Dennis and the Mormon Battalion

By Mabel Harmer

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Chapter 4 – Mule Boy

For several days they drove along the rough road in comparative well=-being. Then one of the oxen became lame and the Martins were forced to drop behind. For one frightening night they made camp entirely alone. By morning, however, the oxen seemed to be all right and, to add to their relief, a young man by the name of James Brown came by looking for stray cattle.

“Will you ride with us, Mr. Brown?” asked Mrs. Martin as he came up to the wagon.

“Sure, Ma’am, I’ll be glad to,” he answered. “I reckon I can look for cattle just as easy from a wagon seat as I can from the ground.” He made a place on the wagon seat by taking Sam on his lap and Dennis drove out onto the road.

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Here’s a suggested craft for the Seagull Girls (12-14-year-olds) of 1923. I’d have had fun making these – still might – but probably at a slightly younger age than 12.

“Lovely colored beads may be made from old magazine covers,” the instructions say. Covers were the only pages in magazines of that era that were printed in color – we’d have an easier time today with all the color advertisements and inserts available. “The picture or design of the cover will not count, of course, except to give varied color effect.”

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Luther Merkins Winsor (1884-1968) was born in Southern Utah and spent most of his career working on development the water resources of the state. When he left Utah, though, he really left town – his professional life took him to Chile in the 1920s, and to Iran in the 1940s.

Early in his five-year service in Iran, Time Magazine featured Bro. Winsor in an article about U.S. advisers to the Shah of Iran:

… Thoroughly embroiled in Persia’s entangled politics and economy are seven U.S. advisers to Ali Soheily. They are there because: 1) the better Persia is run, the better the Russian supply route will work; 2) the Allies are anxious to offset Germany’s influence in Persia, establish a firm barrier between the Nazis and the rest of the East.

Last week the seven were deep in trouble. Lent unofficially by the U.S.,they were paid by Persia. But they had no powers; they could only advise. The seven: …

– Bearded, aging professor Luther M. Winsor, the agricultural adviser, travels the length & breadth of arid Persia, arguing, pleading and explaining to Persian landowners the need for irrigation. (Until Hulaku Khan’s invaders destroyed it almost 700 years ago, Persia had an excellent irrigation system of underground passages and canals.)…

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Lesson 7: “[He] Took Our Infirmities, and Bare Our Sicknesses”

The lesson briefly discusses a very few of the miracles performed by Jesus, with the goal to “help class members understand some of the reasons the Savior performed miracles.” The young ladies of the YLMIA went into greater depth in their study of the miracles in 1906, as shown by these lessons published in the Young Woman’s Journal that year.

THE TEACHINGS OF THE SAVIOR

How Jesus Taught by Miracles.

1. The Nature of Miracles.

Most of the popular fame which Jesus acquired was due to the wonderful miracles that he performed. The people were naturally attracted by the supernatural power that the Savior manifested in the miracles which, we are led to believe, he performed in great numbers during his short ministry.

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For background, see here
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A Good Judge

Jessie: “I was taken into dinner by that officer you introduced me to. He was quite gallant, and remarked upon my bird-like appetite.”

Maud: “Well, he should be a good judge on that point, dear; he runs an ostrich farm in South Africa.”

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Dennis and the Mormon Battalion

By Mabel Harmer

Previous Chapter

Chapter 3 – Fort Leavenworth

The dugout was cleared of its furnishings – namely one wagon seat and some bedding. once more the Martins’ wagon was packed to the canvas top and rolling along behind the plodding oxen.

“Aren’t you thrilled to be on the way, Ma?” asked Dennis when the last good-byes had been said and they were actually on their way.

“Hm, I guess so,” assented Mrs. Martin, “although it seemed kind of nice to be settled for a while and the dugout was getting to look real cozy. I had saved some papers to put on the walls and I was going to plant some hollyhocks outside. Of course, being with your father makes up for everything.”

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There is no particular Mormon history connection to this post. I simply want to acknowledge the 25th anniversary of the explosion of the shuttle Challenger, and to say again the names of the seven astronauts who were aboard. My memories of that day are as vivid as my memories of 9/11 — there aren’t many days in a lifetime that shock and grieve the way January 28, 1986 did.

This is the speech to the nation made by Ronald Reagan later that day:

Ladies and gentlemen, I planned to speak to you tonight to report on the state of the union. But the events of earlier today have led me to change those plans. Today is a day of mourning and remembering. Nancy and I are pained to the core over this tragedy of the shuttle Challenger. We know we share this pain with all of the people of our country. This is truly a national loss.

Nineteen years ago almost to the day, we lost three astronauts in a terrible accident on the ground. But we’ve never lost an astronaut in flight. We’d never had a tragedy like this. And perhaps we’ve forgotten the courage it took for the crew of the shuttle. But they, the Challenger 7, were aware of the dangers and overcame them and did their jobs brilliantly.

