Edith Nielson Brown

My Story

by Edith Nielson Brown

written when I was 16 years old.

I was born in the year 1946, on April 18, at Rupert, Minidoka County, Idaho. I lived in Burley, Cassia County, Idaho with my parents until I was about six weeks old. We then moved to Salt Lake City to live with my father’s mother. We lived with her from May until September. I was blessed June 2, of the same year by my Grandfather, Patriarch Moroni Lazenby at Manti, Sanpete County, Utah. In September, we moved to Union, (East Midvale) Utah.

When I was four years old, my father was in the National Guard, and during the Korean conflict, his group was called into active duty at Fort Lewis, Washington. My mother, sister, Elva, who was born January 17, 1949, and I moved there to be with him. We were in Washington one year. During that time we went to Seattle to see the first and second loads of Korean war veterans returning from active duty. We went to the ocean several times and also during that time, we saw a lot of beautiful country. While there, my brother, Clifford Lee was born on September 15, 1951 and Dad was released on October 10, 1951.

I started kindergarten at Union Elementary school in the summer of 1952. My teacher’s name was Mrs. Quinn. That fall, I went to first grade at Sandy Elementary School and my teacher’s name was Miss Adams. This was the first year the new addition to the school was used. I continued going to Sandy up to the fifth grade. My teachers were: 2^nd – Mrs. Swenson; 3^rd – Mrs. Sheattler; 4^th – Miss Irving; 5^th – Mrs. Sanchez and Mr. Middaugh. Mrs. Sanchez quit teaching around Christmas time. In the sixth grade, I went to the new Midvalley Elementary School, which had just been built that year. My teacher was Miss Johansen. The next three years I went to Mount Jordan Junior High School. In the year 1961, I started the tenth grade at Jordan High School. a school that is fifty years old. Jordan High took state in basketball the year that I was in tenth grade. I attended the new Hillcrest High School during my eleventh and twelfth years of school. It was completed in 1962 and is a beautiful, modern school, which was in walking distance from our home.

The summer of 1953, I broke my right wrist when the chain broke on our neighbor’s swing in which I was swinging. I had a cast on for six weeks.

I was three years old when the television was invented by Philo Farnsworth. We got our first television for Christmas the year of 1954.

Maxine was born on July 23, 1954 and Shirley on June 19, 1959.

I was baptized on May 2, 1954 by my father and confirmed on May 3, 1954 by my Dad in the Union Second ward, East Jordan Stake.

On our vacation in 1957, we went back to Washington to see the sights and my cousin Amy Beck and family. We went through Idaho, Oregon, and Washington on this trip. I enjoyed this trip very much. We went to see Grand Coulee Dam, also the Snake River and many other interesting things.

On our vacation in 1958, my family and I went to Roosevelt for a couple of days to see my father’s sister. During our stay there, it was Maxine’s third birthday and Aunt Thora took us to a rodeo, which was the first rodeo that I ever saw. When we left there, we started for Wayne County and on the way there, we went to Green River. As we were approaching the Capitol Reef National Monument, it started to rain. When we were about a mile inside Capitol Reef, we met a flash flood head on. Luckily, we came to a rise in the road, so we never got wet from the flood. We were trapped in there for three hours, with water on three sides of us and the other side was a steep mountain. It had stopped raining and we were waiting for the water to go down when it started raining again. So we just went through the water, which was still up to the running boards of our ’55 truck and drove straight home, without finishing our planned trip.

In the summer of 1958 and 1959, I went to Brighton MIA Girls Camp for three days each time. I really had a lot of fun both years. In 1959, my cousin, Beverly Jensen was my counselor up there, which made it especially fun.

I graduated from Primary on May 25, 1958, and we were presented our certificates in Sacrament Meeting, in which we sang a song entitled, “We Are Leaving Primary.”

The summer of 1959, I taught the Nursery group in Primary with my girlfriend, Linda Coulter. I enjoyed doing this and it gave me a very good experience. I gave it up when school started again.

In 1960, we went to the four corners, which is the only place in the United States where four corners of states meet. They are the corners of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah. I managed to be in all four states at the same time. We then went to the Mesa Verde in Colorado, which is some cliff dwellings of ancient Indians. We also saw the Arches National Monument. I really enjoyed this trip, especially the beautiful Mesa Verde.

In March of 1960, we got our new Chevrolet station wagon. It arrived on the 24^th (Dad’s birthday) and is a 1960 make and of copper color. In April of 1962, we got our new Chevrolet panel truck. It arrived on the 10^th (Mama’s birthday) and is a turquoise color and a 1962 model. We sold our green Chevrolet ’55 truck to Uncle Leland in February of 1962.

On November 27, 1960, I gave a talk in Sacrament Meeting for the first time. I was 14 years old. The talk I gave is found in the “Sacred to Me” section of my Treasures of Truth book. I was really scared, but I know it benefitted me, so that I’ll be able to give better talks in the future.

I got my first individual award on September 11, 1959, which was presented to me in Sacrament Meeting. I got my second award in September of 1960 and it was presented to me at a youth banquet which was held especially for giving out the awards. I received my 3^rd award on November 12, 1961 and it was also presented to me in Sacrament Meeting.

