Ella Shepherd was born September 5, 1886 to Lorenzo Tracey Shepherd and Sarah Elizabeth Clifton, both of English ancestry. Sarah Elizabeth was the only child of John Clifton and Ann Cook. Ann Cook was John’s second wife. Tracey was born to William Shepherd and Mary Ann Tracey in England and came to Paris, Idaho as a young man of nineteen. He met Sarah, they married and to this union thirteen children were born. Four boys and all six girls lived to maturity.
Ella was born in Paris, Idaho and except for a three year period spent in Montpelier, grew up in Paris. Ella’s father learned to be a shoemaker, the same cordwaining trade that was his father’s and grandfather’s livelihood. In England he also kept books for an estate called “New Forest”. Later in life he was a county treasurer, clerical worker and for many years a clothing merchant.
Her mother, before marriage worked for a Mr. Humphries, milking cows and doing housework.
Some of Ella’s first memories are of the early Sunday walks with her father, Louisa, just older, and other brothers and sisters. They would go to nearby Sleights Canyon, a meadow, or other places where flowers, birds and trees were seen and identified. Many secrets of nature were learned and a bond of companionship was formed.
Happy special parties were given with the parents supervising the younger children and their friends. Ella and Louisa spent much of their time together and while Louisa was quiet and often ill, Ella was plump and quite a “tom-boy”. When she was two years old she climbed from a low dirt cellar to a nearby shed and from there to the housetop where she straddled the roof near the chimney. She called for her mother to see her. Her mother, hanging clothes on the line at the time, was petrified with fear that she would fall. Will Shepherd, a cousin, was just passing by and was called to get her down.
She could outrun, outclimb and outplay most of her friends. Her cheerful disposition was her outstanding characteristic. Her mother described her as a laughing, vivacious child, always willing to take over tasks at home that the other children found displeasing. She was often given second best dresses because she was willing to give others first choice.
A Fourth of July celebration was remembered as a time she gathered wild roses to decorate the homes in town. At conference time, always a special event in Paris, roses and other flowers were worn on dresses and carried to the meetings.
As Louisa and Ella grew older they helped with the younger children. One of their regular duties was to rise early in the morning and help wash and iron. Washing was a task which meant carrying water, rubbing clothes on a washboard and keeping a hot fire going so the clothes could be boiled. During the wintertime snow was melted in a sixty gallon wooden barrel kept in the kitchen. The water was then dipped and poured into the boilers on the stove.
The flatirons were heated on top of the stove which was kept hot by wood and sometimes the bark gathered from nearby wooden pole fences.
Ella remembers an annual family outing called “Cat-tailing”. The parents and children would walk a mile or so east to the “bottoms” where cattails grew in abundance. Here the bed ticks were filled. The heads would then burst as they dried making a soft, silky, fluffy mass.
Fishing with the older boys Joe and Ed was an experience full of fun as well as profitable as far as food was concerned. When food was scarce, chubs and an occasional trout from the streams flowing in nearby pastures made good meals for always-hungry children. The catching of the fish was always the greatest thrill however, and she formed a desire for the sport that she carried into her later adult life.
Long winter evenings were spent playing games and hearing or telling stories. Ella relates: “Father would read from Shakespeare or Tennyson while the children would take turns combing his hair or braiding his beard. Apples, nuts, and at special times, candies were eaten.”
Christmas time with the ten children’s stockings hanging on a line was always a sight for Santa. Even though gifts were simple and often handmade, the time was full of joy as they were bundled and pulled on a sleigh and taken to Grandmother’s home across the road. Ella remembers the rag curls her grandmother made for each of the girls.
Food was always relished, and when her father was on a mission dishes used were made so as to stretch the meager food supply and still be made palatable to the children. Two kinds especially remembered were Lumpy Dick and Kettle Broth. For Lumpy Dick butter was rubbed into flour and then stirred into boiling milk and eaten as a mush. This was eaten almost daily while her father was on his mission. Good homemade butter came from Grandmother Clifton’s. Kettle Broth was made by adding butter or beef drippings to hot water, adding salt and pepper, then broken bread or stale crusts.
“Another inexpensive food was obtained when Joe, Ed or Oliver would go down to the slaughter yard where free liver, oxtails and other nonsaleable meats were obtained. The beef heads were brought home and skinned. The jowls and tongues were saved for eating. Occasionally we visited Grandfather Clifton’s, located two miles north of town, and a cured ham or a side of bacon would be dug from their storage place in the grainery wheat bin. Milk was had regularly and eggs quite often. Wheat was ground at the mill and a mush was made from the coarse and fine millings.
