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RealSlideshow files of Jesse BarlowCompiled by his son, Ora Haven Barlow
JESSE HAVEN BARLOW, second son of Ianthus H. Barlow and Hannah Wintle, was born at Bountiful, Davis County, Utah, August 10, 1870. Most of his youth was spent at East Bountiful where the family residence was located until after Jesse married. The family then moved to West Bountiful into the red brick house built originally by Jesse's grandfather, Israel Barlow, who was a guard of the Prophet Joseph Smith and who died in 1883 when Jesse was 13 years old. Israel Barlow's first wife, Elizabeth Haven, Jesse's grandmother, was a first cousin of Brigham Young and Willard Richards. She was a daughter of John Haven and Elizabeth (Betsy) Howe, daughter of Phineas Howe and Susannah Goddard.
Jesse Married, November 25, 1891, in the Logan Temple, Sarah Luella Stoker, daughter of David Stoker and Regena Hogan. Jesse and Luella had been childhood sweethearts, having lived less than two blocks apart all their lives. He had never taken out any other girl. Many of his stories center around her and many of the incidents of which she wrote in her "Story of My Life," printed after her death in 1956, were also woven around Jesse and their youth together.
Her father, Bishop Stoker, gave her and Jesse twenty acres of his farm land at Syracuse, Utah. This land, spoken of as on the "Sand Ridge" because it was near the sand hill or ridge extending from the Wasatch Mountains to the lake shore, was the basis of the farm livelihood that Jesse and Luella built up, first at Syracuse and later at Clearfield. They moved with two small children, Jesse David and Rena Lellia, to this farm from Bountiful on a rainy Thanksgiving Day 1895. Jesse had chopped and hewed the logs with his own hands to build the one-room log cabin home. Their second son, Ora Haven, was born in it the next October. About 1897 a two-bedroom frame portion was added on the south. Here were born Luella Iona, 1889, Ivan Ianthus, 1900, and Vinal Stoker, 1903.
One of the first things Jesse did was plant about six acres of land into fruit trees, mostly apples. Then before the trees bore fruit he bought and hauled apples from Hooper to Salt Lake City to supplement his farm income. Some of his favorite stories cover these apple peddling days, o ne story being about raising his Syracuse Ward building assessment in almost a miraculous way.
At Clearfield he first bought thirty-nine acres from W.H. Hooper. His brother-in-law, George E. Holt, David Stoker, Jr. and Thomas J. Thurgood also bought similar acreage. George's wife Evaline Stoker, living on the south, was Luella's younger sister. David Stoker Jr.,. living on the north, was her oldest brother. Arrangements for the purchase were made by Bishop Stoker. The down-payment for the Clearfield farm was largely raised by Jesse working for Mr. Mildand Knight, north of the Hooper farm, for one dollar a day with his team.
After a large seven room brick home had been constructed on Jesse's farm at Clearfield the family moved in, December 17, 1903, the fifth birthday of their daughter, Iona, and the very day the Wright brothers first flew an aeroplane at Kitty Hawk, N.C. The first telephone exchange ever to be operated in Davis County was cut into service on Jesse's 33rd birthday, August 10, 1903, just before he moved into the new home. A year and a half later he took his first telephone service, being listed in the 1905 directory under the number 31h.
In a meeting of October 13, 1907 at Syracuse it was decided to divide the ward. The Clearfield Ward was organized November 3, 1907 with James G. Wood bishop. About this time, or perhaps before, electricity was first brought to the area and the Clearfield home was wired for lights, Lighting previously had been by coal oil burning lamps.
In 1910 Jesse was called on a mission to the Central States. He spent two years mostly in central Texas. His stories, some following this history, are about many of his missionary experiences, some very faith promoting. Contracting the typhoid fever from unsanitary water, he was brought to the mission headquarters in Kansas City to be hospitalized in 1012. Luella went to him and served as a missionary there while he was convalescing and they came home together.
On February 5, 1914, Jesse was set apart as the se second counselor to Bishop Wood by Davis Stake President, Joseph A. Grant. In this capacity Jesse served until August 8, 1915, when he was made first counselor to the new bishop, Heber C. Blood. They served until January 14, 1917 when another bishop, David Stoker, Jr., Jesse's brother-in-law was installed.
