Morgan 2: Harold Morgan, Part II

Other Nephi highlights:

For several years my Uncle John Linton operated a large ranch near the little railroad town of Juab, about 15 miles south of Nephi. My brother, Lynn [Richard Linton Morgan, about two years older than Harold] and myself were often invited out there to spend three or four days. Here I learned to ride and drive horses. It was great fun.

My uncle and his wife, Eliza, had a large family, seven girls and one boy. They were fine people. We also used to go out there to skate in the winter. Hundreds of acres of meadowland would be covered with ice one to three inches thick. I also used to visit at the homes of my aunts, Julia Crawley and Alice Ovard in Eureka, which was about 35 miles west and south of Nephi. Their husbands worked in the lead, silver mines. On one occasion I was allowed to accompany my uncle, Joseph Ovard to the 700 foot level.

For a number of years following the death of my father of typhoid fever in Preston, Ida. Aug. 14, 1894 and her return to the home of her parents in Nephi my mother clerked in a department store. She was quick at figures and was well liked and respected by all who knew her. She had great faith in prayer and fasting.

During her marriage, my father was away from home a great deal attending to business and church duties. Being a polygamous wife, my mother was forced to move frequently to avoid arrest by federal agents, who were seeking evidence against my father. I remember my mother telling that on one occasion she carried me in a water bucket from the home of one friend to another. My courageous father must have led a charmed life during these years as he was never arrested though he went about freely attending to business and church affairs.

In the 1890’s he built one of the finest hotels in Salt Lake City. He also established the first business college in that city. Many of the later leaders of church and state attended his school. A bronze bust has been erected on Salt Lake City’s Main Street, at the front of the college site. He was an excellent penman and authored a number of missionary tracts for the church. A number of these are still in use. [The best-known was “The Plan of Salvation”, still in use into the 1960s.]

One of the saddest Nephi periods was when my mother decided to take her three boys and move to Arizona. She felt that here they would have greater opportunity and also have the guidance of an old friend, David K. Udall, then president of the St. Johns Stake, who had lived in Arizona for many years. He had two wives and 11 children. His second wife, Ida Hunt Udall, was a close friend of my mother. [Mary Ann Linton Morgan married David K. Udall April 9, 1903, in Preston, Idaho. They were married for time only by Matthias F. Cowley.]

We were accompanied to Arizona by our old Nephi friends, David and Rebecca Udall. I shall never forget that train ride from Nephi to Holbrook, Ariz. My mother was in deep sorrow, torn between what she thought was her duty to her boys and her duty to her aging parents. The closest relationship existed between she and her mother. In fact the Linton family felt close to their mother. This was in contrast to the feeling they had for their father. I remember him as a strict disciplinarian who had little tolerance for childish play and pranks. During much of the time we lived with my grandparents, he was afflicted with rheumatism and in the winter would sit in the corner by the stove reading the Bible. He was an excellent gardener and a man of strong will and purpose. He lived to be 87 years old.

On arrival at Holbrook were met by President Udall and his wife, Ida. The following day we journeyed in a white top carriage to the little town of Hunt, 20 miles southwest of St. Johns, the county seat of Apache County. [Harold was turned around like many others in St. Johns. Hunt is to the northwest.] This was to be our home for the next 12 years.


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To be continued...

The photo of the John and Eliza Ann Linton family is from lintonfamily.org.
The photo of the Utah mine is from flickr.com/photos/lamzydivey/3006443545/.
The photo of Mary Ann Linton Morgan is from a pedigree chart. The photo was carefully trimmed. I don't know of any other photos of Mary besides this one, the one with her three boys which was in the last post, and one other which I will eventually post in her bio.
The next photo is John Morgan.
The photo of trains in Holbrook is from flickr.com/photos/scottash/589313620/.
The photo of David K. and Ida Hunt Udall is from Arizona Pioneer Mormon. (Link to entire book on sidebar Family History Links as "David K Udall.")