Battling the Davis County School Board

It might be helpful and encouraging to some in these frightful times to share my ongoing battle with the Davis County School Board that in response to complaints from a group of parents, has changed our modified schedule limiting attendance to manageable, social-distancing limits, to full overload of our classrooms beginning Monday:

jrobison@dsdmail.net,
emumford@dsdmail.net,
jutanner@dsdmail.net,
bgerrard@dsdmail.net,
geckersley@dsdmail.net,
mstevenson@dsdmail.net,
cphipps@dsdmail.net,
rnewey@dsdmail.net,
boardmtg@dsdmail.net

August 5, 2020

Dear School Board Members,

Rising Up in Centerville . . . Utah

We celebrated Juneteenth this year and marched for equal justice. It went well. I've struggled though to find the words to express it because I am so out of my depth. Which is why I dove in the first place.

It is encouraging that significantly more than any time before, protests for racial equality are not just something for the targets of oppression. The protests since George Floyd died under a knee have included Americans in all their diversity and privilege. The protests have even gone international. Some of this is to protest the retrograde racism of the trump administration of course. I'm all in for that. And still, I can never feel the depth of the Black American experience. So we try.

My immediate family appears to be woke or at least in the process. A daughter and I marched for refugees and immigrants when trump first starting imposing his bans. There was to be a peaceful march for racial justice in downtown Salt Lake City for Juneteenth this year. I wanted to go except for the risks of Covid-19. We had talked about doing a local march. The daughter who marched with me before prompted me on to set up our march in front of Centerville City Hall and police headquarters. My other daughter said she was in too. We rolled.

Here's our notice:

My daughter went up-front with our Centerville Police:

Welsh Pioneers to Zion

Sometimes the right book just drops in your lap at the right time. Well, I had to order it and going directly to the publisher rather than wait for Amazon got it too me a little quicker.

Welsh Saints on the Mormon Trail: The Story of the Welsh Emigration to Salt Lake City During the Nineteenth Century, by Wil Aaron, published in Wales by Y Lolfa is another book I don't have to write because it is better than what I could do. It has already been an aid to me in my current position as a part-time service missionary in the Church History Library (CHL) of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Church).  Whew! The author is not a member of the Church and is not compelled to the full typing requirements of the name. (I recently was making deliveries in the library and a worker unknown to me commented on a book I had with "Mormonism" in the title. She asked rhetorically and matter-of-factly, "We're never going to get rid of that name, are we?")

It is a highly entertaining read as the writer is a producer of music and television programs in Wales. He has the academic credentials as a professor of Music at Bangor University where I have delved into the archives on family history quests. And it's one of the best general histories of the Pioneer Trail and the settlement of the American West as its chapters are divided by years from 1847 to 1868, the range of the Mormon Pioneer Trail. Told by an outsider to the Church and the the American Experience, it presents a fresh vista of the story in a very accessible format.

Red-lining Systemic Racism - My Cities

One of my Welsh Professors, whom I have also hired as my estate-planning attorney, shared something on Facebook that I thought would be good to memorialize in a blog post. The links would be easier to find through my search box down on the lower right.

He linked some information and fascinating if disturbing resources on the practice of "red-lining" that came out of the New Deal in the 1930s. The Home Owners' Loan Corporation or HOLC was established to readjust home mortgages that were in default or needed refinancing. Major cities were mapped to indicate areas where loans were most at risk. The neighborhoods marked in red were the most risky based on economic conditions of the residents at the time and also expressly and explicitly by race and ethnicity. While the HOLC was abolished in 1947, these maps were used by banks and others interested in economic investment well into recent times. They helped to establish de facto racial segregation in all major cities not just the South where legal segregation flourished until the 1960s. The effects of red-lining are still with us today. You can read more here and here.

And, you can find the maps at the University of Richmond's "American Panorama: An Atlas of United States History."

My paternal line came to America in 1886. The first couple of generations lived in the lowest rated red-line districts of Ogden, Utah, classifications D-8 and D-9 for "Hazardous" with regard to investment.