About ten years before this Jesse had sprained his right arm while laying pipe for the culinary water system for his home. A joint-water bubble on his elbow had formed while the arm was in a plaster cast. The doctor lanced the bubble in error and as a result the arm became stiff, remaining so all Jesse's life.
At last finding farming more and more difficult under this handicap, Jesse and Luella decided in 1920 to acquire the Clearfield Mercantile Company in which they owned stock. They established themselves as Jesse H. Barlow and Sons Company.
For ten years they operated the store while living on the farm nearly two miles away. They had the help of the younger boys, first Vinal for about two years, then Wilmer, Eldon and Gardner. The need deepened to have a home closer to the store. This action was accomplished about 1930 when a four room brick bungalow and a full basement was built on newly acquired lots on Center Street, across the main highway in front of the store. The farm and farm home were turned over to the third son, Ivan.
When the Clearfield Naval Supply Depot was built this farm was taken over by the Government, together with Jesse D.
s farm which had been originally bought by his father. Hill Air Force Base was also built on ninety acres of dry farm land which Jesse sold to the Government for $55.00 per acre.
In March 1941 Jesse and Luella went on another L.D.S mission. They drove their new Plymouth car to the Northwestern States Mission with headquarters in Portland, Oregon, where their daughter Iona, Mrs. K.C. Tanner lived. Eldon, next to the youngest son, took over the store. Part of the store had been previously rented to their son Wilmer for use as a furniture business. Jesse and Luella spent most of the time while on their mission laboring in the Coos Bay area, in North Bend, Marshfield, etc.
Upon their return in December of 1941 when war broke out they spent four years as stake missionaries. They had met in Coos Bay two people who lived in Mesa, Arizona, Fred and Marguerite Simmons. This couple urged Jesse and Luella to come to Mesa in the winter and do temple work. After release from their stake mission and at the invitation of the Simmons they drove to Mesa in the fall of 1945 and stayed that winter with Fred and his wife. The following winter they bought a home at 537 Second Avenue, just south of the temple, and used it during the next ten years. Their third daughter, Velma who is now Mrs. John Peacock, lives in this home.
A heart attack while living there in January 1954 and subsequent strokes took Luella, October 25, 1956. On August 10, 1960, when Jesse was ninety years old, he had ninety descendants: 10 children, 34 grandchildren and 46 great grand children. He had two more great grand children when he died, April 13, 1961 at his home in Clearfieldl, 57 Center street, where Luella had also died. Besides these living descendants they had also lost two additional children and three grand children by death. His ten living children (April 1961) and located where they live are:
The two children who died were Willis, born August 4, 1905 and died April l, 1907, and a twin to Wilmer, Wilburn, born November 12, 1909 and died the next day, November 13, 1909.
Previous to his death Jesse Haven Barlow was the oldest living descendant of Israel Barlow who located for the Prophet Joseph Smith in 1838, the site on which Nauvoo was later built. Jesse had been a resident of Syracuse and of Clearfield for sixty five years, except for the time absent on his two missions and while wintering in Mesa, Arizona.
His son, Bishop Eldon H. Barlow of the Clearfield Third Ward conducted his funeral held at the Center Street Chapel, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Monday, April 17, 1961 at 1:00 P.M. The internment was in the Syracuse Clearfield Cemetery on the same side of the street and on the same street, except one mile north, as his first farm to which he and Luella went on Thanksgiving Day 1895.
He was born one year after the railroad connected the nation together at a point in Utah less than a hundred miles north of where he was born. He died a few hours after the first man on earth went in orbit around it at a speed of 17,000 to 25, 000 miles per hour. Jesse had been one of the first to use the telephone and the automobile in Davis County. His parents had come to Utah with ox-team and his sons and daughters and grandchildren were coming and going by jet airplanes which in turn, are even now being threatened by missile transportation of the future. The ninety years of Jesse's life truly covered a marvelous span of years.
Note: The stories following were recorded on electronic tape May 4, 1958 with Jesse Haven telling them as he remembered them. They were later taken from the tape in shorthand and typed by Carma Lance Barlow, wife of Brentnall Haven Barlow. Present at the telling were Ora & Melvira Barlow, Richard and Norma Barlow.
