The Personal History of Elaine Mary
Scholl
Elaine: I, Elaine Mary Scholl, was
born April 28, 1925 on a Tuesday, about 7:00pm at 1636 Golden Gate Avenue, Los
Angeles, California. My father is George F. Scholl and my mother Emma Bach-
man. I have one sister Audrey May who was almost nine years old when I was
born. I weighed eight pounds. My father acted as nurse to Dr. Abbott until the
nurse arrived. I came near losing my life a few hours after I was born when the
nurse turned the gas on in the oven of the kitchen stove and did not make sure
a flame was burning. I was lying on the kitchen table. My mother was several
rooms away but almost immediately she thought she smelled gas and called out.
It is impossible that she could have actually smelled that gas so far away.
Emma: Elaine Mary was born Tuesday,
7:30 p.m., April 28th, 1925 in a large sleeping porch with twelve windows on
the southeast end of our house. The day before, Brother Peterson his wife Ethel
came. I did not send for them. He came to administer to me and as he did so,
tears ran down his cheeks. He said he felt impressed that I would be a recorder
in the next life. I had lots of experience in it here. Annie D. Snow, a
counsellor in the Relief Society came on Tuesday before meeting. I told her to
go to meeting and pray for me. I was alone all afternoon. As I was having pains
quite regularly, I asked Mrs. Lewis at 4:00 to phone for Dr. Abbott. He came at
5:00 p.m. I got supper for him and George who came soon after. While they ate I
took a hot bath about 6:30 p.m. Elaine was born at 7:30 p.m. The nurse had not
yet arrived. When the nurse, Adelle Bailey, came they took the babe to the
kitchen to oil and fix her. I was a long way from the kitchen, but I had the
impression that the gas oven was on but not lighted, but just escaping gas. I
called them and they found it was. I could not have known it except through
inspiration. The nurse soon brought the baby. She had lots of dark hair and
held her own head right up. She was plump and cute and weighed eight pounds.
She was a good baby, only she got in the habit of sucking her thumb.
Elaine: While very
small I was given nipples to suck to keep me quiet. And as soon I got into the
habit of sucking my thumbs, although mother tied my hands up, put bitter
medicine on my thumbs, etc; she could not break me of this habit. I sucked my
thumb until I was eight years old when she finally found some little aluminum
rings which slip on the thumbs and they did the trick.
Emma: She was
blessed in the Hollywood Ward, July 5,1925 by Angus Elmer Peterson. I nursed
Elaine eight months and she was a very good baby. I should have nursed her
longer, as I had so much milk I had a hard time drying it up. I quit eating and
lost 25 pounds in a few months. Elaine didn't do well on the certified milk
until I gave her orange juice with each bottle. Then she did well and was a
nice plump baby. Certified milk was 30 cents a quart (15 cents when Audrey was
a baby.
Emma: In June, 1926,
Audrey, Elaine and I spent two months in Hermosa Beach in a rented house.
It was a nice quiet beach then. Elaine could walk fast now and we
had to watch her all the time. Comfort Bachman came to see us. Elaine was
playing in the sand and she screamed. We didn't know why until the next day
when we found she had swallowed a large flat rock.
Emma: Elaine's first playmate was Bill Morkin
Jr. who was six months older than she. He didn't talk but he could run fast and
she followed.
Emma: About
November 1, Elaine began to breathe like a man snoring. It was in the night. In
the morning I phoned from Butlers phone for Chas B. Stewart to come and
administer to her. He came at 8:00am and administered to her. His wife was with
him. They said every one had sore throats. If I had only been wise after all my
experience with doctors and had no more I would have saved myself lots of work
and money. But the Relief Society President now urged me to have her doctor. He
said Elaine was a lovely baby and only had Tonsillitis, but he took a culture
and the next day they quarantined us and that is a fake like the doctor. They
put George out of the house, but he came back after dark and left after
daylight, so I had his meals to cook. I almost died with all the work of
sterilizing with Lysol. They sent another doctor and forced us to pay his bill
but I had enough of doctors. I refused the antitoxin, drugs, etc. which he
recommended. I have never given my girls any drugs or "shots," except
Audrey vaccination for small pox. I used soda water to gargle, gave Epsom
Salts baths. Even though I had the diphtheria, I took care of the girls and
even fixed George's food, though he was supposed to be staying elsewhere,
also. Elaine got over the diphtheria first, though she got it last.
Emma:
Soon after Elaine got over the diphtheria I was bathing her in a little tub in
the kitchen sink. I took a kettle of beets off the stove and poured the hot
water in the sink. She jumped up and stood on one foot and it was badly burned
on the bottom.
Emma: 1926-27 was a bad winter for us. One day in February I took
Elaine to the store in her cart. A child came up and kissed her, and she soon
came down with chicken-pox.
Emma: January 28,1927 Will Inglis and my sister Bertha came to
visit us. They stayed until May 17. One day while they were here and no one was
watching Elaine, she ran down to Sunset Blvd., a very busy corner where several
people have been killed. The corner druggist saw her in the street and brought
her in the drug store. He kept her there until we went to find her.
Elaine: In January 1927 my Aunt
Bertha and Uncle Will came down from Utah to visit us. They stayed for about
three months. In June we went to Utah. We stayed there at my Uncle Joe's home
for three months with my cousin Velva, while there almost every day my sister
and I played in Liberty Park which was only a few houses away. When school
started we came back to Los Angeles.
Emma: June 12th, 1927 we took the
train to Utah. Almost across the street was a nice park with a playground where
Audrey and Elaine spend a great deal of time. The Cemetery was nearby and we
went there often.
Elaine: On June 22,1928 we rented our
house to Max Ginsberg, owner of the Bell Potato Chip Company and he lived in it
for ten years. The rent was seventy five dollars a month. Then we started for
Oregon in a 1924 Ford. We stopped at Berkeley and visited our old neighbors who
had lived by us for seven years. I saw Bill who was my first playmate from the
time I was able to walk and his sister Mary Alice. We next stopped at
Sacramento to see one of my mothers schoolmates Alta Cooley Root. After
arriving in Oregon while driving along the highway we had an accident, my
father drove the car to close to the edge of the road and it tipped over in a
ditch and he had to get some farmers who were working near by to come with a
team and pull us out.
Elaine: Our next
stop was at my Aunt Emma Hornechurch's in Brooks, Oregon. There I met for the
first time my three cousins, Willard, Naomi and Erma. They live on a farm and
we helped them weed onions. Then we went to Portland to my Grandfather Scholl
at 679 Locus Street where we stayed the rest of the time. He had an eight room
house and his son Fred and granddaughter Leona lived with him. My grandfather
was nearly eighty years old and very well and happy. He was the only
grandparent I ever saw. I remember having my picture taken with him. They
wanted me to put my arm around his neck but I was too bashful. I'm glad I had
my picture taken with him as he died the following May. We went out in the
woods and picked wild berries and mother canned nearly a hundred quarts of
berries and cherries. Uncle Fred had a cabin at the foot of Mount Hood where we
stayed for two weeks. In August my Aunt Laura had a baby. She died during
childbirth. We attended her funeral. On our way back we stopped at Aunt Emma's
and picked the largest prunes I've ever seen and also helped pick top onions.
