Interview with Nellie Frances (Eyre) Jensen Hill

Nellie Frances (Eyre) Jensen Hill was interviewed on October 18, 1968 in St. George, Washington County, Utah by Fielding H. Harris, a representative of Voices of Remembrance Foundation. She related her personal history of living in various parts of Utah, California, Arizona and Wyoming. Her sister, Callie Drewery Eyre, also participated.

FH:Would you please give your full name?

NH:My maiden name was Nellie Frances Eyre. I married Niels Peter Jensen. After he died, I married Roy M. Hill of Salt Lake City [Salt Lake County, Utah].

FH:What is your birth date?

NH:[I was born] March 9, 1894.

FH:[Where were] you born?

NH:[I was born in] Buck Horn Springs, Iron County, Utah.

FH:What was your father's name?

NH:[His name was] George Gillings Eyre.

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

NH:[Her name was] Harriett Marie (Drewery) [Eyre]. It is spelled D-R-E-W-E-R-Y.

FH:Tell about some of your early childhood memories

NH:When I was about ten months old, my mother had a brother who joined The Church [of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints] in England before she did. He came to [America] and settled in Ogden [Weber County] Utah. Mother always thought she would like to move to Ogden. My mother was a convert to the church in England. My father was there on a [LDS] mission [when] she met him, although he didn't convert her or baptize her. After he came back to Buck Horn Springs, he worked and sent [her] money and she came to [Utah].

Mother was born in Hall, Yorkshire, England and was from a family of twelve children. She always said she was the tenth [child, so] she was the tithing. She 00:02:00joined the church when she was eighteen [years old]. She had one brother who befriended her. [He] said she was old enough to know what she was doing when she joined the church. She was disowned by [her] family because she joined the church. You know how they felt [about] the Mormons in [those] days.

She arrived in Salt Lake City [Salt Lake County] Utah on the dedication of the [Salt Lake] Temple in April 1893 [and] came on to Milford [Beaver County, Utah on] the railroad. They met her at the terminal and brought her down to Buck Horn 00:03:00Springs. She was received very [well] by my father's family. My grandfather [John E. Eyre] always reminded me of a picture of my [other] grandfather in England [George Tindell Drewery] and was very good to my mother. They took her in as one of the family and knew that she had given up a lot for the gospel.

Her mother [Frances (Lowman) Drewery] never wrote to her until after [my parents] were a family [with] four children. Mother had a family group picture taken and sent to her folks. Then her mother wrote [to her]. She said that anyone who could look that happy and content and have that family ─ she [said she] was sorry and felt bad about it [not having anything to do with her].

She was the first [person] to take my mother to a Mormon meeting. She said, "Harriett, there are some elders, they call themselves Mormons, would you like to go with me and hear what they have to say?" So mother went with her. 00:04:00Grandmother never went [again], but mother continued to go.

My father built a little home in Buck Horn Springs and we lived there until I was about a year old. Then we moved to Ogden, Utah [and] my first brother was born on Twelfth Street. I know that my father worked [for] the water works in Ogden Canyon. In those days $1.00 a day was big wages. [Laughter]

FH:Have you been told about this?

NH:Yes, I don't remember it. We finally moved to Pleasant View [Weber County] Utah on a farm. [It was] about eleven miles out of Ogden and my second brother was born on this farm. His name was Lowman Dee Eyre. My first brother was George 00:05:00Drewery Eyre. We always called him "Drew." Lowman was my grandmother's maiden name.

FH:How do you spell Eyre?

NH:It is spelled E-Y-R-E. The same as Jane Eyre. [Laughter] There were two houses on this farm in Pleasant View. My uncle had embraced the gospel at the 00:06:00same time as my mother in England. [He] lived on the house on the hill and we lived on the lower part of the farm. He was a very grand photographer [and] took lovely pictures. He moved back to Ogden and we moved into the house on the hill. Every time I go by there, I show it to [my] family because my third brother [Rear Alonzo Eyre] was born there. [The house] has a red tile roof and it was an older house when we lived there. He [my brother] is sixty-five years old now. I said, "There is the house we lived in before we [moved] to Wyoming." It was considered quite a nice home. My dad's people were called [by the church] to Wyoming to help colonize the Big Horn Stake. We didn't own the farm in Pleasant View; we just rented it, so my father decided to go to Wyoming.

I remember when I was four years old and my last Christmas [in Utah]. We came down to Buck Horn Springs in a covered wagon. There were four children and my [father] put a little sheepherder stove in the front of the wagon and we [were] very comfortable. It took about a week to make the trip. We spent probably a month visiting with his folks in Parowan [Iron County, Utah].

Before going to Buck Horn Springs, my grandfather [John E. Eyre] lived in Parowan. My father was born in Minersville [Beaver County, Utah and] they moved to Parowan. My grandfather was quite a charming man. He belonged to the brass 00:08:00band. His sister, Ellen Banks, was a midwife. I understand she delivered 3,000 babies and I was one of them.

We spent the holidays [there] and then went back. My dad became very unsettled and wanted to go to Wyoming so he chartered a car. In those days, you could charter a railroad car for about $15.00 [to] $25.00 and ship all our machinery, cattle and whatever we had [and] we went in a covered wagon. We left in April and [came] into Wyoming in July. My father stopped in Cumberland, Wyoming at the 00:09:00mines and did [some] work to get us more money to take us on. I remember one [incident] in particular: going out of Evanston, Wyoming, there was quite a steep hill. [Traveling ahead] was a family [who] was caught in a blizzard and had a [young] girl die. When we got on the hill, it started to snow and my mother was terrified. I remember that when we [were] almost to the top of the hill that there were three or four covered wagons ahead of us, stuck in the blizzard. We caught up with them and we all camped together. They were the John Maxwell family [and were] going to Wyoming. The mother was quite excitable and 00:10:00worried about her eight children, as was my mother, but my mother had a lot of faith and so did my dad. We were raised on faith. We got over the hill alright and to Cumberland where my dad worked six weeks [in] the coal mines and then we went on to Lovell [Wyoming].

FH:Did the other wagons go on?