How The Meeting House Assessment Was Earned
G: One day when we lived in Syracuse Bishop David Cook came into our house and chatted with us. He finally said, "Brother Barlow, the Bishopric has decided to build a meeting house in Syracuse for our ward. We were meeting then in the school house, one was west of the town and one over where the school house is now, north of where the meeting house how is. And so I said, "Well, Bishop, I will do the best I can." He went out. Mama turned to me and said, "Where are you going to get the money?" Well, that was the problem. I used to peddle apples in Salt Lake City. I bought them from Hooper and would give as much for the apples as they could get for them in Ogden. So people didn't take them to Ogden to sell. Most of the people saved them for me. I paid them just what they could get i Ogden. I took loads of apples to Salt Lake City and went down on the market on First South Street near where Dinwoody's Furniture Store now is. So when I went back there with a load a little later there was sa Mr. Atwood with a load of apples, about 50 bushels. The market was flooded with apples and he was selling his for five cents cheaper than I was paying in Hooper for the same kind. I got off my wagon and looked at his load, and I said, "Mr. Atwood, what will you take for this load of apples?" He knocked off five cents a bushel from his selling price if I would take the whole load. "All right, Mr. Atwood," I had looked over his load, :Just pull off the road here and go down to the yard and when I come back at noon I'll unload your load and put them on my wagon and take them." And so he did. I went out. I had about ten stores where I used to furnish apples. I went to them and I told them, after I had delivered my regular amount, that I had another load up at the market and if they wanted more I would make them a bargain on them. I told the storekeepers that I'd give the apples for ten cents cheaper than what I had been selling them all the time for, and I was still making a profit just the same. I went to Rigby Brothers, and they told me to bring them, I think, twenty five bushels. And Dan Snarr, he took fifteen or twenty bushels. I sold them as I was going around and I went back and unloaded them and delivered them. I made as much off that load of apples, just as much as I made off the ones I hauled in from Hooper and I saved three days' work. I figured up that I had made ten dollars on that load, that is extra above the load I brought down. And then in about two weeks I was going through Farmington on the old road in the mountains there I looked ahead and saw a wagon with a load of stuff on it. And I thought and wondered. It looked like Atwood. So I whooped up the horses and went down and caught him and pulled up along side of him and I said "What you got on?" He told me what and I said, "Stop and let me look at them." He did and I said, "What will you take for them?" He sold them to me for five cents a bushel cheaper than I could have bought them in Hooper and agreed to take them to Salt Lake City. "Well,l I'll take them if you deliver them to the market in Salt Lake City. So he did and I went to Salt Lake City and went on to sell my load and unloaded his load and went out and sold his also. I had made another ten dollars on that load of apples. That was a total of twenty or more dollars I made extra for the meeting house and I saved six days work doing it.
Young Folks Fracas
G: One day when we were young Mama and some other young folks our age were out walking, going toward home, you know. Somehow some of them started to have a little fracas with one another. I forget it now, but it was about something that Mama was wearing. Aunt Alice, she was Alice Willey then, grabbed Mama. Mama had a scarf around her neck. And Alice grabbed that scarf, you know, and she pulled it away from Mama, you know. They were going past the meeting house and Alice threw the scarf up on the meeting house roof and Mama couldn't get it. So Mama went on home without it and Alice's mother heard about what had happened. She made Alice go the next morning and make arrangements to get that scarf off the roof, take it and hand it right back to Mama. And Aunt Alice did.
A Lesson in Church Procedure
When Grandfather (David) Stoker had been in office as a bishop in Bountiful for some time, Joseph Fielding Smith came up from Salt Lake City. He was young then and at that time was not the President of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles. Grandfather Stoker got so he just hated to see him come up for a conference. Well, at this conference this time, B.H. Roberts was also there and two others of the authorities. Joseph Fielding Smith got up in the meeting and proposed to release Bishop Stoker from the bishopric. He called, "All those in favor of releasing Bishop Stoker raise your hand." Everyone in the audience raised his hand. And I think it was B.H. Roberts who turned to Joseph Fielding and said"You have learned a lesson today in proper church procedure, haven't you?"
Jesse H. Barlow and the Bull
One day we were living in the brick house where the Clearfield Naval Supply Depot is, where they came and took the land off Ivan, and Uncle David Stoker had a bull. The bull got out of the corral some way one day and came down the road and came right into our driveway. He came along, "Boo-oo, boo-oo-oo." Mama and all the children and me, we jumped over the fence and ran into the house out of the way. So the bull came along, booing. I said, "Well! I never let anyone chase me off my place before, and that old thing isn't going to chase me off."
