Saturday, April 21, 2012


LIFE HISTORY OF SARAH LOUISE WRIGHT BUTTERWORTH

 a hot Fourth of July in 1871 in Millcreek Ward, Salt Lake City, Utah, during a big celebration, a baby girl was born to Mr. and Mrs  John Prodger Wright. Her name was Sarah Louise Wright.  On a little homestead which John P  Wright, my father, had settled, they trade the adobes for the house and built a one and a half story building, which was two-rooms.

 I, Sarah Louise, was the fifth child in the family.  I was born on the floe? while everyone else had gone to the celebration except a baby girl two years old, who helped get the quilt ready, etc.  Mother and I lay there for two hours before anyone came.  My father came and brought Grandma Wardell and the doctor-lady Mrs. Rank.  Mother got up and walked fourteen steps to her room upstairs.

 Mother and baby did fine and we still lived on the little homestead,  At the age of six, I started to school in the little frame school house two miles away. I started to primary when it was first organized in the church.  We had home-made shoes and blue and brown Overall material made into clothing.

 At the age of seven years, we bad an epidemic of diphtheria, which went through the country.  Two of my older sisters died with it, Mary Belle and Rhoda Ann, ages eleven and nine.  I lay at the point of death with the disease.  From then until I was eleven~years old, I could not talk plain.  By then I had two more sisters and one brother. When I was eight, I was baptized into the Latter-day Saint Church by Oliver Monson and confirmed by Peter Hansen.

When I was ten years old, I went about twenty-four miles from home to do house-work and tend babies for 75cents a week.  I~stayed for eleven months.  I bought my own trunk, which I kept for forty years.

 At the age of fourteen, I joined the Mutual Improvement Association.  My father and mother went extracting honey from bees and I helped during the summer.  My father was a tailor by trade and my mother and he sat up many nights making overalls for the 7. C. M. I., David Brinton's store in Cottonwood, and many others.

 I well remember when father took his second wife and brought her home to live with us.  Her name was Elizabeth Rynearson, and she had four children altogether.

 At fifteen, I started courtship with Isaiah Butterworth, my future husband, in April, 1855.  Our courtship lasted about two and a half years.  continued working with my father in the summers of my fifteenth and sixteenth years and did housework in the winter.

 The epidemic of diphtheria came into our family again and my father's second wife lost two children, while I slept right in the same room with the oldest the night be-fore she died, but did not get the disease.

 In August 24, 1887, I married Isaiah Butterworth In the Logan Temple.  We lived in East Mill Creek with his father and mother for a short time.  Then we started keeping house. in one of the earliest pioneer homes in East Mill Creek.  It was a log house in which our first baby girl, Mary Louise, was born in May 23, 1888.  In making our living we hauled wood from the canyon for the Chinese laundry in Salt take City, sold hay and dried peaches,  We farmed twenty acres of land and raised wheat, potatoes, and had a few sheep.  In 1890 another baby girl, Isabelle, was born on 0ctober 11, in a little adobe house in East Mill Creek.

 We left there and went up on a piece of land on the sand ridge and received twenty acres of land which had belonged to Isaiah's brother Edmund, prior to his death, in Hooper Ward, Davis Stake.  We settled on a sage-brush flat and built a house.  They divided the Hooper Ward, and Isaiah became second counselor  in the bishopric and I was counselor in the Primary, teacher in Sunday School, and a Relief Society Teacher.

 In 1892. I went down to my Brother's Isabelle Wright, for the birth or our first son, Edmund Isaiah, on the twenty-first of December.  It took place at my parent's old home.  He was blessed~by this grandfather, William Butterworth.  While living  in Davis. County, we were raising wheat, oats, potatoes, and hay.

 In 1894 another baby came, a girl, Lenora Wright Butterworth December 6.  She was born in a little lumber two-room house that we had built on the twenty acres, and we were farming the twenty acres Uncle Edmund gave Uncle William, also.  Also, in 1894, we planted a two-acre orchard of all kinds of fruit trees.  It was a beautiful little orchard, as it grew, and in 1897 bore its first fruit.

