Interview with James Bundy

James Bundy was interviewed on August 24, 1968 in St. George, Washington County, Utah by Fielding H. Harris, a representative of Voices of Remembrance Foundation. He related his personal history of living in various parts of Nebraska, Utah and Mexico. His wife, Chloe Geneva (Van Leuven) Bundy, also participated.

FH:Would you please [give] your full name?

JB:[My name is] James Bundy.

FH:Do you have a middle name?

JB:No.

FH:What is your birth date?

JB:[I was born] October 13, 1887.

FH:Where were you born?

JB:[I was born in] Wallace, Lincoln Town [County] Nebraska.

FH:What was your father's name?

JB:[His name was] Abraham Bundy.

FH:[What] was your mother's [full] name?

JB:[Her name was] Ella (Anderson) [Bundy].

FH:[What] can you remember about your early childhood?

JB:I remember going [with] my dad out on the prairie [to] gather buffalo chips. The buffalo wallows would [become] ponds that caught water. There was a little striped gopher, not a prairie dog, that we used to go out and drown. [We would] pour water down the hole and drown him out. Roy [Bundy], my older brother, would sit by the hole this way and when the gopher would come out [Roy] would catch 00:02:00him around the neck.

There was no timber in that country [area], just a few willows and brush that grew around the bottom [land]. [One time when] we were going out to drown gophers, I fell down and cut my toe. There was a domestic cat that had gone wild and he jumped on me and scratched my head. Years after [when] I was a grown man, the barber would ask me what caused that scar on my head. It was done by this cat. Roy came back with [a] pail that I [had been] carrying water in and hit the old cat over the back and drove him off. I remember sometime after that, the cat used to come around the corral where dad was milking and he killed him. He hit 00:03:00him with a club or a brick because we had no rocks in that country [area]. The largest rock I saw coming out west was about the size of my thumb. It came out of the Platte River [Nebraska] when dad went down there to get sand to build a brick house.

We lived in what was called a sod house. It was where the prairie grass grows. It holds [the] dirt. You [can] take a plow and go down through there and throw it over and it chunks off about every twelve to sixteen inches. That formed adobe [bricks] that made the walls of the sod houses. Afterwards, we built [a] brick building. We had a windmill that pumped water for the horses and cattle. We did not have many cows that I remember. We had a trough about six feet in 00:04:00diameter and a couple of feet deep. That was where our mother was baptized.

FH:Is that right?

JB:Dad was not baptized until we came out here to Morgan [Morgan County] Utah.

I am satisfied he was converted, but he was quite a hand to read. He put it off and was not baptized until he [came] out to Utah.

FH:You said he came to Morgan?

JB:We came down through Wyoming. I remember when we [came] into Wyoming there was a little stream of water that [ran] down through the prairie. There were no trees on this stream and there were fish in there. We stopped a distance from 00:05:00the stream and went over there to fish. [The] fish we caught out of that stream [were] the best fish I have ever eaten.

FH:They tasted good to you at that time.

JB:I had to go barefoot and dad promised me a pair of shoes. When we [arrived in] Laramie [Wyoming], we did not go to Cheyenne; he [purchased] me a pair of shoes. As we started home, we had three colts that were draft horses. We [were] 00:06:00out there somewhere in Wyoming and the Indians wanted to trade dad some ponies for these colts, figuring they would rustle better. About two or three days after he made the trade, the ponies came up missing. I figure it was a scheme to trade for these colts and they would come and drive the ponies back. He could not go after them and would not have found them if he had. We always figured that was a scheme to get the colts.

There were a few antelope on the prairie when we came across Wyoming. We traveled with a man named Jim Smith. I [am] ahead of my story, because dad started out [from Nebraska] alone.

When he [was] out about 200 miles, he [came] out that way as early as he did, 00:07:00because the neighbors around there threatened dad and the elders. Dad borrowed a gun and he promised the elders that nobody would bother them while they were at his place. The elders told him that it was better for him if the mob came and killed them than for him to kill any of the mob. He then moved out a couple hundred miles from home and we met a man by the name of Jim Smith. He had been 00:08:00out here. He told dad he was about three weeks too early and that the feed had not started good, but if he waited [the] length of time [that] he was coming then and we could come together.

I [have] heard dad say that if it had not been for that man he never could have found his way or the water holes because there was a lot of country where the water was not plentiful. Dad figured if we watered the stock in the evening we could drive a few miles from that water and find better feed. Anyone [who] knows anything about stock knows that is right. That is what we [did.] The next 00:09:00morning before we [were] ready to go, this Smith took off early. That was the last we ever [saw] of him, but we managed to get on across.

I remember one night we camped [and] one of the animals had cork shoes on. They had a halter on this mare that tried to scratch her jaw with this cork shoe and caught her foot in the halter. That threw her and she rolled down into the bottom of this draw where [there was a] little stream of water and mud. She fell in and drowned. I can see in my mind's eye, the grass smashed down where she rolled.

We came out [to] where dad was baptized. [At] the place where we stopped, he made a little pool and there were some trout in there. Roy got a pin, tied a string on it and caught one of [the] trout. A nice big one! He pulled it out of the water [and] had to let it go back in again. I was never much of a fisherman. I fished some after [we went] to Old Mexico. We lived on the Bavispe River. It would go dry in the summer time except in the low places that were dug out during the floodwaters. The river would never really run dry, but the water 00:11:00would get so low that it would go through the higher places and pond again in another place. We used to go in there and catch catfish with a pitchfork [that were] two and a half [or] three feet long. I have done some fishing [also] with a hook and line, but I never was much of a fisherman.

FH:You had some [education]. Where did you go to school?

JB:Yes, [I started school] after we came to Bunkerville [Nevada]. We came through Richfield, Utah [Sevier County] because George Beal lived there and he was one of the elders. Then we came on down to St. George and stopped at Charles 00:12:00Seegmiller's place for a few days while the team rested. Then we went on down to Bunkerville. That was where Stephen [A.] Bunker lived. He was the other elder [who] converted my folks.