NH:We all went together and had quite a thrilling trip. I remember seeing the first live bear [while] going through an old abandoned coal mining town in Wyoming. We took our favorite cow, "Blacky." She was tied to the back of the wagon. In the back of wagon was a box with about a dozen hens and they furnished 00:11:00us eggs all the way. [Laughter] The men went back to get the cattle and while we were parked alongside the road a big black bear came down the road. I remember how excited we were ─ mother [put] us all in the wagon. [Laughter] We were very excited!

FH:What happened to the bear?

NH:It walked off into the trees [and] never paid any attention to us. [Laughter] We [arrived in] Wyoming about the first of July [and] it was still snowing. It was cold. The first thing they did was to make a payment on a farm on the river. 00:12:00The sagebrush was so high that we couldn't see over our heads. However, we pitched a tent and dad dug up the sagebrush and planted oats and alfalfa together. In the fall we had a county fair and a state fair where we entered our oats. The bundle of oats went to the Worlds Fair and, in about six months or a year, we [received] a letter from the Worlds Fair [that] my dad [had received] a gold medal. I don't know how gold it was, [laughter] but it was a gold medal and is still in the family. It looked gold! First, a picture came of the Statue of Liberty and finally the medal came.

After that year he went to work [in] Frannie [Wyoming] on the Frannie Canal which was about fifty or sixty miles north east of us. We moved up [there] and lived in a tent while dad worked on the canal. [The canal] was to bring water so that we would have irrigation water. Cowley [Wyoming] was about five miles from where we lived. [It] was named after Apostle [Matthais F.] Cowley and my dad's people all [worked] there. He worked on the canal. About six months ago, in the church paper there was a picture of a rock and it told how it was split so they 00:14:00could move it after President Byron [inaudible] of the Big Horn Stake had circle prayer around the rock. They couldn't go through it and somehow they couldn't go around it, the rock had to be moved in some way. He told them to have [a] circle prayer. Shortly after, the rock split in two and they were able to move it and continue on with the canal. I remember cutting that [article] out and putting it in my scrapbook. I can truly say that we were a faithful family.

When I was four years old I had rheumatic fever. I remember my dad administering to me and I overcame it. When we moved to Wyoming and lived on the river farm, 00:15:00George A. Crosby was the patriarch and he lived down the road from us. When one of us was sick we ran for Brother Crosby to administer [to us]. We didn't call on doctors, we didn't have them. I remember hearing the school wagon coming over the frosty road and the horses coming just as fast as they could come. I could hear my brother [coughing] ─ he had [inaudible] croup. I know when the wagon got there, I had been down to Brother Crosby's and he was there to administer to him. That is the way we lived.

FH:Was it effective?

NH:Yes. It was very cold. It was nothing for it to get [to] 40° below in the 00:16:00wintertime. We walked three miles to school. Our school was [open] three months a year for several years after we [arrived] there. We used to walk along the river banks to school. My mother used to worry when the wind and blizzards came up. Our breath would freeze, but we were healthy. It was a dry cold, a good cold. If it [was] that cold in St. George we would freeze to death! [Laughter]

My dad was the superintendent of the Sunday school for a long time. He had a wagon and put hot rocks in with the straw and we went three miles to Sunday school. In the summertime we always walked [to] Sunday school in the morning, [Sacrament] Meeting in the afternoon and Mutual [Improvement Association] at night, all on Sunday.

[We had] very little entertainment during the week, but we made our own entertainment. In the wintertime, it was nothing to hear a wagon load coming up the road. You could hear them on the icy road [for] a long way. They would come to shivaree [noisy celebration] us. We had good times. We enjoyed every minute of it and our home life was just wonderful. We baked potatoes and had molasses candy. We lived! It was sometimes a little tough, but we made it. I remember 00:18:00often telling the children: "You turn on the tap and there is the hot water." We carried the water almost a mile from the river and heated it in a big reservoir on the side of the stove. We all took a bath on Saturday night and our clothes were washed out [laughter] and dried for Sunday morning, but my mother never complained. I had the measles when I was fourteen [years old] and that kept me down for about a year [before] I finally got over that.

We had lots of good times. We had our friends and good neighbors. We lived next door to our bishop. We finally moved to town and lived in a log house when the last baby was born. It was very comfortable and mother would have things nice.

FH:Were you active in church work during these years?

NH:I belonged to the choir for years and my mother was an entertainer. In Mutual she always had the Lovell Lights. She would get up and read the Lovell Lights. I remember one time when she and another lady who was full of [the] dickens, put on a gypsy play. [An announcement was] put in the newspaper that Madame so-and-so was coming to town to tell fortunes at the ward party. The people really thought they were gypsies! My sister, Callie [Drewery Eyre], was about 00:20:00three years old and had long dark hair with a red bandana around her head. Mother and Rachel Olsen put on this gypsy [entertainment]. They told fortunes and made quite a bit of money for the ward entertainment [fund] by telling fortunes. Most of the people thought they were gypsies [and] really believed what they told them. That was [some of] our entertainment.

Later on, I went to work in the café and my third brother [Rear Alonzo Eyre] 00:21:00went out to work on a ranch. Mr. [Niels Peter] Jensen came from Nebraska. He wasn't a member of the church and my brother told him, "Let's quit this job. Let's go home where they are building a sugar factory and get work. You can have my big [sister]." I was working at the café as a cashier and of course he came [in to eat] and I was never able to get shed [rid] of him! [Laughter]

FH:Did you want to?

NH:In that day we didn't talk [about] temple marriages so strongly. We lived too far away from the temple. Mr. Jensen never came into the church all the years we were married. We were married thirty-four years. Our children were all raised in the church. He said [to them], "You do what momma says." He would have joined the church before we were married, but I didn't think he understood or knew what 00:22:00he was doing so I didn't push it. Mother went with us to Billings, Montana and we were married there. We came home and our first move was to Worland, Wyoming where a sugar factory [was] built. He helped build the smoke stack. After we had been married nearly ten months our first baby was born, a girl. When she was nineteen months old we had another girl.