Elaine: We arrived
in Glendale on September 17,1928 and my mother wished to stay there so we
rented a house at 315 Burchett where Audrey attended the Columbus School but
the street was so noisy we only stayed a short time when we moved to Drew
Street, in Los Angeles. We belonged to the Glendale Ward and now had a long
distance to go, mother taught in the Sunday School and was secretary of the
Relief Society and I stayed with Mina Everett on Tuesdays. One Tuesday she fell
and broke her hip. I remember looking out of the back bedroom window and seeing
Miss Everett lying on the ground hurt. So that afternoon I went to the Fletcher
Drive School and stayed with Audrey. Mother had to help take care of Miss
Everett and I used to bring her mail and stay with her a great deal. She was a
cripple the rest of her life. We gave her a Book of Mormon to read and she died
six years later at the age of 82. I was baptized for her in the St. George
Temple.
Audrey: There were
8 and a half years difference in our age. George spent 7 years to build the Golden
Gate house. Then he rented it out and we went to Portland for the summer. We
visited his folks, his father was 79 then. It was the only time we ever saw
him. He died a few years later. We stopped at other relatives too. Elaine
sucked her thumb until she was eight years old. George did carpenter work since
building the Golden Gate house. That was in 1928. The man that owned Bell Brand
Potato Chip Company rented the house from then until 1936. When we came back
from Oregon we lived on 345 Burchette, then 3321 Drew St., then 822 Fisher St,
and we went to Glen- dale Ward all this time. Later we lived on Orange Grove
Street. Le Grand Richards was the bishop for quite a while. Elaine went to
Fisher school. We went to Utah every summer. Her 1/2 sister Bertha, and her
daughter Charlotte were up there. Charlotte is still there. Then we moved to
605 Lincoln, 521 Milford, where Elaine went to Columbus School. The Patriarch
suggested Utah for Emma, and in 1936 Elaine and Emma went to St. George for two
years. In the meantime George and Audrey moved back to Golden Gate.
Emma: We arrived in
Glendale, California, September 17th, 1928 and rented a nice house from Mr.
Sands at 345 Burchette. We all had bad vomiting and colds soon after arriving
in Glendale, except Elaine. She ate spinach and lots of fruits and milk as
well as her toast and she didn't get sick. We were so sick she was the only one
up and eating for two or three days. Burchette was such a noisy street in the
3000 block, so we only stayed there three months or so.
Emma: In January, 1929 we moved to 3321 Drew
Street, L.A., and rented the house from Mina Everett, a lady of 76 who was
getting a minister's pension from the Baptist Church. We attended the Glendale
Ward at 220 west Broadway. In June 1930 we went to Utah on the bus. We went to
Far- mington. I worked on my temple records at Luella's home. Audrey and Elaine
often went to Lagoon and to Charlotte's to play with Natell and La Deane. We
came back to California in September and moved to 822 Fischer Street, so
Audrey could walk to Glendale High School. Elaine started to John Muir School,
a block from our house. I took her to a chiropractor for treatments. Daddy,
Elaine and I slept in the back yard. We had our beds fixed so we could pull
them out under the stars or push them in a sort of shed, if it rained. She had
a very light case of whooping cough. Elaine played with Ernest and Evelyn Seth.
Elaine's second grade teacher was Miss Townsend. She let Elaine sing a solo for
the P.T.A.
Elaine: When I was
in the second grade I sang in the Glee Club. We entertained the P.T.A. and I
sang a solo and also sang with the Glee Club. In August 1933 Audrey went to
work for the Hughes, where she stayed for a year and a half. I attended Sunday
School and Primary at 220 West Broadway. My Primary teacher was Josie
Halliday. My Sunday School teachers were; Vespa Gough, Elsie Alvord. In
February I had the measles. Frank Dewsnup administered to me and I was not very
sick.
Elaine: In June
1930 we went on the train to Utah and spent three months in Farmington where
Aunt Bertha and Charlotte live. We rented rooms at the home of Luella Hess,
Apostle Orson Hydes daughter. We spent a pleasant summer and returned in
September and as Audrey had graduated from the eighth grade at Fletcher we
moved to 822 Fisher near the Glendale High School where we lived for four
years. In February 19311 started to the John Muir School which I attended for
five years.
Elaine: I played
with Ernest Seth the nephew of Minnie Davis our neighbor who later joined the
church. Before school closed I caught the Whooping Cough. I was administered to
by William Gough and Frank Oliver and I had only a light case of it. All of us
except Audrey slept outdoors all the time we lived there.
Elaine: In June of
1932 we went to Utah on the bus and it broke down so many times it was eight
hours late. We arrived in Salt Lake at 5 o'clock in the morning and took a taxi
to Uncle Emuels at 611 Park Street. Uncle Emuel was very ill having had a
stroke and he died on September 12 before we left Utah. We again spent the
summer at Luella Hesses and mother went to the temple for the first time and
received her endowments, she stayed for the October Conference and we returned
in October.
Emma: May 6, 1933,
Elaine was baptized and confirmed May 7th by Joseph E. Olson. On Mother's Day
she gave a poem and Audrey gave a talk on the mother's day program in Sunday
School
Emma: When we got to Glendale, we rented a
house at 521 Milford. Elaine went to the Columbus school. We often went to
Pioneer park near our place. On Saturdays Elaine went with Audrey to Junior
College to play tennis with Miriam and Esther, Audrey's friends.
Elaine:
We spent the summer of 1934 at Luella Hesses at Farmington. Our old neighbors
Markins, stayed with daddy. While we were gone the house we were renting was
sold and daddy moved to 605 Lincoln where we lived for a year. We spent the
summer of 1935 in Farmington, where we rented a house owned by Mary Ann
Richards Van Fleet, daughter of Willard Richards. She was eighty years old and
this was the house where she was born. We stayed and attended the October
Conference and I attended the Farmington School for three weeks. We returned
the 11th of October with W.D. Le- Cheminant and Apostle John A. Widtsoe's wife,
Leah. We then moved to 521 Milford Street where I attended Columbus School for
a year.
Mama was very ill during this time and was advised by the doctor
to go to a high climate.
Emma: On Nov. 18th,
1936. Elaine went to school at Woodard School. It seemed to me Elaine developed
mentally and spiritually more the two years she spent in St. George than in all
her previous school years. She had some of the college teachers for Art, music,
etc. The library was nearby and I read many books to her besides the Doctrine
and Covenants. I read to her while she ate her meals and other times. I was
very sick in winter of 1937, but Elaine urged me to go to the temple. She was a
great comfort and joy to me then and during the 21 years she lived with me.
Elaine: On November
18, 1936 we went to St. George, Utah. We lived at George Worthens the patriarch
across from the tabernacle. I attended the Dixie Junior High School. I was in
the sixth grade when I left California but started in the seventh there. Newell
R. Frey was principal and while mother was working in the St. George Temple
that winter she found that she and his father had the same great grandfather.
Herold Snow who later became president of the temple was my Social Science
teacher. During the winter on Saturdays I did baptisms. While there I did 400
baptisms. I graduated from the primary in May and we then went to Farmington
and spent the summer at Luella Hesses. I picked cherries and raspberries in
July and earned $7. In September we returned to St. George and rented a room
and slept in a tent at Rosena Blakes. We found that she had the same lines as
grandmothers lines. We attended the South Ward. Margaret Little and Mary
Jarvis were my Bee Hive teachers.
Mary
Naegle: (Teacher in Toquerville) Most of Elaine's teachers seem to feel that
Elaine is a good student but is not working up to her capacity. Elaine seems a
little self-conscious. She should make an effort to respond more in class. Her
P. E. teacher said "Elaine does fair work in Physical Education. Is
usually in uniform, but does not always shower."