“Excellent gardens served well during the summer, although for early spring salads we used multiplier onions mixed with the tender emerging parts of the dandelions – always in plentiful supply – then vinegar, cream and sugar dressing. Later in the year the dandelion leaves, turnips and beet tops made good boiled greens.
“Mother was an excellent cook and catered to the English tastes of her husband. Some of the favorite foods were suet puddings, green peas flavored with mint and roast lamb and beef. Vegetables of all kinds were common in our diet. Kale, kohlrabi and cabbages were raised in our fine garden. A favorite dish was Yorkshire pudding baked underneath a roast so as to catch the drippings. This was eaten hot with the vegetables unless we needed a dessert when it was sprinkled with sugar and eaten with cream or milk. Meat pies, deep fruit pies and puddings were made on special occasions. All the girls in the family learned to cook The English way.
“At six years of age school was attended in the First Ward church house. Esther Ricks was my first teacher. Others later on were Paddy Miles, Oliver Dunford, Annie Osmond, Emil Maeser, and Laura Smedley. Both winter and summer school work was given. A church school was attended with Brother Maeser as an instructor.
“I had scarlet fever at age thirteen and also had most of the common childhood diseases.
“At the age of fourteen I went to Salt Lake City and lived with Uncle William and Aunt Emily Shepherd. They needed help and I was glad to go. Almost a year later our family moved to Montpelier, Idaho where we lived for three years.
“At age sixteen I took my first regular job with Uncle Joseph and Aunt Rose Shepherd. I lived with them in Paris and helped with the cooking and housework. I was still working for Uncle Joseph at the age of nineteen when I planned my marriage to Marion C. Clark.”
Ella continued, “At fourteen I had my first church job. I had some small children in a Primary class. William C. Robinson organized a chorus to which I belonged. Uncle Joseph Shepherd organized a quartette and often took us around the valley to sing. Members of the quartette were Uncle Joseph Shepherd, Jesse Budge, Lottie Nye and myself. I sang alto. As Uncle Joseph was Bear Lake Stake President we had many opportunities to sing at funerals and church meetings. One particular trip I remember well was when Uncle Joe took us to Cokeville, Wyoming by train. We stayed there several days while he organized a branch of the church with its many organizations.”
Ella remembers, “…singing duets with my father as the lead voice. I joined the Bear Lake Stake Choir at the age of fifteen. Father was choir leader and held that position for many years.
“My closest girl friend was Mary Roberts. We had many fine times together. Dancing was a favorite pastime with us. We had many boy friends, and Earl Peterson was one of my first.
“My meeting with Marion Clark occurred at a time I had gone to Montpelier with my brother Ed when he wanted to see his girl friend. I was sixteen at the time. We saw Woodruff and William Clark there whom I had become acquainted with earlier while living in Montpelier. We talked with them and they introduced Marion Clark, a cousin from Georgetown, who wanted a ride back to Paris. He had enrolled at a special missionary school at Fielding Academy. He was nineteen and planning an L.D.S. mission. He was to live in Paris for a few months. I got acquainted with him and he asked for a date for church the next Sunday. He walked me home afterwards and asked for another date. We went together until he received his call to the Northern States Mission.
“We were not officially engaged but we had an understanding and I waited until he returned when he took up the courtship again. We had written faithfully and there seemed to be no question about our plans. A few weeks after his return we had a date and when at the ‘Old Flume’ steps, stopped and asked, ‘When will we get married?’
“We waited until the next June, 1907, and on the fourteenth of that month were married in the Salt Lake Temple. When Marion asked Father Shepherd for my hand in marriage, Marion was told, ‘You are taking the sunshine out of my home’.”
Ella describes the trip from Bear Lake to get married and return as follows:
“Vernon Clark (Marion’s brother four years younger) took Louisa and me to Montpelier in a white top buggy. Stakes were driven in the ground to designate where the road was, as the bottom land between Ovid and Montpelier was flooded by the Bear River. We took the train at Montpelier and rode to Salt Lake City where we stayed at my brother Joe’s home and then went through the temple the next day. We visited Grandfather Woolley (John Wickersham Woolley) in Centerville and then went on to Farmington and visited folks there (Grandfather Ezra T. Clark and family). We then went on to Morgan, Utah where Marion had grown up, saw his half-brothers and sisters there and the old home. After two days there we went back to Salt Lake and on to Montpelier, Idaho. Vernon picked us up there and we went to Paris for about a week. While there Uncle Joseph and Aunt Rose Shepherd gave us a nice party. On the way back to Georgetown we stopped in Montpelier where Aunt Millie and Uncle Wilford Clark had an entertainment for us. When we arrived in Georgetown we stayed with Father and Mother Clark for about two weeks.