In March, 1897, another baby came, a girl, Zelpha Naomi, on March 23. When Zelpha Naomi was eighteen months of age,, Isaiah decided be would like to raise cat-tie, and so sold his farm and possessions and took two cows, two. teams with a wagon-load of household goods, and a white-top buggy with one team, and I drove the team or horses and follows.  We traveled like pioneers to Star Valley, Wyoming in Freedom Ward.  We bought 160 acres of land.  This was the summer of 1898.  We lived here until May 1899, and sold out and traveled all summer looking for a new location.  We went back to Utah, then back up to Blackfoot, but didn't like the country around Blackfoot, Idaho. So we went on over to  Evanston and Big Piney,, Wyoming for the summer. It was a good cattle country.  But I was pregnant and couldn't stand to live in such a desolate country without any good schools for the children.

In the fall of 1899 in October, we went back to Star Valley where we had left sixty head of cattle on the summer range, and had to go and round them up and buy hay for them for the winter.  The children started school in Thayne, and 'we lived about two miles from the school house near the mountains.  That winter we had mountain rats in the house that ate our shoes up.  We also heard mountain lions roaring at night.  It was a quite wild country without railroads.  It was a cattle-raising country mostly.

Then in March, 1900, on the 8th day, a baby girl came, Nellie Josephine.  In April:1900, the government opened up some new land for filing.  Father filed on 160 acres and I filed on 40.  My 40 was meadow land and had pure spring water coming from several springs that furnished water for irrigating the land.  Fathers was sage and meadow land.  On that land he plowed and the children and I gathered all the sage and burned it.  Here we planted alfalfa and wheat and cut wild hay on the meadow.  We went to the canyon to get poles for fencing this land.

Besides the cattle, 'we had milk cows and sold milk.  As the years went by our dairy herd grew, I bought a cheese dairy outfit and made cheese for two summers   This cheese we sold by the load to Wyoming stores and Utah stores.  Isaiah used to haul freight from Montpelier for the stores in Thayne to make some money to buy wire for the fence on our place.  The land had been grazing land for summer range for hundreds of heads of cattle, and pole fences didn't keep them out.  Therefore, it was necessary to put a barbed wire fence in.

During this time, I was first counselor in the Young Ladies Mutual Improvement Association, a Sunday School teacher, and President of the Religion Class.  Isaiah was put in Bishop of Glenco Ward, which was later named Thayne Ward in August 18, 1901, and held this office for four years.  He was released September 3, 1905.  In the fall of 1904, we sold our homestead and moved to Willard, Utah, and stayed there all winter.  In February,1905, I went down to Salt Lake City and stayed with Mother to get ready for the birth of a child.  This child came February 25, and was a son, which was a very hard birth since he weighed ten pounds.  When be was three weeks old, I came home to Willard. This baby was Ralph Wright Butterworth.  My sister Eliza, was a midwife. She delivered this baby.  After going home a week the baby took pneumonia.  Aunt Eliza Zanger came up to help me nurse him.  He almost died and it was through faith and prayers and good work that he remained alive.  About this time, word came that the man who had bought our place had given it up, and we had to move back to Thayne, Wyoming, and take the place back in April, 1905.  Isaiah and Edmund took all our furniture. The children and I went in May on the train.

The two oldest girls, Louie and Belle, went to Salt Lake from Willard and stayed and worked all summer.  Louie  worked in the laundry and Belie did housework and picked fruit.  Father went to Utah for fruit in September and brought Belle home.  Louie came home after October conference.  Truman Hebdon, who had been on a mission for two years, came with her.  She bad been engaged to him while he was away.  I was busy sewing during October and November getting her ready for the marriage.  I made her a pale, blue wedding dress.  Our family being reunited, we had a happy time that fall.  She married December 13, 1905.