Audrey: We both took piano lessons but Elaine played the piano
better. This was only for a short time.
Emma: ...Elaine put the landlord's organ in one of our rooms and
she enjoyed playing it.
Emma: During the winter of 1937-38
Elaine had a queer accident. Coming home from school, she passed the hospital.
As she was going past it, she felt something sharp run into her flesh above the
knee. She was wearing a coat of La Dene's and there must have been a pencil in
the coat between the lining and outer cloth. It broke off and quite a large
piece (point first) was imbedded in her flesh. We went to get the Patriarch to
administer to her but he was ill. So we went to Henry Baker's house. He was one
of the temple ordinance workers. He took us to Moroni Langford's house to get
him to assist. He was also an ordinance worker, later recorder. Brother Baker
was mouth in the administration and it was very striking. He said" Elaine,
we rebuke Satan and command him to depart. He is trying to destroy you. We also
advise you to obey your mother. We say unto you, Elaine, remember this
administration as long as you live. There were some more words I cannot
remember.
Elaine: One day I ran a pencil in my
leg above the knee and it broke off leaving the wood and the lead embedded deep
in the flesh. Dr. Righman removed the pencil led. Brother Baker said; "As
long as you live this administration will be something you will remember,It
will be a sign unto you that Satan will not have power to destroy you if you
keep the commandments of the Lord."
Emma: In June 1940, Elaine graduated
from Thomas Star King Junior High School. We went to Utah. In September 1940,
we returned to Los Angeles and Elaine started to John Marshall High School. In
June 1942, Elaine graduated from John Marshall High School. Elaine started to
City college near Vermont. She didn't like college. She had liked school
heretofore. The war that was now going on made the girls fear they would not
find husbands, if it lasted long, as some thought it might. So she was
restless. We went to church every Sunday. She also attended M.I.A. on Tuesdays.
She and Audrey both drove their father's car, as we could go to church in it
now. Elaine did outstanding work in the Bee Hive class in M.I.A., having a
wonderful scrap book and being an Honor Bee. She had also made a very fine book
of Remembrance in the Junior genealogical class, having a cover with the temples
on it which she made. She had special talent in making scrap books, also in
dress making which she took in grade school and in High School.
Audrey: Elaine
graduated from Marshall. Mother had gone to Utah and George was working so
Glen and I went to the graduation. It was out on the playing field. We were the
only ones, and we had to leave before they called her name. Glen had to go to
work. She was talented at things like making scrap books, book of remembrance,
sewing. One time in Utah she bought a bicycle and she rode a lot.
Dad: I lived at
3641 Seneca in Atwater. I had a friend named Kent Horn in Malta and this was
his sisters home. It was located the first street the other side of the tracks
just under the underpass. I would car pool with two girls in a model A. There
would be two girls and me in the front seat all the way to Lockheed. We also
went to see movies occasionally. We saw White Christmas at the Gateway
Theatre. World War II was well under way. Elaine was 17. We met at the
Hollywood Ward at a fireside at the end of 1942. I was 20.1 guess she had her
eye on me. She thought I was a pretty good looking guy. She invited me home to
dinner. Grandma Scholl could really cook, that was one of her virtues. I was
working nights then, and would occasionally go to dinner or to firesides with
Elaine. We were rather thick around the time the night of the Japanese scare
over L.A. happened. There were bombers going over. They would have a black
outs and one night we were at a fireside at Hollywood Ward, during a blackout
they turned out all the lights and I got near enough to hold her hand.
Dad: My first car
was a Model A coupe for $90, but it shocked me at the expense so I sold it and
took the street car. When we would go on a date we would take a street car. You
could go all over to Glendale, Hollywood, Downtown for only ten cents on it. It
had a nice smooth ride and was excellent transportation, it is too bad they
did away with them, they would be good today. We would sometimes go to the
movies for thirty five cents. She was just my type, quiet, shy like me, and we
seemed to hit it off together. I was working evenings and I went over to visit
her one morning and we were sitting out back and I asked her to marry me. She
jumped at the chance.
Emma:
One Sunday night at close of sacrament meeting two boys stepped up to Elaine
and asked her to stay to fireside. They were Raphael Olson and June H.
Gardiner. She stayed and they brought her home. One Sunday I asked June H.
Gardiner to bring his Book of Remembrance to Sunday School. He brought it the
next Sunday and came to our house for dinner. Audrey drove us home. Elaine had
a rash, so she didn't go to Sunday School. We thought it might be three-day
measles. June and Elaine looked at each other's Books of Remembrance and read
each others Patriarchal Blessings, both given by George Wilde. June came to our
house often from that time. Elaine went to the leap year-dance with Raphael
Olson. June worked swing shift at Lockheed's Airplane Factory and often came in
the daytime. When Elaine was
eighteen years old,
April 28,1943, she quit college.
Dad: We went and got our endowments in St.
George and got married in the Salt Lake City Temple. I was very tired when we
went to take the blood test. We went to a doctor early in the morning to get
the test. I watched them stick the needle in my arm and I didn't think anything
about it and then I watched them take the blood out of Elaine and I passed out.
The honeymoon was hilarious. We went up to Idaho to see my parents, I had only
a week off from work. We then lived for a short period of time at Golden Gate
before I went into the service.
Emma: Sunday, May
16, 1943, at 11:30 p.m., June, Elaine and I took the bus to Utah. We went to
Rosena Blake's in St. George, stayed all night Monday night. Tuesday morning
May 18th, we went to the St. George Temple. June and Elaine got their own
endowments and I did an endowment for the dead. After the session closed, we
went on the bus to Salt Lake. They had to get a blood test to secure a marriage
license. They were married in Salt Lake Temple May 19, 1943 by Brother David
Broadbent, counsellor to the temple president. Bertha went to the temple with
us. They went to Idaho to see June's folks and then returned to Los Angeles.
They stayed in the house with George that summer. June was drafted in the Navy
and left in September for San Diego for training.
Emma:
On October 15, 1943, we had a snow storm. It broke limbs off some trees, but
none of mine. I was working on Sister Blake's record. November 6th I got word
form Elaine that she had miscarriage. She was pregnant about six weeks. She had
gone to Audrey's the day she had it, so Audrey had her go to bed. I hurried
home as soon as possible. I had better health that winter than usual, so after
Elaine got strong we washed all the wood work in our house, which was an all
winter's job. June came from San Diego on his way east. His train only stopped
in L.A. a couple of hours and he couldn't go far from the station, so we took a
taxi and went to the station. Elaine could drive her father's car, so she took
Audrey and me to church, as Audrey still came over every Sunday. I has a very
pleasant Winter. It was the first winter Elaine was home all day.
Emma: I stayed in Utah all summer,
June %id told me he would like to buy a place in Utah if I could find one for
the money he had saved. I prayed about it and later asked Harold and Marvel
Mayfield if they would sell us the acre and adobe house. They sold it to us for
$1600, and as soon as the tenants moved, I went there to live.
Emma: June came from San Diego on his way east. His train only
stopped in L.A. a couple of hours and he couldn't go far from the station, so
we took a taxi and went to the station.
