BIOGRAPHY OF SARAH ADAMS BITELY CONRAD Sarah Adams Bitely was the daughter of Peter Bitely and Elizabeth Maria Douglas. She was born in the State of Vermont on the 21st of February 1802. She was named after the mid-wife, Sarah Adams, who attended her mother. This woman had no children and asked that the little girl be given her name, so she was given the name of Sarah Adams Bitely. Sarah Adams Bitely married Charles Ferdinand Conrad February 8, 1830, in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. Their first child, John was born in Fayette , Seneca County, New York. He died when only two months old. The second child was a girl, Elizabeth, she was born in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. A little later the family moved from New York to Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan, where Mr. Conrad took up 80 acres of land, which was located on Mud Street going into Detroit. This was all new country, thickly timbered, and full of wild animals, especially deer, and bear. There were a few panthers and these animals with their peculiar cry were feared and many stories where told about them leading the settlers into the forest with their cries because it was thought that some child was lost. The trees had to be cut and burned so as to clear the land before it could be farmed. Among the other trees in this section of the country were hardwood trees such as the hickory, oak, end ash. Mr. Conrad leased a piece of his land on the north East Corner of his property for a school house. This school was used for many years. He was a prominent leader in his community and held the of office of Justice of the Peace at Trenton, Michigan. Nine children were born to Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad in Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan. They were poor, but sturdy and loved the new country in spite of the hardships of pioneering. Many times they had only potatoes and salt to eat, sometimes they even lacked the salt to eat with the potatoes. Although Mr. Conrad was interested in his community he didn’t seem to take any of the responsibilities of his family, and many times the children went to school without shoes. Elizabeth wore her father’s old shoes when she had to go out in the snow on an errand. The snow sometimes piled up in drifts of three and four feet. It was so deep that it was possible to sleigh ride over the fences. Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad’s fourth child, William caused her a great deal of worry. He loved to hunt and whenever he found his father’s rifle in the house he would take it and go out hunting. When anyone asked where he was, his father would look in the corner where his rifle always stood and missing it would say "Bill's gone hunting, the rifle’s gone." One day he shot two large bucks, they had been fighting and had locked horns so that his one shot killed them both. Sarah Adams Bitely joined the church in 1843, immediately after hearing Elder M. Sirrine KNQK-QS3 preach the gospel. She and her daughter Elizabeth were interested from the first words of Elder Serrine. They accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints gladly, joyously, without question as though it was just what they had long been waiting for, and their faith never wavered through the troubles and hardships they endured in coming west and pioneering another new country. Mr. Conrad joined the church with his wife. They desired to join the Saints in Illinois and left their home in Brownstown. They traveled as far as LaHarpe, Illinois, here they learned that the prophet Joseph Smith had been killed. This caused them to turn about and go back to Michigan. Some time later Sarah's husband left the church. In 1862 Sarah Adams Bitely came to Utah in the company of another lady who had joined the church. Before they got to Missouri they were sitting in the train when two drunken men knowing that they were Mormons began to annoy them. They marched against them when they walked up the aisle and laughed drunkenly. Sarah took her shawl pin, which was about three inches long, and fixed it so that the next time these men came walking along and fell against them this pin stuck into them. After a few stabs they went away and didn't bother them again. Sarah Adams Bitely located in Provo. Her first home was in a little log cabin, where the administration building now stands. In 1864 her sons Charlie, George, and Serrine, her brother-in-law Frederick S. Conrad, and her son-in-law James Hooks joined her in Utah. They had traveled across the plains with one wagon between them, and reached Salt Lake City in August 1864. In Oct. 1870 her daughter Elizabeth, who had married James Hooks came to Provo with her four children. They came all the way from Michigan to Salt Lake City by train. Her son Daniel Schotte Conrad went to Kansas, where he died in 1878, and William Thomas Conrad died in St. Louis. Miles Henry Conrad was killed by a shot through a window one night while he was sitting by his stove. A short time after Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad came to Utah she was sealed to George Brown, a blacksmith who lived across the road from her. Her son Charlie bought a lot on Third North and Second West, just a block north of the Woolen Mills, which was finished in 1821. The brick work was up when Elizabeth joined her mother in Provo, another story was built on in the spring of 1871. The mill race had to be built up so as to get enough power for the machinery to run by, and this caused water to seep over on Charlie's land and onto the land owned by Mrs. Dan Jones, this ruined their gardens and President Young bought this land from them. Charlie then bought property out on Eighth North and Seventh East where his wife is still living. He built a home here on this land a mile from any other residence and his mother lived there for two years with her son George. Charlie had married and was living on his father-in-law's farm down by the lake. Later he brought his wife out to his land and built a home west of his mother's about a block. When Sarah Adams Bitely began to fail in health she went to live with her daughter, Elizabeth Conrad Hooks, who was living just a short distance south, where her son and his family are still living. Sarah Adams Bitely died in her daughter's home on the 29th of December 1879. She was 77 years old at the time of her death. Biography written by Bertha Louise Hooks November 26, 1934 Provo, Utah (Great granddaughter of Sarah Adams Bitely)

Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum By T.W. Meldrum 1955 (Taken from the David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories book p. 31-22) Deseret Elizabeth Hooks was the 2nd child and daughter of James Hooks and Elizabeth Conrad, and was born October 15, 1854 at Brownstown, Wayne Co., Michigan. One hundred years ago 1854, Michigan was frontier country, but the people were pushing always westward, making farms, clearing timber and seeking a livelihood or riches in other ways, such as trading, buying and selling land, animals or whatever else they had to offer. The Conrad’s (Deseret Elizabeth’s mother and her folks) came from the State of New York and previous to that from Pennsylvania (a Dutch Colony). Her mother Elizabeth Conrad, having been born at Seneca, Ontario Co., New York, April 7, 1830, (being a day after the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized and not far 25-30 miles from Fayette, Seneca co., New York, where that great event took place, in fact, her older brother John Conrad was born there but unfortunately he died the dame day that he was born Oct. 26, 1830.) Deseret’s father, James Hooks was born in England, possibly in the County of Norfolk, and near Whissonnette, Sept. 5, 1830, where his mother Martha Mann Thing/Hooks was born. His father Thomas Hooks immigrated to America in the year 1836, but we are unable as yet to find out what port he arrived at or what ship he came to America in, nor any record of his marriage to Martha Mann Thing. The home where Deseret lived in Michigan was surrounded by heavy forest of maple, oak, hickory and other hard woods and soft woods. Wild animals were abundant, such as bears, wild cats, deer, etc. the wild cat at night would cry out something like unto a baby crying, and seemed to put fear into the children and others and would keep them indoors after dark Deseret’s mother Elizabeth received the Gospel from two Mormon Missionaries, Israel Evans and Nymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City, Utah and she was baptized in the Detroit River Oct. 21, 1869 by Israel Evans. Her husband being out west to California at the time, Elizabeth with her four children three girls and one boy came to Utah in the fall of 1870 by railroad (the Union Pacific Railroad having been completed to Salt Lake City the year previous 1869). Charles Conrad, her bother met them at Salt Lake City and brought them to Provo, in a wagon a 45 mile trip. Sometime later her husband came from California and built her a log cabin in the east part of Provo where she lived until her death. Deseret was baptized a member of the Church by her uncle, Charles Conrad in 1871 at the age of 16 years. Unhappily her father, James Hooks couldn’t see the light of the Gospel, and when one of the ward bishops didn’t pay him for work he got disheartened and went back to Michigan and never returned, the family saw him no more. Deseret (ET or Ettie as she was called) met and was courted by David Meldrum, and after a time they travelled to Salt Lake City and were married for time and eternity in the Endowment House at the City on Feb. 14, 1873. David was the 2nd son of George and Jane Barclay Meldrum. To this couple were born ten children, 7 boys and 3 girls (one baby girl however was stillborn) all growing to maturity except the stillborn girl and a boy Benjamin Howard who died at the age of two of membranous croup. All married and had family except one son Charles Alvin, the youngest who never married. Father and mother Meldrum built a large one roomed log cabin in the north east part of Provo where the three elder brothers, David, James Arthur and Bryan Barton were born, then father built a brick home on the corner of the same lot where the balance of the family were born. Father used the log cabin for a blacksmith shop for years. After living in Provo, Utah for 31 years and as there was an opening of new country in Canada (Southern Alberta) about this time, their son James Arthur received a call from the church to go and settle there, which he did travelling there by team, 750 mile. He helped to fund the town of Magrath, Alberta when he wrote back to Utah to his parents about that land being the land of opportunity and plenty of work available for a blacksmith there. The prairies were being broken up by ploughs and plough points had to be sharpened and machinery repaired, so he urged father to go to Canada. So in the spring of 1903 father moved to Alberta and started a blacksmith shop in the town of Raymond where the Knight Sugar Co., had built a sugar factory the year previous. He built a one roomed house (later two other rooms were added) on the same lot as the blacksmith shop. He lived there until his death Feb. 12, 1918. Mother came to Canada the following year in 1904. The rest of the family at home stayed at Provo to go to school or work until such time that father could bring us to Canada. My brother Parley had come to Canada with his brother James Arthur when he made a return trip to Provo to get material and also to get married. I had not arrived in Alberta until Aug. 1910 except for a month visit when I came here with me Grandmother Hooks in 1907. Mother was stricken with a paralytic stroke in 1916 and it left her without the power of speech and she continued this way until her death five years later. She died of another stroke Aug. 7, 1921, at the age of 91 ½ years. Mother was buried in the Raymond Cemetery beside her husband who had predeceased her my three and a half years. Mother lived a very honourable life and was a staunch member of the church.