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“What Shall I Do?”: Paid Employment for Mormon Girls, 1927

Agnes Lovendahl Stewart

The introduction to this series is posted here.

IV. – The Musician

Utah has always been noted for its love of music. Probably nowhere else in this country will you find so general in interest in singing and in instrumental music of every kind. In almost every home you will find a piano, and usually other musical instruments as well. Several members of the family, often, will play or sing.

Music here is as free as the sweet mountain air. Some people complain about that – they want to see the musician better paid in money for his efforts. But this we will mention more in detail later.

Nowhere is there greater opportunity for young girls and boys to develop their musical talents. The cultural value of the music which we enjoy so abundantly is beyond price.

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From the Belfast Telegraph, __ May 1961:

It’s Still Tough Going West

It’s tough, traveling west in a covered wagon – whether you are heading for Salt Lake City or for the Ormeau Embankment.

The hazards of a journey from Dundonald were fully experienced by the Relief Society of Ireland’s float which set out for the Lord Mayor’s show last Saturday. Reports have just filtered through to me.

The float – a covered wagon complete with pioneer family, fire, pots, cradle, butter churn, and two lads with rifles to ensure ‘safety in the home’ – was making good progress to the assembly point when disaster struck.

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Dennis and the Mormon Battalion

By Mabel Harmer

Previous Chapter

Chapter 2 – The Call to Arms

On a warm July day the wagon train came in sight of a great sprawling camp of tents and covered wagons on the banks of a wide river.

“Well, son,” said the elder Martin. “We’ve arrived. Yonder is the Missouri river, where Brigham Young and the rest of the pioneers are camped.”

“Gosh, Pa, there must be thousands of people here!” exclaimed Dennis, as his eager eyes swept over the bluffs above he river. “We’ll see everybody we knew back in Nauvoo, won’t we?”

“I hope so, son. Looks like there’s enough wagons for everybody in Illinois to have come West in. Where do you reckon we’d better stop?”

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Back in the day, when you went to the movies you really went to the movies – in addition to the feature and the “coming attractions” shown today, movie tickets of the ‘30s and ‘40s and beyond also bought you a cartoon, a news reel, and one or more short films. In 1938, one of these “shorts” produced by MGM was an 11-minute, black and white movie called The Miracle of Salt Lake.

The Miracle of Salt Lake was the creation of director Basil Wrangell (1906-1977), a Russian born in Italy whose American movie career spanned the 1920s through the ‘70s. He came to The Miracle of Salt Lake a year after being nominated for an Oscar for his film editing work on The Good Earth.

The Miracle of Salt Lake was really more of a pageant than a movie. There were no speaking roles among the actors – a narrator told the story of the Mormon pioneers as the camera cut from one dramatic scene to another, swept along by a passionate musical score. And what a vast amount of history was covered in those 11 minutes! The skillful narrator was Carey Wilson, a voice actor who is probably better known for his writing credit on such movies as Ben Hur and Mutiny on the Bounty.

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Fairview, Wyo., Jan. 24. – This morning Clark Ames died at the residence of his son, Oliver. Mr. Ames was born in the state of New York, in 1832, came to Utah in 1849, settling in Salt Lake valley. He has since resided in Sevier, Boxelder, and Cache counties, Utah; and in Gentile valley, Idaho. He leaves 11 grown children and a host of grandchildren to perpetuate his good name.

– Deseret Evening News, 28 January 1907

Snowville, Utah, Feb. 17, 1907.

Reading … of the death of Clark Ames, at Fairview, Wyoming brought to my mind an episode in my life, when I landed in Salt Lake City, Utah, with which Clark Ames had much to do. It is as follows: In September, 1855, I arrived with a company of emigrants, in Salt Lake City (being only 18 years old and had left everything for the Gospel sake). This was the year the grasshoppers were so bad, bread scarce, and famine staring the people in the face – I had been very sick nigh unto death and was yet quite pale and weak – I mention these facts to illustrate and show what an act of benevolence it was to do as Clark Ames did, at that time.

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From the Children’s Friend, 1945-46 –

Dennis and the Mormon Battalion

By Mabel Harmer

Chapter 1 – On the Prairie

Dennis lurched back and forth on the high seat of the covered wagon, trying to adjust the lines to the strange pair of animals that pulled the heavy outfit.

“An ox and a cow,” he muttered half aloud. “That’s worse than our toothless ox. Whoever herd of teaming up an ox and a cow?”

“Nobody before my ma did,” boasted Nancy Abbott, who was bouncing about on the other half of the seat. “Ma thinks of everything. She said, ‘I’m going to the West in this year of eighteen forty-six along with the rest of the folks whether I have a full team of oxen or not, and as long as the cow has to go along anyway, she might as well help pull the wagon.’ She sure is a dandy.”

