Earl & Eliza Halls
(Eliza) Summer over. Earl resigned and he traded the tractor for an old truck. He took the dog to Monticello and gave him to Perdencio. We loaded in the beds, bedding, the sewing machine, dishes, camp dishes and food and headed north, out of the ranch, past the water spring where we hauled our water, and up the long steep hill. On top we stopped. The motor was hot so we all got out to stretch our legs. I looked ahead all the way down that narrow road to the bottom of the canyon and said I was going to walk. I took Don and all the boys. We were glad by now to stretch our legs and I wasn’t about to ride down that road in that old truck, although it made it. I didn’t trust it too much. It got to the bottom all right with no trouble, better down than up. We all climbed in and headed across the desert. It was dry and sandy. We went past the big rock that was called Church Rock because it looked like a church from a distance, standing there all alone. All went well until we came to a dry creek bed. When it storms in that country it pours down and dry creeks run full. Banks on the far side were almost straight up and there we stopped. There was no pressure in back to push the front up, so, there we sat. Earl began to dig us out when a brand new shiny truck came along and offered to pull us out. They had no trouble crossing. They hooked onto the front somehow and got the truck out, but something got bent on our truck. We still couldn’t go. They sent a repairman out from Price to pick us up. He took Don and me to his home. His wife was cooking a large pan of apple and raisin jam so she stirred while we visited. After living in what I had been for the last ten years, not that it had bothered me, her house looked like heaven. It was so clean and pretty. Well, we got on our way and made it to Soldier’s Summit and a colder place I have never been. We tried to find a place to stay, but there was none, so we drove out of town where there was some wood to burn. We got something to eat, made up the beds, and crawled in for the night. We had breakfast and were on our way. We left the coldest place I have ever been in.
(Glenn) When we left the ranch Dad loaded everything we had on the truck. I do not recall if the truck had a windshield or not. I know it did not have a top. Dad and Mother sat in the seat over the gas tank and piled all of us kids on top of the load. I recall the ravine that Mother mentions that we got stuck in. Somebody came along and pulled us out by wrapping a chain around the front axle which is not the thing to do on a Model-T. It put about a four- to six-inch kink in the axle. As I recall, we spent a couple of days camped on the bank of that wash waiting for a new one to be brought from Price. This was quite expensive for Dad because he had to buy a new axle and pay a day’s wages to the man who brought the axle to us. I do not recall any more of the trip except the smell of the newly-mowed hay as we traveled through some of the towns on the way to Huntsville.
(Eliza) On our way, I tried to get Earl to stop at Spanish Fork and see if he could get a job there in the railroad shop, but no, he was headed for Huntsville where I did not want to go. There was no work there.
We arrived in Eden where Ruth and Henry Grow were running a ranch. She welcomed us in and took care of us until we could find a place to live. The only place available was the old Sprague home with two big rooms in front and one small one in back and an enclosed porch.
Lyle’s memories begin at this point.
(Lyle) I remember the porch at the Sprague home. Although it was built to be enclosed, it was not enclosed, as a fire had burned a three-foot hole in the wall at floor level. This we used for the disposal of water from the wash pan, dish pan, and washing machine. It also let in the house flies in the fall. The ceiling would be black with flies, so Mother would take a piece of paper, roll it up, and set the end on fire, then using it as a torch she would walk back and forth burning the flies. Usually it would only burn their wings, causing them to fall to the floor where she would sweep them up and put them in the kitchen stove.
(Glenn) 1925. In Huntsville I remember the Sprague house. It was of brick with
large cracks between the boards on the floors. In the east wall there was a big crack in the bricks that you could see through to the outside. The porch to the north was partly enclosed, but had a big hole burned in part of the floor and wall. This had occurred when children were playing with matches, but they got the fire out before it burned the house down. I recall the swamp down back of the house where the spring was and it was indeed good water. We had a little shed back against the fence that was between us and the neighbors. This is where we kept a cow. The cow was in my charge, feeding, milking and pasture.
(Eliza) The place also had a small barn where we kept a cow. The neighbor’s goat got in one fall and walked all over the hay. After that, the cow wouldn’t eat it. There was a spring down below the hill where we got our water. According to today’s rules, it wouldn’t be clean, but it was the best water ever. We settled in, with help from Nina, Earl’s sister, and with some of her mother’s things, as she and her husband, Verlan Braithwaite, had moved in with her father. She even sent up the electric washer, which I objected to, but she insisted. Earl had given it to his mother.
(Earl) After arriving in Huntsville, about the first thing we did was put up a good supply of fruits and vegetables. I bought a cow from Father and that helped some. That fall I worked on a hay baler, wiring, weighing, and stacking twenty tons of hay a day. I received about $3.50 a day. That winter I worked in the blacksmith shop for $3.00 a day. I caulked horse shoes, shod horses, and did odd jobs, and the blacksmith beat me out of $35.00 on that deal.
(Eliza) Earl picked up a job here and there, and Gene was born May 19, 1925. Earl’s once-was neighbor, who worked in the railroad shops in Green River, Wyoming got him a job there as blacksmith, so he took off and we were alone again.