Emma: Elaine could drive her father's
car, so she took Audrey and me to church, as Audrey still came over every
Sunday. It was the first winter Elaine was home all day. May 23,1944, Elaine
and I went on the bus to Utah. Elaine had not seen the place she now owned. I
doubt if she would have liked to live in the house as it was in Winter. She
loved the orchard and in July she and I picked the cherries. We sold the Royal
Annes to Smith Cannery Co., 50 lugs at 10 cents a lb. Elaine could climb the
trees and was surely a good picker. Elaine got $300 for the cherries and had no
expenses to pay out of it. She put screens on the windows, tar paper on the
kitchen roof and shingles on the other roof where it leaked. But the greatest
thing she did was to go to the temple. She looked beautiful in her wedding
dress and my robe which Rosena Blake made. This was the happiest summer of my
life to have Elaine to go to the temple with me. Elaine went to Los Angeles on
September 12. Elaine was restless, so she got a job at an office in L.A. She
didn't seem to be very happy at her job. June was at Treasure Island in San
Francisco. He was a Radio Technician. In May Elaine went there and they rented
an apartment. June was released from the Navy and went to Logan and started to
the Agricultural College in January 1946. where he had gone a year before.
So Elaine went to stay in Utah to
help Emma. While we were there a girl in the ward told Elaine "you don't
need to worry about your husband, he doesn't pay attention to any of the rest
of us girls in the ward." While in the ward, President Grant died. He was
president of the church as long as I could remember.
Dad: Grandpa has been irritated by a dog that
lived across the fence and to get the dog to stop barking he had thrown a clod
at it because he couldn't sleep. These people got the police on him he had to
come down before a judge, and the judge sentenced him to two weeks in jail.
(Audrey says it was 1 full month.) And he had to spend it in jail! He had left
his car down in a pay lot, and he called us to come down and get his car, he
had a key under the running board and we went down and got his car and brought
it back home. He had to call from jail, they wouldn't let him do anything. That
is incredible that it had happened, because people get away with terrible
crimes and he was just trying to get some sleep. We had the house to ourselves
for two weeks, the hard way.
Dad: The neighbor
up the hill had a dog and the dog died and all the fleas came over right next
to the garage. I can remember going to church and sitting in church and picked
fleas off of us and pinched them with our fingernails to kill them. It was
terrible.
Dad: In San
Francisco in 1945 I was in the service, teaching Radio on Treasure Island.
Elaine wanted to come up as soon as I found a place. I found several places
that weren't suitable. The guys in the service liked the Berkeley Ward. We
would have services on Treasure Island with twenty or thirty servicemen.
Sometimes we would go to other wards for firesides or stake conference. For a
dime you could travel anywhere. I heard about an apartment available in May in
Berkeley in the basement of a ward member. I wrote Elaine and she came on the
train. I was surprised to find her and as brown as an East Indian. She probably
did this to please me. She would sun bathe on the top of the roof at Golden
Gate. It was nice, I contrasted her skin to the white people we traveled with
in the train. That was a delightful honeymoon for us. We were alone, we had a
good allowance, and it was a comfortable place to live. It was pure delight.
That was our real honeymoon. It was also where Kent was conceived. In the service
they were talking about people who had taught for a year were to be shipped out
for active duty. I had taught for a year so we felt my time might be up. Also
we had extra duty at that time to supervise guard duty a couple of nights a
week. Then Elaine went up to Utah for the summer. I got out of the service
January 1946. I hitchhiked from San Francisco down to Los Angeles. Elaine
stayed here and I took a bus back to Logan. I got off the bus at Cedar City and
I took one step off the bus and it shocked me so much that I stepped right back
on the bus, it was probably twenty below. I was used to warm weather for so
long, and I didn't have warm clothing. I was never so shocked at the cold in
my life.
Emma: Kent was born
about 7:00 a.m. March 18 in the same room where Elaine was born 21 years
before. He weighed 7 lbs. 4 oz. She had a very easy birth, no pains until about
5:00 a.m., when I had her take a hot bath. I took care of her and the baby, had
her stay in bed a couple of weeks and not do any hard work for six weeks. She
nursed the baby. His parents called him "bub".
Dad:
In Logan they had sleeping facilities in the fieldhouse for servicemen. There
was a mob up there. For $2 a piece you could buy grey surplus navy blankets. I
rented a bunk and had a shower and could eat at the cafeteria. I stayed for a
while and then Kent was born in March, down in L.A. They sent me a letter
telling me about the birth. The next summer I went and bought that house in
Providence, for $5500. It is two or three miles south of Logan. We didn't have
a dime left. We borrowed a little bit of money and paid cash for the house.
Elaine had a little bit of money she had saved while working at an insurance
company while I was in the service. I had earned $90 a month in the service and
a small allowance for her.
We saved nearly all of that. When I first began working for
Lockheed I was paid fifty cents an hour which was good money, compared to
fifteen cents an hour in Malta. We had almost zero in the way of furniture
because we had spent all our money on the house itself. My dad came down and
helped me move my stuff from the fieldhouse in a Ford pickup. We went to
Deseret Industries and bought a stove. I can remember Elaine the first night in
that house sitting on a mattress in the front room, nursing Kent and looking
pathetic. That was all there was in the room. She looked like she was thinking,
"what have I got myself into".
Dad: The first
summer I was there I worked for a Drug Store over in Logan. The pay was not
very good, 35 cents an hour. I didn't much care for it, because they had me
doing everything in the world; I built shelves, painted with no ventilation.
The next Summer I worked for the city taking care of the cemetery and patching
the streets. I dug the graves by hand. Sometimes we would run into water pipes
which would make it difficult. One time a young girl was thrown out of the back
of a pickup and was buried there. The first day I worked for them, they told me
to go up on the bench on the mountain, where there was a lot of gravel, to get
an old Chevy truck that belonged to the city. It had no brakes; coming down the
hill, I wheeled around things and skidded while trying to get into a lower
gear. I ground the gear but couldn't down shift. There was no emergency brake,
and no brakes. I don't know how I survived. Elaine was almost a widow.
Dad: I also worked for the
Neddos during that time. They were two old maids, and really very nice. I
painted for them, cleaned up but mostly milked and took care of the cows. I
milked by hand of course. We were not short on milk as I could take whatever we
needed. I also put the bull in with the cows when needed. We needed the money
as we were flat broke. I rode a bike. You had to be put on a list to buy a car,
however we didn't have the money for a car anyway. The G.I. Bill paid us $85 a
month plus books.
Dad: The house turned out pretty good. The next summer I put a
forced air furnace in it. It was a coal burning furnace, It had a coil in it to
heat your water, up until then we had heated the water on the stove. You had to
go down and shovel the coal in when you wanted heat. Electricity was really
cheap, so we bought an electric stove. I made a little bit of furniture. This
made the house much more comfortable to live in. We had a big lot with apple
trees and a garden. We picked 6 or 7 bushels of apples each summer. Elaine was
dismayed at first but she was one who would rise to the occasion. We were
happy and comfortable there. It was a nice place to live.
Emma: June decided to buy a place in
Providence. I asked him to sell his place to me. Audrey had given me $300 to
buy a lot several years before, which I still had, also money I received for
cherries, the past two summers. Audrey gave me $400 more and I paid Jim the
same as he paid for the place. They bought the Fuhriman home in Providence, a two
story stucco house. June helped pick cherries. We got a buggy from Virginia
Young for Kent, so we could take him out.
Emma: I went to Providence to
Elaine's Oct. 31st. I am sorry I ever went there. I felt sad to see her living
in such poverty. I had some money, so I went to Logan and bought springs and a
mattress for the twin beds June had made. I also bought food and coal. June got
an old cook stove at Deseret Industries. It was no good and we almost froze.