Elizabeth Conrad Hooks (Taken from the “David Meldrum Family Histories p. 21,22) Written by her granddaughter Ida Ashton Ercanbrack We have met her today to dedicate, and mark this sturdy Red Oak Tree, the only one of its kind in Provo, and think it fitting on this occasion to give a history of the tree and the foresighted sturdy piople who through their efforts have and it possible to meet here. My Grandmother Elizabeth Conrad Hooks was born April 7, 1830 at Seneca, Ontario County New York, the daughter of Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad. She was the oldest living child and only daughter, there being eleven children in the family. When she was 15 months old her parents moved to Michigan, then just a territory. Her schooling was brief as she was only able to attend a short time during the term on account of the long distance, deep snow, and inadequate clothing for such cold weather. At the age of 14 she went away from home to work. She worked very hard for one so young and frail, and received .50 cents a week for pay. At the age of 21 she was married to James Hooks, on Dec. 16, 1851, at Brownstown, Wayne County Michigan, where they lived several years. Here 6 children were born to them, five daughters and one son, Ann, Deseret Elizabeth, Martha Delilah, Leah, James Reese and Sarah Jane. Ann and Leah died in infancy. The family moved to Trenton, Michigan, from Brownstown in 1864. Her husband with her brothers Charles, George and Serrine, and her uncle Frederick Conrad, left for Utah and the West. They freighted goods in Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon and thought-out the north western part of the united States until the railroad came. She, with her hildren, went to live eith her unmarried brother Miles H. Conrad. She wored hard caring for his home and her family. From the time she first heard of Mormonism she was a firm believer of it, but never had the privilege of being baptized until this time, when two missionaries came to the place they were Israel evans of Lehi, Utah and Hymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City. She was baptized by Israel Evans in October 1868, in the Detroit River. After this she made preparations to immigrate to Utah. Grandmother being a love of nature and all things beautiful, thinking of the new home she would have to make in this arid county began to gather and store away carfully the seeds of her beautiful flowers, and of her herbs to be sure of supply of medicines and seasonings in her new home. She gathered squash seed, one variety known as the acorn squash was at one time (through the seed she brought) the leading squash in Provo and the whole of Utah County. Also before she came to Utah she sent to her mother Sarah A. B. Conrad a little box of “Tiger Lily” seeds from which grew the first tiger Lilies in Provo. Grandmother also gathered some peach pits, Apricot pits, plums the walnut and also a few acorns from the Red Oaks that grew there. Realizing that (Great Oaks from tiny acorns grow). She put all these, carefully in the big trunk that was to come with the family to their new home in Utah. In the early fall of 1870 she with her four children left Michigan by rail. At Omaha, Nebraska, they met an emigrant train with Frank Hyde as captain of the company and took passage to Salt Lake City. They stayed in Salt Lake City for about one week, when they were met by her brother Charles Conrad who brought them jto Provo at that time. They arrived in Provo Oct. 1870 and spent the winter with her mother. In the spring she moved to a farm her brother had rented, north of Provo, in what is now known as Pleasant View. In the fall she came back to Provo where she stayed until her husband came and purchased a place on 7th east and 6th north, where he built a small log house, where the Hooks family has resided since that time. Grandfather never accepted the Mormon religion, and after the girls were married he decided to return to Michigan, Elizabeth walked as far as the old Co-Op store, corner of east center and University ave. with him. As she bade him god speed and watched him going on his way a voice said to her very clearly “you will never see him again.” He never returned to Utah and died Jan. 4, 1908 in Wyandotte, Wayne County Michigan. On returning home she looked at the little trees they had planted together, from the seeds she had brought with her. The apricots along the south fence line where a few still remain, there also were the tiny Red Oaks, and she was carried back in her memories to those large ones she had left back home. If these were to grow they must have the best care, however some of them died, there was after a time only one left. Grandmother hoping to preserve its life gave it to her son in law David Meldrum, who was a natural horticulturist, in hopes he could raise it. He planted the tiny tree in his yard and cared for it until it could stand its own. About the year 1879 with the help of his young son David Jr., then about 6 years of age, he replanted the tree outside the lot on the south west corner by an irrigation ditch. (the Meldrum lot was at 3rd east 7th north Provo) David Jr. was born Nov. 19, 1873, and remembers the tree planting. Maple trees were also planted by them about this time, they are still standing a monument to these hardy pioneers. Grandmother carried on with the help of her son Reese, and grandson Elmer whom she reared, to make that little place blossom as the rose. She always had a beautiful flower garden as well as her vegetables and fruits. She lived a full life enjoyed her children, garndchildren, and 2 great grandchildren also many friends and neighbours. She attributed her long life to working out of doors with her flowers. Grandmother passed away peacefully after a few days illness, Aug. 24, 1921, at the age of 91 years 4 months 17 days. She retained hr faculties and affection to the last, never once wavering in her faith and trust in the lord. She was a staunch and true latter day saint and instilled into the hearts of her wonderful heritage to all her decedents.

In this Family Search site - under the "Search" tab, you can search "books". Then in the "books" you can search "David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories" and you can read a beautiful 81 page history of: George Meldrum and his wife, Jane Barclay Meldrum Elizabeth Conrad Hooks Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad David Meldrum Sr. and his wife, Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum David Meldrum Jr. James Arthur Meldrum (who I am a descendant of) Bryan Barton Meldrum Nora Elizabeth Meldrum Heggie Edith Deseret Meldrum Simonsen William Parley Meldrum Thomas Wilford Meldrum Charles Alvin Meldrum

BIOGRAPHY OF SARAH ADAMS BITELY CONRAD Sarah Adams Bitely was the daughter of Peter Bitely and Elizabeth Maria Douglas. She was born in the State of Vermont on the 21st of February 1802. She was named after the mid-wife, Sarah Adams, who attended her mother. This woman had no children and asked that the little girl be given her name, so she was given the name of Sarah Adams Bitely. Sarah Adams Bitely married Charles Ferdinand Conrad February 8, 1830, in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. Their first child, John was born in Fayette , Seneca County, New York. He died when only two months old. The second child was a girl, Elizabeth, she was born in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. A little later the family moved from New York to Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan, where Mr. Conrad took up 80 acres of land, which was located on Mud Street going into Detroit. This was all new country, thickly timbered, and full of wild animals, especially deer, and bear. There were a few panthers and these animals with their peculiar cry were feared and many stories where told about them leading the settlers into the forest with their cries because it was thought that some child was lost. The trees had to be cut and burned so as to clear the land before it could be farmed. Among the other trees in this section of the country were hardwood trees such as the hickory, oak, end ash. Mr. Conrad leased a piece of his land on the north East Corner of his property for a school house. This school was used for many years. He was a prominent leader in his community and held the of office of Justice of the Peace at Trenton, Michigan. Nine children were born to Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad in Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan. They were poor, but sturdy and loved the new country in spite of the hardships of pioneering. Many times they had only potatoes and salt to eat, sometimes they even lacked the salt to eat with the potatoes. Although Mr. Conrad was interested in his community he didn’t seem to take any of the responsibilities of his family, and many times the children went to school without shoes. Elizabeth wore her father’s old shoes when she had to go out in the snow on an errand. The snow sometimes piled up in drifts of three and four feet. It was so deep that it was possible to sleigh ride over the fences. Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad’s fourth child, William caused her a great deal of worry. He loved to hunt and whenever he found his father’s rifle in the house he would take it and go out hunting. When anyone asked where he was, his father would look in the corner where his rifle always stood and missing it would say "Bill's gone hunting, the rifle’s gone." One day he shot two large bucks, they had been fighting and had locked horns so that his one shot killed them both. Sarah Adams Bitely joined the church in 1843, immediately after hearing Elder M. Sirrine KNQK-QS3 preach the gospel. She and her daughter Elizabeth were interested from the first words of Elder Serrine. They accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints gladly, joyously, without question as though it was just what they had long been waiting for, and their faith never wavered through the troubles and hardships they endured in coming west and pioneering another new country. Mr. Conrad joined the church with his wife. They desired to join the Saints in Illinois and left their home in Brownstown. They traveled as far as LaHarpe, Illinois, here they learned that the prophet Joseph Smith had been killed. This caused them to turn about and go back to Michigan. Some time later Sarah's husband left the church. In 1862 Sarah Adams Bitely came to Utah in the company of another lady who had joined the church. Before they got to Missouri they were sitting in the train when two drunken men knowing that they were Mormons began to annoy them. They marched against them when they walked up the aisle and laughed drunkenly. Sarah took her shawl pin, which was about three inches long, and fixed it so that the next time these men came walking along and fell against them this pin stuck into them. After a few stabs they went away and didn't bother them again. Sarah Adams Bitely located in Provo. Her first home was in a little log cabin, where the administration building now stands. In 1864 her sons Charlie, George, and Serrine, her brother-in-law Frederick S. Conrad, and her son-in-law James Hooks joined her in Utah. They had traveled across the plains with one wagon between them, and reached Salt Lake City in August 1864. In Oct. 1870 her daughter Elizabeth, who had married James Hooks came to Provo with her four children. They came all the way from Michigan to Salt Lake City by train. Her son Daniel Schotte Conrad went to Kansas, where he died in 1878, and William Thomas Conrad died in St. Louis. Miles Henry Conrad was killed by a shot through a window one night while he was sitting by his stove. A short time after Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad came to Utah she was sealed to George Brown, a blacksmith who lived across the road from her. Her son Charlie bought a lot on Third North and Second West, just a block north of the Woolen Mills, which was finished in 18?1. The brick work was up when Elizabeth joined her mother in Provo, another story was built on in the spring of 1871. The mill race had to be built up so as to get enough power for the machinery to run by, and this caused water to seep over on Charlie's land and onto the land owned by Mrs. Dan Jones, this ruined their gardens and President Young bought this land from them. Charlie then bought property out on Eighth North and Seventh East where his wife is still living. He built a home here on this land a mile from any other residence and his mother lived there for two years with her son George. Charlie had married and was living on his father-in-law's farm down by the lake. Later he brought his wife out to his land and built a home west of his mother's about a block. When Sarah Adams Bitely began to fail in health she went to live with her daughter, Elizabeth Conrad Hooks, who was living just a short distance south, where her son and his family are still living. Sarah Adams Bitely died in her daughter's home on the 29th of December 1879. She was 77 years old at the time of her death. Biography written by Bertha Louise Hooks November 26, 1934 Provo, Utah (Great granddaughter of Sarah Adams Bitely)

Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum By T.W. Meldrum 1955 (Taken from the David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories book p. 31-22) Deseret Elizabeth Hooks was the 2nd child and daughter of James Hooks and Elizabeth Conrad, and was born October 15, 1854 at Brownstown, Wayne Co., Michigan. One hundred years ago 1854, Michigan was frontier country, but the people were pushing always westward, making farms, clearing timber and seeking a livelihood or riches in other ways, such as trading, buying and selling land, animals or whatever else they had to offer. The Conrad’s (Deseret Elizabeth’s mother and her folks) came from the State of New York and previous to that from Pennsylvania (a Dutch Colony). Her mother Elizabeth Conrad, having been born at Seneca, Ontario Co., New York, April 7, 1830, (being a day after the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized and not far 25-30 miles from Fayette, Seneca co., New York, where that great event took place, in fact, her older brother John Conrad was born there but unfortunately he died the dame day that he was born Oct. 26, 1830.) Deseret’s father, James Hooks was born in England, possibly in the County of Norfolk, and near Whissonnette, Sept. 5, 1830, where his mother Martha Mann Thing/Hooks was born. His father Thomas Hooks immigrated to America in the year 1836, but we are unable as yet to find out what port he arrived at or what ship he came to America in, nor any record of his marriage to Martha Mann Thing. The home where Deseret lived in Michigan was surrounded by heavy forest of maple, oak, hickory and other hard woods and soft woods. Wild animals were abundant, such as bears, wild cats, deer, etc. the wild cat at night would cry out something like unto a baby crying, and seemed to put fear into the children and others and would keep them indoors after dark Deseret’s mother Elizabeth received the Gospel from two Mormon Missionaries, Israel Evans and Nymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City, Utah and she was baptized in the Detroit River Oct. 21, 1869 by Israel Evans. Her husband being out west to California at the time, Elizabeth with her four children three girls and one boy came to Utah in the fall of 1870 by railroad (the Union Pacific Railroad having been completed to Salt Lake City the year previous 1869). Charles Conrad, her bother met them at Salt Lake City and brought them to Provo, in a wagon a 45 mile trip. Sometime later her husband came from California and built her a log cabin in the east part of Provo where she lived until her death. Deseret was baptized a member of the Church by her uncle, Charles Conrad in 1871 at the age of 16 years. Unhappily her father, James Hooks couldn’t see the light of the Gospel, and when one of the ward bishops didn’t pay him for work he got disheartened and went back to Michigan and never returned, the family saw him no more. Deseret (ET or Ettie as she was called) met and was courted by David Meldrum, and after a time they travelled to Salt Lake City and were married for time and eternity in the Endowment House at the City on Feb. 14, 1873. David was the 2nd son of George and Jane Barclay Meldrum. To this couple were born ten children, 7 boys and 3 girls (one baby girl however was stillborn) all growing to maturity except the stillborn girl and a boy Benjamin Howard who died at the age of two of membranous croup. All married and had family except one son Charles Alvin, the youngest who never married. Father and mother Meldrum built a large one roomed log cabin in the north east part of Provo where the three elder brothers, David, James Arthur and Bryan Barton were born, then father built a brick home on the corner of the same lot where the balance of the family were born. Father used the log cabin for a blacksmith shop for years. After living in Provo, Utah for 31 years and as there was an opening of new country in Canada (Southern Alberta) about this time, their son James Arthur received a call from the church to go and settle there, which he did travelling there by team, 750 mile. He helped to fund the town of Magrath, Alberta when he wrote back to Utah to his parents about that land being the land of opportunity and plenty of work available for a blacksmith there. The prairies were being broken up by ploughs and plough points had to be sharpened and machinery repaired, so he urged father to go to Canada. So in the spring of 1903 father moved to Alberta and started a blacksmith shop in the town of Raymond where the Knight Sugar Co., had built a sugar factory the year previous. He built a one roomed house (later two other rooms were added) on the same lot as the blacksmith shop. He lived there until his death Feb. 12, 1918. Mother came to Canada the following year in 1904. The rest of the family at home stayed at Provo to go to school or work until such time that father could bring us to Canada. My brother Parley had come to Canada with his brother James Arthur when he made a return trip to Provo to get material and also to get married. I had not arrived in Alberta until Aug. 1910 except for a month visit when I came here with me Grandmother Hooks in 1907. Mother was stricken with a paralytic stroke in 1916 and it left her without the power of speech and she continued this way until her death five years later. She died of another stroke Aug. 7, 1921, at the age of 91 ½ years. Mother was buried in the Raymond Cemetery beside her husband who had predeceased her my three and a half years. Mother lived a very honourable life and was a staunch member of the church.

Elizabeth Conrad Hooks (Taken from the “David Meldrum Family Histories p. 21,22) Written by her granddaughter Ida Ashton Ercanbrack We have met her today to dedicate, and mark this sturdy Red Oak Tree, the only one of its kind in Provo, and think it fitting on this occasion to give a history of the tree and the foresighted sturdy piople who through their efforts have and it possible to meet here. My Grandmother Elizabeth Conrad Hooks was born April 7, 1830 at Seneca, Ontario County New York, the daughter of Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad. She was the oldest living child and only daughter, there being eleven children in the family. When she was 15 months old her parents moved to Michigan, then just a territory. Her schooling was brief as she was only able to attend a short time during the term on account of the long distance, deep snow, and inadequate clothing for such cold weather. At the age of 14 she went away from home to work. She worked very hard for one so young and frail, and received .50 cents a week for pay. At the age of 21 she was married to James Hooks, on Dec. 16, 1851, at Brownstown, Wayne County Michigan, where they lived several years. Here 6 children were born to them, five daughters and one son, Ann, Deseret Elizabeth, Martha Delilah, Leah, James Reese and Sarah Jane. Ann and Leah died in infancy. The family moved to Trenton, Michigan, from Brownstown in 1864. Her husband with her brothers Charles, George and Serrine, and her uncle Frederick Conrad, left for Utah and the West. They freighted goods in Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon and thought-out the north western part of the united States until the railroad came. She, with her hildren, went to live eith her unmarried brother Miles H. Conrad. She wored hard caring for his home and her family. From the time she first heard of Mormonism she was a firm believer of it, but never had the privilege of being baptized until this time, when two missionaries came to the place they were Israel evans of Lehi, Utah and Hymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City. She was baptized by Israel Evans in October 1868, in the Detroit River. After this she made preparations to immigrate to Utah. Grandmother being a love of nature and all things beautiful, thinking of the new home she would have to make in this arid county began to gather and store away carfully the seeds of her beautiful flowers, and of her herbs to be sure of supply of medicines and seasonings in her new home. She gathered squash seed, one variety known as the acorn squash was at one time (through the seed she brought) the leading squash in Provo and the whole of Utah County. Also before she came to Utah she sent to her mother Sarah A. B. Conrad a little box of “Tiger Lily” seeds from which grew the first tiger Lilies in Provo. Grandmother also gathered some peach pits, Apricot pits, plums the walnut and also a few acorns from the Red Oaks that grew there. Realizing that (Great Oaks from tiny acorns grow). She put all these, carefully in the big trunk that was to come with the family to their new home in Utah. In the early fall of 1870 she with her four children left Michigan by rail. At Omaha, Nebraska, they met an emigrant train with Frank Hyde as captain of the company and took passage to Salt Lake City. They stayed in Salt Lake City for about one week, when they were met by her brother Charles Conrad who brought them jto Provo at that time. They arrived in Provo Oct. 1870 and spent the winter with her mother. In the spring she moved to a farm her brother had rented, north of Provo, in what is now known as Pleasant View. In the fall she came back to Provo where she stayed until her husband came and purchased a place on 7th east and 6th north, where he built a small log house, where the Hooks family has resided since that time. Grandfather never accepted the Mormon religion, and after the girls were married he decided to return to Michigan, Elizabeth walked as far as the old Co-Op store, corner of east center and University ave. with him. As she bade him god speed and watched him going on his way a voice said to her very clearly “you will never see him again.” He never returned to Utah and died Jan. 4, 1908 in Wyandotte, Wayne County Michigan. On returning home she looked at the little trees they had planted together, from the seeds she had brought with her. The apricots along the south fence line where a few still remain, there also were the tiny Red Oaks, and she was carried back in her memories to those large ones she had left back home. If these were to grow they must have the best care, however some of them died, there was after a time only one left. Grandmother hoping to preserve its life gave it to her son in law David Meldrum, who was a natural horticulturist, in hopes he could raise it. He planted the tiny tree in his yard and cared for it until it could stand its own. About the year 1879 with the help of his young son David Jr., then about 6 years of age, he replanted the tree outside the lot on the south west corner by an irrigation ditch. (the Meldrum lot was at 3rd east 7th north Provo) David Jr. was born Nov. 19, 1873, and remembers the tree planting. Maple trees were also planted by them about this time, they are still standing a monument to these hardy pioneers. Grandmother carried on with the help of her son Reese, and grandson Elmer whom she reared, to make that little place blossom as the rose. She always had a beautiful flower garden as well as her vegetables and fruits. She lived a full life enjoyed her children, garndchildren, and 2 great grandchildren also many friends and neighbours. She attributed her long life to working out of doors with her flowers. Grandmother passed away peacefully after a few days illness, Aug. 24, 1921, at the age of 91 years 4 months 17 days. She retained hr faculties and affection to the last, never once wavering in her faith and trust in the lord. She was a staunch and true latter day saint and instilled into the hearts of her wonderful heritage to all her decedents.

