers going off everywhere you
walked, and ice cream, cotton candy and popcorn to eat. The fireworks at night up on the hill near the
Natatorium were the best of all. I have never seen any since to rival them.
Every Sunday evening in the summer there was a band concert and we would have a nickel to spend
for an ice cream cone. In the fall was the County Fair with the large carnival and all the exhibits. Father
was judge of the poultry entries for many years, so we were allowed to go early with him and roam free
all the hours that he worked judging poultry. I especially liked the horse races, but I avoided the horse
pulling contests because they always whipped the horses to make them pull the heavy loads. No, whips
were not allowed, but they made the horses work too hard or something. I didn't like it at all.
In December of 1929, when I had just turned twelve, Dad was called by his company to move to
Tremonton, Utah, to manage the milk plant there. This was the beginning of the end of my childhood,
partly because of my age, but also because of new faces and adjustments. And also, the Great Depression
was soon to affect our lives. Father could not find a home for us in Tremonton and we spent the winter in
Garland, two miles away. Tremonton is up in the extreme northern section of Utah and so much snow and
cold was a whole new experience for us. Going down the Malad River hill on a sleigh was breathtaking
fun, and instead of jump rope, marbles, or tag, we played games on the snow and ice. After a few months
in Garland we moved to an apartment over a business on the main street of Tremonton.
There was another new school to attend and more new acquaintances. I had begun to read a lot of
books by this time and perhaps that is why they promoted me to the eighth grade, skipping the seventh. I
didn't care as I was almost full grown by this time and older than many of the other sixth graders.
Rosco Zar Junior was born March 8, 1930. He was the first boy in the family and much loved and
petted. However, when he was just learning to walk, he fell from the outside stairway of the apartment to
the cement walk about twenty feet below. His little head was broken several ways and we are certain that
it was only through the administration of the Priesthood that his life was preserved. Later he developed a
slight limp and it was noticed that his one side was withering and becoming paralyzed. We again called in
the Elders, and their administration restored him to health. These were my first experiences with the
healing power of the Priesthood, but I have seen its power at other times in my life also. It is always a
comfort to have this wonderful power in my home.
High school years at Bear River High went by rather fast. I enjoyed studying there and there was
always work after school. I worked one whole summer for the wife of a doctor, helping her with her three
little girls and the housework. We were in the middle of the Depression by then, and the twenty-four
dollars I had saved from this summer's work helped to buy books for the three girls of our family to start

156
the school year. We girls had to earn all of our own spending money, tending babies or housework or
whatever we could get.
Father had made a great success of the milk plant in Tremonton and had been sent by his company
back to Richfield to manage the cheese factory where he had formerly worked as a truck driver. While he
was there, the company sold out to another company, which used its own employees, and Father was left
without a job. Mother and we children had stayed behind in Tremonton to finish the school year. When he
came back to us in Tremonton, he decided to remain there because northern Utah was generally more
prosperous than southern Utah. He bought a shoe shop and learned how to repair shoes and made a living
for us that way.
Max Ronald was born November 4, 1932. Rhea had formerly helped with the bookwork in the milk
plant, but now she earned money doing housework at whatever she could get. Mother began to work at
Gephart's department store as a saleslady and Nola worked as a telephone operator as soon as she finished
high school.
I would come home from school, don overalls and a smock and help in the shoe repair shop. Besides
waiting on customers I would do almost all of the finishing and sewing rips. I hated to have my hands

Hepp Orpha

roughened and stained with the black and brown polish, and I was reluctant to have my friends come in
the shop and see me in overalls.
Father was working very hard at this time. We were building a new house under a government
sponsored loan agency one of the president's [President Franklin Roosevelt?] projects for getting the
economy rolling again. Father dug trenches by hand and laid all the sewer and water pipes for the house
besides working in the shoe shop for ten hours a day. Mother needed a very serious operation after Max
was born, and Father sold our car to finance it. She recovered, and other than this, we were all well. All of
our friends worked hard, so we did not feel sorry for ourselves.
Sometimes in the summers, I worked nights at the local cannery when they were running peas. The
washed peas would pass us on a movable belt and we would pick out any weeds or broken peas. The

157
tables were old and wet and drippy, and we would put burlap sacks across our laps to stay dry. We
worked a twelve-hour shift with a half-hour off for lunch and got twenty cents per hour. There was
always a lot of fun going on, as everyone was congenial. It was a good thing because it was very hard to
stay awake and look at moving peas about four or five o'clock in the morning. We considered ourselves
blessed to have jobs and to be able to earn our way when many people were in serious trouble across the
Nation.
One summer our Beehive teacher and her father took us to Yellowstone Park. Besides the three
grown chaperones, there were twenty girls, with suitcases, grub boxes, tents and bedrolls for all in the
back of a farm truck. It was a wonderful trip in spite of frequent rains. We camped at Mac's Inn, Old
Faithful, Canyon, and Mammoth Hot Springs. At Canyon, there were many young men from the Civilian
Conservation Corps who invaded our camp. I supposed our chaperones thought that the best way to
handle the situation was to keep us all busy, so we had ball games, etc., and at night a program by the
light of a very big campfire. My "best friend" Bernice Stokes, and I sang "Whispering Hope." Out under
the pines it was easy to sing and we did very well.
Another summer, Father took Rhea, Nola, and me up to Logan Canyon with three of our friends and
left us. We had a tent and food and were absolutely free for a whole week. We had no fear of being
harmed, as there simply wasn't a lot of crime in those days. One summer Nola and I returned to Richfield
and stayed at Aunt Millie Hansen's home for a couple of weeks. We saw all of our old friends and swam
every day and got very sunburned. So you can see it wasn't all work during those years.
Studies seemed easy for me and I was chosen valedictorian of my graduating class in 1935. Mother
made me a beautiful dress for the graduation ceremonies no one afforded rented caps and gowns at the
high school level during the Depression and paid for a trip to the beauty parlor. I had fifty-two tiny curls
on my head and was complimented on that about as many times as I was complimented on my speech.
After graduation, I worked part time for a dentist, Dr. Green. I would work all morning in the shoe
shop and then try to scrub my hands so that I could assist a dentist. Soon I got a full time job as cashier of
the local J C Penney Company department store. And from there I went to the Post Office. I loved the
Post Office job. I had a very good boss, Bishop James Walton, and nice people with whom to work.
My church activities were important to me. I started teaching Sunday school when I was sixteen
years old. I loved MIA the lessons, speech contests, dancing exhibitions, etc. I was best at "retold story."
Father was drama director for several years and very capable, too. He directed many really fine plays and
I won small parts in some of them. I would be a maid or a housekeeper or something like that. But that
didn't matter as we had so much fun. Invariably the plays were good enough to go "on tour" to the other
wards of the stake, and we would put the same play on several times, trying to haul all of the costumes
and props, and adjusting to the various sizes of stages.
By the time I was working in Penneys and in the Post Office, Earl had returned from his
mission. We now lived just across the street from each other and I had worked with Esther in the
Sunday school stake board and with Floyd in the MIA. So they arranged a date for us and it
didn't take me long to realize that Earl was what I had been waiting for. We became engaged in
April of 1937 but did not marry until December 10th. Floyd and Hope Woofinden were married
the same day, making it a double wedding.
We were married in the Logan Temple. We went to Ogden, Utah, for dinner but returned home the
next day, as I had to be to work. It was "Christmas rush" at the Post Office. I was just twenty. Earl had
built a basement home for us with the shell of the upstairs and the roof. The basement was very
comfortable, and Marco was born while we lived there on March 14, 1939, and Carolyn also on May 20,
1941. Later, we finished the top and rented it for a while, but finally decided we wanted to live in it
ourselves.
Earl farmed at the family farm out near Blue Creek and drove grain trucks in the winter. Then he
worked for a wholesale fuel distributor and then for the O K Rubber Welders Company. He had an
opportunity to buy into this company, mortgaging our home to do so, just before Pearl Harbor Day,
December 7, 1941, when we were drawn into the [Second World] War. The recapping and repairing of
tires became very necessary, and the business increased very much.
Soon Earl had his own O K Rubber Welders Shop in Rexburg, Idaho. Earl was not called to go to
war, as the tire business was considered essential. However, he was not happy in town or in business and
wanted to go back into farming. He bought a large acreage in Lamont, Idaho, and left the running of the

158
tire business to a friend, Paul Newton. We would live on the farm in the summer and in our Rexburg
home in the winter. Barbara Ann was born November 30, 1943, Sara Marie was born June 8, 1945, and
Susan was born January 28, 1948. Rexburg had no regular hospital until after the war, and all three of
them were born in the Rexburg Maternity Hospital near our home on Rexburg's hill near Ricks College.
The farm at Lamont was very high, about 6,200 feet in elevation, and the season was very short. Earl
and the hired men could not start work until the first part of May and then they would work shifts around
the clock to get the planting done. The harvest began in September or the first part of October, and they
had to rush to get finished before the snow came.
The first years were especially hard, as it was not possible to get good machinery due to the shortage
caused by the war. There were many patches of trees on the land. They were mainly quaken aspens with
some pines. Earl obtained a bulldozer and set about clearing them. They were pushed down all in one
direction first of all, and then pushed from the sides into long windrows. When dry, these were burned
and then the piles of dirt and partially burned logs had to be worked again and again until the land was
clear. It was a tremendous amount of work, but about three hundred acres of trees were cleared off in this
manner so that the land could be farmed during the years we were at Lamont. There was lots of hard
work, but Earl was very successful financially.
This was the first of several farms that Earl purchased and improved and then resold. The next was at
Three Forks, Montana. The season was longer and the work not so hectic as at Lamont, but Earl began to
lease more and more land, some of which he had to break out of sagebrush, as the neighbors saw his
success in farming, and soon he was working as hard as ever. He had about four thousand acres
altogether.
Three Forks was a small town at the headwaters of the Missouri River. It was the first time I had
lived outside of a "Mormon" town and I was not pleased with the actions of some of the Montanans. I was
very concerned about raising our family in such a community and sought to get my patriarchal blessing at
this time. Once while we were in Tremonton Patriarch James Walton, my former boss and bishop
consented to give me a blessing. It was a wonderful blessing and he promised me that as long as I
remained faithful I would never want for friends nor for bread.
We were spending our winters in Tremonton, having purchased a small home there, but one year our
crop at Three Forks was hailed out and we sold the Utah home to see us through the next year. We lived
on the farm that winter. We were five miles from the highway where the children met the school bus to go
an additional seven miles to town. Marco was twelve and she drove a little yellow jeep down to the
highway each morning and left it at a neighbor's home. The children would go to school on the bus and
return, and then Marco would drive them home.
There were no other neighbors along this five miles and no telephone, and I would worry about them
all day. Of course, Earl would drive them if bad weather threatened, but it was not always easy to predict
when the dangerous cold fronts from Canada would drop down our way.
Sometimes the temperature would drop forty degrees in an hour. Also, we were increasingly busy in
the small branch of the Church that had been formed there, so we bought a home in Three Forks. Earl
became Branch President and I worked in the Sunday school, MIA and Relief Society. [Ed: Earl was the
second President of the new branch. The first was released after serving a very short term.] We were
building a small, very beautiful church as well. Earl leased, for the church, a section of farmland and all
of the members helped with the work. They farmed this land for three years, taking off two crops. This is
where most of the financing for the building came from.
The men used their farm equipment and trucks to help with any work that could be done, digging the
basement, hauling bricks and stone, etc., and everyone helped in any way that they could. The men
poured the cement foundations and the basement, and did all of the roofing and the women and girls did
all the lathing. Much help came from the various quorums of the stake also. This was how such a small
membership, about fifty when the building was begun, were able to build such a beautiful church house.
Some of the friendships we formed during this time of struggle have been very choice and will last
forever.
The Butte Stake was formed by Elder Spencer W. Kimball and Elder LeGrand Richards on June 28,
1953. We were very impressed with the abilities of these two wonderful leaders, and very happy to live
under the influence of a stake organization again. Our headquarters at Butte was sixty-five miles away,
and we did an awful lot of traveling to attend all of the meetings. We were very busy and very happy.

159
 My oldest sister, Rhea, had died and left seven children. We took five-year-old Mikey and
four-year-old Ronald to live with us. It was quite an experience to try to fit two small boys into a family
of five active girls and we were not at all times as successful as we wished to be. The boys' father, Bert
Wheatley, remarried and took the boys home after they had been with us about a year. At the same time,
Earl could see that the new government policies involving farming were not going to allow the Three
Forks farm to be as profitable as it had been, and he sold our house in town and the farm and we moved to
Southern California, to try our luck there.
We lived the first winter in National City [a part of San Diego] and then bought an avocado and
lemon grove in Fallbrook, about sixty miles north of San Diego. We entered then upon a happy,
wonderful time of our lives. There was a large old rambling house with two patios and a large reservoir in
which we stored water for the trees and also used as a swimming pool.
The older girls were in high school and junior high and we had lots and lots of young people and
friends of all ages at our house.
Earl was first counselor in the presidency of the South Coast District. We worked with Wallace
Gray, president, and Richard Johnson, second counselor, and later, Paul Bahen, second counselor. These
were wonderful men and life-long friends. There were so many really wonderful people there and we
made so many good friends. I was working in Primary, Sunday school, and Relief Society. Fallbrook was
also building a new chapel, but we did not get in on so much of the work there as we had done at Three
Forks.
Our youngest girl, Susan, was nearly nine years old when David Earl was born on September 1,
1956. We were so happy to have a new baby in the family and especially happy to have a son. We loved
the girls very dearly and appreciated having been given them to raise. But the highest goal we had for our
daughters was for them to marry worthy men in the Lord's temples for time and eternity, and thus be
joined to other family groups. So we were happy to have a son. We had trouble finding food that agreed
with him, as he was allergic to cow's milk.
He had tummy aches much of the time and the whole family had to help tend him. We finally found
a pediatrician who helped us get him on the road to health, and then he was a complete joy to the family.
I was working as District Primary Leader, a job I enjoyed very much although I surely had to put a
lot of hours' work into it. We traveled a lot to Escondido, Oceanside, Vista, San Dieguito, Barstow,
Banning, Hemet, and Los Angeles.
At a swimming party for the Homemaker Girls of one of the Escondido wards, one of the girls,
named Maureen, was nearly drowned. She was rescued and revived, but had suffered extensive brain
damage. The Naval Childrens Hospital in San Diego was supposed to be one of the best in the world, but
their specialists could do nothing for her, informing her parents that she would never regain her
intelligence and would continue to live in a vegetable-like condition. She was flown to Salt Lake City to
the Primary Childrens' Hospital as a last resort. Her mother, a very shy little woman was with her. She
remembered that when Maureen had been studying the Church Authorities in Primary, she had on several
occasions commented on her love and esteem for President McKay, and had said, "Promise me that, if I
am ever sick, you will have President McKay administer to me."
Living in Southern California, her mother thought it would be very unlikely that either of them
would ever see President McKay. But now the words came back to her and she finally gained enough
courage to approach Sister McKay on one of her visits to the hospital. She related what her daughter had
asked and Sister McKay promised to bring the matter to her husband's attention, although she could not
promise that he would have time to fulfill the request.
The next morning, when the mother arrived at the hospital, President McKay had already been there
and given a blessing to Maureen. The nurse who had been present did not speak English very well and
could only tell the mother that the blessing was that if it was Maureen's time to leave this existence, she
would go quickly and not suffer any longer. But if her work on earth was not done, she would be
completely healed.
Soon after, Maureen opened her eyes, and in two weeks the extensive braces were removed because
the violent convulsions had ceased. Then she could sit up, then speak. She came home to her family in
Escondido for Christmas. In January she could feed herself, in February she regained complete control of
all her body functions, in March she could walk, and in September she rejoined her playmates at school.
She was a year behind in her studies, but she was perfectly intelligent and her body was normal.

160
 I was very close to this story and it impressed me greatly. I caused that it should be written up in our
District Primary History, and we used it when we began our Penny Parade to help support the Primary
Childrens Hospital. I once again had my testimony in the power of the Priesthood strengthened.
There was only one thing wrong with our life in Fallbrook, and that was that the raising of avocados
and lemons was not profitable. Earl had worked very hard on the grove, redoing the irrigation system,
fertilizing and caring for the trees, and they had responded beautifully. But it was evident from the high
expenses of the grove and the low income, that it could never make a living for the family. So he sold the
grove and bought some farm land about twenty-five miles north of Soda Springs, Idaho.
Marco was attending LDS Business College, but the rest of the family spent the summer of 1958 on
the Soda Springs farm. We had just arrived at Soda Springs when we again had to call to our aid the
members of the Priesthood and their authority to heal.
There was a little creek that ran past the house on the farm, and one day after a rainstorm and the
creek was very high, we missed David. One of the hired men found him floating in the creek and
apparently dead. Fervent prayers were offered as they applied artificial respiration to him. He started to
breathe again, but was in shock, screaming and shaking. We rushed him to the hospital in Soda Springs
and he was given a sedative to calm him. Then we had time to consider a new worry.
He must have been in the water for a long period of time while I searched for him and then while the
men searched for him, and he was almost certain to have brain damage. We knew no one in town, but the
nurses helped us summon some of the Priesthood brethren who administered to him. When he woke up as
the effects of the sedative wore off, he looked around the hospital room and asked, "where'd we go
bye-bye, Mama?" He was completely restored to health, even to a forgetting of his drowning. And we
were allowed to keep him for another year and a half. They were happy days for us.
We kept the Soda Springs farm for only two crops and then traded it for land in Arbon Valley, Idaho,
south of Pocatello. There was a small summertime branch there and we found good friends. Marco and
Carolyn were both working in California. When school started, Barbara and Sara had to go about fifty
miles to high school at American Falls. Earl and I drove a small Volkswagen school bus. We would pick
up the high school children and take them to meet the large bus to go to American Falls. Then we would
make the same round, picking up the grade school children and delivering them to the two-room
schoolhouse in Arbon Valley. Susan attended the fifth grade here.
The snow was very deep, but we never had any serious problems. We would go to the St. Johns
Ward near Malad to church as the Arbon Branch closed for the winter when most of the people moved
out to winter homes. The next winter we looked for a place to live where it would not be such a hardship
to get to school and to church. We rented a home in Logan and had the girls started in school there. We
had returned to Arbon to load out our grain for selling, when David was killed. He was out in the granary
helping his father and was caught in some of the machinery and instantly killed. We buried him in
Tremonton, and many friends and relatives came to offer comfort.
The following winter in Logan was a dreary one. The weather was overcast and gloomy and Earl had
one of his spells of back trouble. He had a weak back, having injured it years ago while driving grain
trucks, and every so often it would give him trouble. So he was unable to keep active for a time.
I had started working as a counselor in the Primary, but found it too difficult to work with
children at this time. I went to work for Western Service Center in Ogden, Utah, as a card punch operator.
Earl's back was still bothering him when it came time to do the spring farming, so I quit my job and went
out to Arbon Valley with him to help wherever I could.
We were very discouraged with farming. Although Barbara and Sara had been a very big help on the
farm, driving tractors and trucks, the girls were not really interested in farming. David was no longer
there to carry it on or to help his Daddy, so we sold the farm and moved to Tremonton. Earl went into the
real estate business and I ran a small preschool nursery for a time, but we gave up these operations when
Earl bought a small grain elevator and milling business. I worked in the office while Earl managed the
processing of the grain into feed, the buying and selling of grain, and running the trucks.
Marco was still in California. Carolyn had married Dee Petersen, the son of some very dear friends,
and Barbara, Sara and Susan went to Bear River high school. Dee and Carolyn moved to Tremonton to
help us in the mill. They had Jami Lee and Timothy Dee and soon Gregory Earl was born. We enjoyed
Dee and Carolyn and the grandchildren very much. Marco married Richard James Holbrook in California
and they came to visit with Christian Bernard, our beautiful California grandchild.