We moved to Graybull, Wyoming and Mr. Jensen worked at the oil refinery. He had a [very] good job there, but the two girls were getting [old] enough to go to Primary and there was no ward [church]. I think I was the only church member there. Some ladies came and [had] me go to their Sunday school one Sunday. All 00:23:00they talked about was nice clothes and new hats. That left me out [as] I wasn't used to that. My mother decided she wanted to move back to Utah. They came down in October and bought a place in Murray [Salt Lake County, Utah]. We came down to Murray in April. I said to Niels, "There is no Sunday school here and I would like to have the girls go to Sunday school and Primary." The oldest was three years old and we were always used to church. We came to Murray in [1932] during the [Great] Depression. I know he rode three cars [streetcars] and then walked a 00:24:00mile and half to the refinery and shoveled flue dust for $2.40 a day which was big wages.

I had several operations and very poor health when I first came [back to Utah]. I [was] in the LDS [Latter-day Saints] Hospital [in Salt Lake City] once for three months. Finally, we had Richard [Jensen], the first boy, when the youngest girl was six years old.

FH:I don't believe you gave the names of the first two girls.

NH:Marjorie Eyre Jensen, I was used to that from genealogy. The second girl was 00:25:00[named] Harriett, after my mother, Louise [Jensen]. Although we lived in a non-Mormon settlement, I took my children back to Lovell to have them blessed. My father blessed both the girls.

After we [moved] to Murray and I [was] a little better, the bishop from the Second Ward wanted me to be president of the Primary. They put me in, but I didn't officiate very long because I had a very serious operation. I remember we lived on Cherry Street in Murray the first year we were there. Before our oldest 00:26:00boy, Richard, was born, my husband [found] a job at Mountain Fuel Gas Company and we moved to Salt Lake City, Utah. I didn't feel like money was coming in fast enough so I [found] big houses, fixed them and rented housekeeping rooms. I worked in [the] Relief Society and Primary. When Richard was four years old, we went to California to spend the winter. My husband was working at the gas company on piece work. He was a young man there and he [thought] he could go back to the oil fields and make good money in California, which he did. All our family went to Long Beach, California and spent the winter. [There were] four or 00:27:00five of us.

The first time I went to California our girls were three and four years old. My husband went down and found a job in the oil fields and then sent for us. I know the girls were about the same size. The first ward we went to was the old Adam's Ward.

Then we came home and were in Salt Lake [City] for quite awhile. We always had a business, had a house that I could rent apartments and finally we took [over] the old Oaks Hotel on South Temple [in Salt Lake City]. Our girls were getting 00:28:00[older] and we had the last baby, [Robert] "Bob" [Jensen]. He was born six years after Richard.

My grandfather used to say to me, "If you ever go to Salt Lake [City] to live, go to the old Fourteenth Ward." So that is where we went, to the old Fourteenth Ward. Bishop Giles was there and he called me as the Primary President. I worked [in] Primary for a long time. We had a very lovely Primary. Sister Primrose from the stake came to visit one time. We put on a pioneer play. She said it was so nice and asked if we would show it at the [Salt Lake] Tabernacle [during] the 00:29:00June Primary Conference. So we put it on at the tabernacle. We also put the Rag Rug Dance on at the [University of] Utah stadium with our Primary girls. It was a lot of practice and work.

Then we went into the cabin business. While we were out there, the Fourteenth Ward [people] went to the Canadian Temple. [Roy M.] Hill's previous wife [Lillian Hill], whom I knew very well, was a temple worker. I worked with her in the stake genealogy. I didn't know Brother Hill very well, [but] I had seen him, but didn't know him very well. However, when they [were] ready to go on this trip to the Canadian Temple, I went with them. We had a very faith-promoting 00:30:00experience while we were there. We went to the temple and had a very lovely trip. [There were] two bus loads of us. We spent three days at the temple in Cardston. The last day we were there we went [to] the night session with President Wood. After the session, we were all assembled in the celestial room. It had a pretty blue rug on the floor and there were so many of us that we sat in a circle on the floor while he talked to us. He was quite old, [with very] white hair. He stood there a minute or two and put his hand over his eyes and said, "I am going to make you all a promise. I am going to promise all of you 00:31:00that you will get home safely." The next day, when we started home, the Cardston people gave us a big milk can of lemonade, cooked chicken and fixed us a wonderful lunch, [enough] for two bus loads.

We left early in the morning and camped at Lake Five in Montana for lunch. I remember what a nice lunch we had and how much lemonade we drank. [Laughter] A friend [who] worked for my husband, Tanner Brown, a cousin to President Hugh B. Brown ─ he worked under my husband at the gas company ─ went with us on this trip. Before we left, my husband said, "Alright Tanner, take care of my wife and bring her home." After we ate lunch and drank pop, we went down to the lake and 00:32:00watched the silver dollar fish. Tanner Brown came along and said, "Come on you gals, let's take a boat ride." The people who owned a resort had a boat that they took people out in. There were seven of us women ─ Tanner wasn't with us. When the boat came, it was a small boat and one of the women was quite heavy. I believe I was the youngest of the group. When they got in I said, "I am not getting in. It is overloaded. Look, the water is almost to the top now." Tanner 00:33:00looked at me and said, "Come on Jensen, don't get chicken. Go on with them". I said, "Alright." So I got in and [Lillian] Hill and I sat in the middle seat. They put the heavy lady right up in the front and the rest of us were in the boat. After we [were out] a little ways, we sensed the danger. The boy [who took us out] was only fourteen [years old] and it was a motor boat.

[END OF TAPE ONE -- SIDE ONE]

NH:I could see the other side of the lake. It was only about 300 feet across. I had in my head that the minute we [were] into shallow water, I was going to get out of the boat. Instead of him going to the shore he turned in the deep water 00:34:00and started back to the shore. Of course, the boat lifted. We didn't jump up or become hysterical, the water just came over the boat and we went down. They didn't see us [as] they were all visiting and talking on the shore. We were about 200 yards out. Brother Circuit was our toastmaster for the trip. They were all at camp telling stories and talking. A lady was walking with her husband and she saw the boat tip over. She left her husband who had heart trouble and ran. "There is a boat over in the lake." Right away, they thought of us and ran out 00:35:00there. There we were with hats and purses floating in sixty feet of water. I know that Brother Hill's wife passed completely out because we held her by the hair of her head [with] our feet under the water until they got to us. She said, "The Lord knew what He was doing when He caused me to pass out because I would have drowned all of you. I would have floundered."