In this Family Search site - under the "Search" tab, you can search "books". Then in the "books" you can search "David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories" and you can read a beautiful 81 page history of: George Meldrum and his wife, Jane Barclay Meldrum Elizabeth Conrad Hooks Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad David Meldrum Sr. and his wife, Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum David Meldrum Jr. James Arthur Meldrum (who I am a descendant of) Bryan Barton Meldrum Nora Elizabeth Meldrum Heggie Edith Deseret Meldrum Simonsen William Parley Meldrum Thomas Wilford Meldrum Charles Alvin Meldrum

Sketch of the Life of Frank Davis Ashton Dictated to and written by his wife Norma Lewis Ashton in 1978 The summer I was born my parents were living in a large tent. They were building a new home, the one they lived in the rest of their lives. My mother wanted so much to get the house finished before I arrived. They didn’t make it. I was born in my grandmother Ashton’s front room on the 8th of July, 1909. I weighed twelve pounds and eleven ounces. The earliest thing I can remember is my mother taking me to my first day of school. We walked down the lane and she stopped to talk to Mrs. Jake Young. I can remember the day Clarence and Bert Goodman were up in the dike swimming. I had on my swim suit but I couldn’t swim. Dad came after me because he wanted to take me to town. I was up on the shallow end. He told me to come across in a certain place. I stepped in a hole and went under. Dad had to jump in with his good suit on and pull me out. When I was just a small boy my dad was harvesting the potatoes on Sunday. U was hanging around and decided to ride on the wagon wheel in spread eagle fashion. When dad started to go with the wagon my foot got caught between the wheel and the bolster as the wheel turned. It broke my ankle. Dad didn’t know I was doing it until I let out a bellow. He had to back the wagon to get my foot out. He started to carry me. I hollered to him to put me down so I could walk but I couldn’t. He didn’t work on Sunday for a long time after that. When I was about seven or eight years old I had Scarlet Fever. I almost died from it. I will never forget the day LaMar, Leah and I had our tonsils removed. Dr. Hughes did it on Uncle Bert’s kitchen table. When I heard Leah and LaMar hollering I tried to break the screen door and get away but Uncle Bert caught me. When I was about eight to twelve years old, my main job was to herd the cows. Elmer Slack and I would take our lunch and drive our cows up on the foothills where Oak Hills is now. We would stay all day and drive them home at night. Elmer would go bare foot and his feet were so tough he could walk all over the thistles. I used to take the cows up to the Thomas pasture where Marcrest is now. We had an old cow named Brownie. She would let me ride her all the way to the pasture and back. We had a really big celebration on the 24th of July at the old church on Canyon Road. I rode old Brownie in the parade. One day we tried to make old Brownie go down the cellar steps. We would get one on each side of her and hold our hands over her eyes so she couldn’t see. She would go anywhere but as soon as she got to the cellar steps she would stop and we couldn’t make her go down. One day mother and dad went away and told us not to pick any watermelons because they were not ripe yet. We tried them anyway. We plugged quite a few and could not find a ripe one. When we saw our parents coming we decided to feed the plugged melons to old Brownie. I was stuffing them down her throat trying to get rid of them. I couldn’t feel any teeth in her mouth. I guess I got my hand too far in for all of a sudden she bit my finger almost off. I still carry the scar. Once in a while we would go to Strawberry to fish. We went in the wagon with Uncle Chuck, Uncle Autte, and Uncle Bert and their families. We pitched our tent by the river. We didn’t have a boat but there were lots of fish. One fall I went with my dad to get a load of lumber out to Strawberry. On the way back when we were going down Daniels Canyon I got cold. Dad told me to get out and walk to get warm. A survey crew was working along the road and had placed a lot of stakes. As I walked along, I pulled all the stakes and put them in the wagon. After a while I crawled up on the wagon and said, “Look at all this good kindling I got.” Dad grabbed his coat and threw over them and said, “Good grief, there they are right down there hammering the stakes in the ground.” One day my friend, Jim Phillips, let me ride his horse to Primary. When we got there I was riding it around the churchyard and it suddenly occurred to me to see if the horse would climb the church steps. It walked up them all right but it wouldn’t back down them. I had to make the horse climb clear to the top of the steps so I could turn it around. When the horse stepped onto the wooden floor in the doorway, the floor sank down to the ground. It cost me ten dollars and I got plenty of tongue lashing. One winter Clarence made a sleigh. He called it the Yumpy. We had a lot of fun on the hills with it. We used to sleigh ride a lot down on the hill by Uncle Chucks. It had a north face and it stayed frozen and slick for a long time in the winter. Uncle Chuck had a bob-sled. We used to have sleigh riding parties and go to someone’s house for hot chocolate to get warm. Sometimes it was very cold and we would put a cover over the wagon-box to make it warmer. Then we would fill it up with straw and heat large rocks to keep us warm. We used to skate on the canal. Sometimes it would stay frozen over for a long time and we could ice skate in either direction for a long ways. My friend, Jim Phillips, had a cutter(one seated sleigh) that he pulled with his horse. When I was a teenager, I went sleighing with him real often. We used to go sliding around the country by tying barrel staves to our feet and then hang onto a rope which was attached to our horses saddle. We used to pull a string of sleds behind a horse to sleigh ride. One cold winter day, Jess and I went to the orchard up by Beesleys to get some honey from a beehive. The bees were not supposed to come out in the cold but they did. We grabbed our hats off to fight them away. After we got away from them, I put my hat on and it had a mess of bees in it. They stung me and my face swelled up and my eyes swelled shut. One day dad had just butchered a pig. That night he told me to go out and set a trap so it would catch any dogs that tried to get to the meat. While I was setting the trap, Leah got a sheet and draped it around her and came down the path toward me. Just as I went to set the trap down, I saw her coming with her arms flapping the sheet in the night. I threw the trap at her and tore for the house. It’s a good thing I wasn’t a good shot. When I was just learning to drive my dad’s Model T Ford, I was taking Lenora for a ride. Max Phillips was coming down the hill by Uncle Chucks with a load of apples as I passed by. I hollered, “Throw me an apple.” He threw one to me and it went into the back seat. I forgot I was driving a Ford and crawled in the back to get my apple. The Ford went up the guy wire on the light pole and tipped over. It didn’t hurt us. Dad and Chuck and the whole neighborhood had to come and help get it right side up again. I didn’t drive again for quite a while. The year I started to go to Lincoln High School, I started walking Norma home from church and I took her to a few dances. We always went with Clarence and Leah. Norma’s mother wouldn’t let her go with me alone. The next spring, about the end of March, Verlbrereton and I decided to run away, find some work, and see the world. We had one dollar and sixty cents between us. We hitch hiked to Ogden. It started to rain and we found a haystack to sleep in. We burrowed into the hay and got out of the rain for the night. In the morning we discovered we were in a stack of foxtail. During the night the foxtail had worked its way through our clothes, everywhere. We caught a ride to Logan and bought a roll and some pop. We were just about ready to go back home we were so miserable and hungry. We decided we wanted to get over the border so we could say we had been in Idaho. A man, Mister Shuldberg, came along in a Model T Ford and gave us a ride. He was a stake president and owned a very large ranch. He offered to give us a job. We took it. He took us to his home and gave us something to eat. He told us he thought we were never going to stop eating. He sent us to get a load of beet pulp. On the way back we decided to see if the horses were good pullers. We drove through a mud hole and got stuck. We had to unload the beet pulp and we piled it in the rocks. The team wouldn’t pull the wagon out when it was empty. A man came along with a little pinto team and pulled it out for us. Then we had to load the beet pulp again, rocks and all. When Mister Shuldberg saw the beet pulp he said he guessed the cows could sort out the rocks. Verl had to go to another part of his ranch and I stayed where I was. We lived in a tent. One day the mosquitos were so thick I couldn’t stand it. I went into the tent and got a flour sack and cut holes for my eyes and pulled it over my head. When I went out to my horses they were so frightened they ran away. After they ran down I went and got them. I came home in July. Mister Shuldberg had a daughter named, Elva, whom I got acquainted with a little bit. When I got home, dad had a contract to haul gravel for the state road. He let me go. I had to haul from the rock crusher up by Stan Robert’s home. Jim Long was working on the crusher. One day when I was loading my wagon Florence and Harold Colvin decided to play a joke on