Cherish Your Cherished People by Rhonda Frankhouser

Hello fellow Cowboy Kisses members. I'm not writing today about sexy cowboys, interesting history or an upcoming new release. I'm sharing a little bit of my heart as it is currently in a broken state. Please indulge my need to share.

Photo Credit

It's easy to feel anger and sadness when you lose someone you love so dearly. For most, living a full and wholesome 78 years, is a true gift. To those left behind, doomed to live the rest of their lives without that loving presence, it's far too short.  

My family and I lost a true, honest and giving soul this past week. A god-fearing man who proudly served his country; gave of his time and heart to whomever needed him; and raised a beautiful family with his wife of over fifty years. He was a father who taught by example, how to be a good and loving human being. My father-in-law, Bill Frankhouser, Sr, was someone to emulate. Someone to value. Someone to remember. 

My husband, Bill Jr, with his father, Bill Sr. His best friend and hero, playing Pebble Beach!

* * *

This story is not so different than the thousands now being told in the wake of the pandemic. We are not more special than the next family who lost a loved one due to complications from CoVid 19, but for us, this is devastating, this loss is raw, and real, and has created pain that needs to be expelled from my soul.

I'm not going to preach to you about precautions and vaccines. My purpose is not to spew more frustration to an already frustrated society. My purpose is to call attention to this very important realization. Please, whatever you do, stop hating and blaming and start loving and living again. Time is running out for all of us. We will all lose someone, we will all die from something, someday. Stop wasting your time!

Please - take my advice - use your time to cherish.

You see, it's not the 'things' we miss about our loved ones when they're gone. It's the love and fullness that disappears with them when they leave us. It's the empty silence once filled with their laughter, that echoes against a broken heart. How will we ever survive without that unconditional love, wisdom, and sincere embrace when we need it most?

My message, should you choose to hear me, is >>>>Do not wait until it's too late to show them how much you care. Pay attention. Take the time. Listen!

A list of things I wish I would have asked?

• What is your favorite thing?
• What would you like to see before it's too late?
• What would you have liked to have done different with your life?
• Tell me all about my grandparents? Family history? Family secrets?
• What can I do to make your life better?
• Will you name all the people in all these old pictures?
• And so on, and so on, and so on....

Ask your questions. Show your love and appreciation, Every! Single! Day!

My family's world is smaller, and ever so much sadder with the loss of this amazing man. Our patriarch. Our Friend. Our Hero. Our Father. Rest in Peace. Thank you for the understanding and kindness you bestowed on us. We will do our best to make you proud and we look forward to seeing you again one day.

Thanks for listening.

Beloved ghosts, twisted mysteries, and timeless love are my specialty!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Award-winning author, Rhonda Frankhouser, pens stories with beloved ghosts, twisted mysteries, and timeless love. Her favorite genres are Western and Contemporary Romance, with the occasional mainstream tear-jerker to keep things interesting. Rhonda's Ruby's Ranch Series, earned a starred review in Publisher's Weekly; a finalist honor in the Uncaged Review Raven Awards; a second runner up in the prestigious InD'Tale Magazine RONE awards and a Book and Benches, Reviewers Top Pic ~ Books of Distinction award. Her follow up Shadowing Souls Series and Let Yourself Believe Series, have captured the attention of both romance and mainstream readers alike. After a lifetime in Central California, Rhonda and her own knight in shining armor, moved to beautiful Northeast Georgia to embark on a brand new journey.

Subscribe to Rhonda's webpage at https://www.rhondafrankhouserbooks.com/
Follow Rhonda on Facebook https://m.facebook.com/RhondaFrankhouser/

• Return to Ruby's Ranch - Book 1 Ruby's Ranch Series - RONE Award Runner Up
• Escape from Ruby's Ranch, Book 2 Ruby's Ranch Series - Raven Award Runner Up
• Legacy of Ruby's Ranch, Book 3 Ruby's Ranch Series
• Christmas at Ruby's Ranch
• Health Nut Café
• Beyond Forever - Let Yourself Believe Series

So Far Away...Communicating Long Distance with Loved Ones Then and Now

Smoke signals: One way to send a message a long distance when you're short on time

For the next six months I will be separated from my daughter by almost four thousand miles, an ocean, and a six hour time difference. This got me thinking how recent this ease of communication has become and how much that one thing has changed in my lifetime.