161
 Sara Carolyn Orpha David Earl Susan Marco Barbara
Earl Hunsaker Stohl & Orpha F Heppler Stohl Family 1946
But the feed and grain business did not prove very profitable and after four years we sold it and went
into farming again, this time on an irrigated farm in the Columbia Basin Project in the state of
Washington. Earl cleared much of the land here, using a D8 bulldozer to remove huge boulders. We
raised hay, peas, beans and corn. The crops were good because of Earl's care and effort and ability, but
the work was extremely hard on all of us.
Earl became very ill with a virus-caused heart attack. I had to have a major operation also. We felt
that it would not be wise for us to go on working so hard. We traded the irrigated farm for some dry land
near Havre, Montana. We were right up on the Canadian border, about thirty- five miles north of Havre.
Susan was with us for the summer and helped with the farming. Then she taught school at a small
teacherage near us. Barbara, a dietitian, and Sara, a secretary, were working California
The Havre land was considered marginal as the rainfall was very sparse. When the opportunity came,
it seemed wise to trade for land at Three Forks, very near to where our other farm had been located.
Carolyn and Dee came from Illinois to help with the farming. There were six grandchildren in the
Petersen family by this time. Jonathan Leland, Mette Marie and Shanna Susanna had been added.

162
 Marco and Richard and three more grandchildren, Conrad William, Heather Christine, and Laura
Elizabeth, came from California. Sara came also, and it was a wonderful reunion. Susan left for a mission
in Northern England in the fall of 1972.
The extreme drought conditions had continued, and we could see that we would have to sell our farm, as
we could no longer afford to operate it at a loss each year. Carolyn and Dee left for St. Charles, Missouri.
Dee obtained work at his profession, an airplane mechanic. We were all alone for the winter of 1972, and
it was the first time that we had been alone for Christmas since the first year of our marriage. However,
we were cheerful, having one daughter on a mission and the rest all happily in charge of their own lives.
We began to look for a small business to operate to support ourselves and traveled 25,000 miles that
winter investigating various enterprises. We finally bought a small trailer court and some apartments in
Great Falls, Montana. Although we worked very hard and improved the property very much, it was not
very profitable. We went next to St. Charles, Missouri, to visit Dee and Carolyn and their family, and we
began working as resident managers of a large trailer court in St. Peters, Missouri. We worked there for a
year, and the owners wanted us to continue, but we did not like the life nor the business and decided that
there must be better ways of making a living.
The money which we should have received from the sale of our farm had not been forthcoming as
we expected, so Earl, with his customary resourcefulness, has begun a new business, that of custom grain
harvesting. It appears to be very successful and we feel it is the opportunity we have searched for. We
now live in a travel trailer, and we move to Lamont, Idaho, in the spring and help Earl's nephew, Brent
Stohl, with his spring farming. We have a lovely spot in which to live, overlooking a creek with the Teton
mountains beyond.
Then we go custom cutting to northern Utah and southeastern Idaho, returning in the late fall to help
Brent. We like the Marysville Ward very much, and enjoy spending the winters in Mesa, Arizona. This
winter we are managing a small trailer park, meeting new people and enjoying new experiences. We are
well and happy and grateful that we are able to work for our living.
Barbara married John Touron in September [1977]. She has been very ill as a result of a tubular
pregnancy, but is recovered and in good spirits. Carolyn and Dee have eight children, including Chad
Aaron and Cory Allen. Marco and Richard are still in California. Richard has received special awards
from his company for the work he has done in plastics packaging and also is doing much consultory work
outside of his company. Sara is an executive secretary in California, and Susan is a computer programmer
in St. Louis, Missouri. All are well and busy in the Church and leading good lives. You will realize as you
read this story that I have left out much that is important and included much that is trivial. But all of the
events that happen to a family cannot be set down for everyone to read. Some are too sacred and precious,
others are too heart-breaking to be spelled out in words, and still others are simply not your story to tell.
The story may seem like a tale of how we made our living, and perhaps it is. But we realized long
ago that the really important events of one's life are those concerning our family and our church.
Wherever we have lived, we have enjoyed the association of people of high standards and morality, and
have made many wonderful friends in the Church. We have developed our own few talents by our work
in the Church.
We are intensely proud of our daughters. They are all beautiful and highly intelligent, and most
important, wonderful servants of their Heavenly Father. We are glad that we were given the privilege of
raising them and proud to leave them to the world as our contributions to society. We are grateful for our
grandchildren and love them very much and pray that they will become as fine persons as their parents.
Our three sons-in-law are choice young men, and we are grateful to them for bringing our daughters the
happiness that they do. We have always found that the happiest times of our lives have been when we
have been working the hardest to serve our Heavenly Father and our family. We have faith that He will
provide the necessities of life as long as we remain faithful to Him.
We remember the influence of many of the Lord's chosen prophets, beginning with Heber J. Grant
and all of his wonderful helpers, down to the present time. I have seen technological "firsts" in my sixty
years: the first radio in my home town, the Model T Ford, Lindbergh's flight across the Atlantic, the
discovery of antibiotics and microwaves and quasars, space flight and the landings on the moon. I have
also lived through the Great Depression, the Second World War and many other interesting and important
things. I have a testimony that the only firm foundations to be found in such a rapidly changing world are
in the family unit and in the church.

163
 Obituary of Orpha F Heppler Stohl
Daily Sentinel 24 July 1996

A funeral service for Orpha H. Stohl, 3122 Chipeta Ave., will be at 11 a.m. Friday in the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter~day Saints on Orchard Mesa with Bishop Lee Wynne officiating. Burial will be at 2
p.m. Saturday in Riverview Cemetery in Tremonton, Utah.
Mrs. Stohl died after a lengthy illness Sunday at her home. She was 78. She had been a homemaker and a
bookkeeper for J. C. Penney Co. Inc. in Tremonton. She was a resident of Grand Junction for four years.
She was born Dec. 5, 1917, to Rosco Zar and Elmira Farnsworth Heppler in Richfield, Utah. She
spent her childhood in Richfield and Tremonton and graduated from Bear River High School.
She married Earl Hunsaker Stohl on Dec. 10, 1937, in the Logan LDS Temple.
Mrs. Stohl lived in California before moving to Grand Junction.
She was a Mormon and had served as a Relief Society president, district Primary president and in
other church activities. She was also a past Parent-Teacher Association president in Three Forks, Mont.
Mrs. Stohl enjoyed quilting, crocheting and embroidering.
Other survivors include five daughters and two sons-in-law, Marco and Richard Holbrock of Fruita,
Col. Carolyn and Dee Peterson of Vacaville, Calif., Barbara Ann Touron of Palisade, Col. and Sara Marie
Stohl and Susan Stohl, both of Los Angeles; two brothers, Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. of Show Low, Ariz., and
Max Ronald Heppler of Tremonton; a sister, Annivor Job of Clinton, Wash.; 16 grandchildren and several
great-grandchildren.A son, David Earl, and a son-in-law, John Touron, are deceased.

Orpha F Heppler Stohl Earl Hunsaker Stohl

Odds and Ends

When we lived in Three Forks, Montana circa 1956, there was an older woman named Grace
Collins
who attended Church faithfully, but was not a member. Her husband would not agree to let her be
baptized. When Grace's husband died, Grace was baptized, but by then she was quite elderly. Grace asked
Orpha to do her genealogy and Orpha agreed. She worked on it for about 30 years, writing letters to all of

164
Grace's surviving relatives, to courthouses, and county clerks, gathering names, places, and dates. Orpha
submitted many names for ordinances. It was a labor of love and selfless service.
Mother had a huge round skillet with a wooden handle that she used every time we had anything
fried
or any one-dish meal. I decided to make supper using the skillet. The recipe said to mix the ingredients
together and then put the skillet in the oven. I did this, not thinking a thing about the wooden handle.
When I checked on the progress of the meal, I saw that the handle had burned.
When Mother got home, she saw the skillet and said to me, "I've had that skillet longer than I've had
you."Fortunately, Dad was able to make another wooden handle for the skillet out of anold shovel handle,
thereby enabling mother to forgive me.

When Mom and Dad lived in High Vista, California and were providing the home for my two cats,
Kitchens, and Coco, Coco got in a fight. Clearly she was in retreat, for she was wounded on her tail end.
She got a huge swelled up place and I hauled her into the vet, which was 35 miles away in Lancaster. He
lanced the abcess and drained it and sewed it up and told us that very likely another cat had bitten her, and
that cats' mouths are full of germs. I hauled her back to Mom and Dad's, another 35 miles. To our dismay,
the abcess place started to fill with infection again and one day, Mom, Marco, and I were contemplating
what should be done. I was not in favor of another 70-mile round trip to the vet, and we all knew that the
stitches needed to be opened again so the abcess would drain. Marco and I both declared that we could
not do it, but Orpha went and got a razor blade and while we held the cat, she opened up the abcess. Coco
recovered nicely and Marco and I learned alot about Mother that day.
Here is a story about Mom and the move from High Vista (Lancaster), California to Grand Junction,
Colorado in 1991. It shows some of her qualities.
Mom and Dad were living in High Vista, California, a very rural area, and had provided the home for
my two cats that I adopted in St Louis, Kitchens and Coco. Mom and Dad had a crew of people loading
the moving truck for about 3 days before the actual move and Kitchens, being very shy, disappeared. The
actual day of the move it was drizzling and I went out walking the 5 acres they owned calling his name.
Finally he came out of an old pile of brush and I gathered him up and shoved him in the cage in the back
seat of my car with Coco. The cats began to howl and cry the moment I started to drive and kept it up for
the first 200 miles where we stopped for gas. Orpha was riding with Dad, and she came over to see how
the cats and I were doing. When I told her they had been wailing for the last 200 miles, she reached her
fingers into the cage and spoke to them, telling them that everything was all right, and they would like
Colorado. They stopped wailing and were quiet the rest of the 800 miles to Grand Junction. I guess that
once they knew she was coming along, they were more secure.

Genealogy for Orpha F Heppler

Born 5 Dec 1917 in Richfield, Sevier, Utah, USA.

Died 21 Jul 1996 in Grand Junction, Mesa, Colorado, USA.
Buried 27 Jul 1996 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Earl Hunsaker Stohl, son of Heber Nelson Stohl and Meltrude Lauretta Hunsaker on 10
Dec 1937 in Logan, Cache, Utah, USA. Earl was born on 17 Apr 1911 in Tremonton, Box
Elder, Utah, USA.

Orpha F Heppler and Earl Hunsaker Stohl has the following children:

Marco Stohl Born 14 Mar 1939 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married Richard James Holbrook on 6 Sep 1963 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California,
USA. Richard was born on 5 May 1938 in Augusta, Kennebec, Maine, USA.

Carolyn Stohl Born 20 May 1941 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

165
 Married Dee Dwain Peterson on 10 Dec 1959 in Logan, Cache, Utah, USA. Dee
was born on 9 Feb 1938 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

Barbara Ann Stohl Born 30 Nov 1943 in Rexburg, Madison, Idaho, USA.
Married John William Touron on 3 Sep 1977 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles,
California, USA. John was born on 4 May 1946 in Watertown, Jefferson, New
York, USA. He died on 29 Apr 1990 in La Mesa, San Diego, California, USA.

Sara Marie Stohl Born 8 Jun 1945 in Rexburg, Madison, Idaho, USA

Susan Stohl Born 28 Jan 1948 in Rexburh, Madison, Idaho, USA

David Earl Stohl Born 6 Sep 1956 in fallbrook, San Diego, California, USA
Died 22 Oct 1959 in Arbon Valley, Power, Idaho, USA

Orpha & Earl watering the garden

166
 Chapter 13
Annivor Heppler Job
My own story

This is a transcription of the life of Annivor Heppler Job as she remembers it. It was made
May 29, 2001 at her home in Henderson, Nevada. RZH Jr.

I think I was about three or four-years old when we

moved into our new house. I had to my forth birthday
back on the farm. This was when we lived in Richfield. I
can remember because mother wrote an invitation that
said "Please come to my house to play on Friday the
fourth of May because it will be my forth birthday.
After that we moved from Richfield up to Garland,
Utah. All I remember about that Garland house is that it
was scary. It had to two stories. I remember
Christmastime. I think I saw Santa. I wasn't sure.
We left that house and we moved to Tremonton. In
Tremonton did we live above the shop? No we had a
house. That was when the cannery burned down. My
mother came in and woke me up to see this. I remember
that there were a lot of flames.
Then we moved upstairs across from the barbershop.
We had a balcony up there. We had a tub in the back in
which we used to bathe.
That is where Ross fell. We had an outside staircase
with a landing on top. He crawled through the bars on
the top of that landing which were just slats and fell on
his head. They prayed over him. The elders came in and Annivor Heppler Job
laid their hands on him every night. I can just remember
that so vividly. Then he recovered. I must have been about six years old when this happened.
The next thing that I remember is when Daddy built the house in Tremonton. I remember
that they built a big hospital right next to us. The man who built it was Dr. Schaffer. I used to
go across the street and tend their children. The elementary school that I attended was kitty
corner across the street. When we moved into our new house it was a custom that their friends
gave them a white elephant party. All the things that you wanted to get rid of you gave to them.
They came and left a lot of junk. There was an old toilet that was sitting out on the lawn. An
old model T Ford truck
and all kinds of things
wrapped up as gifts. My
mother was just aghast. I
remember that.
But it was a fun
house. There were two
bedrooms upstairs. Nola,
my sister, had the back
bedroom. Mother and
dad slept in the front
bedroom. My other sister,
Rhea, and I had a
bedroom downstairs in
the basement. My
brothers, Ross and Max,
White Elephant Party
167
had an unfinished bedroom in the other side of the basement. I think my other sister, Orpha,
shared Nola's bedroom. I don't remember much about Orpha.
The house had a back door and we could sneak in and out when it was late. We had bright
white walls. They didn't paint them or have any wallpaper. It was white plaster. I remember
one time, all of my fun friends, we were going to go on a picnic or some sort of a field trip.
I am in getting ahead of myself because this was in high school. The bus didn't come to
pick us up so I invited them down to my place. You could always come to Heppler's place. We
decided to roast hot dogs in the fireplace. I started a fire in the fireplace and of course the draft
wasn't opened. It smoked up those pretty white walls of mother and dad's new home. I thought
that I was really going to get in trouble for that, I got into trouble a lot, but I don't remember
mother and dad being really strict with us. I don't remember any spankings. We were
reprimanded and we got yelled at.

But back before we went to high school.

We lived kitty corner from the grade school and I always had to come home after school
and wash all of the dishes. Mother and dad and my three sisters worked. I was in charge of and
had to take care of Max and Ross.
My mother and dad and sisters would have a big meal at noon and leave all the dishes and
everything and I had to come home every night after school and wash the dishes. But I always
had a friend to come home and help me because there was good food to eat. We would get the
dishes done just barely before they would get home from work. That was an on going thing.
Then on Saturday I had to clean the house too. I was in charge of keeping it cleaned. I had
to mop the floors. I used to turn on the opera. They had a 12:00 presentations from New York.
It was a radio broadcast. I would dance around to the music of that opera. I just loved it.
We had a lot of music in our family. Rhea played the piano. My dad played the accordion.
I played the clarinet. I played at it. We were not good. None of us were good except Rhea.
She always play the piano for church. We had a fun home even though mother and dad were
working.
We lived right next door to the church. Of course when my mother and dad were not
working they were always over to the church. If we ever wanted to find them we knew right
where they were. Mother used to sing in a ladies quartet. I think I have a picture of that. They
call themselves " The Agony Songbirds". Dad also sang a lot. He sang in a barber shop quartet.

They were always doing activities at the church. They would have what they called "Road
Shows". They would take the shows through all the outlying areas or other churches, Thatcher,
Penrose, and preform at the church there.
In one show Reese and I would sing "Cuddle up a little closer lovey mine". That was the
same show that mother and dad were in and we used to have so much fun on those trips out of
town. Tremonton was a small little burg but there were littler, tinier burgs around. Dad did a
lot of drama. He directed a lot of the plays that they performed.
I remember Sunday dinner. Mother always, or usually had a big pork roast. We always had
friends there. If anybody wanted to bring someone they could come to our house. They could
always get food, especially Sunday. There again though, I always got stuck with the dishes.
When my mother cooked, she had those old metalware pans, and they never got soaked and my
friend, Ann Spencer, she always like to come to our house for Sunday dinner, but she would try
to get out of washing the dishes.
We would go downstairs to my bedroom hoping that the dishes would just go away but they
never went anyway. We always had to come up and do all of the dishes on Sunday. That is a
very vivid memory.
I used to have a lot of friends at the elementary school. I remember some of my teachers.
There was Miss Maughan. I don't remember what grade she taught. The principal was Mr.
Meldrum. I got sent to his office a couple of times. All I really remember is just having a lot of
fun. I never did study too hard.