We only stayed there a short time and then moved to Beaver Dam, Arizona. It was about sixteen miles up the Virgin River from Bunkerville. Dad bought a place. I 00:13:00do not know who he [bought] it from, but it was not much of a place when we got in there. He planted an orchard and a vineyard.

The water went in there low in the spring and summertime. I remember we put a little dam across the wash for the water coming down the Beaver Dam Wash and dug out a hole where it fell over the bank. We built a dam across and held the water up and had a ditch go down where we lived [to] the orchard and vineyard. When it [was] too low, it would not raise up high enough to [flow] out of the ditch. Brother [Hans Peter] Iverson, that is Lillie [Belle Bundy] husband's [Peter Martin Iverson] father, had a place across the road. They used to go up there and stand [in] this pond and dip water up with a bucket into the ditch to get it 00:14:00down to water the fruit trees. He only stayed there about six or seven years and then he sold the place to Jim McKnight. He [had] a team and wagon. One team of horses we brought from Nebraska [and] still had [them] here on Beaver Dam. He had accumulated enough [equipment] in those seven years [that] he needed another outfit. He traded this place and got another span of horses and another wagon.

He went out to Delamar [Nevada] to earn money to buy this wagon. The old wagon he came out from Nebraska [in] had a narrow gauge. That would not do very well going over rough country. The wheels did not fit in the tracks. He went out there to haul wood. There [were] other wood haulers there and they wanted dad to drink with them. He told them, "No." He did not want any of their whiskey, but they were going to force him to drink. He got his axe and told them that he would chop the first man [who] put his hands on him to force him to drink that 00:16:00liquor. I was about nine or ten years old, I guess.

Afterwards, I went back out there with dad with a load of fruit. While we were camped, a fellow came down from the mining camp. He said had been [bitten] by a rattlesnake. He wanted dad to give him some money to buy some whiskey to kill the rattlesnake poison. I believed the [fellow] and could not see why dad did not give him some money, but he did not! [Laughter] He knew better than I did, 00:17:00that the man just wanted the money to buy whiskey.

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JB:[The] geese use to come and land in the cornfield [and] dad shot some [of them].

FH:Was this back in Nebraska?

JB:Yes, back in Nebraska. He shot into a bunch of geese. I do not remember how many he killed. Lillie [Belle] and Roy were older than I was and they went out there and got one of the wounded geese. [They were] holding it under their arms [and] brought it back to the house. I reached out to pet the goose and it pecked me on the lip. [Laughter] That was about the time the tub fell on my hand.

FH:Tell about that washtub.

JB:[Inaudible] After I [was] older, mother told me [there] was a scar caused from this tub falling off and forcing a nail through my hand. It formed a scar that looked like a potato eye. It was there for years.

FH:[Did it] go clear through your hand?

JB:I do not know if it went clear through, but it caused the scar. I have not 00:19:00recorded about the cat yet, have I?

FH:Yes, it is recorded. [Did] you [go] to school in Bunkerville?

JB:No. We were only in Bunkerville a couple of months while dad looked around to find a place where he could locate [permanently].

FH:Then you [moved] over to Beaver Dam. [Is that] where you [started] school?

JB:The first I remember is what they told me [about] going up and over the snow to school in Nebraska. The snow was so deep [that] I could walk over the fence.

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JB:I started school over at Beaver Dam. It must have been just before I was eight years old when I went on down to Bunkerville because Roy and Lillie [Belle] were baptized down there. I was not old enough to be baptized yet. We moved back up [to] Beaver Dam. I went [to school there] until I was only thirteen [years old], I thought. But, according to the [family] record, I was fourteen [years old] before I was baptized. No, I was not fourteen [years old]. Yes, I was baptized at Beaver Dam.

We moved to Mexico [in 1901]. We started down in April with one of the same 00:21:00teams we brought out of Nebraska, along with the one he traded for.

FH:Why did you go to Mexico?

JB:Why?A lot of people teased dad about going down there to get a second wife, but whether he did or not, he did not get [one]. [Laughter] I heard him say, the Beaver Dam over here was too small a place for the [large] family he had. If they lived there and married, [his children] would have to go somewhere else to build a home. That was one reason why he went to Mexico.

FH:Was [it] a good country [when] you went to Mexico?

JB:It was, [but] it was like a lot of other countries: short on water. As I told you before, it was short on water [and] the river ran dry. It did not completely run dry; there was not enough water to go over the ripples. The water would go through the gravel. We could not [grow] alfalfa, but we could [grow] grain by planting in the fall of the year when there was water. We would harvest the grain, plow up the stubble and plant corn, melons and maize. On that same ground we planted spuds [potatoes] in the spring of the year. [We would] dig the spuds, plant them again and raise another crop. That was the kind of country we were [living] in.

FH:You had a long growing season.

JB:It never snowed. Once in awhile a few flakes would fall, but they would melt when they hit the ground. I never lived in snow country until we moved out on 00:23:00the [Arizona] Strip. The children there made skis and bobsleds and would slide down the hills in the snow. I never [had] that pleasure because I had other things to do besides going snow or sled riding. [Laughter]

When we went to Mexico, we stopped at Naco, Arizona. Dad had a job freighting there to raise a little money to go on to the colony. He drove one team and I 00:24:00drove the other [team]. We hauled supplies out to Cananea [north in Sonora, Mexico below the border]. It is about fifty miles from Douglas [Arizona], I mean Naco. [In the early 1900s, Naco was in Cochise County, Arizona on the border.]

FH:Were you about fourteen [years old]?

JB:I was not yet fourteen [years old]. I saw twenty mules hooked onto one wagon; they used big, old wagons. I do not know why they were built [like they were]. I would say the rear wheels were six feet in diameter. They would hook up as many as ten mules; that were what they usually put on those wagons. When one of them 00:25:00got stuck, they would bring back another team of ten mules to pull them out of the mud. They were Mexicans mostly [who] drove those outfits.

.

FH:What were they hauling?