I got me a club and I clim over the fence and went to go up to him. He backed up and looked up at me, "Boo-oo." He took in after me. I broke and ran, him after me. I fell right down. He ran right over me, just like that. I jumped up and ran around the chicken coop, and that is all that saved my life. If I had stood up before him another minute, maybe he would have "Booed" me to death.
A Bear out in Lost Creek
We were camped on the sheep herd at the head of Lost Creek and we had about 300 head of sheep in the herd. Hyrum Sessions was with me. He was my herd partner from Bountiful. We camped in the tent and we were in this tent sleeping one night. We use to have bells on some of the sheep so we could tell where they were. When you traveled through the country and you heard bells ringing, you knew there were some sheep there. Well, all of a sudden, this night in the middle of the night, these bells started to ringing. I woke up and said,"Hy, something's the matter with that herd. Those sheep are running around with their bells ringing. I grabbed my gun and out I went. I ran out into the middle of the herd. All at once something ran past me, just like that and rubbed the side of me. I don't know what it was. It might have been just a sheep, you know. But anyway, the sheep were a running and their bells a ringing. I picked my gun up and fired it off twice. Just like that, and no more bells a ringing. Everything was just as quiet as could be. I waited a little while, and went back to bed. The next morning I got up before the sheep were out and went out into the herd. There were five dead sheep in the herd. What animal was it that had killed the sheep during the night? I examined them. I decided that two of them were killed by a mountain lion and the others were killed by a bear. The lion grabs hold of them by the neck and bites them, cutting their throats. A bear kills them by striking blows on the side of their heads.
Who Got Fooled
G: We used to go to the Young Men's and Young Ladies' Mutual Improvement meetings. They had the Young Men down in the basement of the meeting house there in Bountiful and the Young Ladies upstairs. The Young Men's Mutual was always out before the Young Ladies, so that if they could get out there by the entrance before the Young Ladies, the boys could catch their girls and go home. So when Mama and Martha (Tolman Thurgood) went to the Young Ladies Mutual meeting one time they got in the vestry and they decided to change clothes with one another, Mama was wearing Martha's clothes and Martha was wearing Mama's. We always knew, of course, what they wore and so when they came out on the steps and Sam Thurgood saw Mama he thought that it was Martha and intended to ask to take her home. He saw her with Martha's cloak on and then he saw her face but didn't recognize who it was. He turned around and cried, "Who-woo-woo." He yelled as loud as he could. He yelled four or five times. He thought Martha had given him the sack, you know. So I went along. I knew what had happened then and so I didn't go up and ask Mama to go home. She wasn't going to fool me, so I went along and Grandma Stoker me, "Why don't you take the girls home?" I said "Well, I will take you home, Sister Stoker." "All right," she said, so I took a hold of her arm and I took Mama's mother home instead of Mama. When I came out of the Stoker gate, I met Mama. She was going in and I went on.
R: You didn't say anything to each other?
G: We didn't say a word.
A Fight for Nothing
G: You know, we went to a dance one time when I was about nineteen or twenty years old. You know about the young people, they always treat you like someone had done this and someone that. They had either asked the wrong girl to take her home or something. Well, this night the young men were outside the dance hall and they were fighting about. Sam Thurgood, a friend of mine, was taking one part and I took the other part. So we had our dance and went home. The next day I had been somewhere on a horse and I came back to where Dave's house was (David Stoker, Jr.). It was later John's house. There was a garden there and Sam and Young Dave were working there. There was that little dispute between Sam and me, the night before, we hadn't fought any but we took opposite; sides. Now Dave hollered out to me and said, "come here, come on and he can give you a licking now." I pulled my horse around and we went down into the hollow and I tied my horse up and went down further where they were. Then we walked up to where we were going to fight it out and we went at it. Well, I darn near killed him. I just hit him so bad, you know. I often regret that fight, but later we became very good friends again. He married Martha, Mama's good friend, and I married Mama. After we were married we often took our children over to north Syracuse, later called West Point, were they lived and visited with them. They often came with their children and visited us in Syracuse.