168
 What did we have at the church? The MIA.
This was during the week. These were held Tuesday
night. That is where I got my first kiss. He was
Denziel Ballard. I do not know if he is still a live are
not. He walked me home after one of those church
affairs. That was my first kiss. I remember that
vividly. That was the time also when Reese Allen
was kind of crazy about me. When I was in the
eighth grade we had a new guy come to school. I can
cannot think of his name. His name was Gayland.
He was really hot for me even though in those days
we were only eighth graders. It made Reese jealous
as heck. We were having a graduation or some dance
and I remember that he said, If I win this baseball
game with you go with me. I said okay I would go
with him. He won the baseball game. That was
exciting.
I want to tell you a little more about Reese. He
lived out-of-town. We stayed friends all of our lives.
Sometimes mother would go into the bedroom in the
morning, I guess we had a spare bedroom and no one
in the family was using it, because mother would go
in there and find some of my friends there. They had
moved down into the basement bedroom next to Max Annivor Heppler
and Ross. My dad installed a bathroom and shower
for him down there. There was usually one of my friends sleeping there who lived in one of the
outlying burgs. They would sleep in our bedroom because they couldn't find a way home. My
mother was so generous.
This goes later on when we got into high school. We would have pajama parties and we
would sleep out on the lawn. My mother would get up in the morning and make pancakes for
us. Pretty soon all the guys or friends would show up and we would have everyone there for
breakfast. I mom was a great person. She would set up and sew for me at night and still she
held down a job. She worked at Gepharts in Tremonton.
Then we went on to high school. The high school was in between Tremonton and Garland.
All of the children from Garland and Tremonton attended the high school. And all of the
children from the outlying burgs came to the high school. It was called Bear River High
School.
The kids from Tremonton thought that they were pretty hot stuff. When we got to the high
school, these girls from Garland, gosh, they just took over all the boys. All the boys that we
had gone to school with where just crazy about all the Garland girls. There were a couple of
cute ones. Eventually we all became pretty good friends. But the first year, the freshman year,
the Tremonton girls had a hard time dealing with the Garland girls.
I had a lot of fun in high school, mostly just fun. I learned English well. I had a good
teacher. I didn't learn any math or algebra. I dreaded algebra. I was in every activity that was
available from dancing to all the drama plays. I have a scrapbook of all the plays that I was in.
That was when Reese, Oleen, and Wayne Hales and Sterling Huish were singing in a trio.
(?) They were very popular kids. That was when Reese started to like my friend Ann and I got a
little upset over that. We had always been such close friends. I started going with Wayne
Hales. That was my senior year. He was such a nice guy. I think he is living down in Bullhead
City now. I think he manages an RV place down there. Oleen has since died. Reese has died.
Bob Wenzler, I don't know if he is still alive. All of my girlfriends except Tess Johnson have
died. That is about all of my high school years.
Oh, I was president of the 40 girl Pep Club and we had to practice routines and marched in
all the football games and marched in parades. Before that, when I played the clarinet. I had to

169
give up to the clarinet when I got into high school I had to many other activities. But my first
year in high school I played the clarinet and we would take trips. We took one to Grand
Junction, Colorado, a band trip. It was a band contest. We would go to Salt Lake City, Utah to
the fair and we would march in the parade there. I don't know. I just had a lot of fun.
Then after high school graduation. Oh, I need to tell something very important. We were
cleaning up the gymnasium after our prom on a Sunday and we were seniors. We had the radio
on and we were dancing while we were cleaning up the gym. The news came that Pearl Harbor
had been bombed. I don't think we realized the full impact of it at that time. That was because
we are all having so much fun.
By the time we had graduated in June half of our boys were in the service. They had
already gone or had been shipped out. It was kind of a sad thing but I dont think we realized
the full significance of it. Living where we did away from the coast.
I have heard later that people living on the coast everywhere were really afraid they were
going to be bombed. It didn't effect us like that.
To continue, after high school graduation most of the girls in our group went over to
Logan, Utah to the state agriculture college. (Utah State Agricultural College, Aggies.) Ann and
I wanted to go to college but my dad told me that if I went over there I would have to work. I
didn't want to work and go to college too.
Mom and dad said they would finance me for the summer down in Salt Lake City if I
wanted to go down there and get a job. ( Down there was 80 miles south of Tremonton.) My
friend Ann Spencer talked her aunt into financing her so that we could go down and get a job at
Salt Lake City.
They took us down and found us a boarding house. In those days people would board a
room out of their homes. We were in one typical of an old lady who had a daughter. It was
really interesting. The daughter was quite raunchy by our standards. I think she was bringing
boyfriends home and her mother was always trying to hide them. My parents didn't realize this
when they rented this room for the whole summer. Well, as it was we were thinking this is a
real woman of the night. It was quite exciting for Ann and I just being out of high school.
Anyway, we ended up having the summer down there pretty much. Pretty soon it got to be the
end of the summer and we hadn't got a job yet. I remember playing a lot of tennis but I don't
remember looking for many jobs. My mother and dad said that I had to come home if I had not
found a job by the end of the summer. They could not afford to keep me down there.
Being gutsy like I was, I went and took a civil service test and passed it. A civil service
test in those days was a job in any war department office. This was because by this time the war
was in full bloom.
I got a job out at a place called Kerns. It was an Air Force Base in Utah. Heck, I was
making more money I had ever made in my life. I think I was making $200 a month being a
secretary. I had passed this civil service test and in the meantime Ann had gotten herself a job
also. So we got out of this boarding house. It was not for us. We went and got us an
apartment. This apartment was still in someone's home and it was one room. It had a little
kitchenette and a hideaway bed.
Do you remember that Ross? You came to see me. You and Max came down to see me. It
was on El Dorado street. Anyway because we had this apartment we thought that we were
really cool. We had good jobs.
Of course when I was working for the Air Force base we had plenty of dates. But the
person in charge of our office was called Capt. Scribin. He kind of took me under his wing. He
did not want me to date anyone but officers. He kind of really watched over me which was
really good. I did go to a lot of the officers dances. To me, the war was a long ways away.
I worked in a department called classification. Anyone who was going to be shipped
somewhere had to come to our department to be assigned to a different place and we had a lot of
very wealthy people come through. We had Kemper insurance, he came through. We classified
him. It was a very interesting job. I have a whole book on this. I call it my life in the Air
Force.

170
 Then Ann got married. She married Scott. They were married in the temple. I was her best
maid but I could not go in the temple. I remember that I had to sit and wait in the lobby while
they were married. Then they had a reception at the hotel. It was not the Hotel Utah but I can't
remember its name. Anyway they had a reception there.
Then came another girl, Laura, who had been my friend in high school and move down to
be my roommate. She had a good job. She worked for the railroad. We were just out of high
school and thought that we really had it great. Which we did. We had a lot of guts. That is
what we had. I couldn't even take shorthand very good because I did not apply myself in high
school. However, my job was very easy, fortunately, because my Capt. Scribin was really a lot
of fun.
I worked there about two years and then Reese came to see me. He was on leave. He was
in the Navy. He came to see me. I a lot of the guys from high school when they had leave
would come and see us. This was when I was still living with Laura.
Reese decided that he wanted to marry me. He was a Sigma Chi and he took me up to the
Sigma Chi house. He pinned me with his pin and they serenaded us and sang to us. It was quite
exciting. He left and was shipped back to Ohio.
In October of 1944 they were getting ready to close down the Kerns Air Force Base. Ann
and Scott Christensen were living back in New York City. He was going to Columbia
University. She was working for the Rockefeller Institute of Technology. They wanted me to
come back and see them so I cashed in my war bonds. Quit my job at Kerns and got on the train
and went back to New York. That was quite an experience to go back to New York in 1944 in a
train full of soldiers. But for some reason or other everybody was always taking care of me.
That's the truth.
Ann and Scott were there to meet me at Grand Central Station when I got into New York
and I stayed in New York a month. They were both gone all day working and I, they had a
make out bed in the living room, and I would get on the bus and go all over New York. I would
see all of the hit plays that were playing. I saw Jackie Gleason in a play where he was a sailor
boy. I saw One Touch of Venus. I ended up seeing Swan Lake and the Rockettes. We
went to a lot of places. Then Scott got me a date with this real cute guy. We went to the Coco
Cavanna. I have pictures of this in my book at home.
Then I decided that I didn't want to marry Reese because I decided that I just wasn't ready
to give married. I was still dating and he didn't think I was. He was still in the Navy. On the
way home from New York I took a train to Columbus, Ohio. I met Reese at the train station. He
had a hotel room and I think he thought that we were going to spend the night together. Of
course I was still a virgin. I hadn't, that was the worst thing you could do in those days. Any
girl that was not a virgin was bad. Anyway, I gave him back his pin and he cried and he went to
his hotel room. I don't remember what happened after that. He acted like he was really heart
broken. Reese was quite a character though and he always made a big play of things.
So I went back to Salt Lake City and I went to see a show called Laura with Jean Tierrny.
I was wondering what I was going to do with my life. She worked for an advertising agency. I
thought that would be found and I wanted to work for an advertising agency. I went into a
newspaper office that was right next door and ask them if there were any advertising agencies in
town. They said, yes, kitty corner across the street was the Gilham Advertising Agency. I went
over there and applied for a job. I got one. I filled in for, can't remember her name, anyway his
secretary had been drafted. She had got into the Army. But women didn't get drafted. She had
enrolled in the war. She was a WAC. He needed a secretary really badly. But I could not take
dictation or shorthand too well for that type of a job and I stayed up at night trying to transcribe
my shorthand. Oh, it was a miserable job. It was a very glamorous and exciting job working
for an advertising agency but the pay wasn't very good. It was just the prestige and they always
used to have big Christmas parties and give you bonuses. It was a very glamorous occupation.
But I just trembled because I was not a good secretary.
I remember, oh, his name was Laun Richards, that I had to keep his little bathroom clean. I
went in there onetime and there were lipstick marks on the towel. I knew who you was playing
around with but I wasn't worried about that because I was still trying to get his dictation down

171
straight. I was glad when she came back, his former secretary, she was discharged from the
service and I knew it was time for me to leave.
I had heard in the coffee shop about a place up on the 4th floor called the Owens Illinois
Glass Company. They needed a secretary. It was a two-man office. They would dictate their
letters into a Dictaphone and I would have to translated from that. I thought that would be a lot
easier and I went up and applied for that job. Like I say, I had a lot of guts in those days. I got
that job and that paid about $350 a month. That was really a lot of money back in 1945. Laura
was still my roommate. Then she got married and I was her best maid.
I can't remember the girl who lived with me next. I will think of her name later. She went
to Box Elder High in Brigham City. She was going with a guy who's father owned the Baron
Woolen Mills. They were quite a wealthy family. That is why he she came down to live with
me. He got me a date. It was a party at the University of Utah. That was the first time in my
life that I had to fight of a guy. I remember that I had to fight tooth and toenail. That was the
worst date that I had ever been on. Those dam fraternity guys, I really didn't like them. I didn't
have anybody protecting me like when I worked for the Air Corps. They finally got married
and I was her bridesmaid.
In the meantime, oh, I want to tell you that I had tried to play golf while I worked for the
Gilham Advertising Agency. I thought that I was a pretty hot shot. A couple of the guys at the
advertising department would go with us to the golf course and we would take lessons. I took
lessons and thought I was pretty good.
Also after I had gone to work for Owens Glass
Company I had gotten this good salary and I wanted to ski.
So I, a girl named Helen Torkleson and I, went up to Alta
and took skiing lessons. We thought, boy, we are really
going to do that good.
I was now living alone and I thought that the next
roommate that I get was going to be a man. I was tired of
being a bridesmaid and never a bride. That Christmas, and
that was in 1946, Dec. 21st, Helen Torkleson's sister, who
had quite a reputation, she wanted me to meet this guy who
had just got out of the Air Force. Her name was Francis. I
said, no, I don't want to go out with any of your dates. She
said, this guy is really a nice guy. You will really like him.
I said, I don't trust any of the men that you go out with after
I had that bad experience with the guy at the fraternity
house. She said, I'll tell you what, we will go to lunch and
if you like him you can decide what you want to do after
that. So we agreed to meet outside the Gilham Advertising
Agency building which was a bank building and we were George Malm Job
going to meet for lunch.
I went outside and here were these two guys, one was tall and one was short, they would
start from the curb and run to see who could run up the highest on the side of the building. And
I thought, boy what a couple of freaks they were. Pretty soon Francis showed up and she said,
that is my date. I met George Job and Bob Peterson. They were best friends. George had just
been released from the Air Force. He was a First Lieutenant.
We went to a place up the street and had lunch. We walked up there. I laughed so hard, he
was so funny, this George guy, the guy that had been leaping up the side of the building. He
was so funny. We laughed so hard I split my sides. I agreed to go out with him. We went to
the Rainbow Rendezvous and that was Dec. 21st 1946. I went out with him almost every night
after that. He was just the most fun person. He just made me laugh all of the time.
That Christmas I had received a good bonus from Owens Illinois Glass Company and I went
out and bought myself a whole bunch of ski equipment. I was really going to hit the slopes
because I had taken all these ski lessons. Those skis were never used. They ended up in
George's dad's home and they are probably still there. I never got to use this expensive ski

172
equipment. He just kept me too busy going out. He was going to the University of Utah.
After the war almost everybody who got out of the service, had the GI Bill of rights which
permitted them to go to school like they were on a scholarship. We just had more fun. We went
out with Bob and Bernice Peterson. They got married during this period and we were at their
wedding too. And I thought, I guess this is the guy I want to move in with me instead of a girl.
I remember going ice skating. We did so much that winter. We did this in between his
studies. He would come over to my place and fall asleep. We were both getting so tired. We
decided by May that we had had it. So I decided to get married on my birthday which was May
the 4th. That was in 1947. I was 22 years old and George was 22 years old. We were going to
have just a little ceremony in the Presbyterian Church.
I hadn't told my parents yet. I had brought him home to meet them. I had taken him up to
Tremonton before this. We had gone up to Bear Lake with mom and dad. No that must have
been after we were married. Anyway, they had met George.
I can remember this vividly, this is important. That is when they lived above the shop in
Tremonton. We stayed overnight. Orpha was there. George smoked. I had to ask him not to
smoke around my parents. That was because they were such good Mormons. Orpha went and
got him and an ash tray. I will never forget that. She came and handed him an ashtray. Orpha
liked George immediately. My mom and dad were very skeptical. I think mom like him but dad
knew that he was not a Mormon and they didn't want me marrying outside the Mormon religion.
I had not been to a Mormon church since I had left home. Since I left Tremonton.
(Insert by Ross: I remember when George and Ann came for the weekend in Tremonton.
We lived upstairs over the shoe shop on main street. There were two sides to the apartment. We
slept on the unfinished side which had been converted into bedrooms. Nola had her things there
including her bed. I normally slept in her bed unless she came home for the weekend from Salt
Lake City. George and Ann slept in Nolas bed while they were there.. It was in the front. I was
sleeping with Max in the back. Outside in the back alley of the building was the volunteer fire
department and a high pole on which set a siren. In case of fire it went off. It was situated so
that it came right into our bedroom and then through out the town. When it sounded the
volunteers would come to the station and then to the fire. About 1 AM in the morning it went
off. George jumped straight in the air. He had just returned from the war and thought for sure he
was in the middle of an air raid. He grabbed Ann and started looking for the nearest air raid
shelter. It took quite a few minutes to settle him down and assure him that he was safe in our
apartment in Tremonton.)
George and I decided that we had to get married. We were just tired and besides that we
had decided to try out marriage before we were married. We were getting a little bit worried. I
called my dad and told him that we were going to get married. He said, I will not be there. I
said, why not? We were getting married that next Sunday and he said he was going fishing. I
thought oh gosh! Mother of course, just got in a fury and came down and meet George's parents
and plans the whole thing. We were going to have a cake and everything. They were going to
have it at George's parent's house. But my dad had his backup because George had not ask him
if he could marry me. He had his backup because he had not been included in all of this.
I remember when I got to the church I had on a gray suit and suede black shoes and a hat.
We got to the church. You (Ross) and Max were there. Every body was there and I was really
hurt that my dad wasn't going to be there. He showed up. Bless is heart, old Hepp seemed his
little old self. He was just ornery. He didn't want me to marry outside the church. He showed
up and I was so thrilled to see him.
We went on a short honeymoon up to Wyoming. I cant even remember where he was. We
just went for the weekend. It wasn't a real honeymoon. We just wanted to get away from
everybody.
Then we got on with our lives. We were married. I was working and George was attending
the University. Then we found out, that was when we went up to Yellowstone, where you on a
trip? Every summer our parents would go to Yellowstone. That was the one place that they
took all of us. They were going to Yellowstone this year so George and I decided that we would
go with them. It was on the Fourth of July. We stayed in a tent that mom and dad had for us.

173
After they left we went over and spent a night at the lodge. The next morning I got up and had
some orange juice for breakfast. George had this old Studebaker and the door on my side
wouldn't open. You had to get out of the car and come around and open it from the outside. We
had breakfast. When I got outside I threw up the orange juice. I said to George, oh, I must have
had some poison orange juice. Oh, I was so sick.
At that time my sister, Orpha, lived in Rexburg, Idaho. We stopped to see them because I
was so sick. I laid on her couch all afternoon. When I felt well enough to travel we went on
home. I remember that every time I had to throw up George had to get out of the car and come
around and opened my door so I could throw up. We finally got back to Salt Lake City.
We stopped to see his mother. She was a good old Swedish mother. She was a sweetheart,
Emma. I told her how sick I had been on this trip. She just laughed all over the place. I don't
think it was the orange juice that poisoned you. I think something else more than that did it to
you. And sure enough I was pregnant as heck.
Then my whole life changed. I quit my job. I would go to work and get sick and throw up.
I threw up constantly. I would have to run down the hall from the office to the bathroom to
throw up. Anyway I finally quit. George was working part-time for his brother Jack in Salt
Lake City. He had a big dry cleaning plant. He worked there and we lived in my apartment.
I forgot to tell you then one of the girls at work had bought a new house and it had a
basement apartment. That is where George moved in with me.
On May 1st 1948 we had our first baby and we named her Stefanie Ann. I had an awful
labor. I was in labor for about two days. It wasn't fun. I was such a green horn. I had no idea
how to take care of a baby. I was so smart in everything else that I did that you would think I
would know how to take care of a baby. I was in the hospital for ten days because my breasts
where so swollen with milk. It wasn't a good time in my life and I wasn't sure that I could be a
good mother. When we got home I had to change a dirty diaper and George's mother was there
and my mother was there and they came over when I screamed when I changed that dirty diaper.
They had to come and help me clean up the baby. I was still just a selfish little brat. I tried to
put my jeans on and they wouldn't fit me. I just sat there and cried. I was 23 years old them
and should have been old enough to have a baby.
I did everything wrong with that baby. Mother Job made a layette out of flannel for the
baby. It was beautiful. She had crocheted all the way around the edges. She had also
embroidered little designed on it. She had made three pieces. They all matched. There was a
big blanket. The little receiving blanket and then a kimono. They all had the same flower
design on them and they were just darling.
I hadn't washed them and I put them on this poor baby and her nose would get all clogged
up from the lint of the flannel. I was afraid to take her outside of the house and she didn't go
out for three months. I was afraid she would catch a cold. My milk didn't have any
nourishment and that was why she was crying so much. I finally had to put her on a bottle and
we had to get a special formula that I had to make. When I looked back on those days I just
don't know how I could have been so stupid. But we lived through it.
When she was six months old, it was in July, we wanted to go to California. Grandma Job
and Aunt Martha said they would take care of the baby. George had graduated from the
University in June. That was quite a thrill too. I guess the baby was four months old. We had
been offered a job. Bob Peterson's uncle in California had offered us a job in the J C Penny Co.
He had been up here visiting his brother who was Bob's father and we had played cards
with them one night. He said, George, you would be really good in the Penny Co. You could be
presidential material. You are presidential material. They start you really low but there is so
much opportunity with them.
So we decided to go down to Salinas, California and see about joining this great
organization. We left the baby with Aunt Martha and Grandma Job. We got in his Studebaker
and took off. We got as far as Winamucka, Nevada and the car broke down. We had to spend
two nights in Winamucka until we could get the car fixed. Then we stopped to see his cousin
when we got to California. She lived in San Jose down by the Winchester Mystery House. She
had a great big house out in the country and we spent the night with them.