There was a heater in the front room but he wouldn't let us use it even if I
did buy coal. He has a very stubborn disposition. Elaine got an awful cold. She
was nursing Kent. It was below zero that winter. Kent was 7 1/2 months old when
I went up there. He was a very strong baby. His crib was in the kitchen and he
stood up in it most of the day. He slept in the bassinet the Relief Society
gave me before Elaine was born at night in a crib sheet we bought from Virginia
Young. I had John Wallace send Elaine a hundred pounds of carrots. She grated 8
to 12 ounces of carrot juice for Kent a day, straining it through a thin sack.
Elaine seemed very unhappy. Bishop Maughan lived next door. He was very kind to
them. He gave them a lot of food and other things. We did some washing at his
house in his machine until Elaine sent to Ward's for a washer. Many people in
Providence were kind to them. I doubt if they will ever live among such kind
people again. The Bishop gave June the job of President of the Elders Quorum.
When I had been there about two months, he told Elaine he wanted me to leave.
Audrey: 1947,
George went to Nebraska on a train. He had a lump on his head and he Wanted to
checkjit out with a doctor. It turned out to be benign. While there he visited
with his relatives and bought a yellow Packard for $1000 which seems high at
the time. It hadn't been driven, hardly at all and Glen and I bought it from
him when he got back.
Kent: I have pictures of Grandpa Scholl,
Mother, Father, Audrey and Glen up the canyon. We went on a picnic at the time.
It was the only time I know of when we were altogether in Utah. The car that
George brought up and gave to Elaine was a 1935 Chevy.
Emma: George came
in a car he bought. Audrey and Glen came about June 17. Elaine and Kent came
and stayed a while. Elaine picked some cherries. We put Kent in the bed-room on
the floor while we picked the apricots. He was lying on the bare floor asleep
when we came back. In September they let Kent stay with me. He liked to walk
bare footed , especially when I irrigated. June had job in Providence working
for the city. He put a Lennox coal furnace in their basement, so Elaine was
more comfortable than she had been the previous winter.
Dad: In the Summer
of 1947 Audrey, Glen and Grandpa came to visit us. We all went up to Logan
canyon in the Grandpa Scholl's Packard with Kent, Elaine and I in the rumble
seat. We took pictures of me and grandpa holding Kent.
Dad: In the winter of 1947
we had a 35 Chevy that Grandpa had given us last summer, that Glen and
Audrey had brought up from
California. We didn't drive it much because of the expense but one time Elaine
and I went down to Logan on the ice and I turned it around scaring Elaine half
to death. The time in Providence was pleasant but I don't know how we were able
to accomplish so much. I was full time in school, Elder's Quorum President, and
I worked a lot trying to keep the wolf from the door. But it was a happy time
for us.
Emma: (1948) Elaine
and Kent came down in May. I was so glad to see them once more. Elaine was
pregnant so she couldn't pick cherries. June was getting his masters degree in
Sept. at the Agricultural College, so they sold the place back to Fuhriman's
for $6000. He rented an apartment at the college, but Elaine and Kent moved
down to Farmington with me July 17th, 1948. We went to Bountiful to see Dr.
Stocks. He had delivered 3,800 babies. He came up the Sunday before the baby
was born. Elaine was at Sunday School. August 24th in the afternoon she had
slight pains. She took a bath in the tub. I wrapped towels around her. The
pains got hard. I called the Doctor and got her to bed. Bertha was here. The
baby was already arriving, when the Doctor came. He was disturbed. Elaine was
glad the baby was a brown-eyed girl. She was born in the front room. Kent and I
slept in the bed-room. We put the babies to bed in the kitchen at night. June
came down when he got his masters degree at the A.C. He was planning to go to
Wisconsin to the University. It was 54 degrees below zero there the previous
winter. Elaine did not feel able to go there with two babies, so June went to
L.A. in the car George gave Elaine. Audrey and Glen had been living with George
since June 1946. June stayed with them a while and looked for jobs. He came
back in Audrey's car (Packard) with George's trailer in October. I packed
Elaine's things in the trailer, also my clothes and some canned fruit. We left
here Oct 25th. June got a job at Ionic Equipment Co, 704 N. Kenmore, where he
worked before the war.
Dad:
I wanted to get my doctorate in Wisconsin and become a teacher. It seemed like
a good opportunity. It never really worked out.
Dad: I remember going to church in the Hollywood ward on
Normandie and taking Sandy into the nursery. She would scream so loud you could
hear her for blocks. Elaine and I would stand outside and we could hear her
cry above everyone else.
Audrey: While we were living in L.A.,
we would go to the show quite often. Grandpa Scholl would watch the children
and we would enjoy seeing a good show. Elaine liked musicals. We would just
walk in. Glen worked there. Glen and Jim and Sandra went over to Reeds. They
went down to the garage and left Kent up with Linda, their little girl, but
Kent took off. The Sunset Journal was the free newspaper back then, and when
the police picked Kent up and asked where he lived and all he said was
"Sunset Journal". Sandy had nothing but a diaper on, which was
soaking her dad. Glen, Reed and Dad looked frantically for Kent. They rode up
and down, and finally gave up and were driving home when they saw Kent in a
police car. All he could say was "Sunset Journal".
Dad: Sandy, Kent, Glen and I were
visiting Gil Reed. Kent was playing with one of their children while the rest
of us went out to a garage to look at a machine. When we came back Kent was
gone. We were very upset. We looked all over the neighborhood. Finally we got
in the car and went down to Sunset. Glen drove and on the way saw Kent in a
police car. He did a fast u turn, burning rubber on the tracks and we pulled up
to the police car and told them that he is ours.
Dad: We sold
the house in Providence and Elaine and Kent went to stay with Emma. Every
weekend I would visit them in a '35 Chevy that grandpa Scholl had given us. He
was always doing nice things for us. We dearly loved to go down to a canyon on
the southwest side of Cash Vafyey and come out at Brigham City. We would visit
Grandma Scholl in Farmington. We then moved back t© Golden Gate. I went to work
for Ionic Equipment fixing televisions and then back to Lockheed. We put a down
paymenion a house on
Wing in Glendale, and we decided against it and lost the down
payment and then bought the house on Isabel. Wing was $11,000 and Isabel was
$12,500. Elaine thought that was a horrible amount of money. That was in the
late Fall of 1950. When we moved into the Isabel house the guy who sold it to
us was in there removing the light bulbs. I told him "really!" So he
left part of them in. That took real nerve.
Dad: Mark was born in the summer of 1950 in a
hospital on La Brea. There was a woman in labor who was screaming. Elaine came
in and had Mark and they put the first woman's tag on Mark and Elaine's tag on
her baby. Elaine saw the other child and said, "that's not my baby!"
So Mark is really an adopted child.