There was [some] beading around the edge of the boat and the large end went up. We held on to the beading. They got [small] rowboat to come out to us. Then they [decided] it [would be] too slow, so they came out with a motor boat. We had 00:36:00taken up with a collection to have a paper printed of our trip. One lady had about $9.00 or $10.00 in change in her purse and it [was] wrapped around her thumb. It finally went down and she screamed until she couldn't scream [any longer]. I watched Brother Circuit come to the shore and strip down to his garments and come into the water. When he got to within fifteen feet of us, I said, "Please don't come any closer, please don't touch the boat Brother Circuit. Please don't touch it." He said, "Sing! All of you sing." I thought: he is crazy! What have we got to sing about? [Laughter]

Anyway, we all got out of there. I could see Brother Wood telling us that we would get home safe. I say, never say that you can only go down three times 00:37:00because I went down with Lillian, Roy's first wife, on top of me. We went over and over and then finally came up. I had trouble with my throat and thought: if I [start] choking, I am a goner. However, they [came] to us and the heavy lady was out in the middle of the lake in the rowboat when we all got to shore. [I don't know] how in the world she ever got in there, but Sister Colke was sitting there by herself.

We had a lady, Sister Walters, with us who was seventy-two years old. She had swallowed so much water that they worked and worked with her. We had a lot of testimony bearing when we got out. When they took us to shore, there were two 00:38:00doctors. They took us to Missoula, Montana and put us in a nice hotel. The doctors and two nurses in our group told us that we had swallowed so much water that we could easily have pneumonia, so the doctors stayed with [us] until we got to Missoula and watched [over] us.

In the meantime, my daughter's [Marjorie Jensen] girlfriend picked up [the] newspaper and read where a bunch of ladies were out in Lake Five, became 00:39:00excited, stood up in the boat and the boat went over. [That] was the amount of [the story]. They called and said, ""Marge," your mother was out in the boat and got so excited that she jumped up and the boat tipped over." [Laughter] That was all they heard about it, but they knew we had all been rescued. I will never forget President Woods telling us we would get home and we made it home.

I was the first one to get out [of the bus]. We had [a] motel [six] miles out from Salt Lake [City]. We sang songs and [bore] testimonies there on in. We had such a lively time going and coming [back] it was very, very quiet. It was a faith-promoting experience.

When Richard was nine years old he, had [inaudible] fluid pneumonia that gives in a bag. The only way they can take it out is to draw the pus out. He had a rib and a half taken out. His doctor, Warren Sheppard, took care of him. His daddy decided if we took him to California for a couple of weeks it might rest him. So we took a trip to California. Coming back, he was very sick. When I got home, the first thing I did was give him a bath. [I] noticed a lump on his back almost as big as a potato [inaudible]. We called the doctor and he said that the fluid had come back [and] the only way [to relieve it] would be to take out another 00:41:00rib to get to it. I said that the last time [he had a rib removed, it] left his heart so bad [that] I don't think we [will] have it done. He was pretty well disgusted with me.

Sister Steed lived at the Sharon Apartments and they were temple workers. She had told me that if the fluid ever gathers again I will tell you something that would dry up fluid and you give it to him. She said [to] take a teaspoon full of spirits of varnica, it is very poisonous, and put it in a glass of water and give him a spoonful in water every three or four hours. It dried up the fluid. When he was so bad my husband said, "Why don't you go ask Sister Steed what that 00:42:00is? I will take you up there." So he took us up and carried Richard up the stairs where they lived and then went [to his] job. I said, "I have forgotten what you said to [use to] dry the fluid. Richard is bad again and the doctor wants to operate again." She said, "Sister Jensen, we have a man, Brother Smith from Idaho, who is blessed with the gift of healing. Would you like to have [Richard] administered to?" I said, "I surely would." There were about seven elderly ladies in the room sitting around a table having a bowl of bread and milk. She said, "I will go and get him. His son is with him and he is very fine."

So she got him and we all had [a] circle prayer and they administered to him. I 00:43:00never took him back to the doctor again for that trouble. However, I went in to pay Doctor Kirby for the x-ray pictures and his [Richard] shoulder had filled up again. He said, "How is the boy?" I said, "He is a lot better. He is outside in the hallway. He is afraid of the x-ray machine [and] won't come in." He said, "You bring him [in] and tell him I would like to take a fluoroscope picture and see if [the fluid] really has gone. It can't go out of the lung unless it is operated on or drawn out with a needle." I finally went out and talked Richard into coming [in]. He could stand up and they took a fluoroscope. He said, "What 00:44:00doctor did you go to? Who took care of him?" I said, "I haven't had him to the doctor." He said, "What did you do?" I said, "I don't know what your faith is, Dr. Kirby, but I am LDS [Latter Day Saint]. This boy was administered to by a man blessed with the gift of healing." He said, "Well, miracles do happen."

People who lived in the Twenty-fourth Ward in the Liberty Stake, where I was secretary of the genealogy committee, [knew]. [It] went all around the stake about Richard. He was quite a long time getting better. One time, when they drew 00:45:00the fluid out, his heart flopped [while] his daddy was holding him. [We] remembered Brother Green living across the street and he was there. They immediately administered to him. Before the administration, one doctor told me that as long as he lived he would wear a permanent drain. Now [when] you see Richard, he is a little stooped and there is a reason for that. Otherwise, he has fairly good health. So I have many testimonies of the gift of healing.

I remember when I was [very] sick. I pleaded [with the Lord], if You [will] just let me live until my family [is grown] ─ because I was the one responsible for the family, not their daddy. I felt like both children [were] going to church 00:46:00and I didn't have any trouble with them. The youngest boy came home from Sunday school one morning crying and said, "Daddy, let's move away from this house. Let's move where there isn't any church." [Laughter] [Now] he is president of the Elder's Quorum in Holiday [Salt Lake County, Utah] in one of the wards there and they are all good workers.

FH:How many children [did you have]?