174
 Then we went on down to Salinas and at that time Ruby and Ivan Miller lived in Salina.
She was a twin to Earl Stohl who was married to my sister Orpha. We looked them up and they
just treated and grandly. Bob had the JC Penney Co. in Hollister and he knew the manager of
the Salinas store. We went over to see them in Hollister and he made an appointment to see the
manager of the Salinas store. They hired George immediately. They saw his recommendations.
He was a fly boy just out of the Air Force and a graduate from the University of Utah.
We found ourselves an apartment in Salinas. We left the car there and flew back to Salt
Lake City to get the baby. We got the baby but Georg's mother was heartbroken. See didn't
want us to go down to California and leave her at all. Especially to take that darling little baby
away from her that she had had for a week. But we did.
We got Stefanie and got on a plane and flew her crib down with us. We got down to our
apartment in Salinas which was in a part of town where the Olkie lived. It was a Motel. But
there were a lot of nice people there. Their husbands were stationed over at Fort Ord,
California.
We had a bedroom, a bathroom, a kitchen and a living room. You had to go through the
bedroom to get to the bathroom. It was a tiny apartment. We put up the crib and it was so hot.
We had borrowed a mattress from somebody and slept on the floor. Our furniture had to be
shipped down and it hadn't arrived yet.
We put Stefanie to bed in a diaper because it was so hot. I remember waking up in the
middle of the night. We had left all the windows opened and the room was just filled with fog.
The . fog had come in and we couldn't even see across the room. The poor baby was sleeping
in a diaper in all this fog. It was cold. This was another place where I wasn't a very good
mother.
I ended up having a lot of fun with Stefanie at this time. She was at a cute darling age. She was
six months going on to nine months. I got into this mother bit thing and just adored her. I just
really adored that baby. But we were so poor. George was only making $200 a month.
A lot of times we didn't have anything to eat. We would follow the trucks around. Salinas
was the salad bowl of the world. We would follow these big trucks around and if a head of
lettuce fell off we would stop and get it. Once this guy and George brought home, they were
always working late, they were coming home late and were following a truck that was full of
Navy beans. One of these big 100 pound bags of bean's fell off. I guess two of them fell off
because both of the guys got a bag. They each had 100 pound sack of Navy beans.
I learned to cook beans every which way. It kept us going. We would go to the store and
ask for dog bones and make soup with them. We were really very poor. But we got to be good
friends with Ivan and Ruby and they kept us going. They would bring over food or have us over
there all the time. She made clothes for Stefanie. We would go over and played cards with Ivan
and Ruby. That was our total entertainment. Sometimes they would come over to our little
place.
Then I found out that I was pregnant again. I wasn't ready to be pregnant again because I
had barely gotten to know Stefanie. Then I got sick again. I was throwing up again. But it was
a fun time. I remember having nothing to do but play with Stefanie because George was
working so hard.
Leslie was born June 25, 1949 in Salinas, California. George's mother came down to be
with Stefanie while I went to the hospital. When I came home from the hospital with the new
baby Stefanie didn't even know me. She cried when I came to her. That was such a shock. But
we survived. George's mother helped us out a lot.
After she went home and Leslie was about three months old, no she was six months,
George's mother flew down to see these two babies. She just adored Stefanie and I think that
George was always her favorite. One night we left the babies with her while we went over to
Ruby and Ivan's to play cards. Our neighbor called us. I don't know how she found this out.
She thought that Emma was sick. By the time we got back from Ruby and Ivan's there was an
ambulance there. I went in and held Emma in my arms and she died in my arms. She had had
ill health for some time. We were happy that she could come down and see her two grand-

175
babies. She had taken a bath with them that morning. Even though it was a very sad thing she
did get to see the babies. George flew home with his mother.
Then after that, I am trying to thing, we had those two babies and we were pretty poor. But
we had the JC Penney prestige. Then George was transferred to San Mateo, California. We
rented a place outside of San Mateo in Redwood City. Then I found out that I was pregnant
again. Oh dear. We had these two little girls 16 months apart and we had no money. But we
did have our health and as I look back on it now it was the best years of our life.
In a Redwood City Stefanie and Leslie got the chickenpox. They had them really bad.
Leslie was so covered that you couldn't put at a dime between the lesions. Stefanie didn't have
them so bad because she was fair and Leslie was the dark one. She had the complexion of her
grandmother Emma Job. She was so sick.
Anyway, we weathered that storm and George found a house. He was working in the San
Mateo Penny's store. He found a house right in San Mateo. It was a great big old house owned
by an Italian. It had three big bedrooms and a long hallway with a large living room and a
fireplace that you could walk into. It had a big front porch and a big back yard. It was just a
great place for children. The children used to ride their tricycles around through the dining
room and down the hallway.
It was a great place and San Mateo was a wonderful place to live. There were lots of things
to do. That was where George Jr. was born at the San Mateo Hospital. He was born on July 13,
1951. He it was our first boy. We didn't know what to do with Stefanie and Leslie while I was
in the hospital because we didn't know anyone there. The night that George took me to the
hospital he took them over to our neighbor who was an old Italian Lady. She was as sweet as
she could be. Her name was Lena. No, that is not quite true. We left Stefanie and Leslie out in
the car in front of the hospital while I was delivering the baby. We didn't have anyone to leave
them with. Then it was the next day that this Italian lady helped us out. Can you believe that?
We had left them in the car while I was having the baby.
But George Jr. was an easy birth. Then George took Stefanie and Leslie down to Salinas to
leave them with Ivan and Ruby for a week until I could get on my feet. We didn't have any one
to stay with me. It really was one of the easiest birth that I had had because I was all alone with
this baby and I had finally found out how to do it. I was nursing him and he was a good baby.
He didn't cry. I got my rest. It was very delightful.
Then the little girls came home. They didn't have too good of time down and Ruby and
Ivan's. I think Ruby and Ivan where a little strict. They sure where glad to be home.
Life went on in San Mateo. That was fun because we could, oh, George had been
transferred up to San Francisco, and we could take the train up to San Francisco. We would
take the children up there for Christmas and they could see Santa Claus. They thought that was
a great big thing.
Then we bought our first home in Belmont, California. That was after George Jr. was born.
No, I have to go back on that because Joni came a long. That's right, Joni came a long two
years later. That was while we were still living in the big house in San Mateo. Joni was born
on May 21, 1953. So we were living in this house with the four children. Three children and a
baby. It was fun. Joni was an easy birth also.
During the time that Joni was born, Grandpa Job had remarried Emma's sister, Aunt Josie.
Aunt Josie and Grandpa Job came down to stay with the three children, Stefanie, Leslie, and
George Jr. while I was in the hospital with Joni. Then I came home from the hospital with Joni.
They stayed there about two weeks.
Then we decided to go back to Utah. Josie and Grandpa flew the baby back to Salt Lake
with them on their plane. She was only about a month old. And we drove home to Salt Lake
City with Stefanie, Leslie, and George Jr. in the car. We spent two weeks in Utah. We went to
see Grandma and Grandpa Heppler up at Tremonton. We went to Bear Lake. I think that was a
year that we all went to Bear Lake with the children. We had so much fun. Max and Ruthie
where there. All of Orpha's children, where there. Orpha and Earl showed up with their
children. We had sort of a family gathering. I think that Ross and Shirley may have been there
at that time also. I know that we had the whole family there and it was a fun vacation.

176
 Then we returned back to San Mateo with the four children. That was when we bought our
first house in Belmont. Oh, I was so thrilled. It was so pretty. It was all brand-new. I think
that it cost us about $16,000. It had three bedrooms, living room, beautiful new kitchen with a
disposal, and a big full basement. The basement wasn't finished. We had a nice yard and a nice
neighborhood. It was right up from the school.
This house in Belmont was just a dream house. All the bathrooms had colored ceramic tile.
We had never had tile in our bathrooms before. One was pink and the other one, the master
bathroom, was green and grey.
This is where we started out with the kids going to school. No, actually Leslie and Stefanie
did go to school in San Mateo. I believe they were in kindergarten. Maybe that was just
Stefanie. I cant remember. Anyway, this is where Jonie went to kindergarten so all the children
were in school when we were in Belmont.
Those were fun times. George Jr. was in the Scouts. It is hard remembering all of this. I just
remember living in this beautiful house and we had so much fun.
We had great neighbors. I would play cards with them in the daytime. All the kids were in
school and I would try and hurry to get their work done at night. George was up in San
Francisco and he didnt get home until quite late anyway. He was working really hard. He had a
terrible job. He managed the whole second floor of the JC Penny store in San Francisco. It was
very hard on him. He had all of the dry good and had a demanding boss. That was one of the
hardest times in his life although I was having a great time in this new home in Belmont, CA.
We took a lot of trips up into San Francisco and we would go to the park. We really had a lot of
fun.
Then George was transferred up to Napa, CA. It was the Vallejo Pennys store. We went up
and bought a house in Napa and move the children up there. That was a nice home too.
Everyone should remember what that one looked like. You stayed with us Ross. You stay with
us while you were waiting to be shipped out to Japan. No, that was Belmont when you left for
Japan.
Our lives went on. Our life in Napa was a lot of fun. The kids went to a little school called
Browns Valley. It was a little old school where they had carnivals and fairs. That is where
George Jr. caught a pig. They had a greased pig that they let run around in a contest and he
caught the pig.
All of the kids were in school and I had all of this time to myself. George was commuting
over into Vallejo. He loved his work over in the Vallejo Pennys store. His boss was Robert Van
Cleat and they were great friends and we got to be great friends with them. Bob later went to be
a Vice Pres. back in New York. He died early of a heat attack. He was in his fifties. I dont
know if he had such a good life after all but George was under a lot of pressure but he was
having fun too. He and Bob were great friends.
Then in 1961, this was May 22, I had another baby. It was kind of a shock because all of
the other kids were in school. I had had my freedom and everything but she was a darling little
baby. We brought here home and everyone else was so thrilled to have this baby in the house.
I can remember Leslie changing her diapers the first time I brought her home from the
hospital. Life in Napa was really fun. We had nice neighbors and our children were old enough
that we could almost leave them alone. Stefanie was a teenager now.
Then when Stefanie was fifteen she started having problems with her period. We would
take her to doctors and they would say that there was nothing wrong with her. Finally her
stomach hurt so bad. She had a big lump in her stomach. They finally operated on her and found
this ovarian tumor. The tumor was big as a grapefruit.
That sort of turned our life around. We were just going full tilt and everything was perfect.
I was a perfect mother. Leslie was in the 4H Club. Stefanie was in Girl Scouts. George Jr. was
in Boy Scouts. I was a Den Mother. Malisa was three and Jonie was a Brownie. I think that at
one time I had a Brownie, a Girl Scout, a 4Her and a Cub Scout. The baby was about three years
old. That was when Stefanie got this awful cancer. That lasted two years.
We fought that with everything we knew how to do. The radiation was all we could do for
her. Chemo-therapy was very new. Chemo-therapy was just a new experiment.

177
 In those days you didnt hardly say the word cancer. You didnt mention it hardly. So we
kept the fact that Stefanie was sick from the other children. To explain her illness we gave it
every name in the world. She had to go to the hospital for this radiation and we would just make
up stories so that nobody knew that she had cancer. She kept going to school and kept going to
school.
Finally Bob Van Cleat was transferred up to Seattle, Washington where they opened a
group office. This group office would go out and buy all of the goods for all of the Pennys
stores in the area. He had George transferred up to Seattle into this group office where he was in
charge of all the home furnishing for all the stores in the Seattle area.
By this time Stefanie was unable to go to school. She was in bed. George got us a place to
live in Mt. Lake Terrace. He flew back down, we had a dog named Penny, he took four children
and Penny and I kept Stefanie there. We had sold the house and it was full of boxes. The
moving van had to come the next day. It came the next day and our friend Dorothy took us to
the airport. I few up Seattle with Stefanie. We met George and the other four children and the
dog.
We had to stay in the University Building, a motel until our furniture could get there. That
was about two weeks. Stefanie was quite sick and we had put her in the hospital as soon as we
got up there. These are days that I dont like to remember. It was a real bad time in our life.
Leslie had to unpack everything into the new house. Our furniture finely came but I was so busy
at the hospital all the time.
Stefanie died on May 1, on her 17th birthday. The week before she died it was very
pleasant. Aunt Hanna had flown up to be with me. My mom and dad were there. Uncle Jack and
Aunt Dorothy had been there but they had gone back.
Stefanie wasnt suffering. We had brought her home from the hospital against the doctors
wishes. But I had insisted that she come home. When she died she had all of her family around
her and her grandparents and Aunt Orpha was there. That was in 1965.
It was very difficult. We had a very lovely funeral for Stefanie out at Cassia. (sp)
Everybody from George's office was there. All of us as a family where there. Mother and dad
were living in Mesa, Arizona and came up by bus. Orpha flew over.
I can remember Aunt Hannah, Leslie, George and I going over, I don't think Melissa and
Joni where there, to the Space Needle because they had never been at the Space Needle.
Anyway my dad, while he was there, walked over across the street through the woods and
came back and he said, "Annivor there is a little city hall over there, the city of Mount Lake
Terrace." He said, "Why don't you go get a job." "I think that would be the best thing for you."
That was probably true because at that time I didn't know anybody just having moved here
and then to lost a child. The kids were all back in school. I thought they were surviving pretty
well at the time. Leslie was a cheerleader. The kids said it was the worst thing they had ever
done. They were quite popular in Napa and it was such an extreme change to come up here.
But they were surviving, at least I thought so.
I was having a hard time after my parents left so I went to a cancer meeting. It was a group
of people who were survivors of families who had someone die of cancer. I met this lady there.
She happened to be the city clerk of Mount Lake Terrace City Hall. I told her that I had been
thinking of coming back to work. See told me to come over and see her.
In the meantime, I started volunteering for the Cancer Society. I was driving patients with
cancer for treatments to the Swedish Hospital. I would take Melissa with me because she was
just a little girl. This was before she was in school. The two of us were home alone. The rest
of the kids were in school.
One time while I was out at the Swedish Hospital I walked by the employment agency and I
went in and ask if they had any jobs there. They said yes. So I got a job as a night clerk at the
Swedish Hospital. That meant that I went to work at 3:00 in the afternoon and got home about
9:30 or 10:00 at night I did that for six months. I had gone over to see Lucille at the City Hall
but she didn't have an opening at that time. But she said the she would keep in touch with me.
Leslie had to come home every day and take care of Melissa while I got ready and went to
work. Then I would get home a night and I guess in the meantime George was there at home

178
with them a lone. His work at this time wasn't that demanding. He was having a hard time
getting over the loss of Stefanie. He hadn't shown it at first. But he was having a real hard
time.
My work at the Swedish Hospital was very cathartic. I saw so many people who were in
much worse straits then I was. I was the ward clerk on the ward where they had (couldn't
remember the name it) people who were operated on for brain tumors. Neurology. I met so
many people that were so much worse off than I was that it really helped me out a lot.
The job finally came through at the City Hall and I went to work over at City Hall in the
water department. I worked there and eventually work to my way up to be secretary of the
Planning Commission. Then as a purchasing agent. Then I retired. Well no, I didn't retire. I
need to go back.
George was transferred to Kirkland as the manager of the JC Penney store. We bought a
house in Kirkland and moved out of the rental we had in Lake Terrace. I commuted to my job
for 20 years from Kirkland to Mount Lake Terrace. It was a 20 min. drive. The kids pulled
their selves some way through school. Joni got lost in my work. They pulled themselves up by
their bootstraps.
This was when George was getting quite sick. After two years at the Penny Co. in Kirkland
he went on disability retirement. His job at Kirkland was a hard one too. We had a lot of
prestige. We would go to parties with the mayor. We really didn't have much fun. George was
not doing as well as he thought he should. Every time he would go to get a bonus they wouldn't
remodel the store. But we had a nice house in Kirkland. We thought we had a good life. The
kids were really doing great. Leslie graduated from Mount Lake Terrace. George graduated
from Mount Lake Terrace. Joni graduated from Mount Lake Terrace having enrolled in
Washington and then gone back to Lake Terrace to graduate. Then Melissa graduated from
Lake Washington.
George's emphysema continue to get worse and he was home on disability. He would take
care of Melissa while I was commuting back and forth to Mount Lake Terrace.
Then in 1985 he died. In the meantime Leslie had gotten married to Stephen Recor. Joni
had married Jim. George had married Dar. (sp)
When daddy died Leslie had Branden and Stefanie. Joni had Max and Aaron. Melissa had
Andy and Samantha. George had had a baby with his second wife. Anyway, dad died in 1985.
A year later I retired from work. I guess the rest is just history.

Ross remembers Annivor

I do remember a few interesting things that happened while Ann was at home.

We had a park near by with swings, rings, a slide, and a few other things to play with..
One morning my mother grabbed me and took off for the park. How she knew she was need was
not made know to me. It was nothing magical. I suspects some one had told her by phone.
When we arrived I saw my sister sprawled out on the gravel face down moaning and crying.
When we got her up, she was covered with blood.
It seems that they were climbing up on the slide. Near by was a high bar. Hanging from the
bar with chains were two rings about six inches in diameter. A playmate would swing the rings
toward the person standing on the slide. The person on the slide would then jump or dive for the
rings, grabbing them, and have a pretty good ride or swing through the air.
Ann had dived for the rings and missed. This resulted in her landing face down in the gravel and
sliding through it. She was badly bruised and cut up, but nothing was broken. We took her home
and she made a full recovery.
When I was about fifteen, my father bought a model T Ford. It was a faded light gray in
color and we named it Amapolla. We had many fun trips in it.
On one occasion Ann and her boyfriend, Reese, took it for a spin. Max and I were riding in the
back. Ann was driving. We were on the back country gravel roads having a good time.

179
Max and I had decided to standup with our hands on top of the cab letting the wind blow in our
face. Suddenly Reese grabbed the steering wheel and made a hard right turn. The truck slide in
the loose gravel and Max was thrown out on to the ground. I manage to remain in the back.
Reese realized that we were coming to a tee intersection and running parallel to the road and
right in front of us was a big canal. If he had not made the turn, we and Amapolla would all
landed in the canal. Max was not hurt too badly and we thought it best not to tell anyone what
had happened.
After Ann was married and living in Salt Lake City, we had moved to our apartment in
town over the shoe shop. Max and I had a bedroom in the back. We kept a bedroom for Nola in
the front. She had left her bedroom suite at home..Eventually, I move into her bedroom and use
it as my own. On those occasions when she would come home, or someone else came home, I
slept with Max. I was around seventeen at the time. Ann came home for the weekend and
brought her new husband, George, along to meet the family. We moved them into Nolas
bedroom
I now need to explain that back of the shop, maybe three hundred feet, was the volunteer
fire department housing the fire truck. Back of the building and rising about a hundred feet into
the air was a pole holding a very loud siren. In the event of a fire, it sounded off and all the
volunteers would drop what ever they were doing and run to the engine.
I also need to explain that George was a fighter pilot very recently back from England escorting
bombers over Germany. About two in the morning the siren sounded. George woke from a deep
sleep sure he was in the middle of an air raid. His first thought was to get Ann and himself to a
shelter as quick ly as possible. He grabbed Ann and headed toward the stairs. It took both Ann
and my father several minutes before they could convince him that everything was alright and
that he was safe.