My Early Missionary Experiences
When I first went out on my mission to Texarkana, the first town I went to in Texas. It was right on the line between Arkansas and Texas. I got off there and met President Brown, President of the conference. He was going to take me to Kelsey. We took off through the woods, down over into Louisiana and met some Saints there. We were two or three days. Then we got to meet all of the presidents at Kelsey. This was the area where we were going to be appointed to our companions to work. So we went on. We started through the country and we came to a little town and we did missionary work. Pretty soon we got away from that town. We were going through the woods where nothing would grow and it came night. Dark it was! As we were going along there was a little cabin. They had just built it. It was built with just a little lumber and there were large cracks between the boards..They had not put a thing over these cracks. As we came up to that place a man opened the door and we walked right in and said "We have come to stay over night with you." The man did not get mad, he said "You just give me a quilt and I will lie down here on the floor. Elder Barlow can sleep with you in the bed. He had one bed. So we went to bed and I never slept a minute all that night. I could see those cracks in the lumber over the roof. I could see the moon shining through the cracks. I lay there looking at those cracks, my first night in Texas, wondering if I should stay and fill a mission. Well, the next morning, I guess it was four o'clock, President Brown called me. He said, "We will now go on the road." So we went on the road for about two miles. It was still dark. He lay down by a log by the road and went to sleep. And there I sat on the log while he had a good sleep.
The Healing of Ozro Stroud
We were out doing missionary work. We had a conference at Kelsey. A boy, Ozro Stoud, had a disease that was going among the people. There were hundred of them dying. He had this disease and his folks had sent a letter up to Kelsey to President Pierce to send two elders down to administer to him. So when the conference was out we told the President where we wanted to get our letters from Missouri, He would send them to that place so that we could get them Saturday night. We were about fifteen miles west of Kelsey on Saturday and when we went for our mail, we got a letter from President Pearce to go down and administer to the boy. I think it was Rue M. Leak from West Jordan who was with me. It was two hundred miles down there and the only way we could get there was to practically walk there. So we started out and walked and walked and pretty soon we came to where we took a train and cut our distance off about ten or fifteen miles. We got off the train and walked and walked. We would lay down on the grass and rest awhile and then get up and walk and walk again. We sweated and sweated and pretty soon, about seven o'clock at night, we came to Ozro Stround's cabin. But he wasn't there. His folks said that he was five or six miles away. They wouldn't let us go and administer to him that night, saying, "you're given out now." So the next morning we got up and went over and administered to Ozro Stroud. He hadn't had a wink of sleep for over a week. He slept for four hours straight after we administered to him. Then he turned on the other side and went to sleep for another four hours. We, we went off doing missionary work. Every once in a while, about every twelve weeks, we came to Stroud's home to see the. He was pretty nigh as tall as you, Richard. When we came back the first time after we administered to him Ozro Stroud was there. This was Sunday morning and we walked to Sunday School with that boy.
A Welcome Bed in Texas
While I was on my mission out in the central part of Texas going around the country from house to house, it wasn't anything for us to go to a house and they would be just as mean as the devil to you. So one day we were traveling along until we came to a little town and we went into a man's place and sat down on the bench there where a man was. We got to talking and pretty soon we told him who we were. He got up on his feet, stood there and he said, "If you know what is good for you, you'll get right out of that gate." So we walked out of it. The elders had got it into heir heads that when you come to town where there is a little peak sticking up that is where there is a church. There is no use your going to that town. You can't do anything because a minister is there. He has control of that town. So when we went out of this man's place we could see a little bit of a rising hill and at the top of that hill was a church. and we thought, "Well, there is no use going through this town." There was a street running in the opposite direction from going up through the town. We took this street and on the corner we ran into another man. He was out in the yard. And he was just as mean as the first man. We thought that we would not go through the town, so we took a road that went out around the town. It had been raining all day--muddy. It was awful muddy. We went a distance till about noon or a little after noon and circled all about the town. We did missionary work all north of the town and finally it came time to ask for a place to stay all night. That is how we used to stay. When we had done missionary work, we would go to a place and ask them to let us stay all night. If they took us in, all right. If they didn't they would say, "no." We got over about one half mile when we came to an old abandoned road, Had been abandoned and cut there and the people had fenced it in and were using it as a pasture. When we got to this spot, the end of the unfenced part, both of us had the same prompting: to go over the fence and go up the old abandoned road thorough the pasture. So we did. When we got up the road about a mile further we came to a house and went to the door and knocked. A man's voice called, "Come in, boys, come in." We went in and tried to sell the man some books. He said,"No, I don't want any of your books. I have got seven of them here right now and a lot of tracts too." He showed them to us. He said that the books belonged to a man by the name of Davis. This man Davis had loaned him these books. He said that these books had been into every house in the locality, into every house in Norcastle County. So that is what that missionary work of ours did, selling Mr. Davis those seven little books.