NH:[I had] four [children]. I feel like the Lord has blessed me. "Bob" said to me one day, "You know mom, Betty and I often talk [about] it; nearly all of your brothers and sisters were married in the temple and nearly every one of them 00:47:00[their children] have had troubles, divorces, [or] married out of the church." One boy filled an honorable mission and then left the church and [became] mixed up with the Church of Aaron or whatever it was. Now, he has left it. He was [once] a stake president. He left it and you know how long it takes to get back into the church when you get out under those conditions, so I imagine he is waiting to get back in after serving an honorable mission.

I have been blessed beyond [belief]. I would never have any complaints. If I could just feel better, I would like to go to the temple and work. I could never deny the gospel.

FH:Tell about your courtship.

NH:I went [dated] with good Mormon boys. I went with a returned [LDS] missionary. His mother was so determined that I marry him, but I just couldn't be [forced]. [Laughter] Then I went with Mr. Jensen. [We] met in April and were married the following January.

FH:What happened to him?

NH:It was eighteen years yesterday [October 17, 1950 when] we buried him. My daughter [and family] in Idaho are great hunters. They sent word down that my husband, my son-in-law's father and another man should put in for an elk 00:49:00[hunting] permit. So they [did] and Mr. Jensen was the one who drew out of the three. He worked all night getting the heat in here, this place was new then and we were putting the heat in. At 4:00 [a. m.] he got "Bob" up and said, "We will go now." They were to meet the Pederson's and the rest [of the group] in Nephi [Juab County, Utah]. They were going up into the hills by Mt. Nebo [south of Utah Lake in Juab County, Utah]. I said to him when he left, "Don't you know you have worked all night and haven't had any sleep?" It was Friday the thirteenth. I said, "By the way, it is the thirteenth [so] be careful." He said, "Momma, 00:50:00next year I will buy a little trailer and you can go along." He left and the next time he came in the house was in a casket. The boy went with him and they stopped in Cedar [City, Iron County, Utah] and had breakfast. I think they were in a jeep and I think maybe he dozed at the wheel or had a heart attack. He weighed 265 pounds and had bad high blood pressure, but we don't know [if] he had a heart attack or went to sleep. However, [his] right ear was severed and he lost the fluid from the brain. They called for an ambulance from Beaver [Beaver County, Utah] or Cedar [City] and they didn't have one. So they had to come from Cedar [City] and pick him up. It was between Beaver and Cedar [City] where the accident happened. He lived three days, but he never regained consciousness.

After he had been dead [about] a year, Dr. [Wilford J.] Reichman met me on the post office steps. [He] said, "When are you going to have the work done for the "fat boy"?" [Inaudible] Dr. Reichman thought quite a lot of Niels, so did Persian Nielson. I believer Persian would have converted him ─ he went to church with us all the time. By the way, when the first granddaughter was born, he went up on the [platform] and assisted during the giving of the name.

There were some [events] that happened that we paid no attention to. A year to the day that he died, Richard was baptized for his daddy. Near the day that he was buried, we had his [temple] work done. The children had all been to the 00:52:00temple. They were all eligible so they came from Idaho and around. We all went to the temple and had the work done. I was told by a certain party here [Joseph Fielding Smith] who thought a lot of Niels that it would not do any good to have the work done for Niels if [he] hasn't received it here.

I [served] three years as stake missionary on the temple grounds here. I worked in the bureau. We used to sell books. President [Harold Stafford] Snow came in one morning and was checking the books to see what he should order. I said, "President Snow, I would like to ask you [a question]. Niels will have been dead a year in a few days and I have been told by a certain party that it doesn't do any good to have [their] work done. I would like to ask your opinion." He walked 00:53:00across the floor several times with his arms folded, [then] turned to me and said, "Sister Jensen, our gospel is a gospel of repentance. I would immediately have [his] work done." So I called his children and it was done just like that.

[TAPE RECORDER TURNED OFF]

NH:In 1936 my mother was sixty-six years old [when] she was called on a [LDS] mission to the British Mission. She labored there under [the direction of] Hugh B. Brown. President Brown told her, at that time, she could stay with [a] brother, who became very wealthy. He had spent most of his winters in Australia. Then he [went] to California and [his] last winter he lived in Utah. When mother was called to England [on a] mission he was so thrilled about it. His boy was 00:54:00killed in the service and he told mother, "I want you to have the work done for Harry." Although Uncle George was not a member he said, "I want that work done for Harry." The work [has] been done for all of them now, as far [back] as we can get it. However, when she was on this mission, the war [World War I] [started] along about then. She came home the day I left on a bus for Canada for that [boat] trip. If she had [been] home a few hours earlier she would have probably been on the boat with us. She filled a very successful mission and was measured for gas masks because they evacuated the elders at that time. My mother can bear a testimony.

When her brother came to visit from England in March we took them to Zion [National Park, Washington County, Utah] and Bryce [Canyon National Park, Garfield County, Utah]. We couldn't go to the Grand Canyon [National Park, Arizona]. When she [was on her] mission, they had her go to a single ladies party and she told them about Zion [National Park] and Bryce [Canyon National Park]. She said they were just spellbound. I said, "I don't doubt it, mother. I don't doubt it because I know how you tell things." [Laughter]

Uncle George was a Thirty-third degree Mason. When we got to Zion [National] Park, he stood and looked at the massive walls. She [Harriett] said, "George, what are you going to tell them when you go back to England?" The tears rolled down his face. He said, "Harriett, what can I tell them? How can I describe it? It is wonderful!"

I used to take him around and show him the country. Aunt Sarah, [his] wife, was with him and would sit in the back seat. In England they drove on the different side of the car as we do, so he didn't ask very much about driving the car. One day, going out towards Saltair [Salt Lake County, Utah], I said, "Uncle George, if you really want to drive this car, come on and get in." [Laughter] So he got in on the wheel side and he had a terrible time. [Laughter] Finally he said, "I 00:56:00think you better drive because this doesn't look right to me." He said, "I want a book [about] Brigham Young's history. That must have been a most inspired man." [Auntie] sat in the back seat and said, "Now George, let the dead rest." [Laughter] He said, "You have all the resources in the world in this country. You should all be wealthy." He couldn't understand why we [weren't and] why we had to wait for payday to go [to the store]! [Laughter]

FH:What you did [you do] when you were growing up to have a good time?

