Latest Doings

Dear Loved Ones,

I thought I would let you know what I have been doing the past couple of weeks.

On Saturday, August 14, I attended a Smith Family Reunion at the Pavilion at Scera Park. It was wonderful to see some of my cousins. Some of those present were Mona Lue and Ron Ward, daughter of my aunt Mona; Alice and Rhett James, granddaughter of my aunt Edna; Mark and Dawn Smith and his brother Warren, sons of my uncle Howard. Warren very recently lost his wife to leukemia. Keith and Zona Smith, son of my uncle Don. There were also some children and grandchildren of these cousins. Gina and John, and Mary and Greg were there. David and his little boys were also present. It was so nice to visit with everyone.

Afterward, I went to Alicia and Brian Gates’ daughter Aspen’s baby blessing. It was held in their home in Cedar Hills and she was blessed by her father.. It was nice to see Melissa, Salem and Daniel besides Alicia and Brian. Their little girl is beautiful and their little boy darling and getting quite big. Syl and Brent, Mary and Greg, and their son Dee and wife Denise and boys were also there.

On Thursday, August 19, I drove to California with Mary and Greg to attend the wedding of young Jerry and Kim’s daughter Tara. We went in my car and Mary and I drove she in Las Vegas and L.A. and I in the desert areas. Greg has been having little seizures so he didn’t drive. We stayed at their daughter Becky’s home in Riverside. She and her husband Todd have a darling family: Ethan, Ava and Andrew. Ava gave up her room for me.

Saturday we drove to Newport Beach to the Temple. It is one of the smaller temples with limited waiting room space. Some people waited in the Stake Center across a small street, others outside. We all put on plastic white booties to enter the Temple and Sealing Room. It was a lovely ceremony with Tara’s father and her husband’s father as witnesses. Ryan Terry is her husband. Some of those attending were Gina and John, Robyn Brown (who drove for Gina and John), Mary and Greg, Jerry and Caryol, Jenae and David, Mitchell and Grace, some Tolman cousins, and grandparents and many friends.

After the ceremony and pictures, we went to the Olive Garden Restaurant and had soup, salad and breadsticks. I sat by Jerry (the older one) and across from Jerry’s nephew and his wife. They were very interesting people. He had served a mission in Germany and had met a young girl, Monica, and when she came to the U.S. to LDS Business College, they became very good friends and eventually married. He travels a lot, mostly to China and told of his adventures there.

Between the Temple and the reception we went to Sonia Williams’ home and had a great visit with her. Gina, John and Robyn stayed at her home.

The reception was held in the Valley View chapel where Sylvia and Tricia had their receptions but they never would had recognized it. Jerry and Kim had already moved to Idaho so they had a professional decorate and what a great thing it was. There was a white gauze gazebo built in the foyer with a large white sleigh to hold the presents. The doors into the cultural hall were covered with white gauze and a huge garland of multicolored flowers were over the door. There were gauze streamers with lights coming from all points of the room to a large chandelier in the center.. The walls of the hall were also covered in white gauze and the basketball backboards too with baskets of flowers in the hoops. The area between the chapel and cultural hall was also draped in the gauze.

All the people that were at the temple were there plus many more. Paul Tolman, his brother Tyler and wife and kids, Warren and Dorothea Williams and kids, Becky and Todd Nelson and kids, Dana and Ana Tolman, Sonia, Dana’s daughter Nancy and son DJ were also there. It was a very nice affair.

Sunday we went to Church at Becky and Todd’s ward where he is the bishop. He is a convert of 10 years and a very nice fellow. That evening Warren and Dorothea and kids came to visit, also Randy and Tammy, Mary’s youngest came to visit.

All told, it was a very nice visit and I got to see lots of family. Monday, we drove home and it was so nice to have a lovely place to come home to.

That’s what I have been doing.

More Mission

One of the special things during our mission was taking a sister to the Denver Temple. Connie Hanson was a member, a widow, but didn’t know anything about the church. She had joined when she married her husband who was a member. We went every week to her home and taught her the discussions, then continued visiting with reading the Book of Mormon with her. She loved to have us come and would treat us to lunch or dinner in various restaurants. She would have taken us every week but we couldn’t let her do that. It was a real thrill to go to the temple with her. One of the sisters in the ward, a good friend, was her escort.