JB: They were hauling supplies out to the mining camp and hauling ore back to the smelter. They did not have a smelter. I do not know what they [did] with the ore when they got it to Naco [which was] twenty miles further east. Naco and Douglas were on the [Arizona -- Mexico] border. The ore [from] Bisbee, Arizona was hauled to the smelter, but [the] ore brought out of Cananea, Mexico was 00:26:00before that smelter was built. [It] was likely shipped up to Globe [Arizona] or Tombstone [Arizona] or wherever they had a smelter.

After we had been there from April to October, dad [came down with] typhoid fever and he could not go [on so] Roy and Lillie [Belle] went with me with [the] other outfit. I always drove one outfit. I think we only made one trip and then Roy [came down with] typhoid fever. I can remember sleeping on a little cot with 00:27:00Roy. When he was delirious he would sit up in bed and pound on me trying to drive horses. [Omer] "Dick" [Bundy], my younger brother, Lillie [Belle], Roy and dad [had] typhoid fever, but I never [did]. After they [were able to] travel, we started for the colony. We [arrived] down [at] Colony [Morelos] on

October 13, [1901] the day I was fourteen years old. My brother, Chester [Marion "Chet"], was born that night.

FH:On your birthday.

JB:Fourteen years afterwards and we [were] on the road. Mother was on the road in that wagon until we got to that colony and he was born that night. My wife's folks [Newman and Mariah Elizabeth (Durfee) Van Leuven] were the first place we [came] to as we [came] into the mesquite [bushes]. The country [area] was covered with mesquite [bushes]. They lived in what [was] called a jacal [mud and wattle construction] made out of posts. [They would] stand posts on end and placed creosote ─ no. What do they call wild cane? [Tules.] It is a bamboo 00:29:00cane they put over the rafters and throw dirt over the top of that to build a home.

We had a tent when we [arrived] in the colony. It was on a Sunday afternoon and after church they pitched [a] tent. They all [came] to help and my wife's sister [Maria Delila Van Leuven] came down to wait on mother and do the housework. [There was] a midwife by the name of Lillywhite.

I do not know if your wife told [inaudible]. Roy had just begun to get to where he could walk well [after] the typhoid fever. He had to learn to walk again.

FH:She did not mention that.

JB:He went down to [a] house to buy a little molasses. Two girls were joshing one another about this young man coming into town. I was just a [youngster], but girls are a lot older than boys [when they are] about that age. After [a few] years, she fell for me instead of [my] older brother. He came back up here [because] he had a girlfriend up here at Beaver Dam. He married one of the Iverson girls and I married the Van Leuven girl [Chloe Geneva]. Her sister married an Alldredge and went into polygamy.

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JB:They teased [my] dad about going to Mexico to get a polygamous wife, but he never got [one]. Did she tell you about her chances of marrying into polygamy?

FH:Yes. I think she was saved for you.

JB:I imagine [so]. I went to school down [in Mexico] because it was a habit more than to get an education. In the summertime, I would go to Bisbee [Arizona] and 00:32:00work. I started working as a tool nipper first and afterwards I got a job mucking. I [was paid] $75.00 a month for nipping tools, but as a mucker I [was paid] $l05.00 a month. Later on, when copper [prices] came up, they raised the wages to $4.00. When we [worked] as a ringer, we [were [paid] $120.00 [for thirty days]. They [gave] us a check and we would go to the bank and cash it. Out of the thirty-day [check] they would hold out $1.00 for hospital fees. When we cashed our check they would give us five $20.00 gold pieces, one $10.00, one 00:33:00$5.00 and $4.00 in silver. That was real money in those days!

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FH:That was [fairly] good wages for those days.

JB:It was.

FH:That is more than what it sounds like it to us now.

JB:Yes. I would go back to Mexico and work in the summer and go out to the colony and go to school [just] to be home and among the school [youngsters] more than for an education. I am sorry to say [that]. One of these dollars would buy me four dance tickets! [Laughter]

FH:It sounds like you liked to dance!

JB:Yes, I was a great dancer. When I went into the CCC [Civilian Conservation 00:34:00Corps] they would bring the boys down here to spend the evening in town. I would go to the dance, or to what they called the old time dances. I always had one of the leaders [with me]. They would take the boys back home before the dance let out. I would walk down the road somewhere and wait for the wood teams [to] come home. [It would be] about three or four o'clock in the morning and I would go with them out to the camp. That is how crazy I was about dancing, but I sadly got over it.

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JB:Finally, I came out to the mining camp to work. This molasses deal (when he 00:35:00met the two girls when he went to get the molasses) ─ that was way back when I was fourteen [years old]. I did not go to work in the mine until I was eighteen [years old].

FH:What did you do to make money between when you were fourteen [years old] and eighteen [years old]?

JB:I told you [that] the first job I had away from home to earn any money was washing dishes in a survey camp. The survey camp came down there to survey the railroad [that was] laying out a track to run down to Montezuma, Mexico. It was supposed to come down through the colony, but it never was laid. That was the first job I ever had where I drew any money. I [was paid] $35.00 a month. Our meals were furnished, but we had to carry a roll of bedding. We had a tent to sleep in. I came back home and [went] over where there were rails, but not with 00:36:00the survey camp. They disbanded about thirty miles from the railroad.

FH:Was this down in Mexico?

JB:Yes, [it was] down [in] another valley. They hired a pack outfit. [When we went] down the river, we had a boat that carried a six-hole range, the transits and some of the more precious and bulkier cargo in the boat. The rest of the 00:37:00outfit went [down] on burros. We had to walk to where they moved camp. While I was washing dishes, I had lots of time. They would carry the lunch out on the line. I had most of the day [off] and I did some fishing. I told you I was not much of a fisherman.

There was a little Mexican boy [who] was a son or brother of the man [who] hired the pack train. He and I would get into the boat and go up the river and fish some. We also went out from the river a-ways and there were javalina hogs in that country, wild pigs. We went up on a mesa and there was a bunch of these 00:38:00hogs. They all ran except this one old boar. He stood his ground. I had [a] rifle and I shot him. I told the [youngsters] the old boar hog opened his mouth, I shot him and he fell to the ground and the rest of [the pigs] ran.