NH:In the wintertime we went sleigh riding. President [Heber J.] Grant's half brother lived in Wyoming. Aunt Lucy [(Stringham) Grant], his wife, was our Sunday school teacher. He had quite a family of old maid daughters. Alta [Grant] later married. She was our Sunday school teacher [also]. She really laid the law down to us. [Laughter] Aunt Lucy was a wonderful teacher.

Uncle Jedediah [Grant] [grew] beets. I remember going at 4:00 in the morning and the big old beet rack [would be running]. All the rest of them [would be] down there thinning beets [and] blocking them. I could do an acre a day while my brothers went swimming and skinning toads. [Laughter] We worked twelve hours and 00:58:00could get $8.00 an acre. That went a long ways in my home toward helping to fix it up because we were just poor people. But that didn't hurt [us] in those days.

FH:In those days $8.00 was a lot of money.

NH:You worked for it though, you blocked and thinned an acre of beets. I don't know what it would cost [pay] now. Then in the summertime we used to go to the canyon on picnics. There was always some [activity], not everyday like now, [but] maybe twice a month. My dad's people lived in Cowley [Wyoming] and after church we would drive five miles over to Cowley. I remember that I would walk home after school on Friday night [and] do the washing, ironing and clean up the 00:59:00house because mother had poor health. She didn't have very good health when she raised her family and I was the oldest of eight [children].

We had a colorful life; we worked. I remember one time in particular that I [became] pretty hostile with my brother. I was going to have some girlfriends [over on] Sunday afternoon after meetings. We put up our ice in those days with straw, big blocks of ice [that were] three or four feet deep in the river. I had made a big freezer of ice cream and I hid it behind the organ, of all places. When I came home from meetings, they were all sitting on the front lawn; my oldest brother [George Drewery Eyre] brought his boyfriend home for a big keg of ice cream. That was the kind of brothers I had! [Laughter]

My oldest brother was a joy, really a joy. The second brother [Lowman Drewery Eyre] was a little straight-laced. They called him "Honest John", but my oldest was a joy to have. Mother used to make tea cakes, she called them, at 4:00 in the afternoon. He would have tea cakes and hot chocolate. I don't care where he was in the field, he always [was] home for tea cakes. He would grab mother around the waist and swing her around. We had a [very] happy life.

When the folks [family] accumulated at our place, we did singing. The youngest brother [Rear Alonzo Eyre] had a beautiful voice. Mother said she prayed for a singer.

CE:Dad had a good tenor voice.

NH:Yes, dad had a good voice and mother sang pretty [well]. I had an inward goiter operation that took my voice. I didn't sing very [well], but I was in the 01:01:00choir anyway. We had good times.

FH:Did music play quite a part [in your life]?

NH:Yes. I said to Richard one day, "We all sing in the choir and we never hear a tune hummed in this home." My brother was always singing [in our home]. He never complained of poverty or hard times.

FH:You have an organ. [Do] you still play [it]?

NH:I make a racket, but we have always had a piano and organ in the home. We traded chickens, squash and what-not for the first organ. We were the first on 01:02:00the river to have an organ. My mother sold San Francisco [California] disaster books [about the earthquake] in 1906. We had an old [inaudible] incubator and we just [had] it set when mother [started] selling books. I was ten years old so that must have been 1904. [She would have been twelve years old because the earthquake was April 18, 1906.] I ran the incubator. Out of 120 eggs, we hatched 110 chicks and my pictures [was] in some farm magazine with the incubator. [Laughter] Then we fussed around with bloody chickens. We all helped make a living. I worked for $3.00 a week and could [bring] home a week's supply of groceries.

FH:Have you enjoyed reading?

NH:A lot! I just finished reading the history of one of the apostles.

CE:[It was] Hank.

NH:Did you read it?

CE:Yes.

NH:He had a colorful history. [Laughter] He must have been a most wonderful man.

I worked in the Primary here in the First Ward and my daughter said to me, "You know, mom, I have a book pf yours that was given to you by the Primary officers." I said, "I don't remember [the book]. I remember working in the Primary." She said, "It has about twenty-five names on it. It is the history of Jacob Hamblin and Wilford Woodruff and a few of them. I was in the presidency and in the Relief Society in [the] Long Beach [California] Stake, [inaudible] 01:04:00Ward. There was only one ward and one stake then. We had a nice time. We lived there a year and I worked.

Bishop Giles was the first to get me [to go to] the temple. When Richard was six years old I was working in the Primary. [Bishop Giles] said, "You know they are letting women go to the temple if their husbands don't belong [and are not members]. All you have to have is a letter from your husband." Niels said, "I don't know why you shouldn't go." So I went to the temple. I did quite a lot of work. I worked [with] the Bonneville Stake genealogy getting names ready for temple sealings. We used to take forty of us in a group [in] two rooms. I had 01:05:00two missions in the Bonneville Stake and I took part in the 1930 Centennial. President [Heber J.] Grant gave us credit for a six month mission.

FH:That means you [served] three missions.

NH:Yes, I [served] three missions.

[END OF TAPE ONE -- SIDE TWO]

NH: ─ on a farm in Lovell. We lived there for about six years in a log house and then dad decided to build us an adobe house. He made the adobe [bricks] and put a roof on ─ it was on a slab. We sent to Sears, Roebuck [and Co.] and bought some pretty wallpaper. We papered the rooms and they did look pretty. 01:06:00Mother bought window shades with a nice design across the bottom and fringe. We had good furniture because we sent it from Ogden. Then the rains came, first the wind blew and disturbed the roof. I was scared to death. I thought for sure the roof would go [down]. There was some [sort] of deficiency [in the] the way the roof was [put] on [and] the water came down the wall and washed the wall paper off. I was sad over that, but we [had] a nice home after that. [Laughter] We [had] a [very] nice home in town after that.

Our home life was a happy life. We didn't have a lot of troubles. My oldest brother ran away from home. I don't know if he ran away or not, but he left home and [went] somewhere in Montana riding the freight trains. A [young fellow] with 01:07:00him stuck his head out the window and the next train took his head off. He was ready to come home. He [George Drewery Eyre] is a very good church worker now. He has been in the bishopric and is on the High Council now, but when he came home he had this cute song about cigarettes. It about broke our hearts.

