Jan. 13, 2012

Accidents : Rear ended a vehicles  

It is sometimes very interesting to me that I have not been involved in more vehicle accident than I have over the years. I have done a lot of traveling around the state and even across the country to New York and to California. I must give credit to this fact to the love and care of a wonderful Heavenly Father. I pray to that his loving and watchful eye will continue to be with my family and I. That is not to say that I haven’t been in accidents.

I have had one when taking girls on the fourth year hike to southern Utah, as well as one when going to work at Signetics late in the evening one night.

That is the story I am now going to tell and then maybe include the other one after it in this same segment of my history.

I worked for Signetics for four years on swing shift, three and a half years on day shift, followed by the remaining 7 on graveyard. I would go to work at two thirty PM for swing shift, six AM for days and ten thirty PM for graveyard. One night as I was headed into work I took a different route than somewhat normal. Most of the time I went in on the freeway but this time I went in on the old highway and then up on third south in Prove and onto University ave until I got to 1200 north in Prove which would take me into Orem to Signetics that sat at the top of the hill.  I was driving along that route this night and watching a truck that was ahead of me andf trying to keep a respectable distance. There was a store that sold piano’s near 400 west and 300 south that I looked over to see just as the truck then applied his brakes. There were some people standing by the crosswalk who couldn’t decide whether to cross or not but he had stopped just in case they did and I looked forward again with no time to stop. I was clearly in the wrong and as I hit the truck it pushed him forward to where he would have hit the pedestrians had they decided to cross which they didn’t. In fact we don’t know where they did go as we did not ever see them during the course of the accident again.

Anyway I smashed in the front and pushed the radiator into the engine but basically did not do as much damage as would have been expected. Marie had to come and get me and take me on into work where they were wondering why I was late by nearly a half an hour. We ended up getting the car repaired and were able to drive it for several more years. In fact Ben drove it delivering pizzas during his last two years of high school.  Again I had been blessed by the Lord in that I had not been injured nor had anyone else. The truck wasn’t damaged either since by applying the brakes on both vehicles carried my car under his bumper so that the car was damaged but not the truck.  It was just a good reminder to me to be more careful in driving.

The other accident I had mentioned came when I was transporting some of the young women to southern Utah in the Boulder Mountains where we were going for their fourth year hike. Sister Dahle had liked hiking the Box Canyon as it afforded a good 8 mile hike with the opportunity of staying over one night in the canyon.  We had hiked it one other time and found it a fun as well as beautiful place to hike and camp.  We were going through Gunnison and a road construction site when the accident occurred. We had a lot if stopping and starting and had done a lot of it when I was following another van driven by some people out of Arizona. I had looked over to see Molly’s Nipple, a lone peak near Gunnison that I had seen several times as we visited my grandparents in Centerfield. I looked back just in time to realize the van had started moving and then stopped again. I was not traveling more than 5 mph but when I ran into the van, again clearly my fault, it did cause a sudden stopping and the 5 gallon water container slid forward from between the second bench set and the van wall and came open drenching several of the girls with water. It bent the van hood back slightly to where I still have trouble getting it to open. Again no one was injured, there a was only a short delay as I gave the other driver my insurance information just in case he would need it for someone in his van that might later complain of whiplash injury or something. It was mostly just very embarrassing to me as the driver with 7 girls riding with me and my accident causing some of them to be lightly refreshed by a quick bath of cold water.  The rest of the trip went without incident except for some boys from an American Fork Scout unit that were the same age as the girls and just happened to be going down the box canyon as well the same day we were. But that is another story.

Jan. 12, 2012

4H Forestry

For this story I will break it into several sections. I spent 2 or 3 summers taking 4H Forestry from Burt Danenburg who was the local unit Forest Ranger Supervisor.  The Uintah National Forest had their headquarters in Duchesne so we had the forest service building there along with their fleet of vehicles. It was fun to go there two or three times a week each summer and basically spend the day working with a forest ranger. The following segment are the specific ones that I remember best and are not in any sort of order other than that is how they came to mind as I have been listing them.