“We purchased some things in Montpelier and moved into our first home, an older home first used by Marion’s parents before they purchased their later home. It was to be our home for the first few years of marriage. It was a two room, unpainted home on the Georgetown Creek a half block north of Marion’s parents.”
Vernon, Marion’s brother says, “Marion worked for his father on the farm and did some custom work. He used a fine team of horses belonging to his father, and did quite well those first few months. He planned on building a mercantile store and spent time in the canyons getting logs out and to a sawmill so as to get lumber for the store.”
Ella was pregnant that first summer and fall and they looked forward to a child the next March. However, on a visit to Paris to see the Shepherd parents, a bobsled pulled by frisky horses and a daring driver ‘cut a shine’ as they arrived in Paris, the box on the sled tipped and Ella was tipped from it giving her a bump. That evening she had labor pains and the family doctor in Paris helped deliver a premature (7 month) three pound baby boy (Ellsworth).
After excellent care by Mother Shepherd and others they were able, after a few weeks, to return to Georgetown. Marion to his logging and farm work and Ella to her motherly duties.
The summer and fall of 1908 saw preparations for the building of a new store in Georgetown. Ella helped in many ways besides making the new home comfortable. She soon was taking part in the new town and ward activities joining singing groups and attending parties. Some of Mother’s best friends during these early years were the Hoff girls, Jennie, Inez, and Pauline. She was a part of the Young Adult Group that included Fannie Munk, Nettie Larsen and Louise Peterson. She and Marion were sought after for social occasions. Marion and Ella sang separately or together with groups and took part in dramatics and athletic events. Frequent trips to Paris were made to keep contact with the Paris family and friends. A close relationship was formed with Marion’s parents and family. They lived next door south and became a source of much help physically and spiritually.
The summer of 1909 was a busy one with the store being built, visits from brother Oliver and sisters from Paris. Preparation was also being made for a new arrival in the family. On August 10th Hazel was born.
Marion borrowed $100 from Joe Bee, $150 from the First National Bank and $150 from C. Wallentine. With this money he was able to start the store. He purchased a lot for the store for $100. After labor and materials were paid for the cost was $377.15.
When possible Ella would help in the store. Girls who helped in the store for different periods of time were Inez Hoff, Marie Clark, Jennie Hoff, Lucile Larsen, and other local girls.
Church jobs during the early years were with a girl’s class, (MIA), singing in the choir and a few years later secretary and then President of the Relief Society.
On April 21, 1911 Helen was born and home care for the young family became more demanding.
Recreational events were occasional trips to Paris, to Afton, Wyoming through Georgetown Canyon to see Gillette and Louisa Call, sage hen hunting trips with friends, fishing trips or picnics up the canyon.
Marion homesteaded a dry farm in Nounan, Idaho and a small house was built there so as to “prove up” on the ground. Some time had to be spent there to meet requirements of the Homestead Act.
Clifton Shepherd Clark was born March 6, 1913 and got along well for a month or so, but due to a kidney infection died May 13th. As we relate this event in the 1980’s we regret that the antibiotics of today were not known then. He is buried in the Georgetown Cemetery.
The old unpainted home used by the early family was small. One larger living room, a lean-to kitchen and a small narrow bedroom was cramped, with Ellsworth on a cot in the living room and Hazel and Helen in a small bed in one end of the parents’ bedroom. Plans were made for a simple four room bungalow next to the old house and nearer the creek. It was almost square and there would be two bedrooms, a front room and kitchen. There would be a small room off the kitchen for a pantry. It was finished before the arrival of Iris November 23, 1914. It was our “new house”, cheerful with its fresh white paint and roomier living rooms.
The old house was rented to a young couple for a year or so and then Marvin and Alice Clark lived there while they started their family. Both Floyd and Bruce were not only cousins to play with but were good friends for Hazel, Helen and Iris.
As the young family grew older Hazel was called on to tend the younger children, while Helen seemed more willing to help Mother in the house.
World War I started in 1914. Because of the need for food overseas there was a shortage of wheat for flour, meat and canned goods. Families were asked to observe meatless days. Potatoes were mixed with the flour for bread and oat and barley flour were substituted for wheat flour. Ella liked to cook and made excellent meals with help of garden produce from Father Clark’s garden. There was plenty of milk from cow’s kept at the Clark barn south of our house. Ellsworth soon learned to milk a cow and help on his grandparent’s farm. Julia and Marie were favorite aunts who took a special interest in the young family and Grandma’s place was a ‘second’ home for us children.