Jim. Florence dressed Harold all fancy in women’s clothes. Then he went up to the rock crusher and stood and waved up at Jimmy. He got so excited he got tearing down to see her, only to find it was Harold. I really had a good laugh. In 1927, the Pleasant View Chapel was started. I dumped the first wheel-barrow full of cement to begin construction. My dad and I hauled lots of gravel for the building from our gravel bed. We loaded it all with a hand shovel. When we unloaded it we just loosened the chain around the wagonbox and the planks came apart and the gravel hit the ground. We hauled lots of gravel for people to build cement foundations for home building, loading it all by hand shovel. I used to ride to High School with Leah. She taught school at Sharon Elementary. She had a Model T Ford. It had a leaking radiator and we put horse manure in it to seal the leak. One morning it was very cold and the radiator was boiling by the time we reached Lincoln High School. We pulled up to the service station and I got out to take the radiator cap off. The boiling water came out and covered the hood and windshield with manure. About March of my second year in school, I had been sluffing a little. One day I had my history lesson in good shape, a special report. Two of my friends decided to go to town. I decided they were not going without me. The next day Principle Karl Banks called me to his office. He told me to sit down. I sat there for a long time and he went about his business. After quite a while my dad walked in. The principle told him what had been going on. My dad said, “Well, if you don’t want to go to school to learn, you might as well come home and help me.” I said, “All right.” I walked away from school and I never went back again. I had enough credit to graduate from Seminary. In April, I left with the Yentz Horn family to go to Wyoming to work for Jimmy Mickelson. The Horns were our neighbors and used to live in the Hinkins house by the old packing shed where we lived years later. In Wyoming I learned to ride broncos and punch cows. During haying time, I was the horse wrangler. I had to get up very early in the morning and bring all the horses into the corral. There were about seventy five horses. All the hay hands had to catch their own horses. There was a loud bell that rang to signal meal times. After the noon meal, everyone caught fresh horses. It was five miles to the post office. One day Yentz and I rode a couple of young horses which were being broken to get the mail. On the way, mine threw me and I had to walk home. The horse followed the other horse home and Yentz made me get on and ride it again. During hay time we never worked on Sunday. They had a rodeo instead. While I was in Wyoming, I caught the mumps. I had to go into Big Piney to the hotel and stay there so the doctor could take care of me. I was very ill. It was while I was in bead at that hotel that I discovered that I was deaf in one ear. I was listening to the noise of a saw. When I turned over and put my ear in the pillow, I could not hear the saw at all. I do not know whether the mumps caused it or not. I returned home from Wyoming before Thanksgiving. I can’t remember the year the lower stadium was built, but dad and I worked on it with the team after I returned from Wyoming. After I was discovered I was deaf in one ear, the doctor thought it might be helped through surgery on my nose. Doctor Oaks operated and took some bone out of my nose. I did not know before the operation that I was a bleeder. I had a hemorrhage and had to be hospitalized and have my head packed. I was unconscious and delirious for several days. I finally made it home again. My doctor went on vacation and left me in charge of another. He came out to our home to remove the packs at the proper time. A day or two later I began to get a very bad headache. It got worse and worse. I started to run a temperature. The pain became so intense I was screaming. The doctor came again. When he examined me, he discovered he had left one pack in my head and it had started an infection. Eventually, I recovered but the surgery did not help restore the hearing in my deaf ear. In the spring of 1928, I went to work for Norma’s dad. I soon bought me a used Model T Ford. One day, Harold and Elton Mecham came up South Fork to see me. We decided to go to town. Elton had a Ford, also. I was supposed to take a court a cream down to Norma’s mother. Harold rode with me so he could hold the bottle of cream. Just as we turned the corner by the power plant coming down the canyon, my lights went out. Harold said, “Hurry and catch up with Elton and we can follow him down to home.” I stepped on the gas trying to get close to Elton. Just as I got to the bottom of the hill, Elton disappeared over the top and everything went black. The next thing I knew I was sailing through the air over the bar-pit and landing in a squawberry bush. Harold was still holding the quart of cream in his hands. Dad had to come up with the team and pull me out. I worked for Norma’s dad for four summers from May until October. In the winter I had a day or two on the ditch once in a while. I helped dad haul gravel and once in a while we would get a basement to dig. Norma and I were making wedding plans in the winter of 1932. I went to the desert early that spring to help bring in the sheep. I was moving camp for James Long and Bob Lloyd. A very bad storm came up. It was really cold and miserable. We were so miserable that Bob Lloyd said, “When I tell my grandkids about this, if they don’t bawl I’ll beat the heck out of them.” The sheep had to be moved everyday so there would be something for them to eat and because they had to move in to the shearing corral at Jericho on a schedule. I had to move the camp in the slick, thick desert mud. I slid off the road and got stuck. I was just a little way past Fish Springs. I tried to get the truck out and burned out the clutch. Bob, Jim, and the sheep had gone on ahead of me. They were without food, bedding, or shelter. I decided to walk five miles to a ranch and try to borrow a horse so I could catch up with them. I was able to get a horse. When I got back to my camp, there was another sheep outfit close by. The boss came along and said they would stop across the flat for the night and I could catch him there and they would take me into Salt Lake. I made some biscuits, put some canned goods in a pack, and took off to find Bob and Jim and tell them what had happened. I left the food and a couple of quilts with them and returned the horse to the ranch. I started across the flat at daylight to catch the outfit that had promised me a ride into Salt Lake. I walked until noon and I did not catch them nor see any signs of them. I decided I would have to go back to camp. On the way back, my side started to hurt. It was very hard walking in the slick, sticky desert mud. I reached camp about dark. In the morning I knew I had to get help. I walked the five miles back to the ranch where I had borrowed the horse. I told them I thought I had appendicitis. They thought I was only making an excuse to get into Salt Lake City. They said they were going in day after tomorrow. I went back the five miles to camp and got into bed and stayed there two days and three nights without moving. When the people came I was not able to move. They had to dress me and carry me to their car. My side hurt very badly as the car hit the hills and hollows of the rough road. Once we got stuck and I had to get out and help push the car out of the mud. As I was straining to push the car, I felt the pain go and I was relieved. I assumed that was when my appendix ruptured. When we reached Salt Lake City, they put me on the Interurban(the electric car that ran from Salt Lake to Provo). When I reached Provo, after dark, I got off the car and walked across the street to Smith’s Pool Hall. I was bent over and could not straighten up. Norma’s father was in the pool hall. He looked at me and said, “What are you doing here?” I told him the story. He took me home. He insisted on calling Doctor Hasler. The next morning they took me to the Aird Hospital. Norma came to see me for a few minutes before surgery. Doctor Brown just made an incision and put a tube in my side to drain the infection. He told the nurse to put Turpentine packs on my side. She left them on too long and blistered a large area of my side. I credit the packs for saving my life, even if they did burn me. They seemed to gather the infection and it drained out the tube. I stayed in the hospital for three weeks. When I went home, I had to stay in bed for three more weeks. When I got up I had to walk with a cane. When I went to the desert that spring, I weighed one hundred and eighty pounds. The first time I weighed after I was ill, I weighed ninety pounds. In June the new Pleasant View Chapel was dedicated. Norma came over to visit with me after the dedication. During the afternoon Doctor Hasler came by to dress my side. When he took the dressing off there were two stones about the size of an olive pit that had sluffed out through the drain tube. At that time, a ruptured appendix was almost always fatal. My dad said, “It’s a miracle that you survived and you had better find out why.” A few months ago we were talking about my experience at family home evening. Clarence said, “Just look at his family and you know why he lived.” It took me many months to get well and back to normal. A year later I went to work in the spring for Bill Ercanbrack. Norma’s father had lost his outfit. There wasn’t any other place to work. I hadn’t worked for a long time. I wanted to get married so I went back to herding sheep. I saved all my money through the summer and on December 21, 1933, Norma and I were married in the Salt Lake Temple.