The pain of separation is lessened by knowing two things: My daughter will have a great time, and I can talk to her almost anytime I want--for free, thanks to computers and smartphones. There are so many ways nowadays to keep in touch with far-flung loved ones, it makes my mind spin: email, Facebook, Skype, Messenger, and texting. Changes are coming so fast, probably a few new ones have been developed in the time it took me to type this sentence.  Not to mention via social media you can see what your loved ones are up whether they like it or not on Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook to name a few.

On Tuesday night we put our daughter on a plane to London where she's going for a semester. At three in the morning I got a text from her informing us she'd landed. Okay, fair enough, we did tell her to let us know when she got there. But then at 4 a.m. I got another text. "I think I left all my money at home."
I rolled out of bed and sure enough found the envelope full of pound notes still in her room.

Then came a series of increasingly panicky texts from Heathrow. "I don't know where I'm supposed to go! I don't see the bus from school." My husband threw the covers over his head and said, "Let her figure it out."
With visions of my daughter falling victim to human trafficking or being persuaded to join a terrorist cell, I made my way down to the computer and went to the website for her college. I learned the buses left from the airport every two hours and sent her that information from my phone. There continued a number of texts, which I won't document, but the upshot is apparently there are no employees, information desks or security guards at Heathrow! Unbelievable! An airport that runs itself.

While I was trying to talk my daughter down from jumping in a taxi for a hundred dollar ride, I emailed a friend of mine who I knew would be up early doing yoga or meditating or something else that would be good for her. She had recently told me the story about her own twenty-something year old son and his plan to travel by himself to Thailand. To start off his journey he left his passport two states away. But because we live in modern times, they were able to get someone to send his passport overnight. So, off he goes passport in hand. Later when she was at work she got a text from him. "Mom, I'm in China. Where do I go from here?" By the way, did I mention her son is deaf? And alone.

Between clients at her office my friend frantically tried to access her son's itinerary which he had left at home. Searching through her emails, she was able to find his next travel step from China to Thailand and texted him the information.

Anyway, that morning she replied right away to my email with the following advice: "Take a sleeping pill and turn off your phone."

But, no, I didn't do that. I stuck to my cell phone and computer, sending emails to staff at Queen Mary University alerting them to the fact that one stressed-out American student was wandering around the airport. I also found a help number which I texted to my daughter. When I at last got a message from her that she found the bus and was on her way, I let out a big sigh of relief and forgot how annoyed I was with her over the leaving her money here thing. I also got an email from someone at her school telling me they'd found her.

Because my daughter had a friend leaving for London that night, I was able to message that friend via Facebook and arrange to give her my daughter's money to bring over. Crisis averted. My point here being, we have so many avenues in 2017 to cut through long distance complications without even leaving home. Now if these kids would have figured it out on their own or learned from their mistakes is another question.

Me (in the purple) and my roommate, London, 1980

It's easy to communicate now, but when I did my year abroad in Britain, it was a different story. It wasn't that long ago, but the only tools available to me back in 1980 were telephones and airmail. When I landed in Heathrow back in the dark ages, my parents would have no way of knowing I got there safe and sound until they got my postcard telling them so.

I had a blast that year, but now I think of my poor parents rarely hearing from me for an entire year, and as a parent myself now, I feel for them. The phones were hard to use and expensive. Besides having to work out the time difference and hoping someone was home to pick up, we had to continually feed coins into the phone in order to have a conversation.

 Mainly, we wrote letters to each other. Letters written by hand on thin blue airmail paper. If I had a problem--and believe me I had more than a few--I was on my own.

Cut back a hundred years to 1880. My great grandfather and his cousin left Evanston, IL to seek their fortune in the silver mines of Leadville, Co. I have a picture of the two men on their western adventure. I don't know much, except his cousin died while there, and my great grandfather brought his body back home. He stayed put in Evanston after that.

My great grandfather (seated) and his cousin, Colorado 1880

I can't imagine having to handle an emergency on that scale in 1880. On top of everything else, my great grandfather must have felt so isolated in a communication desert. Telephones weren't common yet, but they did have the telegraph. I imagine he sent a telegram to their families back home alerting them to the death of their relative. Maybe he wrote a long, detailed letter as well, which would travel with the speed of stagecoaches, trains and mail carriers.

