In 1890 Ann Prior Jarvis sat down with a new blank book and wrote out a clean copy of her autobiography. She got 33 pages in and then never finished, so years later her daughter Josephine copied the rest of her mother's history from another book, added some biographical information, added a history of her father, and donated the book to the Washington County DUP.
DUP President Jeanine Vander Bruggen kindly sent a copy of the book along with biographies for the other women in the Eminent Women of the St. George Temple project, a project I'm planning to resume once I finish my book on the slaves in Utah Territory.
There is a copy in the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, and several years ago I added a link to the catalog entry. The link became broken over time and a Jarvis cousin wrote to ask about the document, so I added the entire autobiography to Ann's FamilySearch Family Tree Memories section, split into three parts since it's so large. (Look in the "Documents" section and click "More..." The three files are near the end.)
Ann Prior Jarvis: Memories
Here are images of the first few pages.
Beautiful neatly done handwriting, but unfortunately, unreadable. Are there plans to type it out and bind it for publication?
ReplyDeleteBeautiful neatly done handwriting, but unfortunately, unreadable. Are there plans to type it out and bind it for publication?
ReplyDeleteYes. I am currently transcribing and annotating the diary for publication. If you look in the left sidebar of this blog, see the Index entries "APJ Diary" and its variants. After I am done with my current book on African American slaves in Utah Territory, I will decide between returning to The Eminent Women of the St. George Temple project or publishing Ann's diary.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your interest in the project; Ann's diary is great source material for Utah and Mormon history.