 In August, 1906, we left Wyoming and came to Lincoln, Idaho to work at the Sugar Factory.  Then we moved into Idaho Falls, Idaho.  Here I worked in the Relief Society, worked among the sick a~lot bringing babies, and went to work at Keyster's College where I learned how to sew for other people.  In November on the 17th day, 1913, my second daughter, Isabelle, married James Frederick Davidson, and moved to Rexburg, Ida.

 In February, l9l4, we moved to Menan, Idaho, on the big ranch and worked very hard as a farm woman.  I also worked among the sick.  We lived there for four years, and my husband went to work for Wood's Livestock Company in Rigby, Idaho in 1917. At this time my father John P.Wright, died at the age of 80 years.  In the meantime, Zelpha Naomi married James A Bush, on September 27, 1915 at Blackfoot Idaho

In October 1918 we had a son go to war and it was a very sad time in our lives. He just got in an San Diego and the Armistice was signed.  He had the flu while there. He was Captain of the soldiers that left from Rigby.  June 11, 1919, he, Edmund Isaiah married Gladys Francis Rogers in the 5alt Lake Temple.

In February, 1920, we were called to Camas, Idaho, to run a big ranch for the Woods Livestock Company.  Isaiah was to be the foreman.  Hay was very scarce and we had to ship in corn and baled hay for the cattle.  After we had been there just six weeks or on March 17, 1920, my husband was killed by horses while loading hay off the train.  The men had wagon at the train and he ~Ad just gone to get the mail.  As the train whistled it frightened the horses, and he stepped out of the Post Office just in time to see them run away. He ran out and grabbed one side and Mr. Spoo Savage grabbed the other.  The horses turned in Isaiah's direction, knocked him down, and the wagon wheels ran over his chest,

That was one of the saddest times of my life.  The men came down for me and by the time I got there, he couldn't speak to us.  We took him to Idaho Falls on the freight train, in the caboose.  He died four and one-half hours later without regaining consciousness.  My son, Edmund, and my son-in-law, James F, Davidson, came to the hospital, but father had died.  I fainted away and just regained consciousness as they came up the step.  When the nurse told the boys that father was dead, my son was struck dumb as it was such a shock to him.   We waited there and followed him to the undertakers in the car and stayed at a friend's place, Musgraves.

Friends came from far and near to attend the funeral in Idaho Falls, Idaho.These were the saddest hours of my life, I moved back to stay with my son a few days and then went to Montpelier, Idaho and stayed two months with my daughter, Lenora. We were lonely and sad as her husband was away with the sheep.  I came back from Montpelier to he here for decoration lay, and bought a tombstone to put at the grave.
After this I went to Woods Livestock to work at Spencer, Idaho.  I was the mistress of the house for the manager. I was too homesick, and soon came back to Rigby. I visited my children.  For two years I spent my life this way.  During that first summer, my sister's girl, Belle Christensen. was running the resort at Lagoon in Utah. Nell and I went down to work for the summer  I rented bathing suits and also kept a large house up for our room and board.

0n December 28, 1921. my youngest daughter, Nellie Josephine, married Harold Gates Marler, in Idaho Falls, Idaho.  They were sealed in the Logan Temple on July 29, 1922.  They lived in Rigby.

In order to make a home for some motherless children and a home for myself, I decided to remarry.  On April 2, 1922, I married an old friend of my former husband, William Byram, who had been a widower for four years.  We lived in Ucon, Idaho on a large farm and found plenty to do and care for the children,  They were thrilled to have me come into their home and I was glad to enter.  I worked in the Relief Society and was secretary of the Utah Pioneers.  I sent m~ parent's history to the Utah State to have it put in Heart Throbs of the West.  A few of the Ucon people had a club called the Kennsington and later formed the club "Ulia" wool growers, a branch of the wool growers of Idaho, also the War Mothers in Idaho Falls, George ran the farm as he was the last of the children to he married.

Ralph,.. my youngest son, went to Ogden, Utah, to live with Naomi and Ward to learn the bakery trade from Ward in 1925.  Later he went to Seattle, Washington to continue his knowledge of the bakery business.  He married Mary Melva Bybee in 1931.