One of the missionaries, Elder Malufau, had been Leon’s 7th grade student in band in Monument Valley when he taught there. Small world.

We visited Wildhorn Ranch where Mark Knight, a member of the ward, was the caretaker. The ranch encompasses 350 acres. It was developed in 1929 by a stunt man in the movies. It is a three-story lodge with many bedrooms and a game room in the basement. It has a restaurant-style kitchen and a large dining room. The outbuildings consist of a carriage house, two honeymoon cottages, and several guest rooms in a motel-like layout. There is also a large caretakers cabin where Mark lives. In the 1930s and 40s many Hollywood stars were guests there. John Wayne was one. It is said that once, as he was the worse for drink, he shot a rifle from the living room into the upstairs wall; the bullet hole can still be seen. Esther Williams was also a guest and a swimming pool was built for her use, now in disrepair. After we came home from our mission, a huge wildfire burned the lodge to the ground but the caretaker’s cabin was spared.

Towards the end of the year, Leon started to get sick. We finally realised it was from the mold in the windows in our bedroom. We were able to move into a two-bedroom trailer with washer and drier. It was very nice to be more private. We later learned that the old landlords redid all the windows in the apartment, getting rid of the mold.

Our Stake Mission Leader, when they used to have them, was Mark McConkie, son of Bruce R. McConkie. We liked to visit together. He would comment that our two great great grandfathers, Hyrum Smith and F G. Williams, had been companions.

One P-day we were able to visit a gold mine. The Ward Mission Leader was an engineer there and invited us. It was quite interesting. It was located just outside the town of Cripple Creek. We saw an, explosion; they broke up rocks, then leached the gold out with cyanide. They did say “Fire in the Hold” just before setting off the explosion. It takes tons of rocks to get a little bit of gold but it is worth it. The trucks had huge tires, more than double my height.

When it came time to leave the mission, the ward held a farewell dinner our last Sunday, just after our meetings. We had met so many wonderful people and they had all been so kind to us.
Rob came to help us move back as we had too many items to all fit in just our car. We appreciated it very much. When we arrived in Mt. Pleasant, I wanted to get to the house so we could unpack all our furniture and things stored in the shed. To my great surprise and delight, everything was in place in the house. It looked so good! What a blessing families are!!!

I’m back!!!

We were told, that as missionaries, we should give service. We went to the public library and offered our services. We read the shelves, meaning we checked the stacks and put books back in alphabetical order. I also typed W-2 forms for library employees. We quite enjoyed doing this but our Mission President’s wife said that we shouldn’t do service for an institution. That put an end to that.

About the only time we saw other missionaries was when we went to Colorado Springs for Zone Conference. We were really on our own. When we had a candidate for baptism then the District Leader would come and interview him or her. The Stake President, in Colorado Springs, would occasionally have our zone meetings at his home. His wife would provide a great breakfast. Usually those meetings were held at a local chapel. It was the missionaries’ custom to sing “As I Have Loved You” to the sisters that prepared the luncheon as a thank you.

We met many interesting people. We visited part-member families, inactive members, and families with children who had not been baptised. We were instrumental in baptising eight children and two adults. One interesting baptism was of a child, a daughter of a woman who had been a member, then married a Muslim. She had three children, a boy and two girls, and decided to leave her abusive husband and escaped from Saudi Arabia. She became active in the church again and her nine-year-old daughter was baptised. Leon had her bus driver, who was a member and good friend, do the actual baptising.

We only got stuck once in the snow, even though our home in Woodland Park was 8,500 feet in altitude and some of our members lived at 10,000 feet! We were driving to give a lesson to a nine-year-old and got stuck by the side of the road. After a few minutes, his father, noticing that we were late, came looking for us. Luckily, he had a strong tow rope and pulled us out of the snowy ditch.

In April, 2001, on a Thursday, I started to have pains in my back, really hard ones and I began throwing up. Leon and a member gave me a blessing. Friday I felt o.k. but went to a doctor and he didn’t find anything. Saturday, I started hurting badly again and went to a clinic. I was told it was probably my gall bladder and that I would have to make an appointment in Colorado Springs the next week. I couldn’t get in to see a doctor until Friday but when I did, he put me right into the hospital. The zone leaders came by and gave me a blessing and on April 7th, (our wedding anniversary; I had had a heart attack April 7, 1997, dangerous date!!) I had surgery. The doctor had to make a very large and long incision because he told me my gall bladder was gangrenous! That really surprised me as the only pain I had felt was just the week before.