“Who – the cow or your ma?” grinned Dennis.

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(See here for background)

From 1958 –

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We looked at LDS Business College ads for 1944 a year ago. While those ads were tied closely to the ongoing war, these ads from 1954 are very much in the post-war anything-is-possible mood: Come to LDS! Day or night! Make money! Get ahead!

Love those antique technologies and processes taught as the latest thing in 1954 (and still taught in the ’70s, when I learned and used some of them in the workplace).

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Lesson 6: “They Straightway Left Their Nets”

This year’s lesson is a general overview of the calling of the Twelve Apostles, with the goal of helping “class members understand that Apostles are called to be special witnesses of Jesus Christ and that we are blessed when we sustain and follow them.” The following lessons from a children’s Sunday School class of 1942 show how we introduced the same material in an earlier generation, with more factual detail if a little less “application to our own lives” approach (although I admit I like some of the questions in the old manual – they’re more thought provoking to me – than in the current one).

PETER’S FELLOW DISCIPLES

Peter was not the only interesting and great apostle of the early Church. There were others who loved Jesus and whom Jesus also loved.

Questions:

1. Who were the other members of the Twelve?
2. What is outstanding in their lives?

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For background, see here
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From the church magazines of 1957 –

As a small boy was preparing for his first day at school his pleasure in the new lunch box was being spoiled by concern that he would not be able to identify it. His mother had carefully printed his name on the box, but of course, as yet, he could not read.

Suddenly his face lighted up as he exclaimed, “Oh, I won’t be using my lunch box until noon, and by then I’ll know how to read!”

-oOo-

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From the Children’s Friend, May 1938 –

The Danger Zone: A Story for Boys

By Ezra J. Poulsen

Dale Weatherby was in a mood for adventure. Throwing out his spindle legs to miss the blackberry briers, he leaped from the top rail of the pasture fence. “Hey, Skinny, how’s that fer a jump?” he crowed, as he sped through the air. Landing in a heap in the short clover, however, he gasped for breath, while Skinny, his tall, shaggy yellow dog, began barking over him anxiously. “No – nobody’s hurt, Skinny,” he laughed as soon as he could recover form the shock. “But – but I guess you’re right. It’s not good to jump too far. A fellow might get hurt.”

Circling his arm around the dog’s neck, he struggled weakly up. “Ouch, my feet sting.” For a moment his sunburned mouth twisted with pain. Bur recovering himself, he started dashing across the pasture, his dark eyes sparkling with excitement. “You didn’t know, did you, Skinny, that the gang’s waiting down by the creek. Well, it is.”

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Three and a half years ago, I posted the following article at Times and Seasons — see original comments there. I’m reposting it now because BHodges (of Life on Gold Plates and Faith Promoting Rumor, and also holder of a special title in Keepa’s Best Beards in Mormon History contest) came across his mother’s 1960s-era bandlo and sent me photographs. (Added 26 January:) Commenter Left Field has retrieved his own bandlo from his mother’s cedar chest and has sent photos of the boys’ bandlos, too. You’ll be able to better understand from these photographs why the children of my generation and earlier enjoyed them so much. I’ve added other illustrations and also made some corrections to dating and other details learned since the original post.

If you (man or woman), or your parents, were born before 1960 and grew up in an active LDS home, chances are that somewhere in your family – maybe in a cedar chest, maybe in a chest of drawers – you have one of these relics of Mormon childhood. This is most likely if you grew up in the Mormon corridor, but may also be true if you lived in western Europe.

The word bandlo is evidently a Mormon-invented word (some have suggested the word was inspired by bandoleer) for that band of felt worn around the neck like a long collar, to which were affixed symbols made of felt, plastic, or glass, representing participation and achievement in the last three years of Primary.

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Frequent temple attendance has received increasing emphasis in recent years. In 2009, Elder Richard G. Scott offered advice on ways “to gain more benefit from temple attendance.” His bullet list included eleven items (the best remembered of which, perhaps, is “Remove your watch when you enter a house of the Lord”). Ten of those items focused on the individual attending the temple and the benefits of temple worship to that patron; only one item (“Be mindful of the individual for whom you are performing the vicarious ordinance”) reminded patrons that there is a purpose to repeated temple visits that doesn’t put benefits to the patron foremost.

Benefit to the temple patron is not an entirely new idea, of course – John A. Widtsoe promised as much in October 1920, speaking to the Genealogical Society of Utah:

I believe that the busy person on the farm, in the shop, in the office, or in the household, who has his worries and troubles, can solve his problems better and more quickly in the house of the Lord than anywhere else. If he will leave his problems behind and do the temple work for himself and for the dead, he will confer a mighty blessing upon those who have gone before and quite as large a blessing will come to him; for at the most unexpected moments, in or out of the temple, will come to him, as a revelation, the solution of the problems that vex his life. That is the gift that comes to those who enter the temple properly, because it is a place where revelations may be expected.