Nola remembers Annivor

Until we moved to Tremonton, we had the care of you. We would come home from school
and find a note from our mother telling us she was about some Relief Society compassionate
service mission and had left you with a neighbor. We were to light the fire, start supper, and
bring you home.
When we moved to the Jensen home, we moved from a rural society to a town society.
Daddy had a management position with the cheese factory. We were in Jr. High School,
thinking of ball dresses and dates, and we grew away from you and you were finding your own
friends with a larger circle to draw from. We began to make pin money baby sitting for our new
neighbors who paid in coin rather than a slice of bake on your way home.
With a smaller home and more electrical conveniences, Mother had more time for social
activities. We were closed in by concrete and pavement and no longer roved with the farm boys
over the dusty roads and sage flats. We now rode to Church in the family car. We didn't carry
you or push you in your buggy and we three split up. Each developing her own interests. Rhea
was in High School, she wore grownup dresses, practiced her piano lessons, and curled her hair
, and began using makeup discretely. This was not done by young ladies to any great extent, but
we all knew about it.
Our common bedroom now had two beds. You and Rhea shared one and Orpha and I the
other. We had a chiffonier with four drawers and we each had a drawer, in descending order,
Rhea the top drawer, mine the next, Orpha the third and yours was always the bottom. You were
so quick to take up grown-up ways. I can see you squatting down, arms wide-spread, opening
your drawer with your clothes in a pile by your side, so grown-up, like your big sisters.
One memory I have of early Tremonton Days, before we learned about the effect of
distance and clear atmosphere on objects at night. There was a huge brush fine in the hills and it
seemed so close that we became alarmed and daddy told us to all get up and get dressed. Orpha
was a real dormouse. She could sleep through wind or high water no matter what. She never
really woke up until her proper waking up time. I could be wide awake at the cough of a snail or
the squeak of a bat, but Orpha slumbered on. So she was the last to get moving. We were all

180
scurrying around in the cramped space we had. We were coming and going from the clothes
closet, which was in the far corner, to the chiffonier which was in line with the closet. Rhea and
I were already dresses when Orpha stumbled away from the closet with her clothes in her arms.
You stomped over to open your drawer to put away your nightgown. (We were very well-trained
to be tidy with our clothes.) You opened your drawer just as Orpha came from the closet and she
walked right into it. You sat there, looking up with wide-open eyes as Orpha tromped up and
down all over your neatly placed under-things. Even Daddy had to laugh at this, but by this time
he had gone outside to assess the problem and came back with the word that it was a false
alarm. The fire was really up on the hills, and to get back to bed and shut up." I don't think
Orpha ever knew what went on or how she came to have such a bruise on her big toe. Rhea and I
laughed until daddy spoke to us again, then we all quieted down.
You were very popular along Main Street in Tremonton, this was a "new town" just
beginning to become the commercial end shopping center for the ranchers and farmers in west
Box Elder County, and, as usual, there was a small "second generation" and you had this sweet
smile and charming manner and comical little sayings, interpreting what you heard us say in
your own baby vocabulary. The businessmen, the ranchers, the farmers and sheep herders
passing by all spoke to you and begin giving you little gifts, toys, pieces of candy and pennies,
which you accepted in your usual princess way. You were used to having much fuss made over
you.
Actually, you had a good little thing going up to the time you started school. But the
depression was ending and we began to build our home on what is now South Tremont Street, a
name which I protested in vain. I wants something marvelous and splendid for our new home.
Something like Purple Sage Lane, or Weed Patch Alley, to be more accurate, for this whole
area was a weed infested field before Daddy bought a lot. (As I remember it they were fields of
alfalfa. rzh). Then other homes came along and the new Tremonton Second Ward chapel was
built just two lots south of us and there we were, back in town again.
The Depression had made it necessary for all of us to find work. We wanted to leave school
and work full-time, but Daddy was against this, as was Mother, so we went to school and
worked part-time. During the summers I worked out on the Faust Valley Ranch in the hills west
of Tremonton, where Thiokol now is. Rhea became a dental assistant to Dr. Donald B. Green,
the dentist, newly established, and later, Dr. Ficklin. Orpha worked first in the J. C. Penny store
as a cashier, and later in the Post Office. After I graduated from high school, I worked as a
telephone operator at the Bear River Valley Telephone Company. As this was shift work, I was
not able to go with the family on their annual vacation to Yellowstone National Park.
Daddy had started his own business. First the shoe repair shop, and we all worked there
after school. Then he branched out into sporting goods and mother began working there also.
Thus started the breakup of our close little family as is right and normal.
I have not mentioned Ross and Max. They did their bit to push you off your throne. They
were as enchanting as you had been and as quick and charming. You were with them more and
more, taking the same place with them that Rhea had had with you.
We three, Rhea, Orpha and I, were interested in dating, MIA, little overnight trips to Salt
Lake City to hear concerts, and the Gold and Green Balls. These were all part of the social
activities of a small town. Daddy was drama, dance and music director of the MI A. He and
mother were very interested in all of this.
At first, we all piled into the car after supper, and went on long drives through this wide,
flat new home land of ours. Here fruit fell unpicked from the trees and melons ripened in open
fields. Here signs were posted on the gate, Come and take away, because the farmers could
not handle all of their produce. We could not believe such an abundance and mother canned and
canned.
One time, on one of the first drives we went on, daddy stopped the car at a melon patch
where people were buying melons from the farmer right in the field. We had never seen any
melon but watermelon which were trucked in and purchased from the trucker in Richfield. We
were very curious about this new activity. Daddy asked the farmer how much he wanted for the
melons, and the man said, Two for a quarter. Daddy gave him a quarter and told the man to

181
put the melons in the trunk of the car. The man began throwing melons into the trunk and daddy
watch in astonishment and finally ask, How much did you say they were? The man spelled it
out, two dozen for a quarter. So we went home with twenty four melons and did we ENJOY
them.
You are perhaps wondering if we gave you the measles after your entry into our private
world. No, but later on we gave you other such goodies such as mumps, whooping cough and
the seven-year itch, which we got every year, as did every kid in the school. We all slept
together and were only bathed once on Saturday and put into clean underwear which lasted the
entire week.
Actually the entire neighborhood had these ailments together as we all ran in a common
herd, and we were then running a neighborhood theater in the old coal shed. We wrote the plays
ourselves and they had a lot to do with wandering sons, parted sisters, emotional reunions, and a
great deal of embracing and kissing. Our little theater probably helped spread these infectious
deceases. But they would have gotten us anyway as being quarantined was not in effect until
the disease was firmly seated.
You, of course, had your little part in these plays. The baby the wandering daughter always
brought home. We never questioned why in our world of melodrama the daughter always had a
baby when she returned home. We got ten cents per crate for crating egging and we spent this
wisely on the Friday night movies. We were well up on the world of Hollywood drama in the
pre-talkie days of movies.
I do not remember if you had mumps. We were rather old when we got those dratted things
and I only had them on one side. I do remember whooping cough. This was a dreadful disease
and many babies died from it. It caused coughing and strangulation and the little baby
struggled, trying to breath. You were walking when you had whooping cough, and mother did
everything she knew how. We fasted and prayed and you were given a blessing and recovered
but I remember mother's anxious eyes as she watched you. Whooping cough actually did not
make one especially sick so we played about as usual until the coughing seized us. Then we just
stood where we were and coughed and strangled until the attack passed over. We all survived
and all the neighborhood gang as well.
We also had chicken pox. Those were the ages of childhood in rural pioneer Utah, measles,
chicken pox, mumps and whooping cough. Smallpox and diphtheria and typhoid were about but
seldom caught in a rural community, and appendicitis was quite common, Marion, died of
appendicitis. There was no treatment for this. How fortunate are the children of today that these
are prevented. Of course polio was not known but
Most of the immigrants were from Scandinavia. They were called Scandihoovians by the
old settlers (the second generation). Germans were called Huns or Krauts, depending upon
immediate events. When we had been particularly annoying, daddy called us Kraut Heads.
When there was a new baby in the family, the father took a dinner spoon and bent the
handle back into a loop. This was the babys own spoon.
As you began to take charge of your life, we no longer gave you 24 hour care. It was no
longer necessary that we get your diapers on the line for the early sun to bleach and no longer
necessary for you to cling to us for protection from the "spooks" and just to hitch a ride.
Recoverable deceases were chicken pox, mumps, measles, and whooping cough. We all
endured the 7-year itch several times each year, along with styes, hang nails, and chilblains.
These were the dread diseases. Black Diphtheria a disease which took a high death toil
was called "black". These diseases were typhoid fever, diphtheria, smallpox, and consumption
or TB, lung congestive fever. People recovered from the normal deceases, they were a part of
life, but the dreaded black diseases were fatal and were remembered with horror forever. I
remember my mother saying one time as she was holding our fat little grandchild, Barbara,
"Children don't die anymore. They are so healthy now. Mothers do not loose their babies now."
I do not know what she was thinking of but I remember the sorrow in her voice and the sadness
in her eyes.
One last memory, We were a family of woman, the bathroom was our morning room,
where we all gathered to bathe, brush our teeth, curl our hair, put on our makeup (our bedrooms

182
did not include cosmetic mirrors, or if they did, they were not used). We all used the bathroom.
Here we gossiped and quarreled and borrowed money or dresses or stockings, the village well,
the Country House morning room. One day you were in the bath tub. I expect you were then
about age 12. Ross, who was about four, he could talk, but we still thought of him as a baby,
pointed to your little budding breasts and said to us all in a tone of great importance, When
Annivor grows up, she will wear a brassier on those things." Shocked stupor Mother shooed
Ross and Max out of the room and told us to "hurry up, breakfast is waiting." Then she had a
talk with daddy, and daddy put in a second bathroom in the basement, and that broke up the
family. The boys were separated from the girls, the men from the women, from then on we knew
we had brothers, and we walked and talked a little differently.
Well, I remember your first ball gown, (Annivor) a blue and pink and violet plaid taffeta
gown, and you had a corsage of sweet peas of the same color. I don't remember the young man
who provided the flowers, there were so many, but George will not want to hear of them. It does
seem they cluttered up the front room a great deal.
And who could forget your talents on the clarinet, I could never understand why Benny
Goodman was so popular until it came to me that he never had a little sister who practices the
clarinet when you wanted the front room for your date. And I have to include this, as I have so
few memories of you in Tremonton. In an old diary I once kept, I noted this comment: April 6,
1937, Snow and Wind. Annivor looks out of the window and says, mournfully, "well, it's back
to long stockings again." We were always eager to get out of long stockings with panty waists
and into ankle socks.

Up date by George Jr
.
This was when George Sr. was getting quite sick. After two years at the Penney Co. in
Kirkland he went on disability retirement. His job at Kirkland was a hard one too. We had a lot
of prestige. We would go to parties with the mayor. We really didn't have much fun. George
was not doing as well as he thought he should.
Every time he would go to get a bonus they wouldn't remodel the store. But we had a nice
house in Kirkland. We thought we had a good life.
The kids were really doing great. Leslie, George and Joni graduated from Mount Lake
Terrace. Then Melissa graduated from Lake Washington.
George's emphysema continue to get worse and he was home on disability. He would take
care of Melissa while I was commuting back and forth to Mount Lake Terrace. In 1985 he died.
In the meantime Leslie had gotten married to Stephen Recor. Joni had married Jim. George
Jr. had married Dar. (sp) (Charleen) (Erin).
By time daddy died, Leslie had Brenden and Stephanie. Joni had Max and Aaron. Melissa
had Andy and Samantha. George had had a baby with his second wife.
Anyway, dad died in1985. A year later I retired from work. I guess the rest is just history.
My marriage with Debbie Pollom produced a wonderful son, Nicholas Devere Job. Although
separated and supported from afar, Nick and I have become quite close over the years.
Today as always, he remains devoted to his lifelong commitment to theatrical
entertainment: After a drama major and degree at University of California at Long beach, for
the last six years, he has struggled to break-in, along with his day job, in New York City.
Recently he began a sort of co-op theater with talented friends they call The Unconscious
Collective.
They have already produced and starred in two plays this year with several more planned
for 2010.
My wife LaRae and I retired in Seattle in 2003 and have lived in Las Vegas for over six
years. We still are not use to such a huge climate change.We are involved in community and
limited volunteering here in Henderson, Nevada. We also spend time in our computer club
where we help out by monitoring and lending a hand when we can.

183
 After my Dad died, Mom met Jim Grubb; a wonderful man who we all became very close
to. The two became Snow-Birds spending mild winters at Ann's condo in Henderson, Nevada,
and returning to Jim's home on Whidey Island in the Pacific Northwest for long summers.
LaRae and I became quite use to their arrival here in early Spring. They truly enjoyed each
others companionship. Jim loved to golf and was a fairly keen gambler as well. He passed away
in April 2008, after a brief bought with lung cancer. He is surely missed.
Mom didn't languish too long after that. In December 2008, she moved back to Washington
State, where she now resides at Evergreen Place, an independent living facility in Renton. Her
health has vastly improved.
My sisters Joni and Leslie live within blocks and Melissa not much farther. She is enjoying
their company along with all her grandchildren and sister Leslie's daughter Stephanie's child
Gia. Stephanie is married to a wonderful man, Ethan Gustav, and they are expecting another
child early next year, 2010. Joni's daughter, Erin, also married a great guy, Shane O'Connell.
Mom has visited them often at their new home in Seattle. My sister Joni also has found a
super guy, Don Heaverlo, and they both also live in Renton. Sister Melissa and Brian remain
happily together and their daughter Samantha recently married another great guy, Bryce. They
both enjoy the ocean and living in the Northwest. George Job Jr.

Genealogy for Annivor Heppler Job

Annivor Heppler
Born 4 may 1924 in Tremonton, Utah
Married George Malm Job Sr. son of Walburn T. Job and Emma Ester Mallm 4 May
1947 in Salt Lake City, Utah. George was born 18 Jun 1924 in Salt Lake City, Utah. He
died 10 Aug 1985 in Seattle, King, Washington.

Annivor Heppler and George Malm Job had the following Children

Stephanie Ann Job Born 1 Mar 1948 in Salt Lake City, Utah, Utah.
Died 1 Mar 1965 in Napa, Napa, California

Leslie Kay Job Born 25 Jun 1949 in Salina, Monterey, California

Married Steven Patrick Recor son of Loren E. Redor and Barbara on
20 Mar 1971 in Kirkland, King, Washington. Steven was born 1 Aug
1948. Divorced

George Malm Job Jr Born 13 Jul 1951 in San Mateo, San Mateo, California
Married (1) Charlene Mc Cumber. Divorced.. No children
Married (2)Debbie Pollum daughter of Norm Pollum and Pat in 1978
in
Coeur d Alene, Kootenia, Idaho. Divorced 1981
Married (3) LaRae

Joni Job Born 22 May 1953 in San Mateo, San Mateo, California.
Married (1) 19 May 1973 to James Patrick Stillman son of Clayton
Stillman and Pat in Seattle, King, Washington. Divorced
Married (2) Doug Hoschek. Divorced Oct 1995 No children

Melissa Sue Job Born 24 May 1961 in Napa, Napa, California.

Married 17 May 1982 to Brian Chris Berg son of Earl Berg and
Janyce in Coeur d Alene, Kootenia, Idaho. Brian was born 3 Sep
1958 in Rapid City, Pennington, South Dakota.

184
 Chapter 14
Rosco Zar Heppler Jr.
My Story

I was born March 8, 1930 in the town off

Tremonton, Box Elder County, Utah in the
rolling wheat fields of northern Utah. It was LDS
to the core and all things were done by the church
or to church standards. It was a wonderful place
to grow up.
I was the fifth child and first boy in a family
of six. The preceding four obviously were girls.
Thus, I was received with great joy. Two and a
half years later, my brother Max arrived. That
gave my father two sons.
The arrival of our brother is really the first
thing I can remember as a child. I was taken to
the hospital and permitted to stand on a chair and
leaned over on the bed were my mother was
lying. I don't remember rather my brother was
with her or not. He was probably there and it was
the reason I was permitted to look on the bed.
My grandmother raised twelve of her own
children, six adopted children and a nephew
whos mother had died at child birth. My father
was the youngest of them all and was considered
the scrapings of the bread dough pan.
My father was an honest, hardworking, strict
German, a shoemaker by trade. He was an Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. Lt. U S Navy 1958
outdoors man and loved to fish and hunt. My
mother was a soft spoken fun loving English woman. They loved each other and the Lord and
served him the best they knew how. They had beautiful voices and loved to sing at every
opportunity. After four daughters, I was the long waited-for son. My brother came two and one
half years later. We were a fun, happy, family of six,
At twenty months of age I fell from a second story landing, fracturing my skull. My injury
was beyond medical help and I was taken home to die. Through a priesthood blessing and a
fathers pray plus a promise made to the Lord, I didnt. The right side of my body was
paralyzed for a while but I recovered with a few minor side effects. I am left-handed and I have
a slight limp.
Both mother and father worked and in my early teens I spent my summers fishing, hunting
and playing Tom Sawyer on the Bear River. However, that soon came to an end. My father felt
that work was essential and by the time I was sixteen I was a full-fledged shoemaker earning
forty dollars a week.
My father was thirty-seven years old, when I was born. I suppose he was around forty
when I started remembering him.
I think I would describe my father as a very fine gem in the rough, very rough. His most
outstanding quality was his honesty. He was totally and completely honest in all his dealings.
His word was his bond. This quality caused him a great deal of trouble because he expected it
in everyone else. He had absolutely no tolerance nor patiences for those people he thought were
dishonest or had treated him dishonestly. This problem led him into semi in activity. He
sincerely thought that both his bishop and stake president were dishonest in their business
dealings with their fellow man.

