Notes
Note N03533
Index
Some Facts Relating to the Life of William John Hiatt Compiled by his
daughter, Ruth Hiatt Bryson.
Much of this comes from things I and my brothers and sisters remember of
our father. Some of the information is gathered from histories by other family members. Also I have documents and certificates, in my possession, that have been useful.
My father, William John Hiatt, was born 19 Sep 1887 in Egin, Freemont Co., Idaho. He was the fifth child of Reuben Hiatt and Amanda Jane Rawson Hiatt. They had moved from Utah to Idaho, early in the year of 1885 and homesteaded 160 acres of land on Egin Bench. They lived in John Fisher's house, while they built a big log house, that was described as a beautiful home. It was in this home that William John was born.
I remember Grandmother Hiatt telling me his hair was very light in color, a real "toe head", and his eyes were blue. As he got older and as I remeber him, he had black hair and blue eyes. He stood 5'10 1/2" in height, was broad shouldered and would weigh about 185 to 200 lbs. He was very handsome and I was always proud to introduce him to my friends. he had a beautiful bas singing voice and loved to sing. Many an evening, we children gathered around to hear him sing to us, sometimes, while tottering us on his knee. He was adept with the harmonica, s well, and "The Irish Washerwomen" was one of our favorites to have him play. In years past, he had also played the banjo, but by time I came along, the banjo had worn out and hung silently on the wall, as a reminder of days gone by.
He was very good natured and loved to tease us kids. We loved it as we were getting his attention. He did have a temper, though. I remember when he brought home a new car. It was a 1927 Cheverolet Touring Car. He was so happy to show it off to Mother. He was so excited that he hit the gas feed instead of the brake and didn't make the sharp turn into the garage. He hit a tree and broke the radiator. The air was blue for awhile. Mother gathered us children into the house and out of earshot. The tree got cut down. Another time I remember was just a few months later. The car was repaired and running good. It was sitting in the driveway, as he was preparing to take mother to town. My little brother, Donald, unscrewed the gas cap and poured a handful of dirt into it. Wow We heard about that for awhile.
He loved my Mother dearly and was always doing things for her. We children knew of that love, though acts of love were never displayed in front of us. One morning, when he was home, Mother was making the bed. Some of us children were present and could tell he was in a teasing mood. He waltzed across the room, put his arm around Mother, gave her a squeeze and kissed her on the cheek. She scolded him with, "Will, not in front of the children."
Now to get back to his childhood. My grandfather and grandmother Hiatt were honest, law abiding folks. They loved their children and taught them to be good workers and to love the Lord, a lesson my father learned well. My
grandparents took them to church and set a good example for them.
In May of 1886, a ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
was organized in Egin. It was known as the Brighton Ward and grandfather Hiatt was called as the first Bishop. At the same time, grandmother Hiatt was first counselor in the Relief Society.
William John was blessed by Robert Greenwood, a counselor to Bishop Hiatt. Then when he was 8 years old, he was baptized by Hyrum J. Lucas.
When he was 14 years old, they sold their farm, in Idaho, and loaded all
their possessins and family on the train, at St. Anthony, and moved to Nibley, Oregon, arriving their 1 Feb 1902 in pouring down rain. They bought a place in Nibley and stayed with great grandma Rawson's family until they got a house built. They lived their until sometime in 1907, when they moved to Union, Oregon and lived and worked on a big ranch owned by Hyrum J. Lucas. My father and his younger brother Horace, walked all the way from Nibley to Union and drove the cattle. They had a big nine room house to live in, there. They enjoyed that but there were a lot of rattle snakes on the ranch. One day my father and his younger brother, Horace, went hunting, in the hills. They stopped at a big cherry tree and were eating cherries. My father looked down and saw a big rattle snake coiled up and ready to strike at Horace. He aimed his gun and shot it in the mouth and killed it.
Sometime during the year of 1908, my father, William John, left to serve a mission, for the church, in the Eastern States Mission. He served mostly in Virginia and West Virginia. In West Virginia, he met a family of James and M. Elizabeth Bolt Phibbs, who were converts to the church. They were very good to him. They had beautiful twin daughters, and four sons. They all became good friends.
After serving a little over a year of his mission, my father became ill and was forced to return home, in September of 1909. While he was gone, his
parents had moved to Nampa, Idaha and was farming 160 acres, there. He stayed with them and helped with the farm, then inthe fall of 1910, they moved by team and wagon to Rupert, Minidoka Co., Idaho. Again they bought property and built a house.
There was only a small branch of the church, in Rupert, at that time, and
church meetings were held in the homes of the members. The town, also was
small, but with the Minidoka Project opening up, there were opporunities for
farming, that looked good. The family settled here, and enjoyed living there
and watching it grow.
In February 1911, the Phibbs family moved from West Virginia to Idaho and
stayed inthe Hiatt home until they found a place of their own.
My father, William John, courted one of their twin daughters, Mary Jane, and married her, in the Salt Lake City Temple, 25 October 1911. They were blessed with 10 beautiful children.
The first, a blonde, blue eyed daughter, Grace, was born 19 Aug 1912, in
Rupert Idaho. Then they moved to Ammon, Idaho, in Bonneville CO. for a short
while, where there second daughter, a dark haired, brown eyed beauty, eva Wanda was born 14 Nov 1914.
They moved back to Rupert and lived in a little house on the south side of town. My father worked for a construction company, that also moved houses. While on one of these jobs, he fell and broke his ankle. He got a bad infection and became very ill, nearly to death. He later told the family of how he layed there so ill and watched his spirit leave his body. It was as though he had died. He could not move. His life was spared, however, and his spirit returned to his body, which was a very painful experience for him.