America has had a postal service from almost the very beginning. The first postal system was a private enterprise, but the U.S. government bought it months after it's inception. The postage was due when the letter was received--by the recipient. They quickly figured out this wasn't the most efficient method, and in 1842 the first postage stamps were issued. The cost of sending a letter was three cents.

I was surprised to read that the first air mail delivery was in 1870, decades before the first airplanes. Over five hundreds pounds of mail was sent off attached to balloons. There is no record of any of these airmail letters reaching their correct destinations. It was an idea way ahead of its time and probably best left on someone's drawing table.

Hordes of people made their way to California during the gold rush. The expansion left many folks miles away from the reach of the railroad or stagecoach. The Pony Express was developed to tackle this problem. Riders could deliver mail to remote outposts, often having to travel through hostile Indian territories. I was almost as surprised to learn that the Pony Express only ran for 18 months as I was about the first airmail deliveries.

The big development in communication was the invention of the telegraph. The first message sent in 1844 by Professor Samuel F.B. Morse said, "WHAT HATH GOD WROUGHT."  Interesting first choice.

The telegraph brought on a revolution in communication. For the first time delivering news was not limited to how fast man or machine could move. Think of how this instant exchange of information over great distances was a game-changer.

But, still for the average person in their daily lives snail mail was the way they kept in touch. My thoughts go back to families that were separated by long distance for long periods of time, and I wonder how much information was lost--or how many people were lost to each other. I can't imagine the heartbreak of seeing loved ones go off for distant parts and not knowing if you'd hear from them again. My daughter can wake me up at 3 a.m. anytime to tell me she's safe. Do you have your own stories of separation in your family history?

Raising Cane and Making Molasses



Welcome western romance lovers! Today’s post isn’t about cowboys, horses, or even romance novels. It’s about molasses, that homemade sugar substitute that past generations relied on to satisfy their sweet tooth when real sugar was in short supply.

Cane Field

When I was growing up here in Southeastern Kentucky, one of the biggest and most memorable occasions on the farm was the yearly molasses boiling. Every year, when the first nip of frost was in the air, my uncle and cousins went out into the cane field and cut the crop. Have you ever chewed a section of sugarcane right out of the field? You peel off the tough outside hull then chew the stringy pulp inside to extract the juice. It’s sweet as sugar and it’s delicious!

In anticipation of the cane boiling, my grandmother, mom, and aunt cooked up enough food to feed a small army because the neighbors always showed up and brought their entire families. Sometimes there was even a little pickin’ and singin’ to entertain while the men worked the mill and boiler. Making molasses was another excuse for socializing, plus there was the foam, which wasn’t to be missed, but I’ll get to that later.

Mule-powered Cane Mill

Make no mistake, while everyone had a good time during the molasses boiling, it was also a lot of work. First, the cane had to be stripped in the field where it stood. Then the stalks were cut and hauled to the site. My uncle used a big sled pulled by a mule. Once there, the cane was topped (the seed pods removed). Next, it had to be hand fed into a mill where the stalks were crushed to extract the juice. The mill in the picture is very similar to the one my uncle used. It was operated by mule power. The mule walked a continuous circle around the mill, which turned the mechanism that squeezed out the juice. The juice was collected in buckets, then strained through boiled cloth to remove the bits of pulp. This was not a simple matter of pouring the juice through the cloth. It was more like the cloth was filled with as much as a person could handle and then the juice was forcibly squeezed through. Then, the pulp was scraped off before filling the cloth again. Approximately 100 gallons of juice were needed to make one batch of molasses.

Boiler Pan

After it was strained, the juice was poured into the metal boiling pan. The pan in the picture at left is much more sophisticated than the one we had on the farm. In fact, I’ve never seen one set on a permanent base with its own chimney. The one my uncle used was just the basic pan elevated to the desired height with stones placed at the corners and at mid-point. The normal pan was 7 feet long, 3 feet wide, and about a foot deep. The baffles on the bottom of the pan remain a mystery to me because I don’t know how they worked, and the ones in the bottom of my uncle’s pan looked more like corrugated metal. A fire was kept burning evenly underneath the pan for 6 or 7 hours. During this process, my uncle ran a big wooden paddle back and forth between the baffles to move the juice around and skim off any cane residue that had slipped through the straining process.