When we [arrived] they disbanded the camp. They put that six-hole range on a mule and carried it over to the railroad. That was quite a feat I thought, carrying a range on a pack mule. I got on the train and went up to Douglas, 00:39:00Arizona. [It] was on the [railroad] line. [Douglas] was our custom house years afterwards, instead of Naco.

I cannot remember with whom I [went] down to the colony. I remember another time coming out from the colony. I thumbed my way over to Fronteras, Mexico. I went over there with one of the bishop's counselors. I was quite a hand at throwing a 00:40:00rock. He said if I could throw a rock like that I [did not] need to bother carrying a gun. I went to Douglas and I was going to go back to the mining camp. I was going to ride the rails like they used to do. I was not much of a hitchhiker on the rails. I finally borrowed some money and bought a ticket up to the mining camp. I worked there during the summer and then went back to the colony to be with the young folks and pretend to go to school. I did go to 00:41:00school, but I was twenty-one [years old] before I finished the eighth grade.

FH:There might have been some attraction down there with the girls.

JB:There was!

FH:That is what I thought! [Laughter] What was the name of this mining camp?

JB:[The mining camp was at] Bisbee, Arizona

FH:Would you like to tell about your courtship?

JB:I never took any of the girls serious. I would go out with one girl one night and go out with another the next night. When she would get mad at me, I would go 00:42:00by her place further up in town. I used to whistle and that would make her jealous. [Laughter] I never took any girls serious until after I quit school and went out to Bisbee, Arizona to the mining camp. She came out there and that was when I really settled on her. There were [a] number of girls down in the colony that I used to take out, but [I] was not serious about any of them. It was just to have a girlfriend.

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JB:A judge in Bisbee married us. [We] stayed there and [I] worked for about a year. Then we went back to the colony.

[James and Chloe Geneva (Van Leuven) Bundy were married August 23, 1909 in Bisbee, Arizona.]

They surveyed another power line from Douglas out to El Tigre [Mexico] and I got a job with that outfit. A fellow by the name of Ben Scott and I went down to Esalvo. That was where they started [the] power line, but they started over at 00:44:00El Tigre. We walked about thirty miles to El Tigre. We started out afoot during the night and [the next] day we [arrived] about noon [at the] camp where the surveyors were. The cook gave us some lunch. I was used to washing dishes so I gathered up the dishes and washed them. After a bit, the cook started cooking again to get supper [ready] for the crew when they came in. He kept bringing in dishes. I stayed in the kitchen washing dishes and messing around all afternoon. 00:45:00They put me [to work] in the kitchen. Ben never got on and I don't remember what happened to him. I suppose he went back to the colony. I always figured my dishwashing [experience] got me that job. I stayed [there] for [about] three months and then they gave me a job out on the line. I went out on the line and [was paid] more money and [for] so long hours. I had lots of time during the day. I did not have to work, but yet I had to get up early in the morning and go to work and stay there until the crew was done.

FH:Did you have your wife with you?

JB:No. She stayed at her mother's [Mariah Elizabeth (Durfee) Van Leuven] place 00:46:00over in Morelos [Sonora, Mexico]. [The name of the colony was Colonia Morelos.] I guess she was up at [Colonia] San Jose [Sonora, Mexico]. That was another colony [the Mormons] started further up [the] country.

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JB:I was going back out before I was married. I was going to ride the rails, [but] I backed out and borrowed the money for a ticket. That was not too long before we were married.

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JB:I have another experience I should tell about. [It] was before we were 00:47:00married, too. Dad [had] a job freighting. He had a horse over in the colony, maybe he bought it. He wanted me to bring the horse down to him. [This] was around 1910 because that was when the trouble started in Mexico. The soldiers would gather up all the horses that they could [find].

When I started across the mountain I thought I would take a cutoff. I had to go 00:48:00north and west to Agua Prieta [Mexico]. Then I had to go south to Montezuma and the colony was back here. I figured if I could cut across the mountains and hit the railroad [further] down, it would save me quite a distance.

When I got out in the hills it was cloudy. I had never hunted deer before. If the sun had been shining I would have known where I was going. I [went] off towards the north and west. Finally, I saw four or five fellows on horseback and 00:49:00they were about [a] half mile from me. I figured they were renegades. I had a little money with me and that would be the first thing they would take along with [my] horses. I put the money in my shoe. I went on to meet them [because] there was no other way to get by them. I could not dodge them so I went up to them. They asked me a few questions and finally let me go. They never searched me nor asked for my horses. It is a wonder that they did not.

I went on down to where I met dad and then I came back again. I had this horse to ride back home. I was about up to the colony and I was going to cut off again. I rode off into the hills. When night came I pulled my saddle off and haltered my horse. I do not know why ─ I should have known better. I had him haltered with a long rope and I let [the] rope drag. I thought this would keep my horse from going [too] far. The moon came up about two or three o'clock in 00:51:00the morning. I thought: I had better see where my horse was. I had not gone very far from the saddle before I found the rope. He was footloose and there I was. I [emotional] promised the Lord that if He would see me out of that predicament I would not use tobacco and I never did. [Emotional] When it became daylight, I thought I was afoot and all alone, but my horse was a quarter of a mile away. I went down and got him and came back [for] my saddle. My brother used it. Like 00:52:00all [youngsters], it was an experience. One of my chums used tobacco. He used to smoke and offer me a cigarette. I do not think I ever tried to smoke more than a half dozen cigarettes in my life.

I got into rougher country than I thought [I would]. [There were] deep canyons I had to cross, but I had to go further across than I thought I would, but I finally made it home. That was before we were married. Little things like that 00:53:00happen at different times. It was so long ago and my memory [is] no good anymore. I cannot remember which happened first.

FH:I do not think that is important as to which happened first.

JB:When the trouble started down in Mexico ─

FH:Was this after you were married?

JB:Yes.