185
 He loved the outdoors and spent a great deal of time fishing and hunting or at least as much
as time permitted him. He had a good sense of humor and loved a good joke even if it was on
him. He was hard-working and I can never remember getting up in the morning and finding him
home. He was always up several hours before me and had left for work before I had breakfast.
I don't think he was a very patient man. He did have a temper and knew how to cuss when
the The bane of his life was the stitcher in the shoe shop. It was a complicated piece of
machinery and from time to time would get out of whack. He would work diligently to get it
working again, which sometimes took several hours. He became so frustrated with it one time
that he threw the top part in the backyard. It was heavy enough that it took two men to carry a
back.
He loved his coffee and drank a cup every morning and a few during the day. He also like
beer. However, he was very careful to not drink it around me. I also know that when I was very
young (around seven) he would take a drink of hard liquor once in while. I came into the
kitchen one time, it was morning, and there was a fifth of a nearly empty bottle of some kind of
whiskey on top of the refrigerator. They had had a party at the house the night before. When I
inquired as to what it was he poured a little in a teaspoon and gave it to me. I spit it out. I think
it was his way of trying to teach me not to drink liquor. I never saw hard liquor in the house
again, nor did I ever see him drink hard liquor, nor do I think he was ever drunk. I think mother
had a lot to do with that.
He was very adamant on the fact that I should not smoke. He was smoking when he
married my mother and I think that was one of the reasons they were not married in the temple.
The story goes that he saw one of my older sisters mimicking him smoking a cigarette and
mother wanted it to stop. He said he looked at the cigarette and decided it was not going to be
his master. He threw them away and never smoked again.
I think, in his own way he was a perfectionist. That was certainly true in his work as a
shoemaker. He took great pride in being able to restore worn-out and broken down shoes to an
almost new state of repair. He was very good at what he did.
He loved to work with the soil. Every year we had a garden. It was a large and extensive
garden, a very well laid out and planned garden. He also loved flowers. He was known in the
town for his ability to raise beautiful flowers. I know on many occasions people came to admire
or look at his flowers. During the summer, he would furnish the church with flowers on
Sunday.
He was gifted with the ability to visualize the things he wanted to make or do. I know on
several occasions, I would see them squatting perfectly still and appear to be staring off into
space. When I asked him what he was doing, he would say thinking. He was visualizing what
he was going to do and what it would look like when he got through. Fortunately, that was one
of the things he passed on to me in his genes and it has served me well.
We lived in an apartment above the shoe shop on Main Street. I know I had a bed near the
back of the kitchen. There was a large black coal stove, a range not far from my bed. Mother
could work it to perfection. She was a very good cook. On the right side of the stove was a
water jacket. If you want hot water you ladle it out of the water jacket. Later, one of dad's
friends fastened an old water heater tank to the wall back of the range and to the water jacket.
Then if we want hot water, we touch the tank to see if there was any in it. If all this occurred
when I was four or five years old and didn't mean much to me. I am sure it was much more
important to my older sisters. About the only other thing I can remember about living up there
was one Thanksgiving. The front of the apartment had a large outdoor balcony that hung out
over the sidewalk on Main Street. That Thanksgiving, they released a turkey to the crowd and
whoever caught it, kept it. It flew right up onto our balcony and father caught it. We enjoyed it
as our Thanksgiving dinner.
There was a big yard next to the apartment with a clothesline and lawn. I think I remember
it because I have seen photos of me in it. I well remember, the clothesline, though. Washing
clothes in those days was laborious, hard, and took half a day. The washing machine was in the
back yard. I digress to mention that mother made her own soap out of lye and bacon grease and
that father had bought her a very modern washer. Clothes were pressed dry by running them

186
through two rollers. The rollers were under spring pressure and did a very good job of pressing
the hell out of anything that went through them. While that made them very effective, it also
made them very dangerous. This washer was very up to date. If you caught your hand in the
ringer, or as my father indicated, that part of your female anatomgy that could be caught if you
leaned too close to the ringer, you could press a bar at the top and the rollers would fly apart
releasing what ever was caught.
On one occasion my sisters had finished the laundry and had all the sheets hanging on the
clothesline. I don't remember what I had done, but it upset my sisters and they punished me. In
retaliation, I went outside and threw dirt all over the new clean sheets hanging on the
clothesline. That was a fatal mistake. I am lucky I'm still here today to tell about that
experience. I was beaten within an inch of my life and locked in the closet for the remainder
the day.
Father also had a very large black retriever dog that he used when he hunted ducks. He was
over friendly and the first time I met him he commenced to lick my face. It frighten me and I
ran crying into the shop. It amused my father and gave him a good laugh. He informed me that
that was the way dogs kissed and that he like me and was kissing me. I guess I believed him.
Anyway I became very good friends with the dog.
It was while we lived above the shop that I learned it did not pay to steal if you were going
to get caught. I must have been five years old at the time. My father had a cash register in the
shoe shop, and every night he would take the coins from the register and put them in a leather
bag that he had. It was one the Indians had given him. It was made out of deer skin and had
beads on it. It was a beautiful bag. I was in the shoe shop and father asked me to go upstairs
and get the bag. I did is he instructed, however on the way down I paused long enough to
remove a nickel. I didn't think he would miss a nickel or even know it was gone. I can't
remember if I had had time to spend it or not. But I do remember that my father very quickly
blistered my hind end. I am sure if he had done it today, I could' have put him in jail for child
abuse. After I had shed sufficient tears, he held me in his arms and gave me a loving lecture on
the follies of stealing. I think the lesson I learned was that you better not get caught.
It was at this age and at the shop that I learned that knives were very sharp. I got my hands
on a lip knife. (Specialty knife for trimming the new leather sole of a shoe) It was sharp and I
took a nice nick out of my finger. Damage wasnt permeate and I did recover.
Sometime before I was six, we went to the south side of town to look at an alfalfa field. It
had stakes in it with red flags on them. I was told that was where our new home was going to be.
I have no memory of seeing it again nor when we moved in. Friends of the family gave them a
white elephant party shortly after they moved in. They brought all kinds of trash (clean - but
useless) including what was left of an old stripped out model T Ford.. It was winter and it was
soon covered with snow. We played on it and it disappeared that spring.
Growing up in your family was a lot of fun. That doesnt mean we didnt have our bad
times, it just means we were a fun loving family. The best way to describe our family, was that
we grew up on the poor side of town. However, we didn't know it. It wasn't is until I was much
older that I realized we didn't have a lot of money. We ate a lot of bread and milk with cheese
and onions for supper. Most of the time, my breakfast consisted of a large slice of white bread,
homemade, covered with sugar and cream. On Sunday we would have meat and potatoes and
mother would make pie for desert. She was a very good cook. I don't ever remember going
hungry. We were always clean and well clothed. Our house was clean and warm and I had a
good bed. I knew I was well loved.
We seldom celebrated special occasions or waited for a special occasion to receive
something we needed. When you need something, you received it when my parents thought you
were ready for it. I did have a birthday party when I turned six. After that, you generally were
just wished a happy birthday. When it was time for me to have a biking, I was given one.
There was no special occasion, I was just old enough to have one.
I don't remember much about my father when I was very young. He was up and off to work
before I got up. We would have our evening meal together and then I went to bed. It wasn't

187
until I was old enough to start doing chores that I had
much association with him that I remember. He was a
strict disciplinarian and his word was law.
When I wasnt doing chores, I played with the kids in
the neighborhood. There were a lot of them. Father had a
large garden. He loved the soil. My job was to weed and
water the garden. One time he put out some new raspberry
plants and before he left for work I was given the
following instructions. Make sure you change or move
the water about every twenty minutes or these new plans
with die. He left for work and I left to play. I dont
remember what I did, but I didnt get home until evening.
He was waiting for me on the front steps of our house. He
had a large green switch in his hand. In addition to the
garden we had rabbits. Lots of them in hutches out back of
the garden. It was my job to go to the field and pull
sufficient alfalfa to feed them each night. He switched me
all the way out to the field and all the way back. He didnt
hit me hard enough to do and damage, but it hurt. I learned Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. 1948
that he meant what he said. When I had a chore to preform
I better do it.
Mother and father both worked and I pretty much ran wild. It was a small town and very
one took care of us. We really had to work hard to get into trouble. I had a BB gun and spent a
lot of time in the swamps near by killing birds and frogs. Later I had a 4-10 shot gun and 22
rifle. I spent a lot of time on the nearby river fishing and hunting. About age 15 I started
working during the summers weeding onion fields, picking beans, bagging potatoes and
harvesting fruit (apples, peaches, and cherries). We had a sugar factor north of us and many of
the farmers raised sugar beet. Luckily for me, I started working for my father in the shoe shop
before I was old enough to top beets. It was a dirty hard job and I had no desire to do it.
By the time I was sixteen I was working full time each summer in the shop as a shoemaker. I
was making $40 a week. I bought my own clothes and generally just blew the rest having a good
time. We worked six days a week. Saturday was like any other day. Sunday we went to church.
My favorite hobby was and the one I spent the most time with was building model
airplanes. The stick type that flew. I dont know how many planes I have built, but I was partial
to war planes of the 1st and 2nd world war, especially the biplanes of world war one.
My second love was books. Somewhere in my early school I was taught to speed read. I was
doing 400 word a minute in grade school. I had teachers that helped me along and found good
books for me to read. For that I will alway be thankful. The books were westerns, science
fiction, medical history and progress, detective, and anything else that caught my interest.
In the evenings when I stayed home we listened to the radio programs. Otherwise I ran with
the kids in the neighborhood.
We all had our try at playing a musical instrument.. My oldest sister Rhea became a very
good pianist. My youngest sister played the clarinet in the highschool band. They tried me on
everything. I started with a flute, next the clarinet, then the trumpet, moved on to the drums and
ended up with a bass horn. When they had the 8th grade band concert I was only half way
through the main piece when it ended. The music teacher told me that she didnt think I should
try out for band in highschool. I didnt. I couldnt get interested enough to practice the way I
needed too master a musical instrument.
Both my parents had good singing voices. My father sang tenor. The were in church choirs
and quartets. I have a picture of my mother with a group that was called the Agony Song
Birds. I dont remembering them listen to music on the radio. That is all we had.
Dads magazine was Field & Stream. It was a very popular sporting magazine in its day.
I think mothers most favorite was the Relief Society Magazine I had a magazine called
Boys Life Along with these we had the usual church magazines.

188
 We always had a dog or dogs. Nothing else. Dad always had a hunting dog when I was
little. My first dog and the family dog was a blended solid color (black, brown, tan & white)
not spotted short course hair, breed of terrier. We called her Mitzy. I loved her dearly. She was
a house dog and would sleep with my brother and me in our bed. After I was married I was
partial to White Labs. Over a period of time I had five or six different ones.
On Saturday afternoons we went to the movies. It cost ten cents. There was a news reel, a
cartoon, a serial, Perils Of Pauline and the main feature, which was always a Western with
one of the following, .Hop-along Casitdy, Roy Rogers, or Gene Audtry. I am sure there were
others, but I dont remember them. Mostly in black and white. The cartoons were technicolor.
In the summers both my mother and father worked. I ran loose until I was old enough to
work. I think that I started to work about 12 years. I work at weeding and harvesting the
various crop that were produce. For a few years after my sisters were gone, we would spend
a week at Yellow Stone National Park. We loaded up the car and sometime a trailer and take off.
Usually one or two other family would go with us. The father of one of those families was a
dentist and he had a boat. It was a slow six hour drive to the park from where we lived. Both
car and roads were not that good in those days.
In addition to being a great place to fish. ( I could cast a spinner from the shore in to the
lake and catch trout. It was easy.) there were many geysers and hot pools. Old Faithful being
the most famous. There were few camper and lots of fish. There was also a lot of wild life to
see and we bears in our camp all the time. There was an amphitheater back of the main store
where they dumped the garbage. We would go down there in the evenings and watch the bears
eat.
One time I walked out from between two cabins and found myself between a mother bear
and her cub. I took of as fast as I could back between the cabins with her in fast pursuit. I know
the only thing that saved me was that she didnt want to leave her cub. I was careful to look
where I went after that.
When the family moved to Tremonton we were many many miles away from any family. In
addition we didnt have a car. The nearest relative was in Sallt Lake City and that was 80 miles
away and in those day an over night trip.
We never did have any relative live with us. I am sure I did meet some relatives at some
time in my very young life, but I dont remember it.
My parents were active members of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints.
I went to church every Sunday which consisted of Sacrament Meeting, Sunday School and
Priesthood. During the week I attended a youth activity meeting call MIA (Mutal Improvement
Asso) Camping, Box Scouts, and Basketball plus some class time on religious subjects.
I lived in three different places while I was growing up. The first was an upstairs apartment
over my fathers shoe shop on main street. My father then built a house and we moved in
sometime before I was six. That was my first and only real home. At least it was the first for me
and the first that my parents built and own. I dont remember having a street address. I suppose
we did. We lived on the south side of town on I think Center Street.
The house was one story with a full basement. The top part of the basement was high
enough that you could see out the windows on to the street. I think it was what we call an
English Basement today. The house was nearly square and typical of the lathe and plaster
construction of that time period. The front of the house and entrance faced west. You entered at
the center of the front of the house by going up five or six cement stairs to a small covered
landing. Immediately inside was a small alcove with a closet where you hung your coats and
cleaned your shoes if needed. From there you entered into the living room which was
wallpapered and carpeted . There was a large fireplace with a mantel on the east wall with a
floor to ceiling book case to the left. To the right was an arched entrance into the dining room.
A piano set against the south wall. The sofa or couch was against the west wall which contained
a large window. Against the north wall was a large chair and a floor standing radio. I think it
was a Philco. On the east end was the entrance into a hall with a bedroom on each end and
bathroom in between. It also contain two large cabinet between the bedrooms and bath. At the
east end of the hall on the right was the entrance into the kitchen. The north wall had a counter

189
with cabinets and a refrigerator. The east wall had a counter with cabinets and the sink with a
window over it so you could look into the back yard. The south wall had a door leading down
stair to the basement and rear exit. Next to the door was the electric stove. To the right was the
entrance to the dining room. We ate all our meals here.
The basement was divided into two halves with a hall running east and west down the
middle.. The north side was the standard two bedrooms with a bath between. The were two large
rooms on the south side. One contained the coal furnace with hot air ducts going to all the room
both upstairs and down. In addition there was a coal hopper so you could deliver coal to the
furnace on demand by a thermostat on the living room wall. It was very modern and up date for
its time. There was a coal room, plus a wood or coal stove or range that came from our old
house, a sink, counters, and a large closet with doors and shelves which contained the canning
mother did down there. We lived most of the winter on what she canned during the summer
including many quart bottles of deer meat.
The other room served as my and my brothers bedroom. It was twice the size of a normal
bedroom and contained in addition to our double bed a large four by eight plywood table that
father had had specially built just for us. One side contained the track to my electric train and
by turning the top over you had a large table surface to do whatever. The walls were finished
with lathe and plaster and painted. The floors were cement. I think we had a rug under our bed.
It was my responsibility to keep the coal hopper full. That was a challenge at my age and I fail
on more than one occasion. If the hopper was empty, it would emit a gray caustic smoke that
would fill the whole house. I didnt let it happen too many times, but it upset my father greatly
when it did.
When I was fourteen, my father sold the house and bought a building on main street. We
live above the shoe shop again. There were two apartments. One over the shop. The other one
was over a Jewelry store owned by Mr. Ashcroft. He rented it to my dad and in return my dad
heated his building.
There had been a fire in our side and I remember helping to clean out the burned wood and
ashes. The other side was not damaged by the fire but was black from top to bottom with soot. I
dont remember moving in. We all lived together on the rented side while they built a new
apartment over the shop. Dad had painted our side with pink calamine paint. It looked like he
had just turned loose with a spray gun and covered everything. When the apartment was
finished mother and dad moved. Max and I continued to have bedrooms on the other side.
We did have some fun while living there. It was infested with mice. Mother would let us
bring our BB guns to the table while we ate. If one of the beady little things showed up, we
would shoot it. I sent more than one to Mouse Heaven.
Next door to the left was the local Telephone Co. It was owned by a family named Chido.
As they up-graded the phone service in the town, they would throw the old equipement out
back. I collected it. The old crank phones could general a pretty good electrical jolt. They still
worked. I strung a phone from my bedroom in front to Maxs in the back, and one down to the
shop. We were having a great time. My father was so proud of me that he showed Mr. Chido
what I had done. After that, they smashed all the old equipment before throwing out back.
While the new apartment was being build or restored, the sewer line was broken. The sewer
from our apartment flowed in to a a small pond out back. It was there for quite awhile. My
father named it Turd Lake and so it was.
The town was small. We had about twelve hundred people. We had a train station and the
Puddle Jumper (a two car commuter ) that would come up from Odgen at ten a.m. every
morning. That was a big event. The mail plane flew over at twelve noon every day. The big
events of the year would be the 4th of July parade and a fair and rodeo in the early fall. One of
my boy scout projects was to map out the town on a 2 by 3 white board on which I put ever
house and family by name that lived there. Everyone knew everyone. We had a volunteer fire
department, a jail, a weekly newpaper (The Bear River ?), one policeman, two drug stores (City
Drug & Adams Drug), two grocery stores, (Safeway & American Foods) one dry goods store
(Gepharts), a privite phone company, two theaters (Liberty & Orphrem), a bakery, a bank, two
or three gas stations, two pool halls, a lumber company & hardware store, a creamery, a

190
furniture and radio store, a shoe shop, JC Pennys store, a library, three churchs, and a stop
light. On the west side of town was a cannery. We also had a grade school (1 - 8) and north of
town a mile and a half was the high school (9 - 12). It was located between us and the small
town north of us called Garland.
Early on there were hitching posts for horses and wooden board walks. Later it was side
walks and a paved street. No more hitching posts.
It was a farming community, dry farming and the major product was wheat, the next was
sugar beets and alfalfa (hay). There were also many orchards, apple, peach, etc. We also grew
watermelons and pumpkins (for Halloween).
We had good neighbors that looked after each other.
I dont know if I was old enough to have a crush when I was six, but I did have a girl
friend. I think it was more that she lived close by and was about the only one to play with. We
did have a lot of fun together. Although we grew up together, and remained friends, I never
dated her. Somehow we just grew apart.
The grade school was one block north and across the street. I could be to school in five
minutes. It was grades one through eight. It was two story with four class rooms on each end
making sixteen class rooms. There were two classes for each grade. It also had a gym, stage,
and cafeteria.
After I started school there were plenty of children my age to play with. My best boy friend
lived in the next block east of me. We did everything together. The school was just up the block
and across the street. The church was just two doors down from our house. Very next door to
house on the north was a small hospital. The doctor and family lived directly across the street
(west). There were no fences and back or east of us was open fields and two blocks east was a
large wash, half a mile wide, with a river. We had pheasants in our back yard from time to time.
Today that has all changed. There are many, many more people. The areas where I hunted
and ran are now houses in all directions.
During the summers I worked weeding and harvesting the various crops produced by the
farmers.. I weed onion fields, picked bean, apples, peaches, and bagged potatoes.
About sixteen years of age I started working in my fathers shoe shop and became a full
time shoemaker. We put a sporting goods store in the front. In addition to the sporting goods,
we sold model airplanes and bicycles. I repaired bikes, sewing machines, fishing reels, and
guns.
High school was four years, grades nine through twelve, (Freshman, Sophore. Junior and
Senior) I think there were about six hundred students. The school served many communities in
the area. I know there were one hundred and six in our senior class. It was a farm area and
schooling centered around agriculture. We had science classed but I didnt apply myself well.
When I got into collage, I was way behind when compared with students from larger city high
schools. I was smart enough to get Bs with out too much effort and spent most of my time
having fun. I dont think I had a favorite subject in grade school. I did like books and read
science fiction, science, medicine, mystery and westerns.
I did everything a could to get out of classes in high school. I was in student council,
athletic director for all the sports and travel with the team where every they went, class officer,
and ran the motion picture machine when we had movies. I missed enough of my senior physics
class that the teacher only gave nine tenth of a grade. He said I was gone too much. My senior
English teacher (who I didnt like, and the feeling was mutual), told my mother that I earned a
B but he had given me a C grade because I could have earned an A with just a little
effort. He felt I had earned the B with out doing any thing. I do have to admit that I didnt have
to do much to earn a B grade. When I got into collage I dearly regretted how little effort I had
put forth and how little I had learned.
I was small, scrawny, and very un-co-ordinated, weighing about one hundred pounds. I
only weighed one hundred and twenty pounds when I got married. I wasnt very athletic and
didnt do well in games and sports.

