Orchids in the Snow

By Rosa Lee Lloyd

Previous chapter

Chapter 4

Synopsis: Sharry and Sam Wynter, newlyweds, on their way to Fairbanks, Alaska, meet Angus McFarland, a widower from Bristol Bay in the Aleutian Islands. In Anchorage they are introduced to McFarland’s daughter Marie, and also to Susan Elge of Bristol Bay who has brought her husband Herman to Anchorage for an operation. Arriving in Fairbanks, Sharon meets Sister Jensen, President of the branch Relief Society, who shows them her log cabin that is for rent.

Sharry and Sam moved into the cabin one week later. Rachel Jensen stood in the doorway, looking from one corner to the other with a kindly, satisfied smile.

“It’s a miracle,” she said. “As though someone had touched a magic wand. Only I know how hard you two have worked. Where did you get that lounge cover? I’ve never seen a crazy quilt look so elegant before.”

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From the Children’s Friend,

October 1960

I can’t tell who was behind this burlesque petition sent to Brigham Young when yet another anti-polygamy bill was being debating by the U.S. Congress. I do think it’s rather a clever solution to several problems – don’t you?

To His Excellency
Governor B Young
Governor of Utah Territory

We the undersigned, comprising a large majority of the actual settlers of this Territory, would most respectfully represent to your Excellency,

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From the Children’s Friend, October 1935 –

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Lesson 39: “For the Perfecting of the Saints”

Ephesians

Purpose: To help class members understand that the process of “perfecting … the saints” (Ephesians 4:12) requires us to increase our faith in Christ, follow the teachings of the apostles and prophets, and protect ourselves from the wickedness of the world.

Introduction

Ephesians is traditionally believed to be Paul’s letter to the Saints at Ephesus – the capital city of the Roman province occupying what we now know as Turkey. According to the book of Acts, Paul briefly visited Ephesus on his second missionary journey, and on his third missionary journey he lived in the city between two and three years. You’ll probably recall the story in Acts that the introduction of the gospel to Ephesus caused “no small stir” (Acts 19:23) – the silversmiths and sculptors who made their living by creating small tourist statues of the goddess Diana (or Artemis) actually rioted in the streets against Paul and his companions and the threat to their livelihood represented by Christianity.

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The current lesson has as its stated purpose “to help class members understand the characteristics we should develop to live our religion more fully” and selects several verses from the Epistle of James for particular discussion. A Gospel Doctrine lesson from 1947, taken from Russel B. Swensen, The New Testament: The Acts and the Epistles (Salt Lake City: Deseret Sunday School Union Board, 1946) provides background on the Epistle and suggests four broad themes which may help present teachers link the disparate elements of the current lesson and place them in context.

The Epistle of James

When a church becomes well established, prosperous, and large, the evils of inertia, pride, apathy, superficial orthodoxy, and class distinction often appear. they are somewhat similar to the physical ills which afflict the body after the vigor of youth has departed. such a condition, which had arisen within the ancient Christian Church, impelled a talented and vigorous writer to deliver a message of incisive wisdom and lofty morality. It was composed in the form of a letter, or rather a written sermon, and is preserved for us today in the present Epistle of James.

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Not Satisfied

Waiter: “I hope you were satisfied with your dinner, sir.”

Diner: “Absolutely not. Everything was cold except the ice cream.”

Wake Up, Baby!

Soph: “Why does a stork stand on one foot?”

Fresh: “I’ll bite, why does he?”

Soph: “If he’d lift the other foot, he’d fall down.”

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Orchids in the Snow

By Rosa Lee Lloyd

Previous chapter

Chapter 3

Synopsis: Sharon and Sam Wynter, newlyweds, on their way to Fairbanks, Alaska, meet Angus McFarland, a widower, on the plane, and when they arrive in Anchorage, they are introduced to his daughter Marie who has arrived from Fairbanks. The young couple also meet Susan Elge, from Bristol Bay in the Aleutian Islands, who has brought her husband Herman to Anchorage for an operation.