When I was in the sixth grade, I was chosen with four other students to be editor of the school paper. We put out four papers throughout the year, in which I wrote one of the editorials. This was very interesting work and I enjoyed it.

In the summer of 1961, I went to Woodland MIA summer camp, with our stake. I had a lot of fun like everyone else did. Linda Butterfield and I were the ward paper reports on what happened at Woodland. On the third day that we were up there, everyone was all packed and waiting for the truck to come and take us home. All at once, it seemed anyway, a forest fire broke out with leaping flames coming towards us. We all ran to camp and carried all the equipment and put it into the back of a camper and tried to get out of the area. As we were just leaving, the truck came and the flames became under control.

In the summer of 1961, I was in the Days of ’47 Pageant, “Valiantly Onward.” I was a choral reader and the pageant starred Loraine Day. It was under the direction of Glen E. Sacos. We performed it on July 24 and 25.

On April 8, 1961, my German class went down to the B.Y.U. for the FESTIVAL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES. We were gone the whole day and saw exhibits from the different countries and movies from the countries. We all took a test and I rated very good, which was the highest from our school. The ratings were superior – excellent – very good and good.

When I was in the ninth grade, the swimming pool at Mount Jordan was completed, so we had classes in swimming. At the end of our course, each girl had to pass a test and in so doing, received a little card and a Red Cross pin saying we passed the Red Cross swimming course. I passed the intermediate swimming course.

At my promotional exercises from the ninth grade, I was on the honor roll. I was privileged enough to be able to give the closing prayer at the promotional ceremony.

In 1961, our family went to see Dinosaur Land, which is in Vernal, Utah. This is very interesting to see these prehistoric animals.

The winters of 1961 and 1962, I was in the floor show of the ‘Gold and Green Balls of our stake. Mrs. George Apostle taught us the dances. I really enjoyed being in these dances.

I have really enjoyed my mutual teachers, especially my second year Beehive and My Mia Maid teacher. They are: 1^st year Beehive teacher – Mrs. Ethyl Wilson; 2^nd year Beehive teacher – Mrs. Madonna Biesinger and Mrs. Rose Tapp. My Mia Maid teacher was Mrs. Betsy Meidlinger. We have had some really fun times together.

The girls in our ward played volleyball during the winter of 1961-62. Then in the summer of 1962, we played soft ball. We were under the leadership of Betty Newbold, our sports director. We all really had fun and enjoyed being under leadership.

I was in tenth grade when the first manned satellites were orbited.

The day school let out in 1962, I was playing baseball with the neighborhood kids. I ran up to catch a ball and it hit the end of my middle finger and broke it. I wore a splint for three days.

We went through Capitol Reef National Monument again in 1962. But we picked a day when there were no clouds in the sky. We found the exact spot where we were trapped and piled up some rocks there.

Our vacation in 1962 was to Yellowstone National Park. We left on July 2, a Monday and got there at 4:00 pm that same day. We saw about seventeen bears and two deer. The family camped two nights in Yellowstone, one night in West Yellowstone and the next at Lewis Lake.

We saw all the sights, but those that impressed me were Old Faithful, and the earthquake area. They have left the area just as it was after the earthquake of 1959, so the people may see it. It must have been very terrifying that night. Our whole family was thrilled and excited to see so many bears come out onto the roads. We came out of Yellowstone through the Grand Tetons. They are really beautiful and we had lunch in one of the Parks, Jenny Park in the Tetons. On the fourth of July, we were traveling home and we noticed that there was a rodeo in Afton, Wyoming that night, so we got a motel, cleaned ourselves up and enjoyed the rodeo. On July 7, Mama and Dad left me in Lapoint, Utah to stay with my girlfriend, Eileen Woolley, and they left Elva in Myton, Utah with my Aunt Thora. Elva and I stayed there until July 18, when we rode the bus to Salt Lake City. We got home at 2:00 am.

In January of 1962, I was asked to teach the Moonbeams in Primary. I enjoyed and loved this work very much. I quit this when school started in August of 1962 because they changed out meetings all to the same night and I would be able to handle Primary, homework and Mutual all on the same day.

On Wednesday, August 1, 1962, I went water skiing for the first time. I fell over four times and was on the skis twice. A boy, Jimmie Hepner, who lived in our ward, invited me to go with him and his uncle.

Mom and Dad let me start dating a little bit in the year 1962, when I was 16. All of the fellows who asked me were boys that both Mom and Dad knew or else knew their parents quite well.

I felt my first earthquake on September 5, 1962 while I was in first period at Hillcrest High School. I was quite concerned, especially when our teacher ran out of the room and did not say anything to us.

I was in the dance festival of June Conference in 1963. I was in the floorshow number which was called “Tropical Splendor.”

I got my first job at the Midvale County Library. I started training on August 19, 1963 for 90 cents an hour. At the end of May, I got a raise to $1.40 an hour and put on full time for the summer. I quit my job on September 15, because of college.

I graduated from Hillcrest High School on May 27, 1964 and it was a beautiful program.

On June 30, 1964, I was at a party and jumping on a trampoline. I twisted my ankle and broke it. I had a cast on for five weeks.

I received a scholarship to Dixie College (2 year college) and was on the honor roll of the graduating class.