Grandma’s History

I was born in Logan, Utah on my parent’s 5th wedding anniversary, “many years ago.”  My most vivid memories start when we moved to St. George.  I was in kindergarten, at recess, and I wanted to swing and they were all occupied.  I told a little Indian girl to get out of hers.  The next day her Dad came to school, dressed in his Indian headdress.  He scared me to death…enough said!

My Dad had been in the grocery business as a manager for Safeways.  He met James Pinegar from Provo, who had fruit to sell for the store.  Mr. Pinegar also had a farm to sell, and Dad really wanted to be on a farm again, like when he was a boy.  So we moved to Grandview, which was way out in the country back then, in the spring.  We were raised in the city and to be put in an old house farm house with NO running water was not very easy.  To bathe us, my mother had to draw water from a well in the backyard, heat the water on a coal stove, and put it in a washtub.

On Dec. 21, 1936 our home burned to the ground, but we were all safe!  We finished the school year in Logan while my Dad built a new home for us.  We were a happy family and we had plenty to eat from the farm and gradually replaced our clothes and furniture that we had lost in the fire.

I went to school in Orem when we moved back into the new house.  Grandview was still in the county until I was a Senior.  My grade school (Spencer) and Jr. and Sr. High School (Lincoln) were on 800 S. and State Street in Orem.  We rode the bus to school and if we missed it, we had a 3 mile walk home.

World War II was difficult for everyone, but we did all right thanks to the food from our farm.  The government gave us ration books with stamps in them.  You could use them for food, gas, and some other needed supplies at the store.

I graduated from High School in 1945 and worked that summer in the office of the welfare distribution center in Orem.  I went to BYU for one year, and enjoyed it very much.  Then I met a young man named Jay, whom I liked very much.  Come to find out, my Dad had sold fruit and meat to Jay’s mother for her boarding house.  Jay and I got married on May 15, 1946.

Jay wanted to be a barber and own his own shop, so we moved to Salt Lake and started our married life there.  I worked in the office of a dress shop and we lived in a big old house, just north of the Salt Lake City temple.  After completing barber school, Jay owned his own shop across the street from the Scera Theater.

Six years later we moved to Provo, just south of BYU on 200 E., with our 4 month old baby girl.  What a joy she was to us.  We had waited a long time for her.  3 more sweet daughters would join our family.  Jay was in the Bishopric twice, so I didn’t see him much.  Our ward consisted of many single college students, 87 widows, and about 20 families.  I was called to be the Primary President for 35 children.

When my father died in 1968 we moved back to the farm and had Ted VanBuren build onto the old house.  My mother wanted to stay in the home, but couldn’t live alone.  I then went to work for Mountain Bell (Qwest) for the next 20 years in the Engineering department.  It was a very interesting place to work, because I love maps and we worked on large maps from Lehi to St. George.

My retirement came in 1987.  Jay and I were able to travel for two years around North America and also overseas.  On a return trip from the Southern States, Jay became ill.  He died within a week on May 7, 1989.  I’m so glad I stayed in my old home on Grandview Hill, where old friends are better than gold.  As many of you have stated, “it’s the best place to live.”

P.S. Midge Dawson Patrick is my older brother’s daughter.  Kristine Breeding now lives in her grandparents’ (the Dawson’s) former home where Midge grew up.  Karen Pinegar Smith’s home is on what used to be her grandfather’s farm.