The Water-Fall (Deuel Creek, Centerville Canyon, Davis County, Utah with my Grandson)

The Water-fall

BY HENRY VAUGHAN (1621-1695)

With what deep murmurs through time’s silent stealth

Doth thy transparent, cool, and wat’ry wealth

Here flowing fall,

And chide, and call,

As if his liquid, loose retinue stay’d

Ling’ring, and were of this steep place afraid;

The common pass

Where, clear as glass,

All must descend

Not to an end,

But quicken’d by this deep and rocky grave,

Rise to a longer course more bright and brave.

Mission Journal, Training Day 2

No notes today because it was all FamilySearch intensive with hands-on work. They have a very good teaching system of group lecture with an active screen showing what the instructor is doing while a couple of roving trainers watch and swoop in to assist those having trouble. Then at the end of a segment, a trainer comes for each of us for a one-on-one check through the concepts just learned. They are mostly friendly, too. Some are a bit harsh as former Jr. High School teachers or something. (Oops!)

In truth it seems so odd to serve a mission from 7:30 to 4:00 and be on pretty much the same commute I was on for work just a few weeks ago. I park on Main Street above the Conference Center where there is some free, all-day parking and I walk down the hill. So I don't cross that dreaded South Temple line into the "Great and Abominable" City. I had joked with one friend that I was joining the GAA CHL, but I think I was too harsh unless they're just being nice at training to suck me in. This just isn't a bad place to serve a mission!

The walk in from parking is pretty nice!

We are only on the Third Floor and looking out the window, I see this:

Your Friendly Neighborhood Whistleblower

Yes, that would be me. But I didn't work for the State Department or CIA so I'm not that guy (an American Hero! in my book).

At present, I am safely retired with my benefits and most of my faculties intact. My retirement was already planned for the end of June when we were hit by the trump shutdown of 2018-19 over the Holidays and well into new year.

There was a new, temporary or "acting" boss in the office who, in my opinion, was attempting to assert herself as a proactive advocate of the powers-that-be in DC. That is generally our job with the caveat that we are to advise according to the law and we are held to a higher standard to avoid the appearance of partisan politics. Well, that's been a little dicey in the trump administration.

The World Is On Fire!

It seems that way when you step out your front door and see this:

It is fire season in Utah. This "Gun Range Fire" completely destroyed three homes up by Cheese Park (Twin Hollows) and damaged several others in the night. We were three blocks West of the evacuation zone but two blocks into the "soft" zone where they wanted no one but residents.

The fire started in the middle of the night. No cause has yet been announced. There were weather warnings about dry thunderstorms and winds last night that could have started fires.

My Declaration of Retirement

There is a tradition in retiring from our office of federal employees for the U.S. Department of the Interior (National Parks, Indian Affairs, Fish & Wildlife, Public Land Management, Reclamation (western water dams and management), Geological Survey, etc.) to send of a farewell email to All-Employees. They are usually friendly little good-byes with the occasional long diatribe of political sentiment pent-up in the "non-political" civil service until that day of release.

Mine was this:

That was a last-minute and appropriate replacement for my diatribe. I thought it best to save that for this blog. My post-departure comments are in [ ],  i.e., brackets. Here goes:

Let There be PEACE on Earth

And let it begin . . . in the International Peace Garden, Salt Lake City, Utah.

Why didn't I know this existed?

Yesterday, when I was looking for pics to go with another blog post, I found this wonderful place not far from downtown, at 900 West 1000 South on the Jordan River Parkway. When I arrived at the Family History Library before it opened yesterday morning, I took the opportunity to go wander the gardens.

It's still February, so there wasn't much going on with flowery aspects. I will return, hopefully many times. It's the kind of place I could wander as an old man and sit in peace.

I'll share my photo tour without commentary because I would be tempted to say too many things to detract such as I think the Swiss got a little carried away with their Matterhorn. I wanted to get in line for the ride, but didn't have my mouse ears. No, Peace, peace, peace, be still . . . .