David and Alan drove to Colorado to visit me in the hospital and it was so good to see them. But they kept making jokes and it hurt to laugh. Rob and Erika and family came to see us later in the year. We took them to see the old gold mining town of Cripple Creek. They have lots of casinos there now. I t was always great to see family. Alan and Peggy and family also stopped by on their way to Tricia’s in Albuquerque for Thanksgiving. Mark and Sharon and family also stopped a couple of times as they were driving to Utah from St. Louis and back. David also stopped by another time. We loved seeing all of them.

Beginning of Mission to Colorado

In 2000, Gina retired from her work and wanted to have Mom live with her and John. They already had John’s mother living with them. We drove down to Mesa in the camper thinking Mom might want to stretch out and rest but she sat up in the back all the way. Gina and John have a nice big condo with two bedrooms upstairs, one for each mother, and bedrooms downstairs. Also two bathrooms upstairs and one down.
Leon and I were feeling quite free and decided to send in our papers for another mission. We requested the Family History Center in SLC but our call was to the Colorado Denver South Mission with headquarters in Denver. We found a woman who signed a lease to rent our house for the 18 months we would be gone. I didn’t want Sylvia to have to worry about our house. We spent a few weeks living with Alan and Peggy while we attended the classes at the MTC. reporting December 12. Lauren very kindly gave up her room, which had its own bathroom. We had to be in Denver just before Christmas so we loaded up our car with computer, printer, small TV (David traded our larger TV for a smaller one with video player) and kitchen things and our clothes. We were really loaded down.
Our Mission President really didn’t know what to do with us at first. For two weeks we stayed in an apartment some missionaries had used in Englewood, a suburb of Denver. The financial secretary, he and his wife were senior missionaries, got sick and we thought we would take their place but it didn’t work out. Then in the new year, we were sent to live in Woodland Park, a city about 18 miles west of Colorado Springs. Way up in the mountains, elevation about 8,000 feet. We were surrounded by beautiful pine trees with a view of Pike’s Peak.
Our first apartment was upstairs in a four-plex. It had two bedrooms. After one night in the first bedroom we moved to the second as you could smell the cooking from the oriental family living right under us. We had a washer and drier just outside our door, coin-operated of course. The back of the apartment overlooked the football field of the local high school. We noticed a kitchen chair in a tree in the back yard. Leon got it down and we used it in our apartment.
The Woodland Park Ward welcomed us very warmly. The Bishop was Gary Hasson who had a beautiful wife Melissa. He had filled his mission in Brazil. Her father is Iranian and her children and she have beautiful black eyes. The Second Counselor was Gordon Reynolds. He and his wife Janis had a beautiful home he built out in the pines outside the town of Lake George. Our ward extended over a large part of the country. It took an hour to drive to the fartherest member’s home. We had many wonderful ward members; they were very kind to us.

Life Goes On

Our first great grandchild was born 14 August 1999, Alexandra Lynn Barlow, daughter of David and Elann. This is Sylvia’s first grandchild. We had a five generations picture taken with Alexandra (Alex), David Barlow, Sylvia Barlow, Barbara Honey and Corraine Williams.
Ashley and Tanner, Nancy’s children, spent a few days with us. Leon helped them make little step stools. They helped putting them together and then painted them. They wore Leon’s old white shirts to protect their clothes. I think they quite enjoyed that.
We had another great family Christmas party at the church. This year, there was no heat! It was cold!!! Some problem with the furnace but we had fun being together. Lauren was the director with Becky assisting. Peggy did the narrating. It is always fun to see the grandkids take part.
We finished a kids room in the basement and then had grandchildren paint pictures of Winnie the Pooh and friends. Pooh was painted by Ashley (10), Kanga by Stephanie (8). Laura (5) painted a flower, Tanner (7) painted E-yore and Piglet by Michelle (11). Rachel (10) did Tigger, Zack (7) and Hannah (3) painted a ball and another Pooh was painted by Katie (9). Michelle also painted "Pooh’s Corner" in different colors. Leon drew me a grid on the walls and I drew the figures. It is a fun room for the kids with a little table and two chairs and a toy box.
This year, 2000, saw three graduations: Jenny with a Master of Library Science from Clarion College, PA; Russell Romriell and Chris Barlow from high school.
We traveled again to visit Tricia and Mark. At Tricia’s Laurisa played her clarinet for us and on Mother’s Day, the Romriells brought me breakfast in bed! We always enjoy the pool in Austin. We then visited Mark and Sharon in St. Louis. They now have five children with Rebekah being the youngest. We drove to Kansas City and met Leon’s cousin, Letha Sormanti. She’s descended from Burton Honey, Barsuma’s brother. We also met a granddaughter of Burton’s. It was nice to connect with these distant Honey cousins.
We visited the old Ellsworth cabin in Payson. It was built by Leon’s great Grandfather, German Ellsworth. Five children were born in it. I can’t imagine how the family lived in that small house. It now is used for storage. German built a nice larger house for his growing family.
A distant cousin and her husband now own the property.