Emma:
At 4:00 a.m. July 22nd, Elaine went to a hospital and Mark was born that
morning. I didn't like to see her go to a hospital, the first one she was ever
in. In two days she came home. Mark was a lovely baby. I took care of him. I
had Elaine stay in bed for 10 or 12 days. Sandra slept in George's porch, Kent
in my room and Mark in the dining room, later in the middle bed-room. George
had built a nice little sunny house in the back yard and he slept there. Mark
was a little yellow. Elaine said he was white when he was born. I gave him
catnip tea. Elaine nursed him and he soon got white. He was her largest baby
and easiest to care for. I rubbed him several times a day. Sandra had a skin
eruption. I put her on orange juice and certified milk, then the only raw milk
we could buy in L.A. After buying raw milk there since 1913, it was now
forbidden. June and George gave Sandra food I didn't approve of feeding a two
year old. Raising children around five grown ups was...a sad mistake. Kent was
suffering with catarrh from the mucus clogging his organs. Elaine had grown
very nervous in the two years since she left Utah. She and June looked for
houses a great deal of the time. They made a deposit on one in East Glendale
Ward on Wing Street, but backed out. They later bought one at 914 N. Isabel in
Glendale West Ward. I bought
Kent a youth bed, Mark a crib and
some other things for Elaine with the $150 dollars Mrs. Chaf- fin gave me. They
moved just before Christmas, but Kent stayed with us for several weeks. He
loved to have me read to him.
Emma: Elaine and
her family came next week but went right on to Malta, Idaho. They came back a
week later and stayed two nights. I put Mark in Kent's buggy, Kent on a cot in
the front rooms, Sandra in the play pen in front room and I slept by them on
the day bed. June and Elaine slept in the bed-room. Elaine went to the Dentist
and took Kent to Lagoon. I had her things that she left here in 1948 packed.
June put them and one of the twin beds, spring and mattress, and all the canned
fruit he could get in the trailer. It was raining the morning they left.
Emma: I was taking
care of Elaine's children...Elaine got along fine. June had changed from Lockheed
to N.B.C. Television station in Burbank. He wasn't home until 1:00 p.m. most
of tjie time. He was more active in the church now than he had been since they
came to L.A. in 1948. He was sustained a counsellor in the Elders quorum and he
attended Sacrament meeting when he didn't have to work Sunday afternoons.
Emma:
Mar 15, 1952, June brought Mark over to stay a while. I had secured a crib from
Lola Tanner and bought a new mattress. I had it in my sleeping room. Mark
stayed until June 8th. We surely enjoyed having him. June got me two gallons
of carrot juice a week. He bought Mark's raw milk and other food. I took Mark
for long walks every day. He was only 20 months and he could climb all the
steepest hills. People thought he was three, as he was so large and strong.
Janice was a born Mar. 31st in a hospital. I offered to care for Elaine and the
baby, but they refused, so she had no care after she came to her home from the
hospital. Her health was not good any more as it had been the past 27 years. June
brought Kent and Sandra over April 1st. Sandra's crib was in the front bed-room
and I borrowed a crib from Agnes Beitler and put it in the back bed room and
put Mark in it and Kent slept in the crib in my room. I surely enjoyed Kent. I
had purchased Emma
Marr Peterson's Bible Stories and
Book of Mormon Stories I read them all to Kent and some over several times. I
was sad when Kent went home. He was with us seven weeks, Sandra eight and Mark
twelve weeks. Elaine was going to have Janice blessed first Sunday in June, so
they took Mark home Sat. night before fast day. But Elaine took sick that
night, so June brought Mark back Sunday morning and he stayed that week. I went
to Elaine's Sunday after Mark went home and he was so happy to see me. I took
care of him most of the time the first seven months of his life and three
months again before he was two.
Dad: Gayle was born
in the Ford. It was a foggy night, Elaine gave birth to Gayle and the nurse who
had comej out of the hospital held her up and said, "Don't you have a
light in this car?"
Dad: Bishop Callister was put in soon after we
moved into the Isabel house. Homer Reeder was the Elders Quorum President when
we moved in. I was putting in shelves in the attic of the garage and he came
over and visited with me. Later, I was in the Elders Quorum Presidency with
Frank Workman. I also was a home teaching supervisor with a huge number of
families. I had pages of families. There were 3 supervisors. The ward went from
Glendale Blvd to Burbank to the L.A. river. Mother worked in the Primary a little.
We started family home evening way back then in the early 50's. We read bible
stories on Sunday and went out for ice cream after church if everyone was good.
We eventually phased that out. Elaine really liked ice cream.
Dad:
The home on Isabel was very pleasant. It was comfortable with three bedrooms, a
large backyard and a nice garage with an attic. The kids made friends with the
children on the street such
as: Rick Miletello, Jeff Mc Nulty,_____ McNulty,
the twins, Mary Ellen Baldoff, and
old Mr. Duffy next door. Elaine had hay fever and during the part of the year
the olive trees were in blossom. They would literally rain down yellow
blossoms. We ended up taking out two trees. One was next to the garage and the
other at the back of the house. We also put a new roof on the house. Back in
those days sacrament was at 6:00pm, and the counselor to the Bishop, Lock
Hales, would often say, "no souls are saved after a quarter after."
He was a very fine man. Bishop Callister and Dr Hales were both the cream of
the earth, they would do anything to help you, anything they could possibly do.
They were the finest.
Emma: Audrey phoned
that Elaine had been ill the day before and all night. If she had only told me
the day before I could have taken care of her and saved her much suffering. I
didn't get there until noon and found she had an inflamed ovary from catching
cold at her menstrual period. The woman next door had given her sleeping pills
Christmas eve. I called Bishop Reed Callister to administer to her. He brought
Dr. Hales, his counsellor, the Dentist I refused to allow to pull my teeth in
1936, as he was inactive member of Church and drank, and smoked a cigar. All
they could think of was pain killing dope and advised her to get a doctor. Dr
Hale sent his son over soon with a bottle of pain-killing dope. He also recommended
a doctor. I had to get dinner Christmas afternoon and take care of four
children, so I could do little for Elaine. I went early the next morning and
they said the doctor was coming. All he did when he came was give a
prescription for some more pain killing dope.
Dad: She never had
morning sickness during all the pregnancies. Relatively speaking the deliveries
were easy. Dr. William G. Slight delivered all of the kids in Glendale. He and
Norma lived in the apartments next to the church and had an office on Glenoaks
in Burbank. He struggled to find out what was wrong with Elaine when she got
sick. He finally took her to a clinic across from Sears where he and Dr.
Marshall looked at her. Dr Marshall thumped both sides of her stomach. This
side is tympanic, and the other side is not, Dr. Marshall told Dr. Slight.
There is a growth on this side. They took the growth out of her ovary the size
of an elongated orange. It was huge. Dr. Slight was as fine a Doctor as there
ever was.
Emma: Elaine was
feeling fine. Mark and Janice 1 came to stay with us on 9th December, 1953,
Gayle was born 16 Dec, 1953, Kent and Sandra came to our house, that day and
stayed until after Christmas holidays. Elaine sent over a lot of presents she
had bought for the children. Glen and Audrey came on Christmas day and brought
a very lovely electric train set and Glen ran it for the children and they
surely enjoyed it. It was the happiest Christmas I ever remember. Mark and
Janice stayed with us until the last of February. Sandra and Kent had
chicken-pox in January and February. Elaine nursed Gayle and she was her best
baby, but Mark was a very good baby.
Emma: Kent had measles in May and the other
four had them after I left for Utah. Elaine came to Utah in July. They enjoyed
swimming at Lagoon.
Emma: The L.A. Temple opened for visitors in
Dec. and was open for two months. Elaine was pregnant two months and had a
cold, so could not go. President McKay offered the dedicatory prayer and it was
wonderful. Tuesday afternoon was the Glendale Stake day. June and Kent and Glen
and Audrey went. The temple opened for ordinance work 16 April, 1956.
Emma: If Elaine had
continued to have that faith, she could have been healed instead of paying Dr.