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FH:Did you have three children at that time?

JB:Yes. We came to Douglas where there was a doctor for the fourth [child], a boy, to be born. No, [it was] the girl ─ we [already] had the boy. We came out [of] there with the girl. We did not bring much with us when we came out [from the colony], only her sewing machine, the bedding and a few things like that. We expected to go back. While we were there I [found] a job working [at] the cement plant, but I [only] wanted to stay there a few days. The man [who] I had rented the house from was the foreman on the construction crew down at the smelter. He 00:55:00offered me a job at the smelter [and] I went down there [to work] as a pipe-fitter helper. I worked there for more than a year. During this time I [received] a $.25 raise. I got $3.00 a day.

I told my grandchildren and some of my own children that if they ever went down to Douglas, Arizona to go down to the Copper Queen Smelter and notice [the] corrugated iron [that is] up on that smelter. They were hoisting [the material] up there to the eaves and I carried it up to the roof to the men [who] did the work.

I was a great hand at jumping when I was a young button [man]. I would strain my legs too much. I do not know what happened to them, but I could not lie down. I would have to sit up or stand up. I could not lie down to sleep. This happened to me when I was a young fellow down in Old Mexico. A young fellow by the name of Marion Hall came over from the colony in Chihuahua [Mexico] and he out jumped 00:57:00me. It was a stand and jump. I wanted to show off and try to beat him. I kept trying and trying, but I could never quite come up to his mark.

When I carried the corrugated iron up, it was about 100 feet from the eaves to the apex on the smelter building. I [had] another attack on my legs like I had [before]. I [had one] another time out here on the ranch and I do not know what brought that on.

While I was working on that smelter, it was about 500 feet long. When the whistle would blow, some of us would go down off the roof on to the eaves and down to the square to our change room. There was about twenty feet where there was a four-inch I-beam over the converters and we used to walk [on] that. You could look down in there and see the sulphur smoke come up. One of the boys was working under the eaves. The breeze used to change once in awhile and carry that smoke away from you. But this time the breeze never happened and he fell sixty 00:59:00feet. He died before he [arrived at] the hospital. That [shows] how careless a man will get to save himself a few minutes. Walking that distance we could hold our breaths and it would not hurt us, but it caught him down under the eaves where he could not get a way in. The breeze did not change the smoke and he finally passed out and fell. I have told some of the boys about that [incident]. I tell them how I walked that four inch I-beam sixty feet [above] the ground and I can hardly walk down the sidewalk now! [Laughter] I guess it is hard for them 01:00:00to believe [me]!

FH:You are not quite as young as you used to be! [Laughter]

JB:No, that is right! [Laughter]

FH:There is one thing I want you to tell about. Through the years you were growing up, you said you liked to dance. What else did you do to have fun?

JB:We played baseball.

FH:What [position] did you play?

JB:I pitched a lot of the time and then [I played] shortstop. I never could throw a curve ball, but I could put a ball where I wanted it. I learned that by 01:01:00throwing the ball as close over the base as I could to the batter, and a little bit high, it was hard for him to hit it. If he did hit it, it was close to his hand and he could not hit it [very] far. I was kept in [the] pitcher's box quite a bit of the time.

FH:Were there quite a few baseball teams around the [area] then?

JB:No, but we had our special team. Some of the girls came from another colony to our colony. I was married then and I still played some ball after I was married. I remember ─.

[END OF TAPE ONE -- SIDE TWO]

JB:Some of the girls came over and wanted to know who were the different ones on the ball team. I [said] I was married and that kind of disappointed them because there were not very many of the boys on the team [who] were married.

When I told you about the fellow and jumping, [the one who did the] standing jump with the rocks ─ we use to use rocks for weights. I jumped three jumps ─ three straight jumps and carried the rocks until the last jump. I could 01:03:00cover thirty-five feet by hitting the ground twice. [There] was a little slope down on the ball field where I was jumping. I never ran across anyone that could beat me until after I was married. There was a young Mexican [fellow who] worked for Lillywhite. He had seen me jump and vowed to himself that he would out jump me. And he did. It was about two years after I quit school. I do not think he could have done it when I was practicing.

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FH:When you went to [Douglas] for the fourth child to be born, the little girl, this was when the [Mexican] rebels came. Did you ever go back?

JB:No. While we were out [of] there, the rebels came and ordered the colony out. 01:04:00The [people] all came out, but some of them went back in. We had some grain in the bin and we had about a dozen head of cattle. I bought dad's brand and that is what I gathered up.

We had about a dozen head of them, but by the time they went back in there, the rebels went on through [the area]. Some went back there and gathered what cattle they could. They would have hauled the grain out, but the local Mexicans had moved the grain from our bins to their bins. When I went to gather the cattle, I do not remember just what they got, but I got $31.00 in American money for what cattle I had down there.

FH:[Laughter] Where did you go after this? Did you settle in Douglas?

JB:Yes, we rented a house in Douglas.

CB:We stayed right there [inaudible].

JB:John T. Butler was the presiding elder over the colony.

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JB:He was the one who ordained me to be an elder.

FH:Was he the one [who] ordained you?

JB:Yes. Dad left Mexico and had gone to Oregon and then he came back. [Omer] 01:06:00"Dick," my younger brother, took the rest of the family up to Oregon where dad was. They came back down here to Kaolin, Nevada. The birds of a feather flock together and we finally moved up there.

We went on the freight road again and hauled ore from the Grand Gulch Mine [on the Arizona Strip] back to St. Thomas [Nevada] to the railroad. [On] one of these trips when I was coming out, I bought a tent and pitched it out at the Grand Gulch Mine. She [my wife] lived there a couple of weeks.

CB:A couple or three [weeks].

JB:We had led a milk cow to the mining camp where we had the tent pitched. This old cow use to bawl. The superintendent at the mine said we would have to move on with that cow! [Laughter] I only made a trip or two back. We had to haul water from Pigeon Spring [Arizona Strip] down to the mining camp because there was no spring down there and we needed to have water for the cow. We loaded up and moved out to Mt. Trumbull [on the Arizona Strip].