Shortly after this, their third daughter, Genevieve, another blue eyed
blonde, was born 1 March 1917.
My grandparents, Reuben and Amanda Hiatt, purchased a farm east of Rupert. My father built a house on the farm and moved his family there and farmed with his father. It was here that their 4th child, a dark haired, brown eyed boy, was born to them,16 May 1919. They named him Clayton Elmore.
My father liked farming. He liked to see things grow and he liked the
feeling of accomplishment, when the harvest was in. He farmed with his father for two years and then moved southeast of town, where he farmed the L.R. Adams farm. They were here, when their fifth child, a dark eyed girl, Ruth, was born 28 May 1922. Shortly after her birth, they had a terrible storm that destroyed the crops and killed several of the farm animals. It was a hard time for them. He had a family to care for and they had lost nearly everything they had.
Then he had the opportunity to take over the farming, on the ranch of Mr.
Collins. They had a nice big house, to live in. It even had indoor plumbing. They sure enjoyed living there. It was located near the little country Pioneer school, where the children attended school. He farmed this place for two years, then the place was sold and they mvoed to Paul, Idaho, where their sixth child, a tiny blue eyed blonde girl, Helen Beth, was born 9 Nov 1924.
My father worked for a warehouse owner, in neighboring Burley, Idaho for
awhile. Then went to worked for Wiley B. Craven, as a tennant farmer. Mr.
Craven had rented several farms in the Emerson district, west of Paul. My
father was a good farmer, so he moved from farm to farm, as was needed to get
them inshape. We children attended the Emerson School, and the family attended the Emerson Ward of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. My parents were very active in the church, participating in all they were called on to do. Father served in the Elders Quorum presidency while there.
While they lived on the farm that was known as the Mill ranch, their 7 th
child, Donald Willia, was born 28 Sep 1927. He had dark hair and big brown
eyes.
The winters were fierce, back then, and the snow piled up. The cold wind blew and drifted the snow up over the fence posts and up on the elctric poles. We kids walked to school on the hard crusted snow, through the fields and over the fences as you couldn't see where they were. The country roads were not any more than a lane and impossible to get out in a car, so we moved from that house to the Larsen place, which was up on the highway. We didn't live there very long as the house was much too small for the size of the family, so we moved to the Bowman place, about a mile west. It was much closer to the school.
While living on the Bowman place, their 8th child, a blue eyed, blonde boy was born 13 Feb 1930. They named him Earl Ray. They then moved to Uscola Place where there was a much bigger and better house for the family to live in.
In 1932, my father went to work for Davis Gree, who was the Bishop of the
Paul Ward. He had several farms, also. The one we moved onto had a big apple orchard. This was of course during the great depression. The fruit from the orchard as well as a large vegetable garden helped to feed the large family. Here, on the 28 August 1932, their 9th child, Mabel Jean, a dark haired brown eyed little girl was born.
The following summer, my uncle, Gottleib Blatter, came to see him. He was married to fathers younger sister, Dora May. He had a large cattle ranch, in Chinook, Montana. He wanted father to move there and help him feed cattle. It sounded like a good opportunity for him, so he sold all the household furnishings, loaded up their family in their chevrolet and moved to Montana, in August 1933.
It was a hard and a very cold winter. He worked very hard to make it work. Gottleib said he would build them a house to live in but was only able to build a small two room house. There were still eight of their nine children living at home and it just wasn't adequate. Even when Eva got a job in town at a boarding house, they were still very crowded. Eva came home to spend Christmas day and while walking back to town to work, that evening, she froze her legs. It raised blisters as big as hens eggs on her legs. She wasn't able to work for sometime.
My father loved living near his dear sister, Dora. She was very good to him and all the family. In spite of this, it just didn't work out for him and in the spring of 1934, he moved his family back to Rupert, Idaho. It must have been meant to be, as just one month laster, his dear sister died.
He went back to work for Wiley Craven, on a farm north of Paul. This is
where their 10th child, Vernal Blain was born, 20 Nov 1934, another blonde blue eyed boy.
In 1937, father bought a piece of property in the town of Paul, close to the school and built a house on it. He moved his family there and went to work for Merrill's egg Hatchery, just outside of town. He worked there for several years.
His beloved wife, Mary Jane, became very ill and passed away 15 May 1938,
jsut three weeks after her dear identical twin sister had died.
He greived for my mother and struggled to care for his family. His three
oldest daughter were married with families of their own, but they helped where they could.
In 1943, he remarried. By then, three more of his children were married,
leaving just the four younger ones at home. They moved to southern California, where his wife was from and he worked in the orange groves for a time.
He had some serious surgery and was unable to do the hard work any longer, so he moved to Ely, Nevada, where his daughter, Genevieve and her family lived and owned a grocery store. He managed a motel and an apartment building, there in Ely, until he became ill and died 29 Dec 1948. He was taken to Paul, Idaho to be buried by his beloved Mary Jane.
All of his ten children, although scattered from the east coast to the west coast, gathered back to Paul, in the bitter cold winter, to attend his funeral and give love and support and to comfort each other.
We of his descendants, although living far apart, have kept in close contact with each other and remained a close family. We hold a family reunion each year in August in his mother's honor.
B-Early Nibley OR Ward rec F #5033 Bap-Early Nibley OR ward rec F #5033 TIB Salt Lake Temple #875 bk D pg 25
End-TIB SL Temple #875 bk D pg 25
M-cert State of UT from Salt Lake Temple, no file #
D-cert state of Nevada File # 48-1650