BIOGRAPHY OF SARAH ADAMS BITELY CONRAD Sarah Adams Bitely was the daughter of Peter Bitely and Elizabeth Maria Douglas. She was born in the State of Vermont on the 21st of February 1802. She was named after the mid-wife, Sarah Adams, who attended her mother. This woman had no children and asked that the little girl be given her name, so she was given the name of Sarah Adams Bitely. Sarah Adams Bitely married Charles Ferdinand Conrad February 8, 1830, in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. Their first child, John was born in Fayette , Seneca County, New York. He died when only two months old. The second child was a girl, Elizabeth, she was born in the town of Seneca, Ontario County, New York. A little later the family moved from New York to Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan, where Mr. Conrad took up 80 acres of land, which was located on Mud Street going into Detroit. This was all new country, thickly timbered, and full of wild animals, especially deer, and bear. There were a few panthers and these animals with their peculiar cry were feared and many stories where told about them leading the settlers into the forest with their cries because it was thought that some child was lost. The trees had to be cut and burned so as to clear the land before it could be farmed. Among the other trees in this section of the country were hardwood trees such as the hickory, oak, end ash. Mr. Conrad leased a piece of his land on the north East Corner of his property for a school house. This school was used for many years. He was a prominent leader in his community and held the of office of Justice of the Peace at Trenton, Michigan. Nine children were born to Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad in Brownstown, Wayne County, Michigan. They were poor, but sturdy and loved the new country in spite of the hardships of pioneering. Many times they had only potatoes and salt to eat, sometimes they even lacked the salt to eat with the potatoes. Although Mr. Conrad was interested in his community he didn’t seem to take any of the responsibilities of his family, and many times the children went to school without shoes. Elizabeth wore her father’s old shoes when she had to go out in the snow on an errand. The snow sometimes piled up in drifts of three and four feet. It was so deep that it was possible to sleigh ride over the fences. Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad’s fourth child, William caused her a great deal of worry. He loved to hunt and whenever he found his father’s rifle in the house he would take it and go out hunting. When anyone asked where he was, his father would look in the corner where his rifle always stood and missing it would say "Bill's gone hunting, the rifle’s gone." One day he shot two large bucks, they had been fighting and had locked horns so that his one shot killed them both. Sarah Adams Bitely joined the church in 1843, immediately after hearing Elder M. Sirrine KNQK-QS3 preach the gospel. She and her daughter Elizabeth were interested from the first words of Elder Serrine. They accepted the gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints gladly, joyously, without question as though it was just what they had long been waiting for, and their faith never wavered through the troubles and hardships they endured in coming west and pioneering another new country. Mr. Conrad joined the church with his wife. They desired to join the Saints in Illinois and left their home in Brownstown. They traveled as far as LaHarpe, Illinois, here they learned that the prophet Joseph Smith had been killed. This caused them to turn about and go back to Michigan. Some time later Sarah's husband left the church. In 1862 Sarah Adams Bitely came to Utah in the company of another lady who had joined the church. Before they got to Missouri they were sitting in the train when two drunken men knowing that they were Mormons began to annoy them. They marched against them when they walked up the aisle and laughed drunkenly. Sarah took her shawl pin, which was about three inches long, and fixed it so that the next time these men came walking along and fell against them this pin stuck into them. After a few stabs they went away and didn't bother them again. Sarah Adams Bitely located in Provo. Her first home was in a little log cabin, where the administration building now stands. In 1864 her sons Charlie, George, and Serrine, her brother-in-law Frederick S. Conrad, and her son-in-law James Hooks joined her in Utah. They had traveled across the plains with one wagon between them, and reached Salt Lake City in August 1864. In Oct. 1870 her daughter Elizabeth, who had married James Hooks came to Provo with her four children. They came all the way from Michigan to Salt Lake City by train. Her son Daniel Schotte Conrad went to Kansas, where he died in 1878, and William Thomas Conrad died in St. Louis. Miles Henry Conrad was killed by a shot through a window one night while he was sitting by his stove. A short time after Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad came to Utah she was sealed to George Brown, a blacksmith who lived across the road from her. Her son Charlie bought a lot on Third North and Second West, just a block north of the Woolen Mills, which was finished in 18?1. The brick work was up when Elizabeth joined her mother in Provo, another story was built on in the spring of 1871. The mill race had to be built up so as to get enough power for the machinery to run by, and this caused water to seep over on Charlie's land and onto the land owned by Mrs. Dan Jones, this ruined their gardens and President Young bought this land from them. Charlie then bought property out on Eighth North and Seventh East where his wife is still living. He built a home here on this land a mile from any other residence and his mother lived there for two years with her son George. Charlie had married and was living on his father-in-law's farm down by the lake. Later he brought his wife out to his land and built a home west of his mother's about a block. When Sarah Adams Bitely began to fail in health she went to live with her daughter, Elizabeth Conrad Hooks, who was living just a short distance south, where her son and his family are still living. Sarah Adams Bitely died in her daughter's home on the 29th of December 1879. She was 77 years old at the time of her death. Biography written by Bertha Louise Hooks November 26, 1934 Provo, Utah (Great granddaughter of Sarah Adams Bitely)

Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum By T.W. Meldrum 1955 (Taken from the David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories book p. 31-22) Deseret Elizabeth Hooks was the 2nd child and daughter of James Hooks and Elizabeth Conrad, and was born October 15, 1854 at Brownstown, Wayne Co., Michigan. One hundred years ago 1854, Michigan was frontier country, but the people were pushing always westward, making farms, clearing timber and seeking a livelihood or riches in other ways, such as trading, buying and selling land, animals or whatever else they had to offer. The Conrad’s (Deseret Elizabeth’s mother and her folks) came from the State of New York and previous to that from Pennsylvania (a Dutch Colony). Her mother Elizabeth Conrad, having been born at Seneca, Ontario Co., New York, April 7, 1830, (being a day after the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized and not far 25-30 miles from Fayette, Seneca co., New York, where that great event took place, in fact, her older brother John Conrad was born there but unfortunately he died the dame day that he was born Oct. 26, 1830.) Deseret’s father, James Hooks was born in England, possibly in the County of Norfolk, and near Whissonnette, Sept. 5, 1830, where his mother Martha Mann Thing/Hooks was born. His father Thomas Hooks immigrated to America in the year 1836, but we are unable as yet to find out what port he arrived at or what ship he came to America in, nor any record of his marriage to Martha Mann Thing. The home where Deseret lived in Michigan was surrounded by heavy forest of maple, oak, hickory and other hard woods and soft woods. Wild animals were abundant, such as bears, wild cats, deer, etc. the wild cat at night would cry out something like unto a baby crying, and seemed to put fear into the children and others and would keep them indoors after dark Deseret’s mother Elizabeth received the Gospel from two Mormon Missionaries, Israel Evans and Nymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City, Utah and she was baptized in the Detroit River Oct. 21, 1869 by Israel Evans. Her husband being out west to California at the time, Elizabeth with her four children three girls and one boy came to Utah in the fall of 1870 by railroad (the Union Pacific Railroad having been completed to Salt Lake City the year previous 1869). Charles Conrad, her bother met them at Salt Lake City and brought them to Provo, in a wagon a 45 mile trip. Sometime later her husband came from California and built her a log cabin in the east part of Provo where she lived until her death. Deseret was baptized a member of the Church by her uncle, Charles Conrad in 1871 at the age of 16 years. Unhappily her father, James Hooks couldn’t see the light of the Gospel, and when one of the ward bishops didn’t pay him for work he got disheartened and went back to Michigan and never returned, the family saw him no more. Deseret (ET or Ettie as she was called) met and was courted by David Meldrum, and after a time they travelled to Salt Lake City and were married for time and eternity in the Endowment House at the City on Feb. 14, 1873. David was the 2nd son of George and Jane Barclay Meldrum. To this couple were born ten children, 7 boys and 3 girls (one baby girl however was stillborn) all growing to maturity except the stillborn girl and a boy Benjamin Howard who died at the age of two of membranous croup. All married and had family except one son Charles Alvin, the youngest who never married. Father and mother Meldrum built a large one roomed log cabin in the north east part of Provo where the three elder brothers, David, James Arthur and Bryan Barton were born, then father built a brick home on the corner of the same lot where the balance of the family were born. Father used the log cabin for a blacksmith shop for years. After living in Provo, Utah for 31 years and as there was an opening of new country in Canada (Southern Alberta) about this time, their son James Arthur received a call from the church to go and settle there, which he did travelling there by team, 750 mile. He helped to fund the town of Magrath, Alberta when he wrote back to Utah to his parents about that land being the land of opportunity and plenty of work available for a blacksmith there. The prairies were being broken up by ploughs and plough points had to be sharpened and machinery repaired, so he urged father to go to Canada. So in the spring of 1903 father moved to Alberta and started a blacksmith shop in the town of Raymond where the Knight Sugar Co., had built a sugar factory the year previous. He built a one roomed house (later two other rooms were added) on the same lot as the blacksmith shop. He lived there until his death Feb. 12, 1918. Mother came to Canada the following year in 1904. The rest of the family at home stayed at Provo to go to school or work until such time that father could bring us to Canada. My brother Parley had come to Canada with his brother James Arthur when he made a return trip to Provo to get material and also to get married. I had not arrived in Alberta until Aug. 1910 except for a month visit when I came here with me Grandmother Hooks in 1907. Mother was stricken with a paralytic stroke in 1916 and it left her without the power of speech and she continued this way until her death five years later. She died of another stroke Aug. 7, 1921, at the age of 91 ½ years. Mother was buried in the Raymond Cemetery beside her husband who had predeceased her my three and a half years. Mother lived a very honourable life and was a staunch member of the church.