191
 I had lots of friends, lots of fun and those things that I couldnt preform well at I didnt
worry about. I could pretty much do and get what every I set my mind to and I was smart
enough not to go after the thing that were beyond my reach.
I think I had about six best friends. If I had to pick on, he would be the one that lived four
miles away and I only saw in high school. I was a member of a gang of five and we ran together
and did everything together. I dont think I had one best friend in that group, we were all best
friends.
I dont remember having a teacher I looked up to. I accepted my teachers as persons of
authority and realized I had to do as they said, but I never got close to one, in fact I think I
avoided them as much as I could. I think they always felt that I should have been doing better
than I was. Maybe it was true but I wasnt having any part of it.
I started dating at the end of my sophomore year. I dated almost constantly from then on.
There were nice dance halls in most of the cities near me and we went dancing a lot of Friday
nights and almost every Saturday night.
We were never chaperoned. I think it was because cars were few and far between. That
made our means of dating limited to who ever could get a car. It also cost money. We generally
went three couples to a car and split expenses. We had to be in by 12 or on special occasion 1
or 2 o-clock. In my late teens my parents didnt restrict me and I could stay out as late as I
wanted.
One of the high lights of my high school days was the Junior Prom. Our class advisor was
the basket ball coach and he was uninterested in what we were doing or at least careless about
our prom. Consequently we did pretty much as we wanted. I was a class officer that year and
along with the other officers, we had big plans.
We chose the theme from a song popular at the time, Song of India. Green was the basic
background color. We had several very good artists and we drew large picture from butcher
paper of plants and thing from India to put on the walls. Whenever we need something we
would go to town and charge it to our account. No one questioned us and our advisor took little
notice of what we were doing. We ran up charges all over town. They made us use money from
our senior budget the following year to help pay off the bills. We really went all out and did a
super prom.
How do I explain my first love and our relationship? It started the last of my sophomore
year. A near by high school was having a Junior Prom. My buddy thought it would be fun to get
dates and go. I had seen a little girl I thought cute, and ask her. She agreed. The theme of the
prom was Stardust. We did the usual dancing and what not until the last dance. They turned
the lights down and played Stardust. She rapped herself around me and I was dancing six
inches of the floor. She introduced me to what it was like to dance close and tight to a beautiful
girl. Stardust has always remained my favorite song. It was my first experience and I liked it.
From then on I made girls my first and only interest. Needless to say, this girl was my one and
only true love throughout highschool.
I didnt have a car and she lived thirty mile from me. The only time I saw her was in
highschool. We dated if and when I could double date with someone who had a car. I was also
very shy around her and felt like our relationship was mostly one sided. I was crazy about her
and she tolerated me. I think also that I realized I had neither the means, money, or education to
support a wife and I wasnt ready for marriage. In other words I wasnt ready to go steady.
My junior year I wanted very much to ask her to the prom but for some reason was too shy
to ask her.. It turned out that she did want to go with me and had turned down an offer in hopes
that I would ask her. Another girl friend told me that she did want to go with me and I ask her.
She accepted and I was elated. Thinking back on it, we did have a good time that night. When I
took her home she invited in for a few minutes. I just stood there wondering what to do. Finally
she walked over and gave me a kiss. It so completely startled me that I thanked her for a nice
evening and left. Boy was I dumb and inexperience.
I dated a lot of different girls in high school after that, but everyone knew who I was crazy
for and it was true. All through highschool she was my one and only true love.

192
 At graduation, my year book disappeared for a day. She had it and had written a full page
of romantic memories in it. When I read it, the thought passed through my mind that she only
wanted someone to date her that summer. I saw her at a college dance that fall. Her date looked
like a real jerk and I dont think she was having much fun. I cut in on a dance and she moved us
to an area where we could be alone. She pressed her body up tight to me and ask me where I
had been. Somehow it didnt ring true. I guess I will never know. I didnt ever date her again
Both grade school and high school were very important to my parents. They expected me to
do well. My father didnt want me to go any farther with my education. I have heard from my
sisters that mother once side she wanted her son to become a dentist. This could be possible
because my sister did work for a dentist and he had one of the biggest houses and nicest cars in
town.
My father had worked hard to build a shoe shop and sporting goods store in the community
and want me to take it over. He was very disappointed when I told him I wanted to go to school.
He said that he had worked all his life to build this business for me. If I walked out on him now
I would get nothing and he would never help me again.
After high school I didnt give much thought to my future. I was working as a shoemaker
for my father and spending the money I made on clothes and a good time. I didnt save a dime.
I did have a good time that summer. In addition to girls and dances, my buddies and I did a lot
of fishing and hunting. Life was too good to worry about the future and I didnt have any plans
for the rest of my life. I suppose I was going to remain in the shop and fix shoes.
There was a small state collage (approx. 4000 students) thirty mile from us in the town of
Logan. The fall after high school graduation most of my buddies left for collage. I convinced
my father that I wanted to go. I think it was because there was nothing left for me to do. All my
buddies were gone.
He agreed to my wish and I went over and signed up at the last minute. You could do that in
those days. All you had to do was show a high school diploma and pay the money. Money was
tight and I had seventy five cents for lunch. I stayed at a dorm that had been converted from an
old grade school. Instead of desks they had put in a bunch of double deck bunks and a locker for
you clothes. There were eight of us to a room.
A cook fixed breakfast for us and it was sad to say the least. I ask for eggs over easy. He broke
them on the skillet, flipped them over and put them on my plate. They were still raw. I dumped
them in the garbage can at the end of the table as I passed by. We survive on the bread and
peanut butter that was keep on the tables.
Not only was the food bad, but from time to time it was contaminated. I had a very very
urgent call to nature one night and made a mad dash for the toilet. It proved to be a waste of
time and energy. There were already six other guys that had got there before me and were
waiting in line with the same problem. It was a bad messy night.
That fall quarter (not three semester but four quarters a year) I didnt apply myself at all
and failed all of my classes. I was over there just for the fun of it. They had a Quonset Hut (used
military building) that had been converted into a student union building. There you could get
the best biggest cinnamon rolls I had ever seen. I ate plenty of them. It was there that I was
introduced to poker. The only money I had was for lunch and I went hungry several times
before I learned that the other boys were far more experienced at poker than I.
What I really studied was the social life at the collage. It was great. My father now had a
car so I returned home and went to work. I use my fathers car, my money and weekend having
a good time at the college...
That same fall a high school girl friend, one I had dated once, and double date with several
time, introduced me to her cousin. She lived in the community where I had tried college. I

193
liked her and started to date her. The distance of
thirty miles made it weekends only. Somehow
I managed to get over to see her almost every
weekend. One thing lead to another and the spring of
1950 I asked her to marry me. She accepted and I gave
her a ring.
I told my mother but not my father. Somehow I
didnt think he would approve. I was right. He
wanted me to serve a mission. At the time I hadnt
given a mission much thought. I knew that there was
a God from a previous experience I had had, but
wasnt too concerned about Him.
My father wasnt active and I wasnt attending
church. I didnt see the need for religion in my life. I
did have a spiritual experience at age fifteen. My
father was deer hunting. I was afflicted with Bells
Palsy and the left side of my face was paralyzed. My
mother was terrified. She was sure that the after
effects of my earlier injury had returned. She took me
into the bedroom. We knelt together by the side of the
bed and she asked the Lord to heal me. Words cant
describe the feeling at that moment but I was healed Shirley Adelle Burns
instantly. I was too young to really appreciate all that
happened. But one thing was certain. I had been healed and I knew that there was a God. I also
knew that my mother had talked to him and He had answered. I am sorry to say that my next few
years were not as good as they should have been. While I didnt do any really serious sinning,
church attendance was sparse and religion was not an important part of my life. While I knew
there was a God, I didnt have much time for him.
My father reminded me that because my life had been spared when I was twenty month old,
he had promised the Lord that I would serve a mission. He expected me to fulfill that promise. I
was caught between a rock and a hard spot. After many discussions, I agreed to go.
Telling my future wife was not as hard as I had expected. She was upset and disappoint but
it turned out that she had been waiting for a missionary when I started dating her. She said she
would wait for me. I didnt believe her. She hadnt waited before, why would she wait now. I
wanted the ring back. She wouldnt give it to me. We solved the problem by getting married.
I was under age. My mother had to sign for me to get the marriage licence. We got our
endowments on Thursday March 6, 1950 in the Logan Temple.
The original plan was to return on Saturday to get married and have the reception that
night. Someone suggested that we might as well get married while we were here Thursday. It
seemed like a good idea and we did. We drove to Salt Lake and got a motel. Three days later,
Saturday, we returned home for our reception. Our small town was no different than any other
and everyone know everyones business. I was the first of the group of boys I had run with in
highschool to go on a mission. I doubt the town had any hope for any of us. My wifes cousin
held a reception for us at her home and everyone came. The town support was great.
One of the more well to do man in the town had purchased a motor boat and trailer in Las
Angles, CA. We put a hitch on my fathers car and he gave me enough money to go down there
and get the boat. It made it possible for us to have a nice honey moon trip to California.
I left for a mission six weeks later. I was gone two and a half years. I couldnt have ask
for a more supportive wife. She wrote me weekly and truly did love me. It was her support and
determination that made me what I am. With out her I would have never made it.
.. Being a missionary was new to me and although I tried to do the Lords work, I dont
think I was very good at it. In spite of my weaknesses, the Lord continued to love and bless me.
It was while on my mission that I received a personal experience that solidified my testimony.

194
From that time forward there has never been any doubt. My mission was the turning point of my
life. My wife helped support me both financially and spiritually.
While I was gone she worked as a telephone operator at nights and saved money so I could
go to college. She came out to see me twice. When it was time for me to return she moved to
Provo and got an apartment for us. I immediately started school. At BYU.
I wanted to be a professor and teach at some university. When I started back to collage my
wife want me to go to medical school. She wanted an MD for a husband. I didnt see any
problem with it. I need something.
My father was not happy with my decision to go to college. He had build the shoe shop and
sporting goods store for me. At least that is what he said. I think he meant it. In any event, his
final word to me when I told him I was going to get an education was, I built this business for
you and if you leave me now, you walk away from everything. You will never get any help
from me. At the time he meant it. I think later we repented. He never did help financially, but
I think he was responsible for my brother-in-law sending me six hundred dollars when it was
need to pay tuition one quarter my sophomore year at Northwestern.
The three plus year of college were tough. We didnt do much but work and go to school.
In the meant time Steve came along. He was a perfect child and we loved him dearly.
My mission had kept me out of the Korean War. The home town draft board was
determined that I should serve. They sent me a draft
notice the week after I returned from my mission. The
minute I started college, I joined the ROTC which gave
me an exemption. When Steve was born my classification
was changed to 3A. That kept me out of the service while
I was in school.
During this time we moved back to Logan and I
finish my pre med at Utah State Agriculture College. It
was a land grant college and a transcript from it was far
better than from BYU. Shirleys parents had converted
their garage into a small apartment for students and gave
it to us rent free. It was a life saver. It also let Shirley be
with and get help from her mother when Steve was born.
I managed to pull a 3.6 grade average and was invited
to join the Alpha Epsilon Delta Honor Pre Med Society,
which I did. I wanted all the help I could get when it
came time to apply to Med School.
The time finally arrived to apply to med school. My
applications were turned down because some where along
the way I had failed to get a quarter of embryology. It was
not available until the following spring. That meant
another year of college. We were tired, broke and Shirley
was pregnant with David. I could see my medical dreams
fading fast. My buddy, who I had studied with for the
last two years , was on his way to dental school. He said
Shirley and Ross 1953
with my transcript and grades I was a sure thing for dental
school. I applied and was accepted. I did have to take another fifteen hour of science that
summer. Come fall we left for Chicago and dental school.
I could write a book on my four years in Chicago. Mostly I studied and worded. I learned
that you could get a job anywhere if you were honest and worked hard. They didnt care if you
knew the job. They would train you. These are the jobs I can remember.
At college I started by working in a shoe shop in Logan. I repaired, dyed and shined shoes.
Then the Del Monte Canary, collage dairy farm, furniture store delivering furniture, book store.
In Chicago I started working the counter in a book store, then the Florshine Shoe factory, shoe
salesman in a dry good store, bar tender and delivery boy, metal sheet polishing factory, fork

195
lift driver, night guard for various places, (conventions
- hotels ), brakeman for the Pennsylvania Rail Road,
and as a Red Cap at Union Station.
If I thought college was tough, dental school made
it seem like a vacation. In college I usually knew the
five or six people in the class of thirty who were after
the As. You knew who your competition was. My first
mid term exam in chemistry at dental school was to
explain the O - CO gas exchange that occurred in the
blood. I filled two blue books and felt very good about
what I had done. I received a grade of 94 and a D.. It
was two points below class average. Out of the class of
100 students, 60 of them had written a better paper. It
was a real wake up for me. I did manage to make the
deans list my sophomore year. After that, I was
working full time plus school and I managed to
graduate on time.
By now we had two boys. David was born
November 12 our first year in Chicago. A few weeks
later it was determined that he had a sub dural
hematoma. It was serious. Thanks to the doctors and
medical center he was operated on and the problem
corrected. It was all done gratias because I was a dental
student at the time. He did suffer from the effects of
the hematoma. His one eye was crossed and it was a Ross Shirley 1058
challenge for him the rest of his life.
The end of my junior year I applied for and received a commission in the US Navy as an
Ensign. It paid me $265 a month. That was a god send. I no longer had to work and could spend
all my time getting out of school.
At graduation, I still owed the school $900 in unpaid tuition. They let me march across the
stage and get an empty box. I sent them the money three months later and received my diploma.
The Navy shipped me to Sasabo, Japan. My family and I were to travel there by ship. There
was a flare up in the middle east and they refused to let my family go. I was flown over on a
four engine Constellation. It was the best there was at the time. It took twenty four hour and
two stops. The first in Hawaii, second at Wake Island and finally we arrived at the navy base at
Yokohama, Japan. From there I was flown to Sasabo. My wife and family arrived by ship some
six weeks later. We were there two years. It was a nice relaxing change from the rat race we had
been in for the last eight years. Japan had it problems and limitations but we made the best of it
and thoroughly enjoyed out time there.
I loved the military way of life. It was orderly and routine. At seventeen I joined the
National Guard. We were the 204 Field Artillery Battalion at the Armory in Garland, Utah. Our
job was to fire a 155 millimeter self-propelled rifle. It was a tank with a gun on the top of it. I
was the gunnery corporal, which meant that I pulled the lanyard that fired it. It had about a
three foot recoil and if you wanted to stay out of harms way, you were to the side of it when it
was fired. The projectile was so large that it took two of us with a metal tray to carry it to the
rifle. Training was one night a week at the armory and then two weeks in the summer were spent
at Fort Williams south of Salt Lake City on maneuvers. That was a blast.
While I was at collage at BYU, I was a member of the ROTC Air Force Unit. It was my
intention to learn to fly. Marriage and studies brought that dream to an end.
In Japan our navy base was considered a remote area so we were initialed to ten days R&R
to Hong Kong. It was a fun time. We had traded with another family and took their children so
they could go and they in turn took care of ours while we went.
From Sasabo, they transferred me to the Naval Training Center at San Diego, CA The
officer in charge of traveling billets wrote my order to end in Hawaii. That meant that we had to

196
lay over in Hawaii until they could find us a flight home. That took a week. We stayed with my
friend who was stationed there. It was a real nice vacation.
I remained there for another three years. The United States was at peace at that time and I
never saw any combat nor was in any danger during my time in the Navy
The Navy Training Center in San Diego was a real change. In Sasabo I was the senior
lieutenant with only fiver other officers that out ranked me. Of course they were Captains.
Also, I was doing the dentistry for the Navy dependants in Sasabo so everyone treated me very
well. At San Diego I was one of fifty lieutenants and my rank didnt mean crap.
While stationed in San Diego we bought a tract house in Spring Valley Estates twenty miles
east of San Diego for $400 down and payments of $112 / month. It was a cute little house with
three bedroom, two bathes, living room, kitchen and garage. It was new and we had to do all the
landscaping. It was directly across the street from the school which suited us fine. We also
bought a used 1959 white four door Chev for $1800. It was a sweet little car.
We spent the next three years living in Spring Valley with me driving twenty miles into the
Navy Base each day.
We added Ann to our family Feb. 24 1961. She was a sweet cute little baby. She was a
happy addition to our family.
A few months after her birth, Shirley went into post-partum depression. We tried
everything we could to help her recover. Nothing worked. Finally she went on Lithium. That
helped to stabilize her, but she was never really the same again.My wife was of a different
temperament and wanted me out. It is possible that had she liked navy life as I did, I may have
made it a career.
I think the main reason I left the navy was that we, my wife and I, wanted the challenge of
private practice. I wanted to see if I could make it on my own. She wanted the house, money,
car, and prestige of being a doctors wife. Another was that with her illness, I didnt think I
could leave her by herself.
I left the Navy in July 1965. We both wanted private practice and were on our way to
Oraville, California as a possible place to start. We stopped off at Los Gatos to visit with a
friend I had known at dental school. He was practicing there. He was looking for an associate
and invited me to join him. I did. We started our live in private practice in Los Gatos,
California. Two years later, I moved into my own office about a mile from where I had been
practicing. My buddy was busy enough that he let me take all by patients with me. From then
on, I was always busy.
When we first arrived, we tried to purchase a house, but I could not qualify. When I got my
own practice two years later, we tried again and were successful. We bought a home in a small
community next to Los Gatos called Monte Sereno. It took everything we had and really
strapped as to get the house, but it was what we wanted. The builder took a $3000 note, I
borrowed $3000 on credit cards, and sold some stock for $2000. With that we were able to
make the down payment and move in.
I was making payments to everyone. We had to live in the house for two years without
anything. We couldn't even afford blinds on the windows and covered them with newspaper. In
three years I had paid off all the small loans and only had the main mortgage to worry about.
The house had increased in value so we refinanced the loan for an additional $15,000 and put in
carpet, drapes, a swimming pool, fence, and landscaping. We were now living high on the hog
and spending every dime I could make. Things seemed to be going pretty good.