Walking fences around Mud Springs Campground,

 One of my first memories of 4H  Forestry was going to the various campgrounds in the forest and doing service work on the campsites. One time in particular we went to a camp in Indian Canyon in the Avinaquin area at the top of the canyon. There was a campground there called Mud Springs. The camp was built in the usual fashion with an old log fence that was built by doing a zig zag type structure where each log in the fence was stacked on another log and only notches in the logs was used to keep them in place and thus the entire fence had no wire or nails.  Many of the old fences around the Rocky Mountains had these fences for controlling wildlife and range cattle during the early years of forest conservation practices.

I had visited Mud Springs many times during these years since it was one of our favorite campgrounds and was fairly close to Duchesne thus easy to get to on days when 4H would have several of us going to class. On one of those trips we had spent the morning picking up trash from around the camp and after eating lunch it was not unusual to for the camp rangers to lay down under the trees in the shade and take a short nap. Well for some reason I was not tired that day (as I am always now after eating), so a couple of us in the group decided to walk around the perimeter of the camp. It wasn’t just walking around the perimeter though that made this time so much fun, it was the fact that we went the entire distance, minus the road crossings, on the top of that fence. It has stuck in my mind for many years that we were actually able to maintain our balance on those logs for that entire distance. A few years ago Marie and I visited the camp again as we were traveling to Duchesne to photograph Silver Beaver Recipients for the Utah National Parks Council and I became aware of why that must have stuck so deeply as I realized what it really meant. We looked at that fence that is now rotted out in many areas and discovered that it followed the terrain of the mountain and I had forgotten that little detail. We actually had walked up and down some pretty steep areas on top of those poles and now it seems to me that we were almost like tight rope walkers in what we had accomplished during our lunch.

Mines and Mt Lions, Oh My.

 Another trip found us about half way up Indian Canyon where we had hiked up the east side of the canyon on the slick shale covered hillside. We were identifying different species of trees and different types of rock formations. We were also collecting samples for our presses. We had actually gone several hundred yards up the side of the canyon and had become somewhat spread out when we heard a very strange sound. I can’t recall what it even sounded like now but I very clearly remember everyone’s reaction. Burt’s reaction was very short but very clear, “Get down the mountain” he loudly shouted and we all started running down the hill. I have thought many times about the incident since that day and cannot recall what the sound was but have often wondered if it was a Mountain Lion or a Bear or something of that sort which caused such  alarm in his voice. We  never did (or at least none of us young men) ever did identify the sound but it was obvious to me that Burt had and he knew the present danger that it posed.

That day ended up being eventful to me in a couple of ways. In the afternoon on our way back down the canyon we decided to hike up to the old Gilsonite mine, the entrance is still visible to this day as you travel the canyon. The road looked like a trail and from the bottom of the canyon the doorway appeared to be pretty small and so I was worried from the start about this particular event. We started up the hill and I soon learned that the trail was big enough for a vehicle to travel. It had the room for a vehicle although I would never have driven it since it was also not very far before the drop-off from the road was straight down.  It was a long hike as well though and took us quite awhile to get to the entrance which when we got there was not only two stories high but each story was probably 10 feet tall. We started into the cave but only a few of us had flashlights of which few I was not one. So I depended on the guy in front of me and at times found it hard to see. I apparently have a bit of a dislike for dark, tight spaces (even though it was ten feet to the ceiling) and became somewhat scared that the water, which was steadily getting deeper on the floor, would suddenly be over my head or that the road which was very level would suddenly drop 150 feet to the next level. All of these were not founded on fact and in fact I learned later from my father that the mine actually comes out the other side of the mountain into what we refer to as the right hand fork of Indian Canyon. I was glad though when Burt decided we had gone far enough and to the dismay of several others in the group had us turn around and go out. It was a short hike to the vehicle and that only because we all pretty much ran back down to the bottom. Twice in one day and each time I had been pretty scared.