Boiling cane juice produces a big head of foam. This was the part we kids—and the adults, too—all looked forward to. Everyone came to the boiling with a big wooden spoon in hand for dipping foam. The foam produced over the thickened, darker syrup was the best. If you ask my mom today about making molasses, she’ll talk at length about how she used to love eating foam.

After 6 or 7 hours of constant, gentle boiling, the juice was transformed. 100 gallons of cane juice produced about 10 gallons of molasses. The big gallon-sized glass jars were stored in a safe place and used throughout the year in a variety of ways. Molasses were eaten, just like jam or jelly, with a meal. They were used to flavor cakes and cookies. My grandmother made delicious stack cakes with molasses flavored biscuit dough and dried apple filling. In a pinch, my uncle even used molasses as a sugar substitute in his moonshine recipe.

One of my mom’s favorite memories from her girlhood is of sitting with her brothers and sisters in front of the fireplace during the winter and making tough jack. They boiled a pan of molasses on the open fire until it thickened to candy consistency. Once it cooled enough to handle, they buttered their hands and divided the thickened molasses between them and started pulling it like taffy. Mom says, the more they pulled, the tough jack became paler and more tender. She never had the patience to pull hers for very long and always ate it before it reached perfection. Vanilla could be added during the boiling stage to add more flavor. One of my uncles sometimes added nut kernels to his and mom says he would pull it and pull it until it was nearly white. Then, she and the others would beg for his because they’d already eaten theirs.

Making tough jack sounds like it would have been a good activity to keep the young people busy and happy while they were cooped up in the soddie or cabin during those long prairie winters, doesn’t it? What other activity can you think of that would have kept the youngsters entertained during those cold nights on the homestead in the old west?