When [World] War [I] broke out, we were married and lived in a [very] comfortable home. All the rest of the family was home. To keep the boys from going into the [military] service, she moved to Otto, Wyoming, right out in the sticks. [Mother] bought a farm and moved the family there. My oldest brother worked [very] hard to move us all. After he got us all settled, he turned around and went back to Lovell and enlisted. He was the very first one to enlist in the service in that town. He went through some pretty tough fighting. He was with 01:08:00Judge Cox, [his] buddy in World War I, and was wounded. He [was] in the hospital [for] eight months in France. He came home and recuperated [at] Fort Lewis, Washington. He [became acquainted] with a Catholic family [and] the girls were good to him. They treated him fine, but [when] he came back to Lovell, he came to live with us. When he went to bed at night, his gun was under [his] pillow. [We] never dared to open his door [because] he would jump up quickly with [his] gun. He went through a lot. He is seventy-two [years old] now. He was hit in the head with a heavy crane that lifts heavy [materials]. Talk about being healed 01:09:00through administration and good doctors. His eye was pushed clear in and his nose was flat. Doctor Eley put the bones back in his head. He still has trouble [and] rubs his head. He has a lot of trouble, but he is cheerful with it.

FH:Now tell about your children.

NH:I [have] never had any trouble with my children. The girls went to South High School in Salt Lake City. They were quite close. They look like twins and they always went to church. They didn't know anything else because I had worked in Primary and Relief Society. I was the block teacher for forty years.

"Marge" came home one day to see if it would be alright to go out with a certain 01:10:00boy up the canyon to a chickaree. I said, "I guess so "Marge." You know, I don't think he belongs to the church." She said, "Oh mom, it is just [to] go with him." When they came home she said, "I don't want to go with him. He just wants to neck all the time."

We bought a lovely home on Fourth East and Nineteenth South and we lived [by] the Green family. They had girls the age of our girls and I remember how they saved their money to go to Como Springs [Morgan County, Utah] when school was out. "Marge" met her husband there and that is the only boy she ever went with. They were married in the temple.

FH:[What is] the name of your first daughter's husband?

NH:[Her husband is] Charles J. [Jedediah] Little from Morgan, Utah. His great uncle was [Feramorz Little who served three consecutive terms as] the mayor of Salt Lake City [beginning in 1876].

We bought the camp out north of Salt Lake [City] and put in cabins. We moved to a hotel and then went to [the] motel out of town. [Harriett] Louise [Jensen], [the second daughter] had been going with a boy who was going to the University [of Utah, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake County, Utah] studying to be an engineer. They are the ones who have the beautiful home. He called to see if she would come and go to Thanksgiving dinner with him [at] his aunt's [house]. I don't know where his folks were. She turned to me and said, "Mom, is it alright if I 01:12:00go with "Stan" to his aunt's for Thanksgiving dinner?" I said, "Yes, Louise. You please yourself, but remember, we have had a sad [situation] in our family." I never missed the priesthood until after I married; then it was a calamity in my home, not having the priesthood. Richard was the first to hold the priesthood. You don't know how grateful I was when he was ordained a deacon. She said, "Mom, if you don't think I should go, I won't go." I said, "No, you please yourself dear, you are old enough." She turned and said, "Thank you "Stan", but I don't think you should come out any more." There wasn't any talking about being old enough and it being her business. She just said, "No, thank you, "Stan."

We moved to where we had built the cabins in north Salt Lake [City] and were in a new ward, the Orchard Ward. The next Mutual [Improvement Association meeting] she met her husband, Edward Ted Pederson. She waited for him while he went on a [LDS] mission. They live in Twin Falls, Idaho.

We moved to Long Beach and the dampness [bothered] Richard; then we moved to Phoenix, Arizona. [Louise] worked at the dry dock at Roosevelt Bay [Lake, Arizona]. The girls couldn't understand why she would wait for a missionary. They had never heard of anything so funny. [Laughter] There were very few 01:14:00Mormons [there] at that time, nearly twenty-five years ago.

I remember when she quit to come [home]. He called on his mission and said he didn't know when he would be released. "They are a little undecided when they will release me." The next thing we knew, there was a call from Salt Lake [City], "Louise, I am home. Where are you?" You couldn't get transportation to [travel] on the buses. We put in our application for her to come home and the Negro porter helped her get on the bus. He said, "Come on, you may have to 01:15:00stand, but you are going." [Laughter] She said, "I am supposed to go home to be married." I had got my recommendation and Richard had his so we came for the marriage.

Richard had his two years in the [military] service. When he came home he met Jessie Anderson and then he went on a [LDS] mission. Elder Marvel used to tell me, "We come in the room and [it's] Jessie, Jessie, Jessie." She is a very fine girl.

FH:How many grandchildren do you have?

NH:[I have] nineteen [grandchildren]. We had twenty, but one [grandchild] drowned in the pool. Richard lost a [young] boy. They are pretty good children. Louise's boys didn't go on a mission as I expected they would, but they went to the 'Y' [Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah County, Utah] and if they were called they would go. [Louise] saw a beautiful lace handkerchief the other day on sale for her oldest daughter. [She] said, "Mom, I will buy this for Susan's marriage, [although] I don't know when she will get married." [Laughter] However, she is teaching at Granger High [Salt Lake County, Utah] this winter. 01:17:00[She is a] lovely girl. They are lovely grandchildren. I don't have any complaints, only I am grouchy. [Laughter] If I could just feel better.

FH:What would you like to do if you could do what you wanted to do the most?

NH:I have told Richard many times that I would like to work in the temple if I could hear, [and] help somewhere. Sitting is a little hard on me, but that would be my desire to finish my days working in the temple. She is the genealogist [her sister].

FH:There is one thing that we have missed, we need to have you tell about your second husband.

NH:Oh, Bishop [Roy M.] Hill! [Laughter] After they took "Bob" in the service, I 01:18:00was alone here at the camp. After [Niels Peter] Jensen died, we had sold the hotel. The man who bought it was deferred so far back on his payments that Persian Nelson closed him out. I put Richard and Jessie there and I stayed here. [I] had mother with me, but couldn't handle it alone so I sold it and [bought] a lovely home on Lake Street in Salt Lake [City] on a payment and a second-hand store business.

