The recent "HG vs HV" and sugared lettuce posts inspired me to go back and pull some items from a "diary" kept by Henry Vernon Hall in 1945. During the period this diary was being kept the Halls lived in Murray, UT. That fall they moved to Bancroft, ID where Vern and Eleanor taught briefly (and Vern coached the football team) before purchasing Hallstedt (?the next spring?). Anyhow here are some extracted entries.
Mar. 19
Well, Diary, you old rascal, here you are again. How do you expect me to write? I'm not mad at any body.
Mar. 20.
Chuckey wakes me at 5. I hate that, so does he. I get dressed while he laces up one shoe. He's a good kid tho. We take papers until 6, breakfast then chores.
...
Howard seems to be doing alright on his radio repair job. It sure has made a new kid of him. He makes around $12 per week. Bought malted milk, .30
Mar. 21.
Spent $12 to get the garden plowed. Gosh that hurts. No use to cry tho. Best I could do. 25 cents phone calls.
Mar, 26,
Hi fella; I felt pretty low last night. Uncle Slug was sitting in the front room drunk when I got home. I spoke to him, no answer. I went in the other room and said to Mom, pointing, "How long do we have to take that?" She said, "He wants to talk to you." I said, "He won't get any satisfaction from me." I was worried about getting
him out of there without hurting him.
[Ed: In spite of some attempts to find out who "Uncle Slug" was from dad when he was still with us, and Eleanor after that, I never got a straight answer. So he is apparently another skeleton in the family closet.]
...
Chuckey's cold had caught up with him and Howard had fiddled off so I hurried out to milk. I got to thinking about Howard. He'd been fooling around with Larry all day. Hadn't even gone to church. Now he's scooted out on the chores, said nothing. By gosh I deserve better treatment then that. Seems like the sky's about to fall. When I was about half thru with the last cow, in walked Howard. I told him how I felt about it. For a minute it looked like he was going to be resentful but instead of backing down any, I boiled a little. He admitted I'd been too easy on him then he warmed up and told me all thinkings. He doesn't often do that so I knew everything will be alright.
...
Snow to-day. March marches on. Made 3# of butter. one we eat.
Mar. 28.
Well diary, old guy, you thot I was going to neglect you all so soon, didn't you? I fooled you. You've just had a day of rest. You'll pay for it to-day.
To begin with, Divine Revelation is not well accepted by the world, even in Christendom. That's one reason why Mormonism has been slow to catch fire. The world is in a mess and the L D S Church has the answer, based on revelation.
[Ed: As promised, this entry goes on for some time and ends:]
Now then while the war is on, She'll [Ed: Eleanor] go on getting technical training in research and get hold of the ropes. I'll finish "Human Oak" [Ed: The story he was writing of his father's life] if I can ever learn to think. Gosh I act dumb sometimes. Mom [Ed: Eleanor] will have to help there. We'll get the family organized and our debts paid then as soon as the war is over we'll go to England and go right to work on the ancestors. As we study back among them, the historical basis of Mormonism will reveal its self and we'll write it. If we do a good job it will sell like hot cakes.
Then we'll come home and write, "The Next Depression, It Need Not Happen." Perhaps we can help to avoid it. Too big?
3 comments:
Rich and I were discussing this last night trying to figure how old dad was at the time of the "fooling around with Larry all day" incident. I was thinking he was younger, butif it's Mar. 1945 that would have made him 17.
I also really enjoyed the "Chucky" reference.
That's right. Mar 1945 - Feb 1928 = 17 and a month.
I too chuckle about "Chucky", but I do wish he would've tackled that book on avoiding the next depression.
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