(Glenn) One Sunday I decided to go visit Otto Grow over in Eden and I walked. About midway, at the bottom of Eden Hill, some people who were going to Sunday school in a Model-T truck stopped and gave me a ride. My Grandmother Winter had told me a lot of kidnap stories. These stories were going through my mind, and being bashful, I did not tell these people where I wanted to get off. When we were getting near the lane that went into Otto’s place I hung over the back and put my foot on the road to determine if I could run as fast as the truck was going. I felt that I could, so when I reached the lane, I jumped off. Well, needless to say, I couldn’t run that fast and I rolled about ten or fifteen feet on that shale. Fortunately I had on one of those duck bill hats that came over my nose and saved my nose, but I ended up with big cuts under my nose, on my shoulders, on my hands, on my knees, and I don’t know where else. Apparently it stunned me because I didn’t realize that I was hurt as I got up and started walking in. Of course these people stopped, came back and picked me up and hauled me in. They wondered why I hadn’t told them where I wanted to get off. Aunt Ruth wondered the same thing and she probably gave me a Scotch blessing, but I don’t remember it. She put me to bed upstairs and then I started to hurt. Somehow they got me home. I guess they had a car. I was about two weeks recovering. One day the folks went somewhere and left me alone and I recall that I desired to have company. I requested that our neighbor’s daughter come stay with me. Apparently I was a little sweet on her, but the request was not granted or was denied by her; I don’t know which.
(Earl) During the summer of 1925 I worked on fish ponds for the state Fish and Game in Huntsville, and later worked in another blacksmith shop. In September, Roger Peterson, son of an old neighbor came in from Green River, Wyoming, where he was working on the Union Pacific Railroad. He wanted me to go back with him, which I did. I worked in the roundhouse as a machinist helper. That was one hell-of-a-job. My hours were from 3:30 p.m. until midnight. I roomed at a flophouse and ate at a Chinese restaurant. I worked seven days a week for six months and never missed a shift. I wouldn’t have missed then if Lorin, four years old, hadn’t been operated on for appendicitis. His appendix broke and he came nearly dying. I was called home to Huntsville for about a week.
(Eliza) Lorin came down with appendicitis and had to be operated on. He was four years old and he cried all night with pain in his side. We had no phone, so I called the doctor from the neighbor’s the next morning. He came that night and said he couldn’t understand it, there was no pain. I told him he had cried all night with pain. I had told him that in the first place. He was a good doctor, but a drug addict, so he probably hadn’t taken everything in. Anyway he called a doctor from Ogden who came immediately, and they took him straight to the hospital. Nina took the little kids and a neighbor girl took over the rest, and Verlan took me to the hospital. The appendix broke as soon as the pressure was off by cutting the skin and pus ran out. They called me in to see. The doctors cleaned it up, put in a drainage tube and that was it. He was in bed for some time.
This brings to a close Eliza’s writings about her life. Although she was encouraged to write more, she never did. The writings of Earl, Glenn, Lyle, and Joy however, complete the story.
(Earl) Not long after going back to Green River, a blacksmith job became vacant in the maintenance shop, and I took that. That job paid $6.80 a day which was two dollars more than the roundhouse job. My helper and I batched in a shack in the middle of the railroad yards until they moved the shop to Evanston.
Earl was working in Green River, Wyoming on May 1, 1926 on the date of the thirteenth anniversary of their marriage. He wrote this poem that he sent home to Eliza:
TO MY DEAR WIFE
It’s thirteen years ago today
Since I married my dear wife.
I’ve not been sorry for a minute
That I took her in my life.
When I bow my head in sorrow,
She will meet me with a smile,
Tell me no trouble to borrow
And show me things worthwhile.
She has brought to me six children
Husky boys I love most dear,
And she’s always home and waiting
For the man she loves most dear.
So here’s to wife and babies
On this anniversary night.
May the God above watch o’er you
And keep you in the right.
(Glenn) Dad went to work for the railroad in Green River, Wyoming, while we were at the Sprague house. One weekend when he was home, I wanted to buy a bicycle from one of the neighbor kids for five dollars, so I asked Dad for the money. Apparently I pestered him considerably because he whopped me, so I went into the bedroom and cried. I simulated a cry for two or three hours till finally he gave me the five dollars. That bicycle became one of the best bicycles in town as I began to build it up. It started out as two wheels and a frame. Later on it almost became my waterloo. Otto and I were bicycling to Ogden, and going down a steep part of Ogden Canyon. The road was narrow, and there was a wall separating the road from the river, and on the other side of the wall was a bunch of rocks. Normally we would be going down this hill as fast as we could go, but for some reason we stopped to look at the river or something. When I got on my bicycle the forks separated and dumped me in the road. Had that happened while riding fast, I would have gone over that wall and that would have been my finish. Otto was a pretty smart kid. We just parked my bicycle over the wall so someone wouldn’t steal it and he loaned me his. Then he hitched a ride back home and I had to ride his bicycle back up that canyon.
On one of Dad’s trips to Green River I went with him. We rode the train. Apparently it was at night as we had a bunk to sleep in. I didn’t sleep a wink that night as I was worrying about the train wrecking and killing all of us. My Grandma Winter had told me a lot of horrid stories. While in Green River, Dad lived in a little shack in the middle of the railroad yards. I stayed there and while he worked, I played around in the area.
While living at the Sprague house, I had my first job working for someone and I got paid with one great big round silver dollar. It was the biggest dollar that I had ever seen and I had big plans for it. Dad, in his wisdom, told me to go up to the store and buy myself a pair of overalls, which I did. They cost me ninety-five cents, and I think I spent the other five cents for a candy bar.