Renounce Guns, Proclaim PEACE

It's time to call an end to Mormons arming themselves to protect against an imaginary tyrannical government or even for "self-defense." 

Don't get me wrong. I get the anti-government sentiment. I've worked for the feds for 34 years and don't like them much. But heaven help us if we continue on the path we are on!

There is a sickness in American culture (and I mean the US, not our Canadian or Latin American friends). Actually, there is more than one sickness. One is racism and the original sin of slavery which we have not shed, not nearly as well as other American neighbors who were also under this curse. The other, related sickness is the obsessive love of gun culture.

The LDS Church is more and more a world church. Sure, still with dominant American culture, but that is fading more and more and will only accelerate. We are the only nation where the LDS Church is established, Zion in the Latter-days, where we violate the laws of Zion on a regular basis by arming ourselves.

A Glimpse of my 2nd-Great Grandmother Vaughn

They must have liked the hymn "How Firm a Foundation" in the Ogden Third Ward Relief Society. They appear to have sung it at least every other meeting.

My 2nd-Great Grandmother, "Sr. Isabella Baun was sustained into [their] society" on 1 August 1888, a year after her arrival from England. In those days, it wasn't automatic that LDS ladies would be members of the Relief Society. You had to join and apparently be "sustained" regardless of whether the secretary could spell your name.

The Ogden Third Ward had a meeting house on the Tabernacle square, but the Relief Society often met in the "vestry of the tabernacle." That was a grand building indeed!

Ogden Tabernacle, on the block where the Temple is today.

More Pioneer Research, Winter Edition

Centerville Ward Chapel, Davis County, Utah (1879). Centerville Canyon behind.
Only the center part is original. There have been several additions over the years.

Strolling the streets of Centerville, Utah today, it was nagging me that I still haven't solved the problem of where in town the Thompson Family lived for a few years in the 1860s when my 2nd Great Grandmother, Annie Thompson, was born April 3, 1863. She died as a young mother in 1890, leaving my Great Grandfather at age seven. He died in 1963 and I knew him well, so there is some responsibility here.

Hitting the internet when I got home, I checked out the listing of historical sites for Centerville to see if there is a record of a pioneer home built by a Thompson Family. I'm suspicious there was not. They were hard-working but not with much financial means in life and they likely boarded or shared space with another family in their brief time here. Or because they were here for a few short years, any home would not have been long remembered as belonging to them.

Short Bios of Those Associated with the Ellsworth Handcart Company, 1856

Ellsworth Company, 1856. Brief Bios of those in the official Company list or are mentioned in the Journals of the Company

All information is gathered from the Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel Database (https://history.lds.org/overlandtravel/) or FamilySearch.org unless otherwise noted.

William Knox Aitkin (1819-1864) Travelled with the McArthur Co. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, returned and died there.

David Argyle (1818-1905) born in Leicester, UK. Came with wife Rebecca Jane Finch Argyle (1824-1890), and children, Joseph Jr. (1842-1927), Benjamin James (1843-1917), Mary Ann (1847-1922), Frances (1850-1939), Alonzo Lorenzo (1853-1940), and Priscilla (1854-1932). Rebecca was pregnant during the journey and gave birth to son Hyrum born 10 November (1856-1929). The Argyle’s settled in South Davis County. David and Rebecca both died in West Bountiful.

Thomas Columbus Armstrong (1817-1900). Traveled with his mother, Eliza Salt Armstrong (1792-1860), and his son Thomas Columbus, Jr. (1843-1892). Had one of the wagons that accompanied first Ellsworth, and then McArthur, from Florence, NE to Salt Lake City. They were from Stepney, London, England. Settled in the 2nd Ward, Salt Lake City.

John Ash (1820-1915). Born in Cheshire, England. Traveled with wife, Sophia Edwards Ash (1829-1863), from Birmingham, England, and their daughter, Ellen Matilda (1854-1954). They settled in Cache Co., Utah where John took two additional wives.