197
 Monte Sereno Home

Steve Ann David Greg

Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. & Shirley Adelle Burns Family 1979

198
 Then we added another boy to the family. We named him Greg. Shirley went through the
pregnancy and delivery without any apparent problems. As time progress, she continues to get
worse. Nothing seemed to help. Finally it was decided that maybe if we were under less
pressure to keep up with the Jones, we would do better. I let her go to Utah and buy a house in
Provo. I stayed to sell both the practice and home in Los Gatos.
Life had been good to us in Monte Sereno. Both older boys had gone on missions .The
oldest, Steve was married, and attending school at BYU. David was going to a junior college at
home. Ann was doing well in high school.
When we move to Provo, with the exception of the mortgage on the new home, we were out
of debt, had two cars paid for, and $100,000 in the bank. I had agreed to move on the condition
that I could go back to BYU and get a degree in law. I had passed all the entrance exams and
had been excepted.
In spite of all we did, Shirley continued to go down hill. She required several period of
hospitalization for her depression. In the meantime I was doing my best to keep up in law
school
I came home from college one day to find she was gone. She had moved back to California
with Greg. She wanted Ann to go also, but she had refused. It happened right at final exams. I
didnt do well.
Trying to locate where she was in California proved to be a problem. It took me three
months and then I didnt have her address.
In the meantime she divorced me. I made the mistake of not fighting her. Her lawyer took
me for everything. When I realized what the judge had done I called him a son of a bitch and he
nearly put me in jail. I didnt even have a car, nor could I buy one. Greg was to stay with her.
To make a long story short, a former bishop and friend called and wanted to know why I
wasnt doing something about Greg. I during the day. I ask him what he would do if I flew out
there and kidnaped Greg. He said he would help put him on the plane. I flew out and got Greg.
I got a real estate licence and tried that. Didnt like to work nights and weekends. Went to
San Diego and got a job in a dental clinic. Shirley had moved me out of the house so I rented a
house for me and the three children.
Monday morning I would fly to San Diego and stay for the week. Work in the clinic and fly
back Friday afternoon. Spent Saturday cleaning house, doing laundry, buying groceries, and
what every else was needed for the kids. Monday morning I flew back. During the week the
neighbors watch the kids. They were on their own for meal. I did this for the summer.
When it was time for school, I realized that Greg was too young to go it on his own. I put
David in an apartment with some of his friends and in college. Ann I placed with a family that
had a daughter her age and they were good friends. Ann wanted to stay in Provo her senior year
in highschool. I took Greg with me and moved to San Diego.
Shirley found out we were in California and went back in to court demanding that Greg
was to spend time with her. The told him she had a restraining order against me. She was
leaving Greg with hin court agreed. (DUMB ASS COURT). I was to send him up to her for six
weeks. He wanted to know what to do if she refused to let him return. I told him I would come
and get him. She refused to return him.
I had a pretty good idea of where she was living. I drove to San Jose (four hours) and park
in front of the school where I thought Greg would be. Right at the last minute she drove up and
let him out. She left. I drove up and honked. He came over and got in the car and we left.
A ways down the road I called to tell her that I had Greg..A policeman answered and said that I
had kidnaped him and if I didnt return him, I would be arrested. We went to a park and spent
the morning playing. I figured that if they were looking for me they would be a head of me.
That afternoon I drove on into San Diego.
I moved Greg from one friend to another for a month so she couldnt find him. I then went
to court and kept Greg. The court still required Greg to spend six weeks with her every summer.
When he was sixteen and with his mother, he called and said that if he would stay with her
she would buy him a car. I refused to be bribed. He stayed with her. She went back to court and
got child support to pay for his car.

199
 During all this time I had started to date a little.
One evening at church ( I was working with the
Explorers) the bishop told me that the stake president
wished to see me. I went to his office and he informed
me that they were having a Labor Day Weekend
Singles Conference and they needed a chairman. I told
him I was not interested in the singles program. I did
not participate and I wanted nothing to do with it. He
ask me if I sustained him as stake president. I relied,
Yes. He said, Good. The meeting is down the hall.
It started fifteen minutes ago. You are late.
I presided over the singles conference. There I met
Buena. I wasnt ready then. A year later I met her at a
singles conference in Mesa AZ. We started dating the
middle of November and we were married in the
middle of January.
They immediately put me in the bishopric of the
San Diego First Ward. After five years the stake
president said that if we would put our affairs in order
he would let us go on a mission. We did. While we
were waiting, we spent three weeks touring the Far
East on a medical write off. When we return, he said, Ross Buena 2000
I have your mission call. You are going to be the
bishop of the San Diego First Ward. We served for five years..
We have been together for twenty eight years with a combined family of seven children and
twenty six-grand children and an equal number of great grand children.. She has supported me
as a bishops counselor, high councilor and then bishop. I supported her as Relief Society
President and ward chorister. With Buenas help and that of many others we put together a
book called Many Hands, a History of the Church in San Diego. It was a two-year labor of
love. At the dedication of the San Diego Temple, it was one of the items placed in the
cornerstone.
Finally, he let us put our mission papers in and we received a call to serve an eighteen-
month mission to Malaga, Spain. Upon our return, we built a new home in Show Low, Arizona.
Then we spent a year in Orlando, Florida as temple missionaries. Next we served two years in
the Family History Mission in Salt Lake City.
We had a call to serve in the Navuoo Temple but couldnt pass the physical. Buena was
diabatic . While we were trying to get that worked out, I got blood clots in my lungs. When
SLC found out, they cancelled the call. We now spend out time working in the Snowflake
Temple.

200
Genealogy for Rosco Zar Heppler Jr.

Born 8 Mar 1930 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah

Married (1) 2 Mar 1950 to Shirley Adelle Burns in Logan, Cache, Utah Shirley was born 30
Oct 1930 in Belle Fourch, Butte, South Dakota the daughter of Frank Truman Burns and
Annie Elizabeth Hansen.. She died Jan 1989 in Provo, Utah, Utah. Divorced 1975
Married (2) 17 Jan 1981 to Buena Lorain Pearce in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona

Rosco Zar Heppler Jr. and Shirley Adelle Burns has the following children.

Steven Frank Heppler Born 26 Jul 1953 at Logan, Cache, :Utah

Married (1) Blanche Seeley 25 Jun 1975. Divorced
Married (2) Paula Cary

David Ross Heppler Born 12 Nov 1954 at Chicago, Cook, Illinois

Married Lorna Dee Skyles on 31 Jul 1981

Ann Elizabeth Heppler Born 24 Feb 1961 at Spring Valley, San Diego, California

Greg Roger Heppler Born 9 Sep 1968.

Married Danene Marie Tunney 11 May 1987
Died 7 Jul 1981

Ross Buena

201
 Steve Heppler Grandad Heppler Grana Heppler David Heppler

202
 Chapter 15
Max Ronald Heppler
By R Z Heppler Jr.
Born 4 Nov 1932 Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah
Death 8 Jan 1998 Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah

My earliest recollection of life happen at my

brothers birth. I was taken to the hospital and
remember standing on a chair at the bedside looking at
my mother. She had given birth to my brother.
He was born November 12, 1932 at the hospital in
Tremonton, Box Elder Co., Utah. He was the sixth
child and 2nd son of Rosco Zar Heppler Sr. and Elmira
Farnsworth Heppler. It was unfortunate that our family
was so spread out. I have very little remembrance of
my sisters.
My youngest sister, Annivor (always Ann) was six
years older and we were never close. My sisters older
than her were married or gone from the house by the
time I was twelve years of age. I have very little
memory of spending much time with any of them.
I also did not play a lot with my brother. At least
not that I can remember. He was two and half years
younger than me and too young to do the things I did.
I do recall a couple of incidents, one with my sister
Annivor and Max.
We had a Model T Ford named Amapolla and she Max Ronald Heppler
had a boy friend named Reese. Ann was learning to
drive. Reese was teaching her. Dont ask me how she got her hands on the model T, I dont
know. We were traveling down a graveled back road. Max and I were standing up in the back
looking forward and no doubt thinking we were having the time of our lives. Ann was driving.
We came to a tee intersection. Just past the road running perpendicular to the one we were fast
approaching was a large canal full of fast running water. Reese saved the day by grabbing the
steering wheel and making a very sharp sliding right turn. It seemed like gravel flew
everywhere. It saved all of us from going into the canal. I managed to stay aboard as we make
the sharp turn. My brother wasnt so lucky. He was thrown from the back of the truck on to the
bank of the road. Fortunately no bones were broken and he was not skinned up enough that you
could tell he had been in a near accident. We were sworn to secrecy under fear of death not to
tell our folks and I dont know if they ever knew or not. We were lucky.
The other happened one Halloween. The night before Halloween a group of us were out
looking for pranks we could pull. As we were running down the sidewalk, we encountered a
sprinkler running on the sidewalk and it sprayed us with water.. At first, we were mad. Then we
had a brilliant idea. We kinked the hose to shut off the water and placed the sprinkler on his
porch facing the front door. We rang the door bell and hid in the near by bushes waiting to see
his reaction as he opened the door and got a face full of water. He never came to the door.
When it was apparent that he was not coming to the door, we lost interest and moved on.
Halloween night we were out again. Much to our surprise, there was the sprinkler out on the
sidewalk just like the night before. It was a good prank the night before, so why not do it again.
So we did. Before we could ring the bell, out the door he came. We ran in all directions as fast
as we could. Max, being the youngest, was also the slowest. He got caught. We were known, at
least me and my brother. I dont know if he told my father. However, next door to his house
was a family that had a cow. I dont know what arrangement they had with my father, but it
was my job to go there each evening and get a pail of fresh milk for the family. For several

203
nights after the Halloween prank I bribed my friend into going over and getting the milk. I had
no doubt that he was waiting for me. My fears were for not, for what ever reason, he never
showed and nothing else every came of it.
During our highschool years my father purchased a Kaiser automobile. It was a black
sedan and had some nice features. One was an overdrive. It was possible to start the car in low
gear, gun it, kick in the overdrive and be doing fifty miles and hour before shifting in to second
and then high gear. If done right, you could out dig anyone in town. I never drove with my
brother, but after using it for a night, he would bring it home completely out of oil.
The local highway patrolman was a good friend of my father. Whenever he came into the shop
both my brother and I would go out the back. He told my father that he was laying for my
brother but as of yet had not caught him. We cooled it for a while after that.
The spring of my senor year Max wrecked the car. He said it was due to brake failure. It
was due to some ice on the road. A mile east from Tremonton was an intersection , (four way
stop), know as the Crossroads On the south east corner was a burger and malt shop and
everyone went there from time to time. On the north east corner there was at one time a gas
station. It was current closed. The pumps had been removed but the two posts that held up the
over hang were still standing in front. His friends, coming from the west, had stopped at the
intersection and then gunned through, stopping in front of the station. Max did the same thing.
However, in front of the posts was some ice. When he applied the brakes, nothing happen. He
took out the two posts with the head lights of the Kaiser. He couldnt have lined the car up
better if he had tried. No one was hurt. Other than broken head lights, bent fenders, and a
cracked windshield, the car could still be driven. When I found out, what every happened
between my father and brother was over. I was asked to drive the car to Logan to get it
repaired.
That summer he did it again. This time he was driving with one arm in a cast. He was
trying to drive and put his arm around his date at the same time. He missed a curve and rolled
the car over. No one was hurt but it put the car out of commission for quite awhile. When the
insurance agent came around he ask dad if he was going to continue to let the boys drive. He
said, Sure. Thats why I insure it. The agent cancelled the insurance.
Three miles north of us and contingent to us was the city of Garland. In between there
were farm lands and apple orchards. Right between the two communities was the high school.
Garland had a Utah State National Guard Unit. Its official title was the 204 th Field
Artillery Battalion. Its main attraction was a 155 mm self propelled rifle. It was fun to drive,
ride on and fire. All of us joined up, Max included. He lied about his age. He was 17.
The spring of 1950 I resigned to serve a mission for the LDS church. Three months later
the Koran War started. Max and the guard unit were shipped to Korea. They were the first unit
to get there. He left a young boy and returned a season war veteran. It completely changed his
life style. He was smoking, drinking and basically running wild as were many of his buddies
when they returned.
He met and married Ruth Fillmore. She had a stabilizing effect on him and they settled
down to married life.
At first, he worked for his father in the shoe shop repairing shoes and selling sporting
goods. They next tried living in California near his sister Ann and her husband George Job.
They didnt like it and returned to Tremonton and he again worked for my father. Max bought
the shop from his father who retired and moved to Mesa, Arizona.
He and Ruth built their home in Tremonton and never left there again. My association with
them was infrequent at best. The only time I saw them was when we made trips to Utah for
family visits.
Max became a successful business man and was well respected by the community as the
following articles indicate.

204
 Max Shoe Shop

Max Korean War Ruth Fillmore Heppler

He met and

205
married Ruth Fillmore. She had a stabilizing effect on him and they settled down to married
life.
At first, he worked for his father in the shoe shop repairing shoes and selling sporting
goods. They next tried living in California near his sister Ann and her husband George Job.
They didnt like it and returned to Tremonton and he again worked for my father. Max bought
the shop from his father who retired and moved to Mesa, Arizona.
He and Ruth built their home in Tremonton and never left there again. My association with
them was infrequent at best. The only time I saw them was when we made trips to Utah for
family visits.
Max became a successful business man and was well respected by the community as the
following articles indicate.

Jaycees Install Officers

At their annual Inaugural Banquet, held May 28, at the Garland Cafe, Tremonton Junior
Chamber of Commerce installed Max Heppler as President; Gareth Larsen and Norvel Estep,
Vice Presidents; and Darwin Brough, Kenneth Porritt, Errol Bowcutt, Gary Christensen, and
Jim Anderson, directors. Max Adams was retained as Secretary and Treasurer. Outgoing
president is Jim Anderson.
State President Keynotes: Guest and Keynote speaker of the evening was Carman Kipp,
immediate past president of the Utah Jaycees, from Salt Lake City. In a very inspiring talk he
informed the local club that the Jaycees does not guarantee its itself, he said. By a small
amount of self sacrifice and an energetic positive attitude, a local club can preform wonders in
civic service and develop outstanding leaders in the community, Mr. Kipp concluded.
Following the keynote address, several new members were initiated into the club, and were
pinned by Mr. Kipp and Ted Whitney, National representatives of the Utah Jaycees.
Following the installation of new officers. Jim Anderson turned the gavel and Leadership
over to new president Max Heppler. Mr. Heppler in turn, presented Mr. Anderson with a gift
from the club in appreciation for his outstanding service. A corsage was presented to Mrs.
Anderson for being the cooperative wife that is so necessary for a Jaycee president.

SALT LAKE CITY

Tremonton Man Wins DSA Award for State

A 32 year old Tremonton man who earlier won his community's Distinguished Service
Award Saturday night was named one of three outstanding young men of 1964 in Utah.
Max R. Heppler. Tremonton civic leader and merchant, received the state award at the
Utah Jaycees annual awards banquet along with Salt Lake City veterinarian Dr. Clark D.
Vander Hoff and Magna educator Normand L. Gibbons.
Rep. Laurence Burton, R Utah, introduced the 31 nominees for the award and Gov. Calvin
L. Ramptott. Sen. Frank F. Moss. D Utah. and Secretary of State Clyde L. Miller officiated at
presentation ceremonies. Keynote speaker at the awards banquet was Sen. Alan Bible, D Nev.
Candidates for the outstanding young men honors were jugged on contributions to their
communities or the state, participation in all around activities. evidence of lasting contribution
to the community, exhibitam of leadership ability and personal or business progress.
Mr. Heppler, father of four children, owns and operates Hepp's Shoe and Sporting Goods
Store. He is a member of the City Council in charge of budget and finance, former president of
the Bear River Valley Chamber of Commerce and Tremonton Garland Jaycees and active in
politics.
He was cited for his work with rnentally retarded children of Bear River Valley and
instrumental in the establishment of a golf course in Tremomton. During his term as Chamber
of Commerce president. the membership increased over 50 per cent.

206
 Mark Kurt Wendy Brad
Max Ronald Heppler & Ruth Fillmore Heppler Family

Obituary

Max Ronald Heppler died 8 Jan 1998. There was a large gathering at his funeral and his
honor guarde and pallbearers were members of the Volunteer Fire Department. His casket was
carried to the cemetery in the back of a fire truck. Traffic control was by the firemen. He was
laid to rest in the Tremonton Cemetery.

Genealogy of Max Ronald Heppler

Max Ronald Heppler born on 4 Nov 1932 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Died 8 Jan 1998 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Married 21 May 1956 Ruth Elaine Fillmore, daughter of Verne Browerton Fillmore and
Olive Merrillon in Corinne, Box Elder, Utah, USA. Ruth was born on 27 Feb 1938 in
Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

Max Ronald Heppler and Ruth Elaine Fillmore had the following children:

Wendy Heppler Born on 29 Jan 1958 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.

Bradley Max Heppler Born on 9 Mar 1960 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA

Mark Ronald Heppler Born on 12 Mar 1962.

Kurt Fillmore Heppler Born on 21 Mar 1969 in Tremonton, Box Elder, Utah, USA.
Died on 17 Aug 1993 in Texas, USA. .

207
 What it was like growing up in Tremonton
By Mark Heppler

I was born March 12, 1962 back when Tremonton was a small town quite town with one
stop light. As I was growing up, I was mostly going in and out of the hospital because of my
Epilepsy or seizures.
Both my parents were very protective of me. Even with seizures, I had a normal childhood.
I played with the neighborhood kids. We had a movie house where we went to for movies.
There were a variety of stores on main street. Some were insurance offices and some were
clothing. We even had a lumber store.
Here are some of the stores we had on main street. Jim and Daves Conoco, .The Feed And
Seed Grainery, Anderson Lumber, Farmers Bureau Insurance Group, Northlands Clothing
Store, Bowcutts Reception Center, Lowell's Conoco , the Western Trails Cafe which was also
the bus stop, J. C .Penney, The leader Building, Hamilton Drug Store with an ice cream parlor
inside, Napa Auto parts, Carl and Dons Grocery Store, Safeway Grocery Store, Kings,
Northern Furniture Store, Artie Circle Dive In, Lees Auto Parts, Kreys Chevron, and Gepharts
Clothing Store.
Of course there was my dads shoeshop. As I got older, my dad had me come down to the
shop and put Schwinn bikes together. He also asked me to help the customers that came in and
clean and dust the shop.
When I was in 7th grade I started to wrestle. Dad could not take time off to come and see
me wrestle so my mom had to. I also started in the band. In the summer I was in the Marching
Band. When we had our Fair Parade, all main street closed down and dad watched me from the
store. I could tell that he was proud of what I accomplished.
As you know Uncle Ross, mom and dad drank. When he got home from work, we had to go
to our rooms so mom and dad could have some time together. Dad always had financial stuff to
do for the fire department. He was a volunteer fireman for 40 years. He did his own books for
the shop too.
Growing up at the house was like any other household I guess. We had discipline and rules
to go by. If we stepped out of line we were disciplined for it. Wendy and Brad got most of the
disciplining. I was too afraid of my dad too do anything too wrong.
Living with dad and mon was great. There always love in our home. Mom even worked at
Thiokol for a while to help dad out with the financial stuff.
As we kids got older, I enjoyed being with my dad at the shop. I helped him with the shoe
repair. All in all, I have fond memories of my dad and mom. I also have fond memories of the
shop.
In 1995 a fire destroyed the shoe shop and other stores on that section of main street..We
now have a park and war memorial there.

208