In the meantime, I met [Roy M.] Hill. His wife [Lillian Hall (Jones) Hill] had died. She worked in the temple for twenty-nine years. She was a wonderful woman. 01:19:00They never had any children, [but] they adopted a girl when she was nine years old and raised her until she was married. Otherwise they never had children; he would have liked to have had a family and so would have she. She was a Jones and was born in Cedar City and settled in Bunkerville, Nevada. Their three boys [her brothers] work in the temple all the time. Two [live in] Delta [Millard County, Utah] and the other one is hard of hearing [and] lives here in one of the [small] cottages. She came from a fine Jones family and he came from the Hills over by Gunnison and Fayette [in Sanpete County, Utah]. [He] was an ex-bishop 01:20:00when I married him.

FH:How did you meet him?

NH:He was in the real estate business in Salt Lake [City] and I went to see him about a piece of property. When we took the place back, we sold it for a pretty good price. I had always wanted to invest and Mr. Jensen had left me well-provided for. I had always wanted to be on the money end of the deal. I wanted to make money and Brother Hill's first wife was very religious. She never worked [outside of the home]; I had always helped bring in the living [income]. I had met him at the real estate office. I had known Lillian very well; we had 01:21:00worked in the stake genealogy together, but I had never seen him around. When we went on the trip to Cardston, Canada, he was the one who promoted the trip and she [was the one] who decided that I should go even though I had moved out of the Fourteenth Ward and was in the Orchard Ward. She kept after me to go so I went with them; it was called the Good Will Trip. I remember when we got to Helena, Montana we went into the city [and] county building [where] they were giving us maps. The lady there missed a certain map and she accused one of us of taking it. There were fifty of us in the group, two busloads and believe me, she 01:22:00got all her literature back quickly! [Laughter] We gathered up everything and handed it back to her. I bet she has often thought of that because there are a lot of Mormons up there now. Montana was hard on the Mormon people. [It was] mostly [the] Catholics.

When I was seventeen or eighteen [years old], mother and I went to Billings, Montana and took the [children] to school. Mother thought we could take [in] boarders and we did. We made a little money and spent the winter there. The [children] went to school. I was out of school and we got a house and took [in] roomers and boarders. My brother took us up in a covered wagon [laughter] and went home and helped dad on the farm. Farming wasn't very good. At that time we 01:23:00bought our first piano. We came home with a few rugs and [things] that we had earned through boarders and helped fix up [our] home. But I had always worked and been in business, [so] this is a hard time of my life.

FH:How long did you live with [Roy M.] Hill?

NH:We were married in March 18, 1953. Niels [Peter Jensen] died in October 1950. [Roy M. Hill] died [October 4, 1963]. The lady at the rest home said if you come to visit him, it kind of upsets him. The neighbors went to visit him and [he asked] if they had come in for conference. They said, "No, Roy, we are your 01:24:00neighbors." He said, "You are in for this great conference. Where are you staying?" He had two sisters die before he did. He said, "Pearl and Rhoda are coming for me at this great conference." He died October 4, [1963].

FH: This happens to quite a few people.

NH:Yes. He said, "They are coming for me at this great conference." Richard took me to the funeral. I wasn't very well, but Richard took me.

FH:I think you have had a lot of fine experiences in [your] life.

NH:I have had a lot of hard work. I have [worked in] a lot of apartments, hotels, motels, cafés and pleating shops and have done everything. [Inaudible]

FH:You are well-qualified to give counsel to your descendants and bear your testimony to them.

NH:I am like Nephi and came from goodly parents. I know the gospel is true and I know if I live it the way I should that there is a reward for it. All I live for now is to meet my family and my loved ones. I know we will meet them. I don't worry about that, but they tell us now that we can't go up to see them. They 01:26:00have to come down to see us. [Laughter] My mother and father and all [the people on] my father's side and now, my sister [Callie], are doing genealogy. She is doing mother's genealogy.

President [Hugh B.] Brown said that the blood of Israel was weeded out of the European country, but it seems to be springing up again because they are converting them over there. We have several of our first and second cousins of the younger generation [who] have come into the church that wouldn't listen when mother was there. Although, when she was on her mission, President Brown said, "You are old enough to stay with your brother. You don't have to stay at the mission home; you can stay at your brother's home." So she spent most of her time with her brother. He was wealthy, had a lovely home and was very nice to 01:27:00her. I do know the gospel is true. I am not much of a speaker. I don't get up in public very much, but I do know the gospel is true. I couldn't deny that. I have never regretted [becoming a member]. I have a very nice family and the in-laws are just as dear to me as the rest of my family.

I hope that we can live good enough that daddy will accept [the gospel]. Richard came to me [about] a year after his dad died. He woke me up at 5:00 in the morning and said, "Mother, I know dad has accepted the gospel. I have seen him and I know he has accepted it." Louise said, "Daddy is a lot different than he 01:28:00used to be." Although he was never very against it ─ other than a few little things that happened around ─ [and] they notice those things, which is sad. It doesn't bother me what they do. I am like my grandfather. I had an uncle who didn't like to pay tithing. He said, "How do I know what they do with the tithing money?" [My grandfather] said, "I don't worry what they do with my tithing money." I don't either. I just get [pay] it in, that is the main thing. It doesn't bother me.

I know the gospel is true. I have been healed many times for I have had a lot of illness. I know that we don't depend upon the elders like we used to, which is sad. We [used] to depend upon the elders absolutely. I know that we run to the doctors. Doctors are fine, but the priesthood is wonderful. [Laughter]

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NH:Both my boys married lovely girls from St. George, Utah. Robert [M.] married Elizabeth Cyprus, a very fine girl. They were married in February 1953. Then he went into [military] service and spent two years. They live in Salt Lake City and have a fine family. She is a lovely mother.

I guess I have told enough. I am always grateful for the many blessings I have received and know the Lord has greatly blessed me. I thank Him every day of my 01:30:00life for it. "Bob" said to me one day, "Mother, I often wonder how you raised us all and got us to the temple like you did." I said, ""Bob," remember that it takes a lot of praying to raise a family. I try not to bother the Lord too much now because I because I bothered Him too much when I was raising you children." [Laughter]

[END OF TAPE TWO -- SIDE ONE]