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From the Relief Society Magazine, 1959 –

The Bishop’s Wife

By Sylvia Probst Young

Marian, with a little smile of amusement, watched her husband eating breakfast across the table. apparently unaware of anything around him, he masterfully managed the eggs and bacon without taking his eyes from the morning paper.

“Typical American husband,” she observed, “without a paper in front of his face he couldn’t enjoy the meal. Why, I could feed him burned toast and scorched bacon, and he wouldn’t know the difference.”

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“What Shall I Do?”: Paid Employment for Mormon Girls, 1927

Agnes Lovendahl Stewart

The introduction to this series is posted here.

III. – The Salesgirl

Salesmanship is a popular line of work! And one which has splendid possibilities for advancement and growth if one is efficient, and works with a determination to reach the goal in view.

A young girl starting at the bottom in department store work usually begins as a “messenger” or “cash girl” to run various errands in the store. Her beginning salary is usually $1.50 per day.

A beginning salesgirl without experience, or with just a little experience will receive $1.75 per day, and her salary will advance according to her ability, and her length or “seniority” of service. As she progresses she may attain a salary of $3 per day or as high as $100 per month if she is given charge of her particular department and perhaps made assistant to the department buyer.

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Objects as well as people – or maybe objects because of the people associated with them – have stories worth remembering.

Brigham Young married Miriam Works in Haydenville, New York on 5 October 1824 when he was 23 and she was 18. They had two daughters before Miriam contracted tuberculosis and died at age 26, in Mendon, New York (a few miles south of Rochester), a few months after she and Brigham had been baptized as Latter-day Saints.

Miriam died at the home of her good friends Heber C. and Vilate Kimball, who lived about a mile south of the village center at the crossroads known as Tomlinson’s Corners, and was buried in the small cemetery a few hundred yards from the Kimball home. Brigham marked her grave with a fieldstone – a rough, uncut rock found on the site – with only “M.Y.” chiseled into it. Brigham, Miriam’s two daughters, and the Kimballs soon moved to Kirtland, Ohio, trusting that time and vandals would be kind to the grave. “I took pains at the time of her desease [decease],” Brigham wrote many years later, “to have the place distinctly marked, and was quite satisfied that if it had not been interfered with, the stone would readily be found.”

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From the Relief Society Magazine, September 1936 –

Mrs. Bennett’s Baby

By Ruth Diane Fisher

Only one house separated the homes of Mrs. Dearbourne and Mrs. Young. For years they had been neighbors, for the last six they had not been congenial. The quarrel had happened so long ago that now the cause was forgotten. But the sting remained – a sting that rankled so irritatingly in their minds that the two women, formerly the best of friends, were not on speaking terms. Their passive enmity was now taken as a matter of course by other neighbors, who had ceased to worry about it.

When the nondescript family moved out of the intervening house, they vaguely wondered who would be the next to occupy it. Curious eyes peered from behind curtained windows as a young couple with a baby carriage came to the place one day. In a short time a large moving van followed and the new family was installed.

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Our family photo album opens to the page for 1923 –

Logan, Utah 6th Ward Primary Boys

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Lesson 3: “Unto You Is Born … a Saviour”

Matthew 1-2
Luke 2

Purpose: To encourage class members to rejoice in the birth of Jesus Christ and follow the example he set in his youth, “[increasing] in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.”

To achieve this purpose we will review the events of Christ’s birth and youth, and also consider our sources (that is, discuss some of the differences between Matthew and Luke, to whom and why the two gospels were written, and how an awareness of those factors can help us better understand and make their testimony of Jesus Christ our own).

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Lesson 5: “Born Again”

The current lesson manual seeks “To help class members understand that to receive everlasting life, we must be “born again” and continue to follow Jesus Christ” and takes its illustrations from the visit of Nicodemus to Jesus, and Jesus’s words to the Samaritan woman at the well. This lesson for the 1970-71 Course 18 (for 18-year-olds) Sunday School manual teaches the same principles of “walking in the way of Christ,” but with the illustration of the sacrament.

Renewal and Recommitment

“… whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.” (John 4:14.)

As Jesus Saw It

The night before Jesus was crucified he was commemorating the feast of the Passover with his chosen twelve.

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A New Kind of Blessing

A young lady who taught a class of small boys in the Sunday school desired to impress on them the meaning of returning thanks before a meal. Turning to one of the class, whose father was a deacon in the church, she asked him:

“William, what is the first thing your father says when he sits down to the table?”

“He says, ‘Go slow with the butter, kids; it’s forty cents a pound,’” replied the youngster.

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