Marking trees

On another trip we drove up the old road which is now covered by the water of Starvation Resevoir. We were going out to do some Forest Service business that I did not understand since we were being taught to identify trees and learn of their importance to our lives and yet on this day we were going out and putting big paint marks on them so that they could be cut down. Well I learned that day what it ment to the forest to have trees “harvested”. Burt was very picky in which trees should be harvested and which should remain and he was looking specifically for things like disease and overcrowded areas etc.  We drove up through an area that I knew as the twin peaks at the head of strawberry river. Then we kept driving and went places where roads didn’t even exist, places where only deer hunters seem to drive otherwise. Then suddenly to my amazement we ended up at Mud Springs campground. I finally knew again where I was and learned about how close things can be to where you are and not even knowing that you are that close. It was a great trip and one that will always remain in my memory because I learned about some real good uses of forest management.

Leaf press,

One of the projects that we had to do for 4-H was to make a leaf press fro 1 inch slat boards. It was about 14 inches by 20 inches (just guessing now) but there were two sides that were then put together with two pieces of cardboard on each half and filled with several white pieces of  paper of the same size between which leaf and pine needle samples would be placed. The boards were then tightly bound with a couple of ropes. It was a lot of fun drying our plant specimens for 4-H using this plant press. Years later, even though I almost threw it out several times when moving, for some reason I had held onto that press and my children used it for school projects. It was well worth the time it took to make.

Above Granddaddy Lake rolling rocks.

 One last trip that I remember from the first year that I was in 4-H forestry I remember getting to the Forest Service Station quite early with our lunches packed as usual to go with us. We drove up the Duchesne River through Utahn and ended up at Tabiona and then Hannah. We turn right and went down a road that had trees growing on both sides of it making a tunnel from the branches covering the roadway. (I think I have always loved pictures of roads like that usually taken in the deep south of America due to that one day.) We then went up a small canyon and were soon climbing along a very rough dirt road higher up on the mountain as we would wind through the trees and vegetation. Finally we topped out onto a long flat area typical of these mountain ranges in Utah. Some of the mountains go to a top peak but many of them end up leading to flat areas several miles wide in most cases. We stopped and went to the edge of the hill and could see down into what is known as Rock Creek canyon.  Then we walked over to a wreckage of a small aircraft that had crashed several years earlier. After exploring the wreckage we got back into the truck and drove another mile or so to the edge of another part of the plateau.  There we got out and hiked to the edge and were suddenly looking down on Granddaddy Lake in the Granddaddy Basin. I have wished many times that I had known enough about photography back then to have taken a camera with me that day because I would like to have that image today somewhere other than in my mind’s eye. For several years following that day as I would climb into the Grandaddies on scout trips I would look up to the edge of the mountain above Granddaddy Lake  and try to remember where we were possibly standing at that day on that 4-H trip. 

There was one lesson learned that day that I will never forget. When we had first walked to the edge above Rock Creek there were several of the older boys that started to roll rocks down into the canyon but as soon as Burt got there it came to an immediate halt. He told us about people who had been hurt badly by someone unknowingly rolling rocks down onto them from similar vantage points but because they couldn’t be seen the ones rolling the rocks were unaware of the consequences of their actions. I have never rolled rocks again off of areas even if I could see clearly all the way to where the rocks would stop.

Jan. 11, 2012

1st Counselor in BYU 166th Ward

In early February of 2006 I received a phone call from BYU asking my wife and I to come over and meet with a Pres. Bowman of the BYU 3^rd Stake.  I had known a number of men in the ward who had served at BYU and always felt sorry for them that they couldn’t attend their home ward. I didn’t know what it involved but was sure that the travel each week would wear on a person after a short while. Tia had attended a ward at BYU but we had never gone to church with her while she was there and only knew that she met in a classroom. So it was with a bit of fear and trepidation that we came over and met with President Bowman. He talked to us for a while and then said that Jim Lundberg of Mapleton had been called to be a Bishop and requested that I serve as a counselor to him. I knew Jim even though he was in a different ward because I was in the Bishopric there when he and his family moved into the ward.