Last of Honey Relatives trip

Sunday, 9-12. We called and found out the time for Sacrament Meeting and attended one of the several wards in Syracuse. We felt right at home. That is one of the great things about the church, you have instant family wherever you go. We then abandoned the freeway and drove along the Mohawk River in the Mohawk Valley. This was a key place in the Revolutionary War and one of Leon’s ancestors, Cpl. James McTaggart, joined the Kings Royal Rangers of New York, 2nd Brigade, a part of the Loyalist army. He had leased a farm there in the valley prior to the outbreak of war. It is a beautiful drive.
We visited William Johnson’s Hall. He had been the commander at Ft. Niagara at one time and was a powerful influence among the Iroquois nation. After his wife died, he married Molly Brant, an Indian woman and had nine children. His hall was a large, two or three story home surrounded by acres of land. He died just before the Rev. War and his son John took over and organized the Loyalists from his area. From there we drove into Schenectady to see where Leon was born. As we got off the freeway we saw the very large General Electric complex where William Honey, his father, had worked. Not too far away we found the house still in good condition and the neighborhood still very nice. We spent the night in Albany, NY.
Monday 9-13. We drove into Massachusetts to the town of Watertown, now a suburb of Boston. This is the place the Honeys are first mentioned, in 1687. We were very disappointed; no historical markers visible and the streets were very narrow and crowded. The probably hadn’t changed since colonial times. We did go to the city library and obtained a map of early Watertown and some information but not much new. We spent the night in Leominster, MA.
Tuesday 9-14. We went to the town of Dunstable, MA, on the NH border, another town where early Honeys lived. The countryside was beautiful, heavily wooded and the town sort of meandered alongside the road. No big city center. We visited three old cemeteries but found no Honeys. We were told there are many unmarked graves. I really enjoyed the beautiful countryside. We drove to Concord, MA. They have a very good Visitors’ Center and museum which explained about the battles at Concord and Lexington. We walked the path to the North Bridge, many times replaced from the original, and saw the statue to the brave Minutemen. The town of Concord is old with many colonial homes, very well maintained.
Wednesday 9-15. We drove down to Fall River, MA on the coast of Rhode Island Sound off the Atlantic, thus completing our trip from sea to shining sea. We visited Battleship Cove, where the USS Massachusetts battleship is anchored, also a destroyer, a submarine and two PT boats which were on display. We climbed all over and inside the battleship and submarine and wondered how sailors could find their way around the battleship, so many little corridors, or on the submarine, how they could sleep on top of the torpedoes. The rain from Hurricane Floyd started falling that evening, fortunately, not hard.
Thursday 9-16. We drove into Vermont and visited Pomfret, which consisted of Pomfret, South Pomfret and North Pomfret. Joseph Honey had lived there with his family for a number of years and had several plots of land there. The town were very small, if you blinked, you missed them. All very green and beautiful. Visited the local library but found nothing new on the Honeys. We then visited Sharon, VT, the birthplace of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Very nice Visitors Center. The people there had large umbrellas for us to use as we walked around.
We then drove to Whitefield, NH to visit more Honey cousins. We were warmly met by Tom and Haleen Dieterich; she is descended from Randal Honey, Barsuma Veness’ brother. They have a lovely large old farmhouse they have refurnished. One wall had pictures of different family members and some interesting items, such as Henry R. Honey’s glasses (he is Randal’s son) also a large picture of Joseph S. Honey. They had a copy of his obit., also copies of a letter in his own hand-writing and made copies for us. We spent the night in Franconia, NH, about 20 miles from the Dieterich’s at an Inn. It was still raining cats and dogs and part of the parking lot was flooded. The TV went out because of the storm.
Friday 9-17 we started back home, arriving 9-22. Everyone we met was so gracious and considerate. We wish we could have stayed long enough to really become acquainted to learn more of Leon’s cousins Pero algo es algo (but something is better than nothing.)