How I Got My Train Ticket
When I was on my mission, we were down in the central part of Texas and I was traveling around and there was a disease going around. It was killing people off by the hundreds, all over, and I don't know what kind of disease it was but anyway, I took sick. I couldn't go out and do missionary work. So the other elders who lived with me, there were four of them at that time, telephoned up to Samuel O. Bennion, the president of the mission in Independence, Missouri, and he said, "Put him on the train. Buy a ticket to the outside town of Oklahoma. When he gets there I will have a ticket for him there from the outside town of Oklahoma up to Kansas City, Missouri." And so they put me on the train, a sick man. I could walk around, a kind of fever I had. When I got to the outside town of Oklahoma I got off the train and I walked into the station and asked the man, "Have you got a ticket for Jesse H. Barlow for Kansas City, Missouri?" He said, "No." I walked away, about five feet. I turned around and something said to me, "You go demand that ticket." I was snot to go plead and plead, but I was to go demand it. So I doubled up my fist and went back to the window and shoved my fist right into his face. If he hadn't given it to me I would have punched his nose. He reached down and gave me the ticket, and out I went, and that is all there was to it.
R: But did demand it of him?
G: I said, "You give me my ticket!" Like as much to say, I will knock your nose off if you don't. I had my fist right in his face, like that. If he had just turned me down again I would have hit him too. He gave me the ticket, so out I went.
Mustache Vamoose
G: I was out there in central Texas as a missionary with a great big, wide mustache sticking way out here. I was always curling it, and them little devils, the younger missionaries, out there kept tantalizing me and wanting me to cut it off, and I wouldn't. One day we were out there with the Saints west of Athens. There were six of the missionaries and one of them caught me and threw me down and held me. Then all six of them held me and one of them cut it off. I had no mustache after that.
March 10, 1980My FatherBy Vinal Stoker Barlow
My Father, Jesse Haven Barlow was a large man, for his time, measuring six feet in height and weighing about 190 lbs in the prime of his life. A hard worker, able to work longer hours than the sturdy horses he drove. In the early days, after completing the summer farm work he would spend many long winter days and nights hauling, by team and wagon, produce to the Salt Lake City market. This became necessary to supplement his scant farming income and to support his growing family.
Dad was a shy man never pushing himself into the limelight but I understand that in his younger married life he was apt to defend his views with his fists, when pushed too far by another. He was a kind and gentle man with hiss children and the farm animals. He was honest to a fault and it was known throughout the area that his word was his bond. He always paid his bills even if he had to borrow the money from the bank to do it. I remember one time a conductor on the Bamberger rail road in giving Dad change for the ticket he had just purchased gave him a $5.00 gold piece instead of a nickel. The light was dim and Dad didn't notice until he got home. He carried the coin with him for weeks until he found the conductor who gave it to him and was able to return it.
He loved his children with all his heart and always provided for them the necessities of life. We didn't have all the nice things that were available at that time but we did have what was adequate for our health. I really wanted a bicycle in my teenage years but this was out of the question. I did learn to ride one on the other kids bikes. Dad set a good example to his sons on how to treat a wife. He loved her dearly and she was surely the "apple of his eye". I never remember him contradicting mother on any subject or refusing her anything she wanted. I suppose things of a serious matter had been discussed between them and a decision agreed upon before it was brought to the attention of the family. Through an error on the part of some doctors, Dad carried a stiff arm the rest of his life. This happened in his late thirties and I don't remember when it was otherwise. It was hard for him to write, use a shovel or a pitch fork, picking up a box of fruit or a sack of potatoes was very difficult for him because of this arm. This was probably the reason they purchased the store where the work would be of a lighter nature. He suffered severe pain off and on for the rest of his life.