Elizabeth Conrad Hooks (Taken from the “David Meldrum Family Histories p. 21,22) Written by her granddaughter Ida Ashton Ercanbrack We have met her today to dedicate, and mark this sturdy Red Oak Tree, the only one of its kind in Provo, and think it fitting on this occasion to give a history of the tree and the foresighted sturdy piople who through their efforts have and it possible to meet here. My Grandmother Elizabeth Conrad Hooks was born April 7, 1830 at Seneca, Ontario County New York, the daughter of Sarah Adams Bitely and Charles F. Conrad. She was the oldest living child and only daughter, there being eleven children in the family. When she was 15 months old her parents moved to Michigan, then just a territory. Her schooling was brief as she was only able to attend a short time during the term on account of the long distance, deep snow, and inadequate clothing for such cold weather. At the age of 14 she went away from home to work. She worked very hard for one so young and frail, and received .50 cents a week for pay. At the age of 21 she was married to James Hooks, on Dec. 16, 1851, at Brownstown, Wayne County Michigan, where they lived several years. Here 6 children were born to them, five daughters and one son, Ann, Deseret Elizabeth, Martha Delilah, Leah, James Reese and Sarah Jane. Ann and Leah died in infancy. The family moved to Trenton, Michigan, from Brownstown in 1864. Her husband with her brothers Charles, George and Serrine, and her uncle Frederick Conrad, left for Utah and the West. They freighted goods in Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon and thought-out the north western part of the united States until the railroad came. She, with her hildren, went to live eith her unmarried brother Miles H. Conrad. She wored hard caring for his home and her family. From the time she first heard of Mormonism she was a firm believer of it, but never had the privilege of being baptized until this time, when two missionaries came to the place they were Israel evans of Lehi, Utah and Hymphus Murdock of Salt Lake City. She was baptized by Israel Evans in October 1868, in the Detroit River. After this she made preparations to immigrate to Utah. Grandmother being a love of nature and all things beautiful, thinking of the new home she would have to make in this arid county began to gather and store away carfully the seeds of her beautiful flowers, and of her herbs to be sure of supply of medicines and seasonings in her new home. She gathered squash seed, one variety known as the acorn squash was at one time (through the seed she brought) the leading squash in Provo and the whole of Utah County. Also before she came to Utah she sent to her mother Sarah A. B. Conrad a little box of “Tiger Lily” seeds from which grew the first tiger Lilies in Provo. Grandmother also gathered some peach pits, Apricot pits, plums the walnut and also a few acorns from the Red Oaks that grew there. Realizing that (Great Oaks from tiny acorns grow). She put all these, carefully in the big trunk that was to come with the family to their new home in Utah. In the early fall of 1870 she with her four children left Michigan by rail. At Omaha, Nebraska, they met an emigrant train with Frank Hyde as captain of the company and took passage to Salt Lake City. They stayed in Salt Lake City for about one week, when they were met by her brother Charles Conrad who brought them jto Provo at that time. They arrived in Provo Oct. 1870 and spent the winter with her mother. In the spring she moved to a farm her brother had rented, north of Provo, in what is now known as Pleasant View. In the fall she came back to Provo where she stayed until her husband came and purchased a place on 7th east and 6th north, where he built a small log house, where the Hooks family has resided since that time. Grandfather never accepted the Mormon religion, and after the girls were married he decided to return to Michigan, Elizabeth walked as far as the old Co-Op store, corner of east center and University ave. with him. As she bade him god speed and watched him going on his way a voice said to her very clearly “you will never see him again.” He never returned to Utah and died Jan. 4, 1908 in Wyandotte, Wayne County Michigan. On returning home she looked at the little trees they had planted together, from the seeds she had brought with her. The apricots along the south fence line where a few still remain, there also were the tiny Red Oaks, and she was carried back in her memories to those large ones she had left back home. If these were to grow they must have the best care, however some of them died, there was after a time only one left. Grandmother hoping to preserve its life gave it to her son in law David Meldrum, who was a natural horticulturist, in hopes he could raise it. He planted the tiny tree in his yard and cared for it until it could stand its own. About the year 1879 with the help of his young son David Jr., then about 6 years of age, he replanted the tree outside the lot on the south west corner by an irrigation ditch. (the Meldrum lot was at 3rd east 7th north Provo) David Jr. was born Nov. 19, 1873, and remembers the tree planting. Maple trees were also planted by them about this time, they are still standing a monument to these hardy pioneers. Grandmother carried on with the help of her son Reese, and grandson Elmer whom she reared, to make that little place blossom as the rose. She always had a beautiful flower garden as well as her vegetables and fruits. She lived a full life enjoyed her children, garndchildren, and 2 great grandchildren also many friends and neighbours. She attributed her long life to working out of doors with her flowers. Grandmother passed away peacefully after a few days illness, Aug. 24, 1921, at the age of 91 years 4 months 17 days. She retained hr faculties and affection to the last, never once wavering in her faith and trust in the lord. She was a staunch and true latter day saint and instilled into the hearts of her wonderful heritage to all her decedents.

In this Family Search site - under the "Search" tab, you can search "books". Then in the "books" you can search "David Meldrum Sr. Family Histories" and you can read a beautiful 81 page history of: George Meldrum and his wife, Jane Barclay Meldrum Elizabeth Conrad Hooks Sarah Adams Bitely Conrad David Meldrum Sr. and his wife, Deseret Elizabeth Hooks Meldrum David Meldrum Jr. James Arthur Meldrum (who I am a descendant of) Bryan Barton Meldrum Nora Elizabeth Meldrum Heggie Edith Deseret Meldrum Simonsen William Parley Meldrum Thomas Wilford Meldrum Charles Alvin Meldrum

Sketch of the Life of Frank Davis Ashton Dictated to and written by his wife Norma Lewis Ashton in 1978 The summer I was born my parents were living in a large tent. They were building a new home, the one they lived in the rest of their lives. My mother wanted so much to get the house finished before I arrived. They didn’t make it. I was born in my grandmother Ashton’s front room on the 8th of July, 1909. I weighed twelve pounds and eleven ounces. The earliest thing I can remember is my mother taking me to my first day of school. We walked down the lane and she stopped to talk to Mrs. Jake Young. I can remember the day Clarence and Bert Goodman were up in the dike swimming. I had on my swim suit but I couldn’t swim. Dad came after me because he wanted to take me to town. I was up on the shallow end. He told me to come across in a certain place. I stepped in a hole and went under. Dad had to jump in with his good suit on and pull me out. When I was just a small boy my dad was harvesting the potatoes on Sunday. U was hanging around and decided to ride on the wagon wheel in spread eagle fashion. When dad started to go with the wagon my foot got caught between the wheel and the bolster as the wheel turned. It broke my ankle. Dad didn’t know I was doing it until I let out a bellow. He had to back the wagon to get my foot out. He started to carry me. I hollered to him to put me down so I could walk but I couldn’t. He didn’t work on Sunday for a long time after that. When I was about seven or eight years old I had Scarlet Fever. I almost died from it. I will never forget the day LaMar, Leah and I had our tonsils removed. Dr. Hughes did it on Uncle Bert’s kitchen table. When I heard Leah and LaMar hollering I tried to break the screen door and get away but Uncle Bert caught me. When I was about eight to twelve years old, my main job was to herd the cows. Elmer Slack and I would take our lunch and drive our cows up on the foothills where Oak Hills is now. We would stay all day and drive them home at night. Elmer would go bare foot and his feet were so tough he could walk all over the thistles. I used to take the cows up to the Thomas pasture where Marcrest is now. We had an old cow named Brownie. She would let me ride her all the way to the pasture and back. We had a really big celebration on the 24th of July at the old church on Canyon Road. I rode old Brownie in the parade. One day we tried to make old Brownie go down the cellar steps. We would get one on each side of her and hold our hands over her eyes so she couldn’t see. She would go anywhere but as soon as she got to the cellar steps she would stop and we couldn’t make her go down. One day mother and dad went away and told us not to pick any watermelons because they were not ripe yet. We tried them anyway. We plugged quite a few and could not find a ripe one. When we saw our parents coming we decided to feed the plugged melons to old Brownie. I was stuffing them down her throat trying to get rid of them. I couldn’t feel any teeth in her mouth. I guess I got my hand too far in for all of a sudden she bit my finger almost off. I still carry the scar. Once in a while we would go to Strawberry to fish. We went in the wagon with Uncle Chuck, Uncle Autte, and Uncle Bert and their families. We pitched our tent by the river. We didn’t have a boat but there were lots of fish. One fall I went with my dad to get a load of lumber out to Strawberry. On the way back when we were going down Daniels Canyon I got cold. Dad told me to get out and walk to get warm. A survey crew was working along the road and had placed a lot of stakes. As I walked along, I pulled all the stakes and put them in the wagon. After a while I crawled up on the wagon and said, “Look at all this good kindling I got.” Dad grabbed his coat and threw over them and said, “Good grief, there they are right down there hammering the stakes in the ground.” One day my friend, Jim Phillips, let me ride his horse to Primary. When we got there I was riding it around the churchyard and it suddenly occurred to me to see if the horse would climb the church steps. It walked up them all right but it wouldn’t back down them. I had to make the horse climb clear to the top of the steps so I could turn it around. When the horse stepped onto the wooden floor in the doorway, the floor sank down to the ground. It cost me ten dollars and I got plenty of tongue lashing. One winter Clarence made a sleigh. He called it the Yumpy. We had a lot of fun on the hills with it. We used to sleigh ride a lot down on the hill by Uncle Chucks. It had a north face and it stayed frozen and slick for a long time in the winter. Uncle Chuck had a bob-sled. We used to have sleigh riding parties and go to someone’s house for hot chocolate to get warm. Sometimes it was very cold and we would put a cover over the wagon-box to make it warmer. Then we would fill it up with straw and heat large rocks to keep us warm. We used to skate on the canal. Sometimes it would stay frozen over for a long time and we could ice skate in either direction for a long ways. My friend, Jim Phillips, had a cutter(one seated sleigh) that he pulled with his horse. When I was a teenager, I went sleighing with him real often. We used to go sliding around the country by tying barrel staves to our feet and then hang onto a rope which was attached to our horses saddle. We used to pull a string of sleds behind a horse to sleigh ride. One cold winter day, Jess and I went to the orchard up by Beesleys to get some honey from a beehive. The bees were not supposed to come out in the cold but they did. We grabbed our hats off to fight them away. After we got away from them, I put my hat on and it had a mess of bees in it. They stung me and my face swelled up and my eyes swelled shut. One day dad had just butchered a pig. That night he told me to go out and set a trap so it would catch any dogs that tried to get to the meat. While I was setting the trap, Leah got a sheet and draped it around her and came down the path toward me. Just as I went to set the trap down, I saw her coming with her arms flapping the sheet in the night. I threw the trap