While dad and I were freighting out there it had rained. We could see the clouds 01:08:00and thunder and lightning further on east from the mining camp. A bunch of the fellows, six or seven of them, drove out there with their families with them. Anyway, [my wife] was along. When we got part way out there, they wanted to still go further east to what they call Hurricane Valley [on the Arizona Strip]. We divided up the hay and grain that we had for all the teams so they could go further on and they went on out. They went all around the country [area] and decided that was the best they had seen. Dad said wherever grass would grow he 01:09:00could [grow] grain. We thought that would be a good country [area] to move into. We did not have any machinery. In the beginning, we planted corn because we could cut that with a hoe and shuck it. Afterwards, we planted grain in the fall of the year. It was hard wheat grain.

FH:[Was it] winter wheat?

JB:Yes.

FH: Did you [have fairly] good crops there?

JB:It was good for the work we did; because all we did was plow up the ground and sow the grain and then harrow it. When we harvested the grain, you could still see the tracks of the harrow so that was how much we did with the ground after we planted it. We never got a very big crop, but we got all we earned. All 01:10:00we did was plow and plant it and harvest. We never did have a binder out there. We finally came in and got a header and took [it] out there.

FH:How many years did you stay in the Mt. Trumbull area?

JB:We went in there in 1917 and ─

CB:And [are] still there.

JB:─ stayed there. We still have a homestead out there. My brother and James G. [Gwendol Bundy], our second boy, and [Vivian August] "Pat" [Bundy], my brother, are about the only ones left there. There are folks, like ours, [who] 01:11:00had children and some of their [children] have homes out there, but nearly all the families have moved out. They [became] discouraged when the Taylor Grazing [Act] was passed [June 28, 1934]. Those whose holdings [had] used the public domain were entitled to some government ground and those [who] did not have much stock and just had the homestead were not allowed out on the public range. That discouraged them the [most].

FH:If there had been plenty of water out there, would you have had good crops?

JB:That is right. We still could if we had water. The younger generation is not willing to put up with the hardships the older ones did. James G. and this 01:12:00fellow here [Chester Marion Bundy] bought a section of ground on top of the mountain [Mt. Trumbull]. That is nearly 1,000 feet higher than it is in the valley. They get more storms up there, [and] he still [grows] grain there. Rye got into the grain fields and it is [very] hard to kill that off. Chester [Marion Bundy] stayed with his cattle and used his half of the section for mostly cattle. James G. quit when he could not sell his wheat because the rye [was] so bad. There was work he could do to make more money, quicker money, than he could make farming.

FH:Did you plant crops in the ground every year or did you alternate?

JB:No, that was one thing we never did. If we had alternated the crops, like you 01:13:00say, and [had] two seasons in the ground, I still think they could have [grown] grain. There was work they could get on the outside. They could not run cattle or sheep on the public domain because they had not used it. Most of them only had a milk cow and [a] few head [of cattle] around the pasture. Rosenberry got seven patented sections [of land] and he used those, but when the Taylor [Act] was passed he had not used the public domain, so they did not give him any. He got disgusted, sold out and quit. A lot of them out there with seven sections 01:14:00[of land] could have [grown] a lot of feed. But he did not [feel] they treated him right so he got sore and left. He was not a Latter-day Saint and he did not come up to our place in the colony. Most of those at the colony had a homestead and there was not enough [land] to [raise] livestock on to amount to anything.

FH:During these years [of] building your homestead and working it out there was where your family was born. How many children [did] you have?

JB:[Inaudible] We had five children when we [came] to the valley and when we 01:15:00left there we had nine. Two children died. One of the little girls drowned [Cleo Fern Bundy] and the other one died of pneumonia, a baby [Mabel Lavell Bundy]. The little girl was two years old when she drowned. [Denven LaVar Bundy] was the first one born out [at Mt. Trumbull]. He volunteered as an aviator [in the United States Air Corps during World War II]. [Those] were [the] four out of the five after we went out there.

FH:Will you name the children in order of their birth and the names of the mate they married?

JB:[The oldest child was] Loren Sylvester ["Bud" Bundy]. You will have to tell [about] the two girls.

CB:I gave you all the [inaudible].

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JB:The two girls, [Mildred Iona and Genevieve], were sealed to me.

FH:They were by her [Chloe Geneva] first marriage?

JB:Yes. The older one, [Mildred] Iona married Alvin Shelley. He was a homesteader out there. He belonged to the [Shelley] family [who] homesteaded out there.

FH:Before we go any further, I want you to clarify a point. You said they were sealed to you. When did this sealing take place?

JB:It took place in 1916 up [in] Salt Lake [City, Salt Lake County, Utah].

FH:In the Salt Lake Temple?

JB:Yes. At that time we lived close to the railroad so we took the train into Salt Lake [City] instead of coming here [to St. George]. My parents were sealed here in [the St. George] Temple.

JB:Loren Sylvester married Maureen Nelson, Joe Nelson's daughter. James G. [Gwendol] married Beatrice Nelson. She was a cousin of Maureen's. Her father's 01:18:00name was John Nelson. William ["Bill" Fay] Bundy married Eliza Nelson, she was another cousin. She was Jim Nelson's daughter. Lincoln never married. He always wanted a family but did not want a wife! [Laughter] We lost him [during] World War II. He probably would have eventually married. How old was he when he went into the Army? [He was] about twenty-four [years old]?

CB:He went in January and February he would have been twenty-four [years old].

FH:Where did he lose his life?

JB:He was last seen over France.

FH:Did he fly from England?

JB:Yes. He may have dropped in the [English] Channel. He was lost and that was all [the information the government] ever gave us. This girl ─

CB:[Denven] LaVar [Bundy] was next.

JB:He married Audria Stratton from Hurricane [Washington County, Utah]. Then comes Nathella M. [Bundy and] she married Dell Wood from Hurricane. Mind you, all these [children who] married and came away from there, their wives or their husbands took them away. That was what happened [at] Mt. Trumbull. There was nothing to keep them there. Then Merlin [Dee Bundy] married Rebecca Hunt. These 01:20:00girls would come out to our dances on the [Arizona] Strip and the boys [would] fall for them.