The store was a special place for getting many needed groceries. Marion worked early and late keeping the shelves stocked, going on buying trips to Montpelier and Salt Lake, as well as acting as a buyer of hay and grain which was then shipped to such places as Kemmerer, Wyoming and other points east on the Oregon Short Line Railroad. The store was important not only for a service it rendered as a dispenser of food, clothing and farm equipment, but was also a gathering place for many people to meet and exchange gossip, stories and jokes. (Lyle Bacon, Dick Payne, etc.)
Sundays were special times with Marion as Sunday School Superintendent and also choir leader for the Sacrament Meetings. The children attended classes held in the one room chapel where curtains were drawn as class dividers. Grandpa Clark often came over Sunday mornings to see if the Sacrament Gem and Concert Recitation were memorized.
Alma Hayes, and later, John M. Bee, Harrison Tippetts and Albert Bacon were Bishops remembered.
June was born June 1, 1917.
The flu year of 1918-19 was a trying one, but in retrospect an interesting experience. After school had started in the fall there was an increase in Spanish Influenza and it was epidemic in Georgetown as well as other parts of the country and world. After a month or two of school we were dismissed from classes and attempts were made to have no contact with anyone who might be carriers. People wore masks thinking they could keep away from the germs. Care was taken with food brought in also. Mother and Hazel became ill first, then all of us but Father were down with fever and general flu symptoms. Even though we stayed in bed a week or so I believe we were not extremely ill. Father cared for us well and had the help of a nurse who came to Georgetown occasionally from Montpelier. Mother and Grandmother Clark also helped a great deal. Hazel took a longer time to recover. There were no church meetings held until late spring. Several people died that winter and spring but funerals were not held. School classes were repeated again the next year. Father, in addition to his helping with us at home, kept the store open for business.
With war over and flu having run its course, home life got back to a more normal routine. With five children to care for and a busy husband buying and selling, Ella kept busy with taking turns at the store and helping in the Relief society. Times were hard; people had a hard time paying their store bills and Father had to do some sales work other than at the store.
Mother often visited with her parents in Paris and Louisa and Gillette Call in Afton, Wyoming.
Pleasant times were had when Mother and Father went on chicken hunts in Dry Valley taking Vernon and Bessie, Newell and Meta, Ellsworth and often Dick Payne. Mother liked to hunt and had special high boots and a 410 gauge shotgun. We took lots of butter and bread and then by gathering mushrooms in the area had great out-door meals of sage hen, mushrooms, home-made bread and lots of good spring water.
When possible, fishing trips on Blackfoot River, canyon streams or Bear River were made. Overnight camps were fun and were had at least once a year. Sometimes mother would take us kids and go down a mile or so from home to catch chubs and a few trout on the Bear River on Grandpa Clark’s property on the river. We used cane poles obtained from the stock of them in our store. As we grew older she would let us go on our own. She was always willing to make a nice special meal of the fish with our garden produce added.
Every summer we would go up the “lane” to the three acre garden spot where Mother would pick raspberries and currants. Excellent fresh raspberries from a jar and some good jam and jellies made her famous pies a real treat.
The late winter and early spring of 1920 Mother stayed nearer home as she was again pregnant and on March 26th gave birth to Gordon Shepherd Clark who was a welcome addition to a family where four older sisters were ready to care for and try to “spoil” him with their special care. Hazel at ten years of age was often given the responsibility of Gordon and the other younger ones, June and Iris. Helen was fast learning home skills and enjoyed helping Mother with cooking and cleaning chores.
As Gordon grew, Mother was able to take responsible ward positions in Relief Society and also helped often in the store until it was sold to Wilbur Bacon in 1928.
In 1927 and 1928 Hazel helped a great deal in keeping the store going as Father went on the “road” selling men’s clothes in Southern Idaho, Wyoming and Nevada. He was home for only short periods of time. Mother went with him occasionally.
The summer of 1928, I (Ellsworth) went out with him and we spent the fall and winter in Nevada mostly. I sold a Salt Lake knitting works line of woolens (ladies wear, blankets, etc.) and Father sold a men’s suit line. Mother, of course had her hands full with the family at home. In the spring Mother came with us and we visited in Northern California along with our sales work.