Happy reading and writing!
Devon

Devon's web site
Blog - Romance in the Wild West

Photos shared from Wikipedia and freedigitalphotos.net

The School in the Hills

Living in Southeastern Kentucky during the 1950’s and ‘60’s has given me a lot of first-hand, daily life experience to draw from when I’m writing my western historicals. It wasn’t until the late 1960’s and early ‘70’s that real progress began to filter into the Appalachian Mountains and, until then, many things remained pretty much the same as they were back in the 1800’s. Since a couple of people have expressed an interest, over the next several weeks I will attempt to share some of my experiences with you. Even though not directly connected to the Old West, I hope you might find it useful in some way.

~~~~~~~~

The first school I attended was called Bennett’s Branch. It stood atop a high ridge that was known locally (although you'd never find it on any map) as the Tollie Hill. It was called that because Tollie Sasser, the teacher at Bennett's Branch, and his family lived in the only house midway up the hill. Coming from my grandmother's farm, in the opposite direction, the walk to school was only about a quarter of a mile, if we took the shortcut through the woods.

To give you some background, here’s a picture taken circa 1943 or '44, when my mom and dad were students. I’ve drawn arrows to them. Mom is the little blonde holding onto her best friend and dad is the cute fella with the dark hair. This old photo is one of my treasures, but there were a lot of people not in the shot, including my aunts and uncles. It’s a shame, too, because—as far as I know—this was the only class picture that was ever taken at Bennett’s Branch.

Click on photos to enlarge.

At the time of this photo, the school was actually two separate buildings. Tollie Sasser (that’s him standing on the far left) taught the upper grades (5-8) in the stone building you see here, and the lady standing on the extreme right taught the lower grades (1-4) in a separate one-room log building. The log building, which was built in 1935, was the original school.



Our desks looked like this.

By the time I started school, the log building was long gone and so was the lady teacher. The stone building was all that remained and Mr. Sasser was the only teacher with all eight grades lumped together in one room. The students in each grade were separated by rows of desks. Depending on the number of people in each grade, there might be two grades in a single row. The year we started, my cousin and I were the only students in 1^st grade. Being the youngest and smallest, the older girls quickly took us under their wings. We were allowed to sit anywhere we wanted while the others were given their lessons. Most of the time, we shared a desk with the older girls, who drew paper dolls and made drinking cups out of notebook paper for us. When it was time for our lessons, we sat right up in front of Mr. Sasser’s desk, all eyes and ears and eager to be the smartest. We were quick learners. I think it was because we had the advantage of hearing the other students' lessons throughout the day. By the time we moved up to the next grade level, we already knew the material.

Like all the buildings and households in the area, the school had no indoor plumbing or running water. Thinking about it now, I'm not even sure if it had electricity back then. A lot of light came through those big, tall windows in the southern exposure. (note to self- ask mom) But back to the water...when you walked in the door, the first thing you encountered, standing in the left hand corner, was a small wooden table holding a water bucket. There was also a wash pan. When someone used the wash pan, they were expected to carry it outside and dump the water when they were finished. Mr. Sasser drew the first bucket of water from the well every day. After that, it was up to the older boys to keep the bucket replenished. A communal dipper hung from a nail above the bucket, but most of us used the aforementioned paper cups made from notebook paper when we wanted a drink. Even back then, we must have had some vague notion about cooties. :)

At dinnertime (we’d never heard the word lunch; the noon meal was dinner and the evening meal was supper), we all rushed to the cloakroom, grabbed our pails and ran outside. The cloakroom was a long, wide closet equipped with hooks for coats and shelves for storage. It ran along the front of the building and was situated immediately to the right when you entered the door. Outside, we sat on the ground and ate our dinner. It was like having a picnic every day. After that, we played (usually marbles, kickball, jump rope, or bob jacks) until Mr. Sasser told us it was time to go in again. If the weather was bad, we ate at our desks and used playtime for spelling or adding contests

.

One day each week, the older girls used the extra time between lessons to give the toilet (also known as an outhouse, but we never called it that back then) a scrubbing down with the soap, brushes and buckets that were stored in the cloakroom. As I write this, I'm reminded of something in particular about that outhouse. Whenever one us girls had to "go," we always took another girl with us to stand guard outside the door. In case any of the boys ventured too close, the girl on guard could sound the alarm or warn the boy away. The problem was, the old toilet was built of rough lumber, which had warped from the weather, leaving gaps between the boards, and we girls were afraid the boys might see us sitting on the throne if they wandered too close. The latch on the door wasn’t all that great either, just a small piece of wood with a nail driven through it that you turned to hold the door closed. A tug on the door handle would drop the latch to the floor. Looking on the bright side, at least no one could lock themselves in. ;)

During the winter, Mr. Sasser arrived at school extra early every morning and built a fire in the big potbelly stove so the room would be warm when we got there. During those cold months, the boys took turns carrying in buckets of coal and keeping the fire fed. At dinnertime, we all sat around the stove while we ate. If we were lucky enough to have a moon pie (huge treat back in the day) in our lunch pail, we held it up to the heat and melted the icing so we could lick it off. I'm telling you, you haven’t lived until you’ve scorched your tongue on a hot moon pie. ;)