Dad was always preaching thrift to his children, advising them to save money and put it away for a rainey day. I remember one time, it was about 1953 when Lois and I had just purchased a brand new sporty chrysler car. It was a bright red with a white top. On our first trip to Clearfield after the purchase, I stopped in Dad's driveway and went into the house to get mother to come out and see it. When she spotted it she exclaimed "isn't that a beaut?" Dad following her out said "How much did you pay for it?" Mother said "Oh Pa let them enjoy it".
He was greatly concerned for his children and wanted desperately to leave something for each to help them get started on their own or something for their future. He and Mother even went without things they needed to put aside something for their children. I remember one time, after mother had passed away, we were up to Clearfield to visit Dad. I was trying to convince Dad that he didn't need to save for his children and that most were able to take care of themselves. I suggested that he might go to Ogden and buy himself some new clothes. I said "Buy you a new suit, buy you two suits". He said "Son, what would I do with two suits?"
I can't remember Dad ever striking any of us. I am sure he must have had occasion to discipline me in my mid teenage years, but he never did. One time he picked up a stick and threatened me with it if I didn't mind hem. I ran away and he didn't have a chance to use it. When he told mother that I ran away from him, she said "He better not run from me. I knew better than to try that as mother was a good runner and could catch me and then I would get a double dose. In later years, after I was married I use to tease Dad in front of people by telling them about the time Dad threatened me with a 2X4. He was always embarrassed and swore it was only a stick.
Dad was a highly religious man. He truly loved the Lord. He served on two missions and loved the gospel with all his heart and wanted all his children to feel the same about the gospel as he did. On my visits with him through out the years he was either teaching me the gospel or the benefits of thrift. He used to say "A penny saved is a penny earned." He also used to say "Teach them what is right when they are young and when they are old they will not stray from it".
I am so grateful to my parents for their love and I am sure that we sons and daughters have benefitted greatly from their teachings and for any success we may have had in our lives. I especially am thankful that they didn't give up on me in my latter teenage years when I must have given them great concern and many heart aches.
TAPE MADE BY ELDON BARLOW
VS Barlow speaking:
My Father, Jesse Barlow was born in 1870. Times were different then than they are now. A few dollars was a lot of money to them then. A few dollars now isn't worth very much. some of the customs they had then you'll find were different than they are now. For example, until a man is grown up and married, he still belongs to his father and mother and anything that he makes belongs to them, unless they want to give it to him. This is some of the background. It was 1956 and he was 86 years old when this was taken.
Eldon, another son made the recording as follows. After Mother passed away in October 1956, It became our privilege and pleasure to have father in our home rather frequently, since he lived just next door, to spend an evening with us or to share a meal with us. This recording was made in our home on November 1956 on a dictating machine. Now almost 18 years later, It has been transcribed with some difficulty to this cassette tape, That we might all enjoy hearing him relate some of his experiences as a young man and as a missionary.
Eldon: Dad, can you tell us a little bit about Grandfather Barlow. You know, I never did see him.
Grandpa: Yes I remember, I wasn't quite 18 years old. I was going with a girl, you know and I was going to get married.
Eldon: Who was the girl you were going with Dad?
Grandpa: Her name was Luella Stoker. I wanted to go off to work and Papa said "You can't go, you ain't 18 years old. You belong to me till your 18 years old and you have to stay home." I didn't pay no attention, I made up my mind I'd go get a job. So I went down to Nelsons father, down in South Bountiful and I asked him for a job and he gave me a job to go out and herd sheep. I went back to father and I said "Father, I'm going out, I've got a job. I've got it already now. I going to go. You tell me how I'm to go." "Well, he said, You go and give me half your wage." So I went out herding sheep all summer long.
One time they put me in a canyon with the sheep all alone. I was about two weeks there in them mountains all alone, with them sheep. Then they finally sent me to Lost Creek to herd the sheep up there. I went on working for Jess Nelson, kept on herding sheep for awhile. Finally he told me I could go for a vacation to spend the 24th of July. I went down to Bountiful where our folks lived and spent the 24th of July and then I went back up to the herd again and I told the boys what to do. I was then foreman of the herd. I went to work first for $20 a month and finally he raised my wages up to $30. Then when he put me in as foreman, I got $40 a month. That is a regular bargain. So I kept on herding and finally he said he wanted some one to come down and help put up the hay. I told him to pick two and I'd send them down but I said I'm not going and he went down and told Jess Nelson that I wouldn't pick hay for him. He said"Well, I'll fire him." The word went around all the herd boys and then It came to me that I was going to get fired. I just made up my mind he wouldn't fire me so I let one of the boys take care of the herd and I went down to the Ranch. I went down and I told Jess Nelson I was going to quit right now. "Oh, he said "what you going to quit for?" "Well" I said " You can't fire me." He said "I ain't goin to fire you". I said "Well, You said you was and it's all aver the country, and I'm not going to get fired so I'm quitin. I won't work another minute for you". He said "What am I going to do?" Well, I said "You get your horses and ride up and get those sheep and I'll help for awhile so I did that and then I came home.