We accepted the call and then he began to tell us that he had served at BYU now going on 8 years but a typical length of service was 3 years in a Bishopric. He told us how he loved serving here and that we too would grow to love it. Our assignment would be with the 166^th ward located in Liberty Square apartments in Provo around 500 East and 500 North.  I didn’t know that Jim had been on the High Council for two years in the Stake and so he was very familiar with the comings and goings of service over here. Well the following week we came to Sacrament Meeting and sat up in the back of the large room where the service was held each week. The Bishopric was all seated down in front unlike the usual up in front like I was use to in the other Bishoprics that I had served in with the Mapleton Stake. The podium was now below most of the students and on the same level as those in the front row. A table divided us from the student where during the week lectures on biology were conducted including the dissecting of mice and other things.

We were sustained and then asked to talk and then after the meeting observed as the students were crying with the release of the old Bishopric. Now we were faced with the daunting task of learning the names of 152 new students who would soon be leaving school for the summer. There was a set of triplets that were members of the ward and they looked so much alike that I just knew I would never know them but by carefully watching what they wore and when their name was called I was soon able to at least get them correct each week. Later I put their pictures on the computer and scrolled back and forth through them until I knew the identifying freckles on their faces that were easy to see and thus easy to keep straight which one was which despite what they wore. Later in fact Lindsay was called as the Relief Society President and we became very close to her. They were the ones who greeted Brittany during the summer term into the ward and made her feel such a special part of the ward. The next two summers were not the same since they had gotten married and were no longer part of the ward and the students didn’t seem to get to know her as well those years.

Well we learned their names long enough to get to love them and then each year in August would start fresh with mostly new students. With my love for photography we would have them come for FHE and do picture sessions with the FHE groups each week. We became lonely in fact when for some reason they wouldn’t be there during some weeks. Then I would photograph them at the ward socials and was able to get to know them that way even better. Then in 2007 I was introduced to Facebook on the internet and began posting the pictures of our events on that website. It has been great also because as the youth would leave at the end of the terms I would still have contact with them. We have had a great time and so when it came time to be released in Jan on the 11^th I  knew that I now felt totally different about service at BYU.

I had opportunities to extend callings and to get to make assignments and was always so grateful for the willingness each would have as they accepted the assignments. I never had to worry about whether the would get done either and grew to love ov 450 students which we were able to get to know in the three years I served in the Bishopric. Marie would always come to church with me as well and she and I both fell in love with each student. Now I have been called into the High Council on Jan 11, 2009 and am greatly loving this call as well since I still see the old ward members and also see them in other wards now too.  It is really neat to be able to continue serving here at BYU and with a ward over whom the Bishop that is serving was once the High Councilor assigned to our ward when I was in the Bishopric.  There are many stories that I can now add to my list and would put them here but then it would be too long to read so I will separate them out.

(Every now and then I rewrite one I had already written but not realized it. Here is the second version of this story.}

BYU 166^th Ward Socials.

The time that I spent in the Bishopric as first counselor to Bishop Jim Lundberg were some of the greatest years of my life. We got to learn, temporarily, the names of nearly 500 students.  I think I will always remember their names and their faces but matching the two parts together when I see them from time to time now just doesn’t happen except for a few that we really got to know well.

Part of the reason that it was so fun was because it wasn’t work to get to know them and it wasn’t work to get them to accept and fulfill their calling. It wasn’t work to get them to give talks in Sacrament meeting and in fact several asked if they could. It wasn’t work to plan socials because they did it themselves. It just wasn’t work to be a part of such great wards. (I say wards because they would have around 90 % turn around each year as the youth would move to other apartments to meet more people and find their eternal partner.)