Mr. Sasser was a firm believer in daily exercise. If the weather was too cold or nasty to go outside, sometimes he’d go out and cut a long switch from a tree and we’d all line up inside the schoolhouse and take turns jumping over it. After each round, the switch was lifted a little higher. If you tripped, you were out of the game. When it was our turn, he always lowered the branch for my cousin and me because we were the smallest. Since we were given special treatment, we were usually declared the winners as well. Can you imagine kids these days being entertained by something like that. Sometimes, like when my electronics are giving me fits, I miss those simpler times.

Many of the students of Bennett’s Branch--mostly those of my parents' generation--migrated north when they reached adulthood because that's where the jobs were. In those days, working the family farm was pretty much the only option if you stayed here. Before I started the fourth grade, my dad moved us to Ohio so he could earn a living as a welder. As you can imagine, this little country girl had to make quite an adjustment when we moved to the city, but I hardly missed a beat when I started school in a new place. Mr. Sasser had taught me the basics very well. Granted, there were no art classes at Bennett's Branch, no music, and no library. If I had continued there, would I have become an avid reader, or learned to play the piano and paint? Would I have pursued writing and publishing? There's no way of knowing, of course, but these questions have crossed my mind a time or two. 

Before I go, I want to share another picture. This one was taken seventeen years ago. This is a view of the front of the school, and that’s me standing in the doorway. As you can see, the place is overgrown, the windows are all gone and the roof has collapsed. I wanted a picture of the old girl before she fell down completely, so hubby and I got in the car and drove over one day. The school is only about ten miles from our house. If you look closely, you can see the remnants of the tongue and groove walls behind me. That area at the front of the building where the windows are was the cloakroom. The stone step I’m standing on is where I sat and cried and refused to budge on my first day of school because I was terrified of going inside. (I thought it was like jail because it was built of stone, very similar to the jailhouse in town, but without the bars on the windows.:)

Since this picture was taken, the current owner of the property gutted the building and rebuilt it. I wish I could say it was restored, but it wasn’t. The cloakroom was not rebuilt, a new roof went on and the walls inside were covered with modern paneling. The room stands empty now, no desks, no stove, no water table. But once a year, the owner opens the building and many of the surviving former students gather there for a reunion. My mom and uncles go, but I can’t bring myself to go with them. Call me strange or overly sentimental but I’d rather remember the old school as it was when class was still in session.

Happy reading and writing! If you have questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

Devon

Devon's web site

Devon's blog

Family History Plays a Part

Blog post by Ciara Gold


I love family history! I think I may have inherited my mother's "genealogical" gene. She's quite the bloodhound when it comes to finding information on ancestors.

My grandmother's parents (mom's side) have an interesting story. My great grandfather came over in the late 1800s and settled in Georgetown, Texas. He had a farm where he grew cotton but at one point in time, he also ran an ice cream parlor in town. His sister was still in Switzerland along with his future bride. Great grandmother was born on the "wrong side of the blanket" and because of her illegitimacy, was doomed to domestic work with little chance at a good marriage. She agreed to come to America and marry my great grandfather without having met him, on her friend's recommendation alone. Her friend being great grandfather's sister. 

So that's the watered down version and one of these days I plan to write a story just for them. They must have gotten along fairly well because they had a long and fruitful marriage.

Because of our family love of handed down heirlooms, I tend to use some of these items in my stories. Great grandfather's story led me to search for the demitasse spoon that came from his ice cream parlor so I could share it here. Alas, I have temporarily misplaced that spoon but it led me to the rest of my collection. I haven't looked at it in years but I'm wishing I'd pulled it out sooner. Among the odds and ends I've collected over the years are two salt spoons.


The cowboy of the old west didn't have access to salt shakers like we know them. Instead, salt was put in cellars.  These cellars would be common practice until around 1940 and of course, to dip into these small bowls of salt, one usually used a small salt spoon. I'm having a hard time picturing the gruff ole cowboy using one of these dainty items. I imagine on the trail, they didn't use much salt as that would have been a luxury.

I found another spoon that has always sparked my curiosity. It's hand wrought by a Native American tribe. I spent time researching and I believe it's of Navajo origins dating before WWII, early 1900s. When I hold it, I feel connected to the four winds as reflected by the symbol gracing the tip of the handle.

The historical western I'm working on now features a blacksmith. Not your typical "cowboy" but he has all those wonderful qualities we assign to the "cowboy". While he's not a silversmith, he would have to go through some of the same steps a silversmith might enjoy to make various metal items, only on a grander scale. Pounding hot metal is no easy task. I plan to write more on this topic later. Anyway, the spoons have sparked an idea for a scene so I guess I'll close for now.

www.ciaragold.com
http://ciaragold.blogspot.com/

A Pioneer Thanksgiving

As I was looking for something to share about Thanksgiving, I came across this very moving story that gives wonderful insight into our ancestry.  I'm pretty sure the owner won't mind since I'm giving them full credit as well as sharing the link where I found this step back into history.  Enjoy.  I certainly did.

A PIONEER THANKSGIVING
Taken from a story written by:
Joseph Wallace Thompson