We retired from the farm in 1937 and spent the winter in Seattle, Washington, visiting Ralph and Naomi.  In April, I came home to see one of my oldest grandchildren buried, Eunice Rogers Butterworth.  In June I had a bad spell of kidney trouble.

We bought a little cottage in Ucon, Idaho.  Since then, we have spent some winters in Seattle, some in California, and some at home.  In March, 1947, my second husband, William Byram, entered the Sacred Heart Hospital in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and underwent a major operation for ulcers of the storrach.  He was in the hospital for six weeks and came home to Ucon on the first day of April. I had several heart attacks at this time, but recovered to care for him.  William took sick with his stomach  for three years he was ailing.  After much care and suffering, he finally passed away at the home of his son, Arley in September of l949.

In April of l948 Ebbie and I carne to Seattle to visit Nell and Naomi as he had been poor in health for years.  The muscles of his body were hardening and he had rheumatism most of his life off and on.  We had a lovely visit and on our way home, he caught a bad cold.  He contracted pneumonia and passed away on May 3, 1948, at his farm in Menan Idaho, He left a wife, Gladys,  five sons and  one daughter.

On my 75th birthday on July 24, 1946 all my children, grandchildren were  present with the exception of Vadier Mumford and family, Harold Gates Marler, Jr, serving over seas, and Donald Bttenworth and wife.  We had lunch, then a program, and played games, and danced and visited.  I received several presents from the family among which was a ring given me by my children.

Eleven years have passed and we have had family reunions every year in July. Last year in April 1955 in Salt Lake City, Utah, I had a stroke at Rachel Wright's house and haven't been as active since then.  However, I still crochet, knit, sew, and embroidery and help with the housework wherever I go.

Our family reunion was held at the girls camp in Righy, Idaho July 4, 1955. There were between 55 and 60 members of the family there.  We had a very good time together for two days and one night.  That was a night to remember with all the caper that were going on and flash cameras in action.

We ere shocked and saddened on the 7th of May, 1956 when my granddaughter, Louise Parry passed away in Montivedeoc, Uruguay.  Her husband, Frank, was president of the L.D.S  Mission in Uruguay.  She was the Mission Mother for eleven months and had been very happy in her work.  They sent her body ty plane to Seattle, Washington to be buried.  Frank returned to the Mission to resume his work with the aid of his three lovely daughters.  I remained in Seattle after the funeral to corn fort her rnother and father (Naomi and Ward) and visit with Nell and Gates.  We are going to the Butterworths in Idaho July 20 and 21, 1956, at the same place as last year

The remainder of that summer she was at Louie Hebdon's home caring for her and helping through a nervous breakdown.  In the fall, the last of September, Belle, Jim, Naomi, and Ward, took Mother over to Nora's and By's at Montpelier to stay with~them while they went on a trip to California.  Before leaving Montpelier, we received the sad news of Glademere Mumford's death in Portland, Oregon.  The body was brought to Montpelier and funeral services held in October, 1956.  Mother remained there until October 30 when she suffered a severe stroke about seven o'clock in the morning.  She spent five weeks in the hospital, then was taken to Nora's home.  Nell and Naomi and Belle and Louie came, also Ralph and watched her slowly gain her strength.  She could finally feed herself and walk with help.  She stayed there until February 1, 1958;  She was then taken up to Rexburg to her daughter's home (Belle Davidson).  She recovered to a certain extent, but was never the same. She was cared for by her children for two years and three months.  She even made a trip out to Seattle in April of 1959, and spent the summer with Naomi, Ward, Nell, and Gates.  She traveled by car both ways and was a 'real good traveler.

 on January 19, 1960, she had a final stroke and passed away January 29, of 1960, early in the morning at the home of her daughter.  Thus ended the life of our Precious Darling Mother.
T.D. HEBDON'S MOTHERS MOTHER

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