The following is the beginning of a history written my Mrs. Lillian Alcorn Rowley. It too will be published in installments.
HISTORY OF LILLIAN ALCORN ROWLEY
I was the oldest child of Clark Alcorn and Harriet Ann Weaver, born on the 7th of January 1904. I was born in Brigham City, Box Elder County, Utah. I had blue eyes and medium dark hair and I weighed about four pounds.
If I remember right Dad said they lived in the 4th Ward in Brigham City, Box Elder Stake. I was blessed on the 31 of January 1904, Perry Ward, Box Elder Stake, by James Sheldon Nelson Sr. (who later became the bishop of Thatcher Ward, Bear River Stake.)
In July, 1905 my parents moved into the third ward in Brigham City and on the 23 of October, 1905 my brother Leonard Clark Alcorn was born. He had large brown eyes and dark hair.
In the fall of 1905, I believe it was, papa and mama moved at Garland, Utah where papa worked at the Utah-Idaho Sugar Factory. We lived in a tent. That winter we moved to Thatcher, Utah and lived in one room of my Aunt Fannie and Uncle Sheldon Nelson’s home. Aunt Fannie was my mother’s older sister. Not too long after moving there. I had diphtheria. One of my cousins, Myron Nelson, died with the dread disease,
While I was recovering from this illness I guess I was quite cross and it seems that my brother Leonard wasn’t feeling too well either, anyway mama was rocking him. I somehow got my big toe on my right foot under the rocking chair, and my toe was crushed. To this day I have a real thick toe nail, it really looks like a rock. Until my youngest son, Grant, was about 12 years old he thought it was a rock. He hardly knows what a rocking chair is and my saying mother rocked on my toe, he thought somehow a rock had replaced my toenail.
It seems that I was quite a proud little girl and when I was all dressed up to go somewhere I would always smooth my dress out, and papa said I would try to look at myself to see if my dress looked all right and if my hair was combed.
On the 1 of March 1907, my brother William Vernon was born. We still lived in the one room at Aunt Fannie’s place in Thatcher. I don’t remember him although I had just passed my 3rd birthday. On the 10th of May 1907 mama and papa were going into Brigham City. Dad was going with a load of grain and he was going in with a load of grain and he was going in a big wagon. Bishop Nelson was going in a white topped buggy. Mama was riding with the Bishop. The wind was blowing hard, and baby Vernon was fussing and crying Bishop Nelson asked mama if she could not quite the baby. Mama was always sensitive about her babies disturbing anyone, so she held him tightly to her breast. Then they arrived in Brigham City, baby Vernon appeared lifeless, and limp. They took him to a doctor and he was dead. They told mother that it had been heart failure to spare her any further heartache, but actually he had smothered.
One Christmas when I was about five or six years old, seven or eight little girls my own age were dressed in long white dresses. We had our dolls and we laid them in a cradle made out of cardboard. We knelt beside the cradle and sang, “Away in a Manger,” at the Christmas program.
I had been taught to always be truthful and never tell a fib. The fall of 1909, Mother started me to school, which was about a mile from our home. I would not have been six until January of 1910. But mother told me to tell the teacher, if she asked, that I was six. When the teacher did ask, I told her, “I am five but Mama told me to tell you I was six.” I went to school for about two days and that was it, until the next year.
We lived on the Booth place in Thatcher, Utah. The schoolhouse was a two roomed building. One room was the Chapel and the other one was for school. I think they danced in the school room, too. It stood where the Thatcher-Penrose Ward Chapel now stands.
I always looked forward to the times when we used to go into Brigham City and Perry where our grandparents lived. Dad had a very spirited little team of horses, Dick and Bess, he called them. We had a one-seated buggy without a top, but with a real large umbrella fastened to the back of the seat. Mother would dress us up in our Sunday best, and off we would go. Usually by the time we got to our grandparent’s home, we were dusty and dirty, and look as if we hadn’t been cleaned up at all.
Leonard and I would sit on the top of the seat with our feet on the seat. Mother would hold the baby and maybe a small child would sit in the seat between mother and dad, and on our feet, too.
Dad was always singing. The horses were really a snappy little team and fast trotters, too. Some of the songs Dad would sing were: “Loy My Little Shoes Away,” “My Old Kentucky Hills,” “ My Mother’s Dear Hands,” and many others.
It was about twenty-five miles into Perry. We lived west and north of Brigham City.
We were quite active in the activities of the Church, and as we were growing up, my brother Leonard and I went quite a few places together. During the summer months we used to walk to and from the 83 Church doings. I remember well this one particular time. Leonard wasn’t with me, however, and it was at night. Several girlfriends and myself were walking home about 10:00 pm. We all walked in the same direction up to a point when we separated and went on alone. Well while we were together we told ghost stories and all sorts of frightening things. When we parted I was determined that I wouldn’t run, I wasn’t going to become frightened. I had to pass a cemetery on my way home, and about the time I was walking past, I noticed a rustling sound. I slowed down to listen and the rustling slowed down. I speeded up, not running however, and the rustling speeded up. I didn’t dare look back and I was determined not to run. Just about the time I arrived home, I discovered that the “rustling” was just my full, heavily starched slip.
Mother used to buy most of my clothes and shoes. Once she saw these very cute shoes that were on sale. She had bought them and brought them home for me. I really liked them, but they were too short. But my mother had got them on sale and she insisted I wear them. So I suffered through it. This she did several times, and as a partial result my feet are very squat and wide.
I remember one time I had worked and earned some money for myself. I gave the folks some and then went to town and bought a beautiful brown satin dress. It was teared, I believe it had two tears. I had had my eye on it for a long time, and when I took it home, my mother didn’t like it and almost made me take it back. One time I bought a hat, and brought it home, this time much to my surprise, my mother liked it very much. Mother was hard to please and that is why she bought most of my clothes.
I graduated from the eighth grade in school, and that was ll I was allowed to go. My father was from the school of thought that girls didn’t any more education than that.
When I was about 15, it was discovered that my mother had cancer of the breast. She was operated on and had one breast removed, the right one. She suffered with cancer for three years and in May of 1922 she passed away. I was with her at the time and was holding her hand. I was just 18.
Loony Lunts and Company 