Henry William Attley (1832-1911) traveled with his wife, Christina Stuart Attley (1826-1913). Henry from England and Christina from Scotland were married in St. Louis, 1856. They drove one of the wagons that accompanied the handcarts starting out with Ellsworth and ending up with the McArthur Co. Childless, they adopted a little girl and lived out their lives in Salt Lake City.

Arrival in the Valley, September 26, 1856

Failing to get a Rand McNally Map of Utah, I have not plotted these locations. The good news is that the Mormon Trail is followed by modern highway (for the most part). Take the side road down Echo Canyon and stay on it to Henefer. Turn left and go up and over to East Canyon, where the original trail is covered by the water of the reservoir (I went water-skiing there once and it just didn't feel quite right boating over a drowned pioneer trail). Then follow over to Little Mountain and Big Mountain where the original trail still exists just a ways to the south of the highway. Stop at the top of Big Mountain for the first views of the valley as this is the right place, and drive on down Emigration Canyon to This Is the Place Monument. The monument is free, it costs a bit to visit the pioneer village which is really cool, but you can get in for free if invited to special events like family reunions. The Heber C. Kimball Family Reunion is a hoot because you will run into people you never knew your wife is related to as there are thousands of his descendants. But the important thing is that Elinor Jenkins Vaughan (age 68 - approximate), Jane Vaughan Lewis (age 29), John Lewis (age 33), and John Samuel Lewis (age 8) made it! See the Ellswoth Company info here.  For earlier portions of the journey, see Iowa, Nebraska, and Wyoming segments.

And join in celebrating the entrance into the Valley of blessed, honored pioneers!

The first handcart company led by Captain Edmund Ellsworth, and including Elinor Jenkins Vaughan
 with her daughter's family, enters the Great Salt Lake Valley, Sept. 26, 1856
(LDS.org media library)

DAY 106

23^d
The camp rolled out at 12 P.M. and Travelled 18 miles[.] the road was pretty good. We forded the Weber[1] about 1 P.M. and had dinner in the Weber banks[.] camped about 30 past 6 P.M. Wood, water and feed plenty. We were visitted by a few Indians. (Galloway OTD).

T. 23^rd Came 21 mi and camped on E Kanyon Creek[2] (Oakley OTD).

They Made It Across Wyoming, 1856

First of all, I broke these segments into modern state lines based on the highway maps I have charted. I'm still old-fashioned in that way even if no one uses state highway maps anymore.

In 1856, the territorial boundaries were at the continental divide. Nebraska was on the eastern slope and Oregon on the western, at least down to the 42nd Parallel North, the present-day northern boundary of California, Nevada, and Utah. And in 1856, Utah Territory went east to the continental divide to include what is now southwestern Wyoming. Still, there's some satisfaction in beginning Wyoming at Fort Laramie and on west to Yellow Creek at the Needles before Cache Cave and Echo Canyon in Utah. Ft. Laramie works, because it was there. And Yellow Creek because, well, that's another family story.

The numbered days continue from Nebraska and began at Iowa City from the departure on 9 June 1856. The first date is the 24th of August 1856. [Galloway was off by a day].

The names that are not footnoted are explained in previous segments, Iowa and Nebraska.

DAY 76

23^rd Sun 24
The camp did not travell any to day[.] We were busey with the hand carts[.] At 6 P.M. We had a sacramental & saints meeting[.] a good time of it (Galloway OTD).

24 Sunday in camp all Day[.] an Indian visited us, we had a good meetting Partook of the Scarment some of the Brethen testified[.] Brothers France[,] Oakeley [John Oakley] & [William] Butler spoke[.] felt well and to thank my God for my Deliverance (Ham OTD).

Sun 24^th The 1^st Indian we have seen since leaving Florence came to our camp. Broke up an old waggon[.] Meeting in the eve[nin]g[.] Sacrament administered (Oakley OTD).

