AN UNFORGETTABLE MOMENT ~~~ Dorothy J. Buchanan First Place Professional Anecdote

Jack Summerhays came to Mount Pleasant like a bombshell. He was handsome, very bright, and he taught music like a master.

People were fascinated by him. He had an interesting personality and soon became friendly with the people in Mount Pleasant. The only thing was, he couldn’t find a place to live, and above all, he wanted a place with a modern bathroom. Few homes in Mount Pleasant had such luxury. He wanted a bathroom because he was a great bather! He finally found a house and was able to live with Mr. and Mrs. Auer Proctor in the east part of town. The house had a nice bathroom with a narrow, high window at the west side that really enchanted him. The word got around that he bathed in the night.

This was an interesting item for some of the teenage girls in Mount Pleasant, so one night a group of four or five of them got a ladder and decided to watch Jack at his bath. They had barely started up the ladder when someone made a noise and Jack heard it. Guessing that someone was eavesdropping, he called, “Come in girls, the water’s fine.” The girls were upset and quickly hurried down the ladder and away.

Although he left Mount Pleasant at the end of the summer, the story of Jack’s bath always brought a laugh. How do we know this story is true? The 91-year-old writer was one of the young girls!'

Jack was the son of Joseph William Summerhays, who crossed the plains in 1866 by covered wagon, and Mary Melissa Parker, who came to the Salt Lake Valley as a young child with one of the handcart companies.

This family established the well-known Summerhays Music Company.

(The above information came from Carol Jean Summerhays, a longtime music teacher in the Salt Lake City schools. Jack was her father’s uncle. Carol Jean remembers Jack as a fun-loving, rather dashing person. On his 95th birthday he sang for his guests in his still beautiful tenor voice.) 

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The following photos were found on Family Search and added by Kathy Hafen

CLEMENTINA MARION MORRISON ~~~ Pioneer of the Month January 2024 ~~~ First Wife of Ferdinand Ericksen

 Description

Inscription on back: Piano of Clementina Marion Morrison in the home of her granddaughter, Rowena Beatrice Proctor Spackman at Cardston, Alberta, Canada September 1982

Saga of the Sanpitch 1985 ~~~THE B.R.G.s Dorothy Jacobs Buchanan Professional Division Honorable Mention Anecdote

Also called "Girls' Night Out Club".

 

 Shortly after the turn of the century, a number of Mt. Pleasant young women organized a club called the Betsy Ross Girls, better known as the B.R.G.s. Their objective was to do needlework, as the name implied,, But I am sure that a great deal of sprightly conversation accompanied their stitching, for those young ladies were attractive, personable, and well-informed. They had a custom that each one presented a silver demi-tasse spoon to a member when she became engaged to be married. The name of the donor was engraved in the bowl of the spoon. As my mother was one of the first to be married, she received several of those precious spoons. I loved to polish them and read each name Often, my mother would relate information about those friends and some of their activities in the B.R.G.s. Subsequently, I married and had a home and family in Richfield. Many years later, I met a charming lady from Marysvale named Mrs. Etta Bertelsen. In the course of our discussion, she told me that her mother, Marie Syndergaard Long, was raised in Mt. Pleasant. I recognized her name as a good friend of my mother's and one of the B.R.G. girls. This discovery pleased us both. I then told Mrs. Bertelsen that I had a silver spoon with her mother's name, "Marie," engraved in the bowl. I could hardly wait to witness her happiness when I took it to her. The next time we met, Mrs. Bertelsen opened the conversation by saying, "And NOW, I have a silver spoon for YOU!" She handed me a spoon engraved with my mother's name, "Bertie." We were two delighted people — grateful that we were able, after those many years, to make that rewarding silver spoon exchange.

THE PROCTOR FAMILY ~~~~ From Our Archives

This is in Alice Hafen's Photo Collection.  It is a picture sent to her grandparents, Henry Ericksen and Wilhemina Morrison Ericksen in 1925.  Perhaps someone will appreciate this photo from the Proctor Family.

Judge Ferdinand Ericksen Obituary

Nancy Elizabeth Winchester Proctor Home ~ Researched and Compiled by Tudy Barentsen Standlee

Sego Lily Rebeckah Lodge ~ Active in Mt. Pleasant As Early As 1901

The Rebekah Lodge was the Female  Branch of the International Order of Odd Fellows.

The following was found at  the old Liberal Hall on the south side of Main Street.

The Rebekah and Odd Fellow Lodge that I remember was on the second story on 

the north side of Main Street.

N.G. stands for Noble Grand  (President)

V.G. stands for Vice Grand  (Vice President)

Auer and Clementina Proctor Family Photos

Auer and Clementina Beatrice Proctor (Bee)

They were part of the large LDS contingent that went to settle in Alberta in the early 1900s.