Eldon: What about Grandpa? What did he say when you got home dad?"
Grandpa: Well I went up to Father and I had made about $200, you know, and half of it was Fathers because I had agreed to give him half of what I made. So I kept my bargain. I gave him $100. So the next morning, mother and father and the little kids got in the buggy and into Salt Lake City they went. And when they got back home I was getting ready to go out with the women. Father came up to me and tapped me on the shoulder and said "Son, you don't know what you did for me, do you?""No", I said, "I don't." "Well", he said,"you bought all the kiddies all their dresses and all the clothes for the winter and you bought all the coal for the winter and all the groceries for the winter, that's what you've done for us this winter."
Eldon: Well that was pretty nice. I guess he was glad you went out herding sheep after all wasn't he Dad?
Grandpa: Yes he was glad I went and glad I have him the money.
Eldon: Tell us about the log house Dad.
Grandpa: We moved from Bountiful and built a little log house in Syracuse and after we had been there about a year or a little more, Bishop Cook came up there and said they were trying to build a meeting house in Syracuse and he offered each family so much to build a meeting house with and said "Your allotment is $25.00 to build that meeting house. I said, :Well Bishop, I'll do the best I can." When he left, Mama said,"where are you going to get the money?" Now here's the way the Lord opened up the way for me to get that money. (see back story) I made enough to pay my assessment on the meeting house and saved six days work.
Eldon: What about the time in the Mission Field when you had to pay for your breakfast?
Grandpa: When I was in the Mission Field, the Elders were all young men and I was 40 years old (see steeple story)
Finally we stopped at a big Hotel and they said they didn't have any room. While I was walking along by the Elder I had a silent prayer and I asked the Lord to open up the way and just give us a bed, a place to lay our head. The next place we hollered hello and the man came out in his night clothes and he said come in boys. We told him who we was. He said you boys haven't had any supper." So he gave us some supper and opened up a door and there was some beautiful beds. The Elder was crying like a baby. Tears were running down his eyes and of course mine were too. We were so tickled to think we'd have a place to lay our head. We weren't crying because we had been turned away, we were crying because the Lord opened up the way for us. So we went to bed and slept. The next morning the man stuck his head in the door and said "you gentlemen want your breakfast this morning?" I said "yes, if you please". Then when he shut the door I said to Elder Hensley "We've got to pay for our breakfast this morning"/ So we got up and went to breakfast and it was quite a large family and the man who took us in, he ate his breakfast before we did and we went into the front room and sat down and when he got through, we went in and preached the Gospel to him and he said he was just as clean as them two men the night before and he said "I don't want anything to do with you, I don't even want a tract. You can just keep your mouth shut. I said "Well mister, you've been very kind to us last night. You gave us supper and our bed and breakfast, What do we owe you for your kindness"? He said "You don't owe me one cent for your supper and your bed. Just go and pay that woman for your breakfast. So I went in and asked the lady how much we owed her and she said two bits a piece. When we went out we could see where the steeple was and we went back the way we were going and finally went off to the right hand road and started to do missionary work. The first house we talked to the man and we told him how many places we had asked to stay all night, about 18 or 19 times and he said "Why didn't you come here, I've taken care of lots of Mormon Elders.
Eldon: Dad, Why don't you quote us that scripture you always use to quote about the last days? You know, about cars that ran like lightening and all that business about the latter days?
Grandpa: Nahum Chapter 2 verse 3: The shields of the mighty man will be made red. The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall jostle one against another in broad ways. They shall seem like torches, They shall run like the lightnings.
Eldon: What do you think he's talking about Dad?
Grandpa: He's talking about the last days when he'll establish his Church in the tops of the mountains. After Joseph Smith had seen that vision and the angel made it known to him in 1820, Automobiles began to come into the country and they ran like lightning.