Times were hard. Ellsworth started school in the fall of 1929 (University of Utah) and stayed with the Nels Larsen family. Hazel also came to Salt Lake during the summer of 1929 and after a brief job with a Schiller family started working at Hotel Utah. She stayed with the Julia Wunderly family for a time. Helen was completing her senior year in Georgetown but had been to Salt Lake briefly a year earlier during the summer. Hazel also had spent a month or so in Salt Lake earlier with the Larsen family. She had come to recuperate after a bout with typhoid fever.
In the fall of 1930, the year of 1931 and early 1932 Ella spent much of her time helping her mother with an ailing father in Paris, Idaho. She also kept the home going in Georgetown with Iris, June and Gordon still at home. Grandpa Shepherd died April 30, 1931. The spring of 1932 and early summer Ella came to Salt Lake City and entered the LDS Hospital for an operation. She was 45 years old at the time. Ellsworth, Hazel and Helen, who were in Salt Lake going to school and working, were able to visit her often as was Marion whose sales work was in Salt Lake, Nevada and Southern Idaho.
Iris went over to Paris to help Grandmother Shepherd after Grandfather’s death – staying there until the spring of 1933.
Ella was in Salt Lake for Ellsworth’s graduation from the University of Utah in June of 1933 and Iris came to Salt Lake to work. June and Gordon also came to Salt Lake and moved in with Ellsworth, Hazel, Helen and Iris. They lived at 158 North Main Street, the Bodell (later Geneva) Apartments. Marion was also there when he was in town. Gordon attended West Jr. and Sr. High Schools.
Hazel married Andrew Sonzini the 10th of November 1933, leaving the rest of the family at the Geneva apartments. Our home in Georgetown was locked and our furniture, etc. left there.
In 1934 Helen, Iris and June continued working. Ellsworth, now engaged to Dorothy Smith, went on a short-term mission in December of 1933, returning in June. Then getting a promise of a teaching job in Geneva, Idaho, he attended the University of Idaho summer school at Moscow, and on August 29th was married in the Salt Lake Temple to his fiancé. He then spent a few days in the family home in Georgetown before moving to Geneva, Idaho where he taught school.
Iris worked at Payless Drug on 3rd South in 1936 and there met Harold Larsen. They were married November 10, 1937. They later moved to Tacoma, Washington.
Helen met Harold Gunnerson at the Kress Department Store where they both worked. Harold had lost his wife and had three girls 5 years through 11 years. They were married the 6th of May 1941 and moved to Clearfield, Utah.
During these years Mother maintained the home on Main Street (Geneva Apts.) where June and Gordon lived. Father was there when home from selling trips. June met Marion Turley in the 17th Ward to which they belonged and they were married on the 13th of May 1942.
Gordon spent the school year of 1939 and 1940 with Ellsworth’s family in Parker, Idaho. He joined the Idaho National Guard after high school graduation and later served in the Medical Corps. He met Betty Bowman while home on furlough and married her on the 18th of July 1944.
After June and Marion were settled in their home on South 11th East Mother and Father moved in with them. Grandmother Shepherd also came to live with them as she needed nursing care which Mother and June provided. Grandmother Shepherd went to Ukiah, California to be with daughter Alice; she died there on March 27, 1947.
After a severe heart attack suffered while working for Union Tailors in Salt Lake, Father died on the 6th of February 1949. Mother stayed with June until June and Marion moved to California then moved into a small home on Blair Street that Hazel had built on a piece of property across from her Blair Street home.
This became a place to visit often by all of us who lived in Salt Lake. Mother had a nice Hawaiian vacation with Gillette and Louisa Call. They also went on a Canadian tour. She also met often with her sisters Louisa, Flo, Lillie, Annie and Alice who came to Salt Lake for a week’s visit. They would rent an apartment at the Belvedere Apt. and visit and receive visitors such as Brothers Tracey and Ed, Gillette and Chester Call, and other relatives. It was an especially choice time as they met annually for several years.
During the fifties and early sixties Mother’s home became a center for children and a growing number of grandchildren who came to visit “Granny”.
During the spring of 1964 Mother had some light strokes and then, on the 4th of July, a more severe stroke which sent her to the LDS Hospital. She died there on July 7, 1964. After a very nice funeral service in the Central Park Ward she was buried in the Salt Lake Cemetery alongside her husband Marion.
Note: Early life notes were from Mother herself, Grandmother Shepherd and genealogical sheets. Her later life was remembered by Hazel, Helen and myself as well as the younger children, Iris, June and Gordon.
-Ellsworth [Marion Clark]-