Harold K. Marshall and the hospital he owned in Glendale eleven hundred
dollars. She was operated on by him and had her left ovary and a cyst removed
22 April, 1957.
Dad: Grandma Scholl
was over helping. Jeffrey was six weeks. Elaine was just home from the hospital
after having the cyst removed. I was giving Jeff a bath on the sink in the
kitchen. I had a washing in the Blackstone automatic washer next to the 5
gallon bottle of Sparkletts water, and as I am bathing Jeffrey, the washer gets
out of balance, and it starts to shake around and it began to knock the bottle
of water over. Here I am busy bathing Jeffrey, and as I try to save the bottle
of water, Jeff falls to the floor with a thud. Elaine was there two seconds later,
berating me for my negligence. She was shaking with anger.
Dad: During the
summer of 1958 Elaine was pregnant with Jeffrey. We were walking back across
the park from a picnic at Verdugo Park, she was holding Gayle by the hand and
fell down and bumped her stomach. That really scared her. She was shaking all
over from the experience.
Emma: 26 December,
1958 Elaine gave birth to her seventh child, Julie. 27 December I went to
Glendale to help them. I slept in their playhouse at 914 No. Isabel three
weeks. I rented a room from Mary Johnson at 630 No. Jackson for five months. I
only stayed there nights, as I helped Elaine every day of the five months from
6:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. I read religious books to Mark every night. They had
purchased a home at 1366 Cleveland Drive and were painting and fixing the house
to get it ready to sell. Elaine painted and worked hard. They moved to the
house Cleveland Drive when school closed in June, but did not sell the house on
Isabel until later.
Sandy: Elaine used to hide chocolate bars in
the freezer and she would ask me to go and get them for her. I felt rather
guilty because Dad didn't feel she should have them. I remembers finding a
chocolate bar in a bowl in the cupboard, and eating part of it. I didn't admit
to it so Dad took everyone into the garage and said, "we are going to stay
right here until we find out who ate the chocolate bar".
Sandy: I remember one time
I made mother mad. I was walking from the front to the back of the house
carrying Julie who was a baby, and I dropped her. I took her into mother, she
was screaming at the top of her lungs. I said mother, she must have hit a
branch. She said, are you sure?!
She then rocked her on a chair to try and get her to stop crying.
Mark: We were up in
Utah. I climbed up on a tractor in Utah, I released the mower on the back of
the tractor. Dad was yelling at me, and mother grabbed me and said "leave
him alone". Another time Dad was trying to get mother to drive the truck.
Mother wasn't too good at the clutch, and she was taking off and dumped part of
the load. Dad came up and told her that was not too cool.
Sandy: I remember
getting my mouth washed out with soap. I didn't even know what I said or what
it meant.
Kent: On August
19591 was camping with Scout Troop 26. We had just completed the Silver Moccasin,
a 65 mile hike. Mother wrote me the following words. " Dear Kent, We
arrived home at 6:30. Nobody got car sick but David. I wanted to send up your
jacket, but Reeders and Petites had left. Wear two or three shirts and two pair
of pants mornings and evenings plus your sweatshirt. It is hot here. I do hope
your blister is better. Have it taken care of if not. Glenn and Audrey got back
Friday night. Haven't talked to them yet. Granddad will start the fence at end of
week. We miss you. Try to get lots of sleep. Love. Mother"
Dad: In the summer of '59
we took our usual vacation to Idaho and Utah. We went in the green 55' Ford
station wagon. The family enjoyed visiting Emma in Farmington, climbing the fruit
trees and eating cherries. Sometimes they would walk to a natural spring at the
far end of the property. The kids would bathe in a large galvanized tub in the
kitchen and play on a hammock that was strung between two trees out front. In
Idaho we would visit the Gardiner grandparents. The children would enjoy
helping with the cows, chickens and running around the farm. We slept outside
under the stars near the creek and made whistles from the reeds nearby. We
always had a big bonfire where we would cook hot dogs and marshmallows.
Golden's family would join in too.
This particular summer we decided to
take a hike with Grandpa Gardiner. It was to be our last outing with him, he
died the next year. Kent, Sandy, Elaine, Grandpa and I got into the old pickup
and drove up toward the largest mountain around; Black Pine. Grandpa Gardiner
had seen an ore deposit from the valley floor as he drove past Black Pine over
the last 30 years and we thought we would go exploring. We drove the truck as
far as possible and got out and began hiking toward the far side of the
mountain. When we had gone a fair distance we decided that we needed the food,
shovel and water, which were back in the pickup. I volunteered to go back. It
was a long hike. On the way back with the supplies I got really tired. I would
walk a few paces and have to sit down. It took a long time to get up the
mountain. When I finally got to the others, Grandpa said, "What took
you?" When we got to the ore deposit we found that someone had beaten us
to it and had dynamited it and there was nothing left. We then hiked to the top
of Black Pine. From there you could see forever. It was a beautiful sight. The
Great Salt Lake was clearly visible. I found myself so tired that even though
we were going downhill I had nothing left to give. My muscles were completely
spent. My heart was just pounding. I would take three or four steps and have to
sit down, panting like a puppy. It was the most tired I have ever been in my
life. Grandpa, Sandy and Kent went on about a half mile ahead. Elaine stayed
behind with me. She was worried that I might faint or pass out. One of the nice
things about marriage is that kind of caring. When we finally did get back we
had to do the chores.
Dad: Elaine said we
have too many kids for this little house on Isabel. She said it won't hurt to
look, which is always fatal. She would go out and look once or twice a week for
houses. She found the Cleveland House and asked me to go look at it. I said
yea, it is a pretty good house, a big house. They wanted $27,500, and we made
the offer and they wouldn't take it. So that was it. Quite a few months later
Elaine saw the real estate woman who showed us the house before, and Elaine
told her that house must be gone by now. The real estate woman said no, they
are renting it out because they couldn't sell it and asked if we wanted to make
another offer. So we offered $25,000 again and they took it. That was June of
1959. We did a lot of painting. When we first came in everything leaked. We
bought the house from the Deppie family who lived over on Virginia Street. They
rented the home to a couple. She was in an iron lung. Before we formally moved
into the house the lady called and told me that the furnace was not working,
could I come over and fix it. I did, but I found that there were two very old
gravity furnaces that barely worked in the home. Mark liked the sprinkler
system because the Isabel home didn't have one.
Dad: Once in the home the children went around
and made friends with Sue, Bobby and Annie Briggs. Paul, Sue and Lorie Lauten
were across the street. Next door was Bunny. The kids were happy that they
could all walk to school, and liked the large house and big back yard.
Emma: Saturday, 26
March 1960, I received a letter from Elaine saying she was ill. Since October
she had felt very fatigued. In January she felt her stomach getting large and
hard. In March she went to a doctor. He said it was her liver that was enlarged
and her heart was causing it. I got a ride to Los Angeles with Bishop Sylvan
Graf on a cattle truck. June met me at the Cecil Hotel, 1st and Spring, LA. I
went to Elaine's home at 1366 Cleveland Drive and slept in Marks bed room. It
is a beautiful home, a large living room, living room, kitchen, breakfast noon,
service porch, five bed-rooms and fruit room in basement with a large lovely
yard. George build a six foot redwood fence to enclose the back yard. I was not
able to do anything for Elaine. She was examined by many doctors and they
experimented on her with their shots, drugs, etc, things which I do not approve
of. She was administered to by the Patriarch, Wilford Edling, Bishop Reed
Callister and others. I only went to the West Glendale Ward one Sunday to
Sacrament meeting. My health was very poor while I was there and I could not
sleep. But I did a lot of work and washed all Elaines woolen blankets,
sweaters, bed pads, etc. I got up at 4:00 a.m. most of the time. I read to Mark
as many nights as he would come to bed early. At Easter vacation he went with
Glen, Audrey, Gerald, Beitlers and Roberts to Shoshone for a week. He came back
very sick with bad ears and a cold, bronchitis, which he has had since he was a
baby. He was very sick and threatened with pneumonia.