As told to his daughter, Eleh T. Shumway Lazenby

My grandmother, Lucy Simmons Groves, who was one of the pioneers in Utah’s Southland, lived in a fort called Fort Harmony. It was late in the fall [about 1854], and people had gathered in their meager harvest, and it was very meager too. The men folks had a very busy season, with clearing the brush from a few acres of land, plowing, planting, digging a canal to irrigate their crops, and guarding the colony from the unfriendly Indians, and building a fort for protection, they were unable to raise much more than would be needed for man, and beast through the long winter months before another harvest.

Each family had a few sheep on which they depended for wool to make clothing. They carded, spun, and wove the wool into cloth. The people, true to the traditions which they had inherited from their pilgrim fathers, my grandparents (Elisha Hurd Groves and Lucy Simmons) were wondering just what they had to be thankful for. True, they had been delivered from those bloodthirsty wretches which had so cruelly murdered their beloved prophet and his equally loved brother, (Joseph and Hyrum Smith) and had mercilessly driven the people from their beautiful city of Nauvoo, and the comfortable homes they had only begun to enjoy. All this in the dead of a cold cruel winter, so cold the people crossed the great Mississippi River on the ice, a thing that seldom happened. Yes, they were out of the power of the mobs, but it had cost them those dear homes, and the long, long journey of a thousand miles or more through a wilderness infested by
wild beasts, and equally wild Indians. They had left behind almost everything that gave comfort and happiness, but they had a priceless heritage handed down to them from their Pilgrim parents. A strong will, and resolute determination that no trials could weaken or discourage, above all a faith in God that could not be shaken. So, they thought, even after all they had endured, and the present dark prospects, they had much to be thankful for.

Their little daughter, my mother [Lucy Maria Groves], who was born during the cold days when they were out on the prairie before coming to Utah, was then a little barefoot girl and was lonely and wished for a little chum to play with. As the day of Thanksgiving arrived, cold and stormy, they were huddled around the fireplace. Grandfather said, “Well, we have no apples to toast on the hearth. We have some corn, and I will parch some, and we have a nice fat deer hung up so we will roast some of it, and we will still have a Thanksgiving. We’ll not regret the past. It has given us a wonderful experience, so we will not long for nor wish for those things nowimpossible to obtain, but be thankful for what we have.”

The day was far along and night would soon be approaching, wrapping its dark shadowsover all the land. He said, “I will go out and take care of the stock, and then we will enjoy our Thanksgiving dinner.” As darkness came on, the snow began to fall. A real winter storm was on. The wind moaned and roared outside, and as if to accompany the elements from the hills nearby, and from every direction came the mournful howl of wolves. Grandfather remarked that he would surely feel sorry for any human being who happened to be out there tonight. As the night drew on, the storm increased in violence, until it seemed to shake even the adobe and stone walls of the fort. The man who had charge of the gate said, “For fear someone may be out tonight, I will not fasten the gate. I will leave it slightly ajar.”

The night grew wilder, and they all decided to go to bed. Grandfather was just starting to bank the fire, when there came a hard bang on the door like something heavy had fallen against it. He hurried over to open the door, and as he raised the latch, the door flew open and in fell an Indian. He was almost naked and so near frozen he could hardly speak. He held a bundle in his arms wrapped in a rabbit skin robe, which he had had to keep him warm in winter. As he fell on the floor, the bundle slid from his cold nerveless arms, and a faint cry came from the depths of the robe. It was the cry of a baby. Grandmother sprang up and hastily picked it up in her arms and unwrapped it, and lo, a tiny Indian baby, warm and cozy, came into view. “Father,” she said, “Thank God we are here to save these people.”

The baby was all right except for being hungry, but the man had nearly frozen to death. The sun had risen on another day before he recovered enough to tell his experience. He then told the story. His tribe [Shebitt],1 not a large one, had been out on their annual hunt to get a supply of venison for winter, and had killed plenty of deer, but a large band of bad Indians from another tribe had surprised them and killed them all including his wife. They took all their meat and ponies. They had struck him down and left him for dead. He had no idea how long he lay unconscious, but when he came to, all his friends and his wife were lying there cold and stiff. When he turned her over, the little one was lying there beneath the mother in a little depression in the ground, cold but still alive, and unhurt. The robbers had stripped all the good robes but had left this one, he thought because it wasn’t much good. He wrapped his baby in it, and came many days to the white man’s lodges to save his baby, and if the white man had not opened the door, he could not have done so. He was too sick, too cold, too hungry to go one step farther. He said, “If white squaw take baby, and raise up like white baby, she may have it for her own.”

He said, “Me now happy. Me want to die. You take care of baby. You good white mans. Me say goodbye.” And although he lingered a few days, he had fully decided not to live. Grandfather gave him good care, but he died and was laid to rest as if he were a white man.

Grandfather and Grandmother raised the baby, who grew to be a beautiful woman, bright, intelligent and a lovely girl. They loved the dusky little girl as if she were their own. They named her Evelyn. She was a real playmate to little barefooted Lucy, their own daughter. She grew to womanhood and married a good, honorable white man. My grandparents often said that of all the Thanksgiving days, the day on which little Evelyn came to them was the best of all.

----- Murland Packer

(post found at:  http://www.fortharmony.org/Pioneers/Pioneer%20Thanksgiving.htm)