Sam unlocked the door of Marie McFarland’s apartment, shoved the suitcases inside, then lifted Sharry in his strong arms.

“Over the threshold for you, little bride,” he said gaily.

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From 1946 –

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The adult Sunday School lesson for –

December 9, 1928

The Social Teachings of Jesus as Applied Today

“Cultivation of good will toward fellowmen, accompanied by intelligent effort to secure social justice and otherwise to be of greatest service to immediate associates, community, and humanity, is descriptive of the moral duty of men and women today.

“That devout religious spirit which, in New Testament times, prompted its possessors to give to the begging leper by the wayside now prompts citizens by cooperative action to build leper hospitals where these unfortunates may be comfortable for the remainder of their lives, while every effort is also made to discover a cure for the hitherto incurable. It has also become a prime moral and civic duty of modern men to cultivate and, if necessary, enforce by law, such a spirit of justice and tolerance that innocent persons will not be in prisoners, and even guilty ones will have humane treatment and opportunity for restoration to normal social life. There is likewise the civic duty of providing industrial or social insurance, widows’ pensions, free public education, and other similar measures in justice to all. Were such provision made, the widow and the fatherless would have less need of that charity which is manifest in providing material aid to the destitute.” – Milton Bennion, Moral Teachings of the New Testament, pp. 223-224.

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Moan Alone

By Genevieve J. Van Wagenen

She enjoyed poor health to such an extent,
That she bragged of her pains wherever she went.
Her aches grew worse – my, oh! MY!
And her friends grew fewer – you know why!

(1948)

In another life and in a galaxy far, far away (well, twentyish years ago, and in Provo, Utah), I worked for a largish company as its training and quality assurance guru. The company had started out small, literally in the garage of one of the owners, and had expanded to the point where, after I had worked there several years, a layer of middle management was considered advisable.

Hence the arrival of the young man whom I shall call Daryl. Daryl was a fresh graduate of BYU’s business school, a young man eager to establish his mark on the corporate world by managing the heck out of me, a technical writer, and a young woman whose particular job I can no longer remember. He intended to mold the three of us into an organization embodying and validating his own theories of management.

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Orchids in the Snow

By Rosa Lee Lloyd

Previous chapter

Chapter 2

Synopsis: Sharon Haskell marries Sam Wynter, an engineer, and plans to go with him to make their home in Fairbanks, Alaska. At the wedding reception Sharon’s Aunt Jewel catches the bride’s bouquet.

It was almost noon when Sharry and Sam arrived in Anchorage the following Wednesday. The airport was buzzing with activity as they left the luxurious nonstop airliner that had brought them from Seattle in less than seven hours.

The transparent blue-spring darkness had faded, and the sun loomed brilliantly above the eastern summits.

Today was June fifteenth, the beginning of summer in Alaska. Every living thing seemed vital and full of energy.

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Questions asked and answered by the Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Association in 1903 –

Q. Has a local patriarch the right to give blessings outside of his own district?

A. He may have the right, but it might not be proper. No person should act in any of the offices of the priesthood without a calling. When any person is about to act in any capacity in the priesthood, let him ask: Am I called to do this by proper authority, local or general? If he can say yes to that question, then he has the right to perform any of the ordinances that the priesthood which he holds, and the office which he occupies, entitle him to perform, otherwise it might be highly improper for him to act. If a local patriarch is visiting friends or relatives outside of his stake, and is asked for a blessing, he is at liberty to give it; but it would be improper for him to travel outside of his stake to solicit patronage as a patriarch.

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You Have Not Failed

By Bertha A. Kleinman

You have not failed who have withstood
The grilling years of wear,
For golden twilight still makes good –
The oldest tree can grow new wood
And blossom just as fair.

You may at some despondent stage
Review a squandered youth,
The future – still a whitened page –
Can yet absolve the darkest age
And fill your life with Truth.

There is no period of your past
So hopeless to recall,
No round of days so overcast
But your tomorrow is more vast
And can redeem it all.

Mistakes are rounds by which you mount –
Defeated, great souls rise –
And as you grapple and surmount,
There is no failure God will count
In any life that tries!