Emma: Seeing Elaine
so sick was one of the worst experiences of my life. I think it is the after
effects of the surgery. She spent most of her time in bed. The sisters from the
Ward were very kind, bringing food and gifts. Alice Williams Reeder, Homer Reeder's
wife did all the ironing. A neighbor, Mrs. Briggs, did the mending on machine.
I feel so sorry for Elaine's poor children.
Audrey: The doctors
decided on a liver operation and when they diagnosed her again they found that
her heart was bad and decided against the operation.
Dad: When mother
was well along with the Janice pregnancy she was ill and nauseous and had a lot
of pain. After Janice was born she was also ill. She was so sick she couldn't
nurse Janice. We tried to feed her cows milk but she just threw it up. You
could see the skin between her ribs because everything you would feed her she
would throw up. Finally we had to feed her goats milk which worked. Janice was
the most smiling baby of all of our children. Elaine also threw up and had a
lot of pain and agony. Then she got over it. She felt good. She went through
several of these phases where she had a lot of pain. Some doctors said is was
psychosomatic. She never really got a good diagnosis until she went to Dr.
Marshall after Jeffrey was born. He felt around on her and operated on her and
took out some kind of a cyst or tumor on her ovary. Then she felt good. Then we
thought we've got this thing licked. They said it was not malignant, but she
never really came back strong after that. After Julie was born it was feeling
funny again, and I remember laying in bed and I was really startled, I could
hear her heart leaking around the valves, a swishing sound. Her liver got as
hard as a rock. Then she went down from then on. I think the cancer began in
her ovary back in 1957 and never stopped. The cancer was in her lungs and in
her heart.
Dad: I can remember
holding Julie while we went to many doctors, looking for help. We went to
U.S.C. medical center and because her stomach was so large they insisted on
taking a pregnancy test. She was full of water, her legs, stomach, everything
below her waist. She weighed a 100 pounds when she was well but she became much
lighter as the disease progressed. I bought her a chaise lounge and a soft
mattress to help her in her agony. They were very uncomfortable for her. She
seemed to get along best in our bed in our bedroom. She had a flushed face,
starting in 1957. One time we were sitting on the rug talking on a Sunday
afternoon and I noticed small purple dots on her face. At first it wasn't
unpleasant, later it was. It must have been related to the cancer. The cancer
diagnosis was made in June 1960 and she died in August.
Audrey: Kent went
with us to kShoshone and we found out all the awful stuff about Elaine when we
returned.
Dad:
She was feeling better in July and we went to the beach, we picked up a
shipment of fresh Utah cherries on the way, from the railway express. Her
system couldn't handle the cherries and they caused horrendous gas and pain. That
night she got dreadfully sick. She took Perkidin, a pain killer. I slept on the
floor or in the front room so I didn't bother her. That night I woke up with a
horrible feeling, I walked into the bedroom and looked in the bed. She was not
there. She was wearing her garments. I looked in the bathroom, and in the kids
bedrooms. I could just imagine her walking out on the street. This was in July.
I thought where could she be. I checked in the garage and she was asleep on the
front seat of the Ford. She was so out of it she would not respond to me, so I
picked her up carried her into the house. That is as good a scare as I have
ever had.
Dad: Easter Week,
1960, Dr. Slight said there was no hope. So I went to Dr. Marshall and he said
in effect, we all have to die sometime. Then I went back to Dr. Slight and said
isn't there anything we can do. He put us onto another doctor. That Dr. said
yes, we can fix her up. I don't know why he said that, money or what. Anyway we
took her down to Children's Hospital. They had the facility to check the
functioning of the heart. They ran tubes up into her heart through her legs.
When she came out of that, I was working midnights, I was so tired that I was
exhausted, and one day I didn't go over to see her. When I did get over to see
her, boy was she upset. She was so mad at me she could have killed me! She said
she never wanted to go into a place like that again, ever; she said it was
inhuman. It might have been. After that she couldn't do figures in her head.
She was brought home and given heavy pain killers. Sister Brown, Ofa Shimmer,
and Helen Blair came in and gave her shots. They wanted to show me how, but I
didn't think I could stand it.
Dad: In the middle
of August she was walking around checking to see if the kids had enough jeans
for when school would start. The day before she died part of the family went to
Disneyland. Bishop Callister insisted that we go. Kent, Sandra, Mark went with
me. Jeff and Julie went and stayed with Sister Kroksh. That night I took her to
the bathroom and she said, "you know, I don't think I'm ever going to get
better". The morning of the 30th I turned her over to help her to the
bathroom, and she gasped, and was gone. The Browns and Dr. Slight came over the
morning after she died. The Relief Society also came in and helped with her
and cleaned the house that day.
Emma: Tuesday
morning 30 August 1960 Audrey phoned to Charlotte to tell her my darling Elaine
had just died. I talked to Audrey Wednesday 31 August and told her to excuse
me from attending the funeral. I could not stand to see her seven dear
children's sorrow at her passing. I prayed for my lovely Elaine, taught her the
gospel, and worked for her 35 years. I thank the Lord for sparing me the awful
ordeal of seeing her die and seeing her poor sick body lowered in the grave.
She has fulfilled her mission of motherhood and I pray her work in the spirit
world will bring her happiness.
Kent: There was an
open casket the night before the funeral. The funeral was held in the Glendale
West Ward where there were many mourners. It was a sad confusing time for us
children and for Dad. I think that we all felt that somehow she would be
spared, and there was a tremendous sense of loss at her passing. The funeral
was long. Audrey sold Dad two spaces next to the Kroksh's for Elaine's last
resting place. Glen is buried in the next plot. The cemetery is located in
Burbank and is called Valhalla.
Audrey: June who
had changed his name to Jim sometime before Elaine died, married Carol Thomsen,
October 7, 1961. Jim's sister, Gloria came and stayed with him and the children
most of the time until he and Carol were married.
Audrey: George died in January 1967, he had a
cold, then a stroke and took pneumonia and died. He was quite feeble and we
were glad he was only really bedfast a few days.
Audrey:
On October 5, 1969 after sacrament meeting Emma was walking across a cement
patio toward the car when she fell and broke her hip. The night she broke her
hip she said she knew she was going to die and she wished she could just go to
sleep. Sunday morning Oct. 12, which was Jeffrey's birthday, she went to sleep
and passed away.
Dad: Over the years
I've had a couple of dream where she has stood before me, clear, vivid and
unspeaking.
Kent:
Twenty eight years after Elaine's passing she leaves behind a vast assembly of
children, spouses, and grandchildren. Her dedication to her family, to the
gospel and to her husband remain as evidence of a life well lived. Her
patriarchal blessing says, "Thou shalt find strength and helpfulness
therein and thy part of the work shall be a bright spot that others shall see
and appreciate. Thus thy good shall live eternally." May we one day merit
the blessing to be with her."