Sunday 24th Rested from travels but had to repair hand carts. Meeting at night. Received the Sacrament. Spoke at the meeting. Bro. Ellsworth spoke some time and said we had made great improvement; that the last week there had been less quarreling and those that had robbed the hand carts, or wagons, unless they repent their flesh would rot from their bones and go to Hell. (Walters OTD).

A Death in Echo Canyon

A Mormon Pioneer Wagon Train in Echo Canyon on a day without the rain but otherwise still seemingly miserable.
Likely after 1861 because of the telegraph poles.

No wonder Echo Canyon has always haunted me!

Early in my blogging life, I became friends with a great, Mormon historian, Ardis Parshall. You can find her work at Keepapitchinin.org. She kindly corrected me when I told her that my family had a story that my 2nd Great Grandfather, Daniel Bartholemew Roman, had come across the plains in 1855 with a handcart at the age of four. You see, the handcart companies didn't start until 1856.

And I just discovered where that handcart story might have come from.

Daniel came from Piedmont, Italy with his widower father, David Charles Roman. Daniel's deceased mother was Jeanne Malan, of one of the first families to join the LDS Church in Italy. Daniel's father David, remarried in Utah to a widow who came with the Ellsworth Handcart Company in 1856, Suzanne Robert Rochon. She became widowed when her husband, Jean Michel Rochon, died in Echo Canyon on the 22nd of September, 1856, four days short of the Salt Lake Valley. An account of his tragic, though nameless, death is in the journal of William Butler, an Irishman, and Captain of the Second Hundred in the Ellsworth Company:

Upon arriving at Echo, Utah I became very sick and was forced to lie on the ground due to the pain in my stomach. After praying and resting a short time, I was able to continue on. As the company had gone on down the canyon, I was forced to travel alone, there being a terrible rainstorm raging and I was unable to see except when the lighting would flash. While traveling alone, I overtook an Italian and his little girl with their handcart. They also had been left behind to die. This man died before morning. I buried him the best I could, not having a shovel. I then traveled on, taking the little girl and her cart with me. During that day we overtook another man and his daughter by the name of Clark. They also had been left by the main company. I said to myself later, “Had it not been for Mr. Clark and his assistance I could not have continued on.” We overtook the main company the following day. Here we camped to bury our dead. Our provisions almost exhausted, we all cut down to one cup of flour a day.

Another Lost Pioneer: Found!

Elizabeth Bourne Thompson (1822-1878)

I'll just cut and paste my submission to the LDS Church History Library and their response. The important thing is that her descendants will now know that she was with her family in the Ellsworth Handcart Company.

I have been doing some indepth research on the Ellsworth Handcart Co. of 1856 in preparation for writing about my ancestors who were in the Company (Eleanor Jenkins Vaughan, her daughter, Jane Vaughan Lewis, Jane's husband, John Lewis, and their son, John Samuel Lewis). I found evidence to place a pioneer in the company who is not listed with the rest of her family in the company's lists and is identified in the overland travel database now reflected on Family Search as coming to Utah in "unknown companies."

John Oakley's journal [included in the overland travel database as: Oakley, John, Journal excerpt 1856 June-Aug.] for Thursday, 19 June 1856 records "I baptised 7 persons[.] Betsy Bourne for remission of sins. . . ." This was in Skunk Creek, near Green Castle, Iowa. I could not find a "Betsy" or "Elizabeth" Bourne in the Ellsworth or McArthur Companies (which were together at this point). But there is a large family of Thomas Bourne included with Ellsworth so I went to Family Search, Family Tree. Elizabeth Bourne, likely known as "Betsy" was the daughter of Thomas Bradford Bourne by his first wife, Susannah Lane, who died in 1829. Thomas is listed in the Ellsworth Co. with his second wife and their children who would have been step-siblings to Elizabeth. I don't know why "Betsy" was left off the Company rosters. She is not on the ship manifest with the family on Mormon Migration database either. But the fact that she is mentioned in Oakley's diary as part of the handcart companies travelling through Iowa, gives some evidence that she came with the rest of the family in 1856 (of course she could have stayed in Florence, but as she's not recorded in any other company from Florence on, it's more likely she was left out of the Ellsworth list where the rest of her family appears). I hope this is of some help in tying down when Elizabeth Bourne came to Utah.