at her and tore for the house. It’s a good thing I wasn’t a good shot. When I was just learning to drive my dad’s Model T Ford, I was taking Lenora for a ride. Max Phillips was coming down the hill by Uncle Chucks with a load of apples as I passed by. I hollered, “Throw me an apple.” He threw one to me and it went into the back seat. I forgot I was driving a Ford and crawled in the back to get my apple. The Ford went up the guy wire on the light pole and tipped over. It didn’t hurt us. Dad and Chuck and the whole neighborhood had to come and help get it right side up again. I didn’t drive again for quite a while. The year I started to go to Lincoln High School, I started walking Norma home from church and I took her to a few dances. We always went with Clarence and Leah. Norma’s mother wouldn’t let her go with me alone. The next spring, about the end of March, Verlbrereton and I decided to run away, find some work, and see the world. We had one dollar and sixty cents between us. We hitch hiked to Ogden. It started to rain and we found a haystack to sleep in. We burrowed into the hay and got out of the rain for the night. In the morning we discovered we were in a stack of foxtail. During the night the foxtail had worked its way through our clothes, everywhere. We caught a ride to Logan and bought a roll and some pop. We were just about ready to go back home we were so miserable and hungry. We decided we wanted to get over the border so we could say we had been in Idaho. A man, Mister Shuldberg, came along in a Model T Ford and gave us a ride. He was a stake president and owned a very large ranch. He offered to give us a job. We took it. He took us to his home and gave us something to eat. He told us he thought we were never going to stop eating. He sent us to get a load of beet pulp. On the way back we decided to see if the horses were good pullers. We drove through a mud hole and got stuck. We had to unload the beet pulp and we piled it in the rocks. The team wouldn’t pull the wagon out when it was empty. A man came along with a little pinto team and pulled it out for us. Then we had to load the beet pulp again, rocks and all. When Mister Shuldberg saw the beet pulp he said he guessed the cows could sort out the rocks. Verl had to go to another part of his ranch and I stayed where I was. We lived in a tent. One day the mosquitos were so thick I couldn’t stand it. I went into the tent and got a flour sack and cut holes for my eyes and pulled it over my head. When I went out to my horses they were so frightened they ran away. After they ran down I went and got them. I came home in July. Mister Shuldberg had a daughter named, Elva, whom I got acquainted with a little bit. When I got home, dad had a contract to haul gravel for the state road. He let me go. I had to haul from the rock crusher up by Stan Robert’s home. Jim Long was working on the crusher. One day when I was loading my wagon Florence and Harold Colvin decided to play a joke on Jim. Florence dressed Harold all fancy in women’s clothes. Then he went up to the rock crusher and stood and waved up at Jimmy. He got so excited he got tearing down to see her, only to find it was Harold. I really had a good laugh. In 1927, the Pleasant View Chapel was started. I dumped the first wheel-barrow full of cement to begin construction. My dad and I hauled lots of gravel for the building from our gravel bed. We loaded it all with a hand shovel. When we unloaded it we just loosened the chain around the wagonbox and the planks came apart and the gravel hit the ground. We hauled lots of gravel for people to build cement foundations for home building, loading it all by hand shovel. I used to ride to High School with Leah. She taught school at Sharon Elementary. She had a Model T Ford. It had a leaking radiator and we put horse manure in it to seal the leak. One morning it was very cold and the radiator was boiling by the time we reached Lincoln High School. We pulled up to the service station and I got out to take the radiator cap off. The boiling water came out and covered the hood and windshield with manure. About March of my second year in school, I had been sluffing a little. One day I had my history lesson in good shape, a special report. Two of my friends decided to go to town. I decided they were not going without me. The next day Principle Karl Banks called me to his office. He told me to sit down. I sat there for a long time and he went about his business. After quite a while my dad walked in. The principle told him what had been going on. My dad said, “Well, if you don’t want to go to school to learn, you might as well come home and help me.” I said, “All right.” I walked away from school and I never went back again. I had enough credit to graduate from Seminary. In April, I left with the Yentz Horn family to go to Wyoming to work for Jimmy Mickelson. The Horns were our neighbors and used to live in the Hinkins house by the old packing shed where we lived years later. In Wyoming I learned to ride broncos and punch cows. During haying time, I was the horse wrangler. I had to get up very early in the morning and bring all the horses into the corral. There were about seventy five horses. All the hay hands had to catch their own horses. There was a loud bell that rang to signal meal times. After the noon meal, everyone caught fresh horses. It was five miles to the post office. One day Yentz and I rode a couple of young horses which were being broken to get the mail. On the way, mine threw me and I had to walk home. The horse followed the other horse home and Yentz made me get on and ride it again. During hay time we never worked on Sunday. They had a rodeo instead. While I was in Wyoming, I caught the mumps. I had to go into Big Piney to the hotel and stay there so the doctor could take care of me. I was very ill. It was while I was in bead at that hotel that I discovered that I was deaf in one ear. I was listening to the noise of a saw. When I turned over and put my ear in the pillow, I could not hear the saw at all. I do not know whether the mumps caused it or not. I returned home from Wyoming before Thanksgiving. I can’t remember the year the lower stadium was built, but dad and I worked on it with the team after I returned from Wyoming. After I was discovered I was deaf in one ear, the doctor thought it might be helped through surgery on my nose. Doctor Oaks operated and took some bone out of my nose. I did not know before the operation that I was a bleeder. I had a hemorrhage and had to be hospitalized and have my head packed. I was unconscious and delirious for several days. I finally made it home again. My doctor went on vacation and left me in charge of another. He came out to our home to remove the packs at the proper time. A day or two later I began to get a very bad headache. It got worse and worse. I started to run a temperature. The pain became so intense I was screaming. The doctor came again. When he examined me, he discovered he had left one pack in my head and it had started an infection. Eventually, I recovered but the surgery did not help restore the hearing in my deaf ear. In the spring of 1928, I went to work for Norma’s dad. I soon bought me a used Model T Ford. One day, Harold and Elton Mecham came up South Fork to see me. We decided to go to town. Elton had a Ford, also. I was supposed to take a court a cream down to Norma’s mother. Harold rode with me so he could hold the bottle of cream. Just as we turned the corner by the power plant coming down the canyon, my lights went out. Harold said, “Hurry and catch up with Elton and we can follow him down to home.” I stepped on the gas trying to get close to Elton. Just as I got to the bottom of the hill, Elton disappeared over the top and everything went black. The next thing I knew I was sailing through the air over the bar-pit and landing in a squawberry bush. Harold was still holding the quart of cream in his hands. Dad had to come up with the team and pull me out. I worked for Norma’s dad for four summers from May until October. In the winter I had a day or two on the ditch once in a while. I helped dad haul gravel and once in a while we would get a basement to dig. Norma and I were making wedding plans in the winter of 1932. I went to the desert early that spring to help bring in the sheep. I was moving camp for James Long and Bob Lloyd. A very bad storm came up. It was really cold and miserable. We were so miserable that Bob Lloyd said, “When I tell my grandkids about this, if they don’t bawl I’ll beat the heck out of them.” The sheep had to be moved everyday so there would be something for them to eat and because they had to move in to the shearing corral at Jericho on a schedule. I had to move the camp in the slick, thick desert mud. I slid off the road and got stuck. I was just a little way past Fish Springs. I tried to get the truck out and burned out the clutch. Bob, Jim, and the sheep had gone on ahead of me. They were without food, bedding, or shelter. I decided to walk five miles to a ranch and try to borrow a horse so I could catch up with them. I was able to get a horse. When I got back to my camp, there was another sheep outfit close by. The boss came along and said they would stop across the flat for the night and I could catch him there and they would take me into Salt Lake. I made some biscuits, put some canned goods in a pack, and took off to find Bob and Jim and tell them what had happened. I left the food and a couple of quilts with them and returned the horse to the ranch. I started across the flat at daylight to catch the outfit that had promised me a ride into Salt Lake. I walked until noon and I did not catch them nor see any signs of them. I decided I would have to go back to camp. On the way back, my side started to hurt. It was very hard walking in the slick, sticky desert mud. I reached camp about dark. In the morning I knew I had to get help. I walked the five miles back to the ranch where I had borrowed the horse. I told them I thought I had appendicitis. They thought I was only making an excuse to get into Salt Lake City. They said they were going in day after tomorrow. I went back the five miles to camp and got into bed and stayed there two days and three nights without moving. When the people came I was not able to move. They had to dress me and carry me to their car. My side hurt very badly as the car hit the hills and hollows of the rough road. Once we got stuck and I had to get out and help push the car out of the mud. As I was straining to push the car, I felt the pain go and I was relieved. I assumed that was when my appendix ruptured. When we reached Salt Lake City, they put me on the Interurban(the electric car that ran from Salt Lake to Provo). When I reached Provo, after dark, I got off the car and walked across the street to Smith’s Pool Hall. I was bent over and could not straighten up. Norma’s father was in the pool hall. He looked at me and said, “What are you doing here?” I told him the story. He took me home. He insisted on calling Doctor Hasler. The next morning they took me to the Aird Hospital. Norma came to see me for a few minutes before surgery. Doctor Brown just made an incision and put a tube in my side to drain the infection. He told the nurse to put Turpentine packs on my side. She left them on too long and blistered a large area of my side. I credit the packs for saving my life, even if they did burn me. They seemed to gather the infection and it drained out the tube. I stayed in the hospital for three weeks. When I went home, I had to stay in bed for three more weeks. When I got up I had to walk with a cane. When I went to the desert that spring, I weighed one hundred and eighty pounds. The first time I weighed after I was ill, I weighed ninety pounds. In June the new Pleasant View Chapel was dedicated. Norma came over to visit with me after the dedication. During the afternoon Doctor Hasler came by to dress my side. When he took the dressing off there were two stones about the size of an olive pit that had sluffed out through the drain tube. At that time, a ruptured appendix was almost always fatal. My dad said, “It’s a miracle that you survived and you had better find out why.” A few months ago we were talking about my experience at family home evening. Clarence said, “Just look at his family and you know why he lived.” It took me many months to get well and back to normal. A year later I went to work in the spring for Bill Ercanbrack. Norma’s father had lost his outfit. There wasn’t any other place to work. I hadn’t worked for a long time. I wanted to get married so I went back to herding sheep. I saved all my money through the summer and on December 21, 1933, Norma and I were married in the Salt Lake Temple.