FH:They would come out and steal your boys away from you! [Laughter]

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JB: [Daniel] Atwood [Bundy] is next and he married Elizabeth Hardy. She was a St. George girl.

FH:[Was she] Sarah [Hardy's] daughter?

CB:Grandma says Sarah Hardy.

JB:Yes.

FH:What is his name?

JB:[His name is] Daniel Atwood. I will tell you how [he] came by that name. Just 01:21:00before he was born, I had a small truck and for an outing I would load the [children] in the pickup truck and take them up on Cedar Mountain [Iron County, Utah]. There was a doctor named Dr. Atwood Kelly and he wanted a picture of the family, so he [took] a picture. We went back home and after a couple or three years [our house] burned down.

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JB:When he heard we had burned down, he sent us a couple hundred dollars. He was a cowboy out in Wyoming, but he had gone back east. He was a doctor when we met him.

FH:[You] named your baby after him?

JB:That was how he got the name Atwood.

CB:[The doctor's] home was in Maryland.

JB:"Nord" was next to the last one. Vanord Orin Bundy ─

FH:How do you spell that name?

CB:[It is spelled] V-A-N-O-R-D O-R-I-N.

JB:─ [and] he married Gloria Kimball. Her father claimed he was grandson or the great-grandson of Heber C. Kimball, but he went with the polygamists. She had a younger sister and this old man was after "Nord" all the time to marry another girl and have two wives. He [Vanord] did not go for that. I think that was one thing that caused their separation because she hung to her folk's idea of polygamy. He did not.

FH:What was Kimball's name? Do you remember?

CB:He was Heber C. Kimball. It was not just a claim; he was Heber C. Kimball's grandson. He was named after him. He was a wonderful man, a bishop, high councilman [and] had been a wonderful man in The Church [of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints].

JB:He fell for the polygamists. I had gone with a group of men during The Depression. They allowed us a week, no more than a week, and we were paid $4.00 01:25:00a day. I had a truck and they hired me to haul the boys down on the road. We were breaking [a] road through from here down to the Colorado River and down to Pearce's Ferry. While we were down there, [my wife] got sick and sent for me to come home.

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JB:It was a cheap outfit. It had thawed and we were afraid we could not come up the road and off of the mountain and go off from Wolf Hole down into what they 01:26:00call the Pacoon Desert [on the Arizona Strip]. When our week was up we started home and came up this way and to Bunkerville [Nevada] and then up to St. George. We went from here to back home.

FH:Back to Mt. Trumbull.

JB:Vern Iverson, my nephew, never did catch up with me. He came to get me because this birth was coming up. He never did catch up with us and I never knew anything about the baby until I [was] about eight miles from home. About twenty miles from home, the truck I was driving, broke down. It was some little

gear in [the truck]. Some of the boys [who] were with me got a ride home [and] two stayed with me. We finally walked into home. When I [was] about halfway from where the truck broke down they told me about [the] baby boy. I went on home to greet my wife and [the] new child.

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JB:I was the road foreman here and that was how I came to be down there with the truck moving these boys. I was still [a] road foreman when they moved the CCC 01:28:00camp in here. They wanted three men to be foremen from out of [Washington] County. I was one of them and Floyd Hallmark was another one. He was a homesteader out there. Lester Parker was the third foreman. I came in and was with the camp.

FH:Where was the camp located?

JB:It was located here because of the water.

FH:[It was] here in St. George.

JB:If they could have gotten water out there for a couple of hundred boys, the 01:29:00camp would have been built out there nearer to the work. Also, there was no doctor out in that country [area]. They did not like the boys to [be] more than fifty miles away from a doctor. We did move a spike camp out [to] Wolf Hole. We put one of the foremen out there with the spike camp [at the top of Quail Hill], but he was only there a short time when they came for me to take his place. We worked from that spike camp and the other boys worked from here. They would drive out to work. Finally, they had a job out [at] Parashaunt [on the Arizona Strip]. That was seventy-five miles from here. They consented to let the camp move out there contrary to the rules of the CCC. We built fence out in that country [area].

After we finished the work there, we went to Duncan, Arizona. The foreman and some of the key men went there [but] none of the boys went. They sent us another bunch of boys out of Texas to work in Duncan. I stayed down there, but did make a trip home once. It was before Christmas when I went down there.

In July they disbanded that camp, but I quit before they disbanded the camp and came home. They wanted me to run their camp up here. We used to run the [United States] Post Office. The first thing they did was [to] take the post office away from us. [They] said [we] could not hold two government jobs. [Laughter] We gave up the post office and next they wanted me to give up the grazing land they had given me and that was a little too much. I told them I would rather have the grazing land than the job. I quit the job. That was how I came to be with the CCC.

FH:[Did] you stay out there [on the Arizona Strip] until your family was all [grown]?

JB:Yes. The family [had] all married. We still stayed out there. [Daniel] Atwood built a home out there. The ranch we had was hardly big enough to support more than one family. When he built this home he went to work for wages to pay for 01:34:0001:33:00the home.

[END OF TAPE TWO -- SIDE ONE]

JB:I had some ground over here in Middleton [Washington County, Utah]. There was an advertisement in the newspaper [looking] for someone [who] had property down in this section of the country [area] where they could put a KOA [Kampgrounds of America] building. He [Daniel Atwood] was working down close to [Las] Vegas [Nevada] and had joined one of the wards down there. When he saw the advertisement he came up here and thought it would be a good layout. They moved up here and he built [the] KOA over there. He had the good luck of [it] burning down, but he was insured and got most of his money out of the KOA insurance. We 01:35:00had been called here to the [St. George] Temple in 1960. He came up here in about 1964 or 1965.

FH:[Did] you move to St. George in 1960?