South Pass

Looking West from South Pass. Pacific Butte on the left.

"Top of the World," some say even if it is not a peak and hardly a pass in the traditional sense of crossing mountains. One does have a sense of a spherical earth dropping down in nearly every direction (Wind River Range on the north excluded).

My grandson and I had a wonderful trip exploring portions of the Overland Trail in Wyoming in commemoration of the day after Pioneer Day and my wife's birthday, as she is out of town. The OT refers to four recognized trails that crossed here although Native Peoples have crossed here for millennia. The trails are: Oregon, California, Mormon Pioneer, and the Pony Express. We could also add in the Astorians in 1812, Mountain Men, the Whitman-Spaulding Missionaries of 1836, some commercial stage lines, the overland telegraph, and many visitors, but only us two last Tuesday.

As one of our purposes was family history, I will illustrate a few sites with reference to the Ellsworth Handcart Company of 1856 with my direct-line ancestor, Elinor Jenkins Vaughan, her daughter Jane Vaughan Lewis, Jane's husband John Lewis, and their son, John Samuel Lewis. They crossed South Pass on September 13, the 96th day out from Iowa City. They camped three miles down this road at Pacific Springs which can't be seen but is at the base of Pacific Butte on the left, just before the small ridge, just left of center. My Grandson and I walked down and back to get a feel for the trail. It was a good walk and a better talk.

At one point, I explained that while pioneer children may have sung as they walked and walked, they were probably not always happy. I told him that he was big enough that he would likely have helped with the family handcart, but the younger children above toddler age would get up, have a breakfast of biscuits and tea (long before Pres. Grant started enforcing the Word of Wisdom) and head out on the road in a group led by adults while the others packed up the camp. Eventually, the handcarts would pass the children. Then, the two or three wagons with the company would pass as the oxen were slower than people with handcarts. Hopefully, the new camp would be ready when the children came in. We imagined that mothers might have gone back up the trail to meet their children if they weren't needed for cooking or setting up their camp. I also explained that the children were sometimes guided by the adults with long sticks, like a gaggle of geese. And they were poked or prodded (or worse) if they lagged.

Updated Trek Guidelines

As a Pioneer Trek Agnostic, I found Keepa's link to an updated booklet of the LDS Church on Handcart Trek Reenactments interesting.

Once again, don't get me wrong! I love a good historical reenactment as much as any interpretive historian. I've explored a lot of pioneer trails, etc., etc. What I don't like is emotional manipulation as a substitute for a truly valuable, spiritual experience.

So, I was pleased to see that the worst abuses of trek are now discouraged. I cut and pasted the items in italics:

Reenacting deaths or violence—including mob violence— is not to be included as part of treks.

I guess that's a bit stronger than "discouraged."

There was a Senior Seminary trip to Echo Canyon I attended years ago. It was a lot of fun to travel there and stand beneath those pinkish sandstone cliffs as they told us about the Utah War and the defenses built up on top where we were to hike. Then, a couple of cowboys rode up on horses and in very threatening manner yelled at the leaders about why we were there again when they had been told to stay away, etc.

One of the fathers that had driven our group ran for his car to get his gun. You see, we had come from the Wyoming side of the trail. Well, a little south of the main overland trail, but right on the later trail of the out-and-back companies, the stagecoach, and the eventual railroad. Rock Springs is a wild and woolly place even today.

Echo Canyon, Utah, on the Mormon Pioneer, Pony Express, and California/Hasting Cutoff Trails
Free use Wikipedia commons by gracious permission of  Flckr User: Leoboudv