(1926)

There’s a whole ward now in Southern California’s Lake Elsinore, with a Family History Center, and there are other nearby wards in places like Wildomar and Sun City and Perris, each with a modern chapel. In 1940, though, there were only about a dozen LDS families in the Elsinore Branch – the Mellons and Hales and Jensens and Bradshaws and Statons and a few others. Like most branches, they depended on missionary elders to help them with their meetings and the organization of their Sunday School and MIA programs.

They met in a rented hall, and like probably every other branch they looked forward to the day when they could build a chapel of their own. It could be small, because there were so few of them; it could be simple, because like all chapels in that era it would be built by volunteer labor; and it would be inexpensive, again because there were so few members to pay the expenses.

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We’ve been in the heat of the southwestern deserts; time to head for the frozen north. And we’ve read stories that ended in weddings; time for one that begins there:

From the Relief Society Magazine, 1960 –

Orchids in the Snow

By Rosa Lee Lloyd

Chapter 1

Sharon Haskell opened her eyes, stretched her arms, and looked dreamily at her beloved bedroom.

Frothy white curtains criss-crossed her window where the early morning sun was a pinkish mist; a golden filigree tray with perfume bottles glistened on her ivory dressing table, and the long French mirror with the pink taffeta bow at the top, completed the room especially designed for an adored twenty-one-year-old daughter.

Suddenly her face crumpled and she covered it with her hands. Tears came achingly. She was going away. She was leaving all these precious things and the people she loved; her twinkling, witty mother, her big, generous-hearted dad, and Kenny, her fifteen-year-old brother who was a teasing rascal at times but adorable anyway, really adorable. And Aunt Jewel, too. Dear, thoughtful Aunt Jewel. She could not bear to leave them. And yet, she was overjoyed to go!

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A five-part (ten-verse) series dedicated to Keepa’ninny Mark B.

The Snooks

By Olive W. Burt

1.

Even a Snook should hang his head
When this slips out, “I laid abed.”
And almost everyone will frown
When Snooks say carelessly, “Set down.”

Of course, they’ve learned “lay means reclined”
And “We sit down” – but they don’t mind.

2.

For prize mistakes we choose this one
A Snooky favorite, “I done”;
And then its twin, “He done.” Oh, dear.
Snooks will not change in this we fear.

It’s just as easy, isn’t it?
To say, “I did,” “He did his bit”?

(The Instructor, 1938)

For background and links to chapters in this series, see here

LESSON XV

JOURNALISM – AUTHORSHIP

The Power of the Press

This is the day of the newspaper. All people are not readers of books, but in civilized countries there are very few indeed who do not read the papers regularly. The country paper is probably the most potent factor in moulding public opinion 8in rural districts, while the great city dailies have their influence the country over. That the pen is mightier than the sword has been recognized by such military readers as Napoleon, who said he would rather have an important newspaper on his side than an army of men.

Some papers adopt the policy of simply giving the news without color or comment, while others use almost all items as a means of furthering the ambitions and ends of the ones who own them. The newspaper is also frequently used as an instrument to further political ideas.

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For background and links to chapters in this series, see here

LESSON XX

SECURING AND KEEPING A POSITION

“In looking for employment the most important thing is that you shall be able to do the work that your prospective employers want done.” – S. Roland Hall.

After choosing a vocation and preparing oneself for it, the next big problem is the securing of employment. In some occupations like farming, where a person has his own farm, or in one like medicine, where the young physician is going out to practice by himself, there is no necessity for going through that uncertain step of securing a position; but in most occupations the young man starts by working for some other person or organization. He places his services on the market and he is naturally anxious that the sale shall be prompt and the compensation satisfactory. There are a few general principles to be kept in mind the same as in making any other kind of a sale.

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For background and links to chapters in this series, see here

LESSON VIII

BUSINESS

“Every man who studies along the fine and broad lines of commercial enterprise today must recognize the fact that a business career is a profession as noble in its way as that of the lawyer or the engineer. Men and women must be trained for it.” – John Wanamaker.