We had some great socials. Since Bishop lived in a neighborhood with a pool we held most of the opening socials there. Towards the end we were getting a little shy of doing it there because it seemed as though toward the end of each one someone would crack their head on the bottom of the pool getting large cuts from the impact. It was almost a guessing game as to whom it would happen to the next time we planned a social at the pool. We only had four there but that was enough. I believe that we actually did have an accident free event the last time. We also had two socials at a church owned home in left fork of Hobble Creek canyon. Both times they were fun nights filled with games and socializing. I even cooked 8 Dutch Oven cobblers for the first one. (Then learned my lesson.) We had one for Halloween in Payson at a barn and one at Shepherd’s home in Mapleton for an opening social to a summer semester. We held two at the white church in Mapleton, one at a park near BYU in Provo (on my birthday where they brought an ice cream cake for me) and one up Provo canyon where the youth floated the Provo River on tubes. We held several with other wards of which one was a large dance in the Liberty Square clubhouse for Halloween and two were held at a sledding hill in Midway. Again one of them was also held at the pool in Mapleton since both Bishops lived there and the two wards combined memberships were fairly low in number and we had one other social at the pool in Liberty Square. (It was around late summer and a couple of the men wanted to throw me in but luckily for me my camera around my neck prevented the mischief from happening.) Some of the socials were held at the clubhouse on Fast Day where we had meals to break the fast. We also held two or three of them in the Wilkinson Center for Fall semester closing social’s just prior to the break when they would go home for Christmas. We held one at the Mapleton City Park near the white church. The two best though were when we rented a bus and took groups to the Manti Temple for baptisms and endowments in the Manti Temple.

In my collection of images you can find pictures from all of the events and one member commented once to me that they really appreciated my taking the pictures for them. Marie and I had to miss one that was a talent show held in a building at BYU since we were photographing a wedding that night. Other than that one I think we were able to attend every single event that they planned during those three years. I even learned about Facebook and began posting the pictures from each event there after they had occurred so the youth could see the image so that I had taken. Before that they had to wait for a closing social to see a slide show of the images from that semester.

Jan. 10, 2012

Hauling Hay for Harold at 6 am alone

We had a very good neighbor and friend named Harold Spencer. He came form the Mormon colonies in Mexico and went to work for Brother Rasmussen our neighbor. Our neighbor had a pretty daughter named Carolyn that he fell in love with and married. They then moved into the home next to ours in Duchesne. (By next I mean about a half mile away toward town.)

Harold and my family worked together a lot doing the farms. Harold would do hay with us and we would do it with him. I grew up basically helping him every summer. We would often do chores for each other as well when someone needed to go out of town or for some reason wouldn’t be home to milk the cows.

One summer when I was about 16 or 17 we had decided to haul the hay off one of Harold’s fields at 6 AM one morning. There were some of the other boys from town that were also going to come help. I got up early and milked the cows so I could get the tractor and wagon over to Harold’s place before everyone started to arrive. When I got over there I couldn’t find anyone so I just headed out into the filed with the tractor and started to load the hay. Probably an hour and a half later later I had a full load of hay on the wagon. It took longer because I would have to drive the tractor to the next set of bales, stop and get off and put the hay on the wagon, get on the wagon and stack the hay, and then get off and move the tractor forward to another set of bales. Due to that process I would also carry the bales further than normal since I didn’t want to move the tractor as often. Then as the wagon was nearly full getting the hay up on to the second and third layers of the hay on the wagon also took a little longer and I would often have to get up after each couple of bales to move them into place so I could get room to load the next couple of bales. I was getting pretty tired but finally had the bales loaded and about a quarter of the field of hay loaded onto the wagon. I got on the tractor and headed back to the yard when the others finally started to arrive. They told me that they thought that they were early and were not suppose to be there until 8AM. Well I don’t know who was right or wrong but at least I had some help which I was beginning to fear might not happen.