More Honey Relatives trip

Wednesday 9-8. We drove to Akron, OH, and visited Leon’s first and only cousin on the Honey side, Margaret Raynor Warren. She lived just a few blocks from our motel. Leon has pictures of a visit her family made to his family when they lived in Schenectady, NY, when he was a little boy. The family only visited together one other time, in 1947 in Cleveland, OH. Her mother is William Honey’s sister Doris. We also visited the next day with her and her son Kenneth Warren. We saw lots of family pictures.
From Akron we drove to clarion, PA, about 100 miles away, to see Jenny, our granddaughter. She is getting her Masters in Library Science at the University in Clarion. It was great to see her and to see where she lived, ate and studied.
Friday 9-12. We decided to trade Canada for LDS Church sites. We had originally planed on driving up into Ontario and seeing where his Loyalist ancestors lived but it sounded like a good trade. We drove to Kirtland, OH and toured the temple there. It is now owned by the RLDS church and they maintain it very well. When I mentioned that my 2nd great grandfather was F.G. Williams, the guide said "you are standing on your grandfather’s farm." The Church has a good relationship with the RLDS’; they let the mission president hold testimony meetings inside with the newly-arrived missionaries, We saw FGW’s picture and also Rebecca Swain Williams’ picture in their Visitors Center. We visited the Newel K. Whitney home, which is our Visitor’s Center now, and his store. We drove out about a mile to the Isaac Morley farm, a distant relative of Leon’s, and learned many interesting things. Our next stop was about 30 miles away to Hiram, OH to the John Johnson farm. We couldn’t go inside as they were renovating it. We then drove to Buffalo, NY and it was late at night when we arrived. We got confused trying to get off the toll-road and went through the wrong gate, the one that pass holders use, so we didn’t pay our toll. We expect to receive a fine in the mail any day now. (We never got one!)
Saturday 9-13. We drove to Youngstown, NY on the tip of the Lake Ontario and the mouth of the Niagara River. It was a beautiful view of the lake and one could just barely make out Toronto on the other side. My 3rd great grandfather, Isaac Swain, had lived there and in 1836 had built a beautiful three-story cobblestone house. It was built on the foundation of his earlier home burned by the British in the War of 1812. That earlier home was built on the battlefield of La Belle Famille which took place between the French and British in 1759, during the French and Indian War. We went to the town library to found out where the home was located. We were sent upstairs to the Historical Society and two little old ladies were so happy to see us and happy to know I was related to the Swains. They copied pictures and information for us. One of them, age 96!!! drove us out to see the home. It had originally been called The Willows but there are none growing today but was surrounded by lovely trees. It was a beautiful home and the owner let us come in and see the parlor and take a picture of the original fireplace.
From the home we drove to see Ft. Niagara. It had originally been French, then British and finally American. It has been restored to its French days. The drawbridge has the inscription Porte des Cinq Nations , Gate of the Five Nations to favor the Iroquois Confederacy. LaSalle had first built a fort at this location in 1678, then another was built in 1687. It too was abandoned. The permanent fort was built in 1725. From there we drove to Palmyra. The Church, from aerial surveys for the exact location and dimensions, has reconstructed the log house where the Joseph Smith Sr. family lived and where Joseph received the visit from the Angel Moroni. The original large white frame house the family later lived in was there though an extensive renovation program was going on inside to return it to its original configuration. We walked into the beautiful Sacred Grove, no one else was around, but someone on the other side of the grove had a boom box going playing loud music which spoiled the atmosphere. I was so disappointed! We drove the four miles to the hill Cumorah. We thought the hill would stand out more but there are many hills in the area. It was a little larger and very beautiful. There is a lovely Visitors’ Center. We then proceeded to Syracuse, NY for the night.