Business may be not only a vocation in itself, but it necessarily enters into every other vocation, industry, and activity in the world. Agriculture, mining, manufacturing, law, medicine, engineering, teaching, art, etc., all have their business phases; and those engaged in these various occupations must know something of its transactions. Even the running of the Government, the presiding over a church, or the directing of a charitable institution call for a high order of business ability. So important has commerce become to the welfare of mankind that the transaction of its affairs has called for the entire time of a great body of workers. It has been found necessary to organize commerce into its various branches for convenience in operating. As a result a great many business vocations have been developed.

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Lesson 41: “I Have Finished My Course”

Both the current lesson and the following one from the 1983 Gospel Doctrine manual center on the epistles to Timothy and Titus. The current lesson, with its purpose statement “to encourage class members to learn and teach true doctrine and be righteous examples for others,” is much stronger than the old one, with its rather generic listing of good qualities leaders should have; still, there may be some parts of this old lesson, particularly in its introductory discussion of Timothy’s personal background and the role of the home in preparing Saints, that could be useful to today’s teachers.

The Pastoral Epistles

1-2 Timothy, Titus

Objective: From the teachings in Paul’s “pastoral epistles,” identify those qualities that will help us become more godly.

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An Optimist

Ding: “What did your wife say when you got home last night?”

Dong: “She never said a word. And I was going to have those two front teeth pulled, anyway.”

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ACT III.

Camp Scene, as in Act I.)

Soldiers. Lo! the red man is a joker,
In the camp he loves to lurk,
And in keno and in poker
He is cunning as a Turk.
When he paints with yellow ochre,
And allows his squaw to work,
We feed him up,
We feed him up,
And show him how to shirk!

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Sarah E. Tollerton (1868-1945) was born in Ohio. She married for the first time at age 38, to Cassius M. Buck, with whom she had one son, William; they lived in Minnesota. She was widowed — twice — in her 50s. Sarah then moved to Twin Brooks, South Dakota, and supported herself as a public school teacher. It was in Twin Brooks that she encountered the missionaries at nearly 70 years of age.

My Road to Happiness

In order to make it perfectly clear how far the Lord has taken me on my road to happiness, let me describe myself before He placed His hand on my shoulder and said, “You’re wrong.”

In the first place I had been taught nothing of a religious nature. God was not mentioned in our home and Christ very seldom. I was taught to live the good life: that we must be good because it is right. How lacking in strength and resistance that doctrine is I have found to my cost. Without Christ by our side we can’t really live the good life.

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From May 1932 –

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Reaping We Wonder

By Lucretia Penny

Could it be broccoli? Is it a beet?
Tomato? Potato. Irish or sweet?
Could it be maybe a roasting ear?
Bring out the botany and catalogs, dear.
Asparagus? Leeks? Cress as in creeks?
At long last we’re reaping the thing we have sown.
Could it be squash? An artichoke cone?
Spinach? kraut? the Brussels sprout?
But we raised it! It’s ours. We’d better find out!

(1946)

This opinion was published in the Millennial Star, presumably written by its editor, Parley P. Pratt. The text of the scriptural verses he cites can be found at the bottom of the post. Get out your washtubs and cooking pots, ladies, and don’t forget the basin for washing Parley’s feet. And shut up, already.

Duties of Women.

A certain Elder writes us, 22nd of June, “If you would set forth the duty and standing of women in the church, in one of your numbers, it would be of some use to us, as some of our sisters feel a little disposed to get out of order.”

It is clearly implied in the above statement that the sisters referred to know what their duty and standing is; (for how could they feel disposed to get away from a thing they were ignorant of?) and the Elder also must have known their duty and standing; (or else, how could he have been qualified to bring such a charge against them?) and knowing these things, why does he ask us to set forth their duty?

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ACT II.

Elder Scram’s parlor in Salt Lake City. The Elder alone. Picks up packages of bills on table; opens one.)

Scram. Hello! what’s this?
A hat for Sis!
Bill of Angelina’s bonnet
With tremendous charges on it.
O dear! O dear!

(Opens another.)

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