JB:[Our] oldest daughter, [Mildred Iona (Bundy) Shelley] had bought a place a block south of us across the street. We moved in there and lived for about six years because we have only been here a couple of years. We built this home.

FH:You have yourself a nice, comfortable home here [in] a good location.

JB:Yes. Dad bought this [property]. He owned from one lot this side of the corner over to this fence out here. He willed all of the [children] a lot. He had some more land over where Omer ["Dick"] lives. He let us draw for the places. My sister, Ina, and Lillie [Belle], another older sister, and I drew the 01:37:00lots in here. Lillie [Belle] sold hers. Ina and I bought one of the sisters out because there was only 120 feet in here and the City [of St. George] required four-rod lots. When we bought her out, we had sixty-one feet eight inches out of the four-rod [lots] and [the city] never made any kick out of us building here. That was how we came [to be] here.

FH:Since then, you have been working regularly in the [St. George] Temple. Do you like that work?

JB:Yes, I like it. I never did much [work] in the church while I was in the bishopric out there. Five years out of the eight years in the bishopric [I was 01:38:00with] the CCC [and] never was home to amount to anything. When I came here, I decided I would try to do what I could.

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FH:[You are] trying to make up for lost time.

CB:You were a ward clerk for many years.

FH:Were you [a] ward clerk?

JB:They put me in as ward clerk out there. I always said it was because of lack of material! [Laughter]

CB:He went from the bishopric to ward clerk.

FH:Do you have a wonderful family?

JB:Yes, considering [the] poor start they started from [in the beginning]. [Laughter]

FH:Is there anything else that we might have missed?

JB:There is nothing more than what a lot of the children now know.

FH:This will be for generations yet to come. After all of this lifetime of experience that you have had, some of it [fairly] hard, you probably have some counsel you would like to give to your descendants. Maybe you would like to 01:40:00counsel them and then bear your testimony to them.

JB:The younger boys appreciated what little I could give them in their work and in the ranch. One of the girls was an outsider and when I told her what we were 01:41:00doing and what we received for our work, she said that was a testimony to her.

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JB:I tell them I am a has-been now. They will have to go to another place for counsel. I know the things we have gone through could not have happened without the gospel. For all our testimony in the gospel and the last few years here since she [Chloe Geneva] has been sick, I have had the power of the Priesthood brought to me so strong I could not deny it. [Emotional] I cannot express myself 01:42:00in words like it is in my heart. [Emotional] Three out of [our] nine boys have gone on [LDS] missions. The [son] we lost in World War II and another one married quite young and [they] never went on missions.

CB:He is doing missionary work now.

JB:Those [who] have gone on missions have been a testimony to me. [Emotional] I never got the money that I put out to put them in the mission field. [Emotional]

FH:You have had a rich life, a rich heritage that you are passing on to your lovely family. I know they are grateful to you. The Lord has been with you strongly.

JB:My grandfather [Isaac Bundy] was about the only one of dad's family that I knew much about except one [of my dad's] sisters. We lived seven miles from Cozad [Nebraska] and that was our trading town. We use to go down there and the [children] would play with her children. I do not remember too much about granddad until we moved out here. He came with us in a prairie schooner across [the plains for] about 1,300 miles.

When we got to Beaver Dam, he said us [children] made too much racket and he wanted to live [by] himself. He pitched a tent away from where we lived. Mother would send me up there with a bottle of buttermilk so he could make pancakes. He used to have me button his shirts because his fingers were getting like mine. I can remember trying to punch part of the skin through that buttonhole along with the button. [Laughter] Anyway, he drank coffee and I think that is why he never was baptized. During the seven years we lived at Beaver Dam and before we went to Mexico, he went back to Nebraska. He wrote to dad and asked dad to do his work in the church. He was ninety-four years old when he died. I think he was 01:46:00around ninety years old before he went back there.

Ina knows when he went back. I can remember dad saying that neighbors around the country [area] knew that old man Bundy been over the road because he chewed a bigger cut of tobacco than anybody in the country [area]! [Laughter] He quit that and never used tobacco when I knew him, but he still drank his coffee. He was converted in a way, but was never baptized. He got his name on the record 01:47:00where he lived. His [church] work was done for him. They tell us it does not amount to much [when] they had a chance to do their own work. It shows they did have some interest in the gospel if they asked to have their work done.

FH:Those are the things that will all be straightened out when we are in the millennium. There will be a way.

JB:Another thing that is a testimony to me ─ I have a nephew [Verl Alldredge], 01:48:00my wife's sister's boy, [who] lived out there on the [Arizona] Strip. There was an old man by the name of [James] "Jim" White [also known as "Old Man White" who] used to come down for [his] mail. It was twelve miles down to our place from his place up on the mountain. He would come down to get [his] mail and she [Chloe Geneva] would generally fix him a bite to eat. [She would feed him and everyone else in the area.] This Alldredge boy, he was just a button [youngster], but he fell for that old man. The old man was murdered out there. He had some sons in Fredonia [Arizona] and this old man has appeared to this boy 01:49:00in such a way it has worried him. [Emotional] The old man wanted his [church] work done. He never joined the church nor took much stock in it, I guess. Yet, 01:50:00he knew the gospel was true. So this boy has been trying to locate his folks to get his genealogy in order to do his work. I do not know what progress they have made [as] I have not asked the boy lately.

FH:There will be a way to take care of it one of these days, if it is that way. Do you have a strong testimony of the gospel?

JB:I do, yes.

FH:I think you should tell these people about this. Tell how you feel about the gospel.

JB:I know that the gospel is true. I have often said I could not understand why 01:51:00more people could not see the truth of the gospel. If I was a missionary and went out among people with the story the missionaries go with now and the people would not believe it, I do not know whether I could [emotional] ─.

CB:Be patient.

JB:─ because I cannot understand why they do not understand with all the things that have happened to the church. It could not have happened without the gospel and without a prophet to lead them. [Emotional] I have born my testimony to them before that I hoped and prayed to live steadfast to the gospel because I 01:52:00knew it was true.

[END OF TAPE TWO -- SIDE TWO]