                                                       Elizabeth Proctor

The first settlers of Stirling, Alberta, Canada, came in answer to a prophet’s call. With the Mormon community of Cardston, Alberta, already well-established about sixty miles away, the LDS Church struck a deal with the Alberta Irrigation Company to send settlers and workers to western Canada in exchange for land and pay.

In April 1899, Church President Wilford Woodruff called Theodore Brandley, a Swiss-born bishop living in Richfield, Utah, to oversee the establishment of a colony of Saints in southern Alberta. Brandley and others were tasked with building the Galt Canal and then remaining in Canada to sustain the region’s new irrigation system. The first group, led by Brandley, arrived near the future site of the village of Stirling on May 5, 1899, and quickly set about building houses, digging wells, securing fuel, and establishing crops.

Further immigration was encouraged in Salt Lake with articles in the Deseret News that touted Stirling as a home of “good crops without water.” The piece declared one man’s success in producing ”fifty-seven bushels [of wheat] to the acre, with no irrigation water on it. That we think is hard to beat in any other country.”

Stirling’s settlers built the town using the distinctive pattern of Joseph Smith’s “Plat of the City of Zion.” The system featured roadside irrigation ditches and unusually wide streets laid out in a grid pattern oriented to the cardinal points of the compass.

By November 1899, the town was established and the canal completed, two weeks ahead of schedule. Roughly two years later, the town of Stirling was declared a village, in September 1901. Today, the Village of Stirling has a population of just under 1,100 people and is still home to two LDS wards. In 1997, Stirling was designated a National Historic Site of Canada and called the “best surviving example of a Mormon agricultural village.” 

 I also found a wonderful website for those wanting to know more about the Proctor Family called:

HOUSE OF PROCTOR

http://www.houseofproctor.org/genealogy/

1900 Photo from the Alice Hafen Collection

Here are the names as I read them:  Ethel Seely, Zella Seely, Maggie Reynolds, George and Mable Borg, Winnie Candland, Eloise Anderson, Fannie Candland, Vanetta Proctor, Hannah L. Frandsen, Bertha Nielsen, Bertie Madsen, Mary Miranda Seely, Etha Nielsen, Jennie Jorgensen, Botilda Madsen, Eliza Swensen, Mina Hasler, Marie Peterson, Maggie Ericksen, Blenda Matson, Annetta ???, Mr. and Mrs. A.R. Thompson, Alfred Nielsen, Emil Hafen, J.E. Jorgensen, Hyrum Nielsen, Jon Woodring, George Candland, Leo Candland, Arthur Nielsen, Walt Lund, Don  Omen, Azel Peel, Frank and Daniel Jorgensen, Byron Carter, Chris Beck, James Fechser.

Odd Fellows Lodge _ Unknown Year

Officers of Company D First Infantry N.G.U. ~ Deseret News 1907-10-26

OFFICERS OF COMPANY D FIRST INFANTRY N.G.U. 

The officers who appear above are the captain and two lieutenants connected with D Company in the first Infantry , U. N. G. at Mt. Pleasant.  The captain is L. P. Nelson, a native of Denmark, who emigrated with his parents at the age of four, to Utah, in 1874 inducting at Mt. Pleasant.  He early identified himself with the national guard inducting in C Company, First Infantry, before Utah became a state, C Company being the third organized at the time.  At the organization of the present D Company, at Mt. Pleasant, Nelson was chosen Captain.  It is claimed now that this command is the strongest of the militia organizations of the state.  During his captaincy, the company ... attended the encampments at Fort Russell and American Fork, carrying out the .......and other athletic honors at the latter encampment.  He is the central figure in the cut.

First Lieutenant William Hansen was born at Mt. Pleasant in 18..?.  He was formerly a student at the L.D.S. University, Salt Lake, and afterwards engaged in the mercantile business, .... at present head salesman and part owner in the Wasatch Mercantile Company, and is an enthusiastic member of the local fire department.  Lieut. Hansen was elected first lieutenant at the organization of D Company.  He stands at the left in the picture.

Second Lieutenant A. W. Proctor was  born in South Cottonwood , 18..? but  moved with his parents some years ago, where he graduated at the Wasatch Academy, and subsequently he spent two years at the Utah Agricultural College, where he received a good military training under Captain H. D. Styer of the Thirteenth infantry, now major in the Twenty-ninth, and was made first sergeant.  Lieut. Proctor is now in successful charge of a large farm left by his father.  At D Company chosen second lieutenant.

Proctor-Seely Wedding 29 September 1948

Proctor Family - 1925

This is in Alice Hafen's Photo Collection.  It is a picture sent to her grandparents, Henry Ericksen and Wilhemina Morrison Ericksen in 1925.  Perhaps someone will appreciate this photo from the Proctor Family.

Betsy Ross Girls

Also called "Girls Night Out Club".