(From the history of Judson Isaac Tolman).
Much had been said by the Church authorities regarding the desirability of some sections in southern Idaho, among which was the Goose Creek Valley. Father gained permission and soon was off with his family to join the few who had already come, and commenced the settlement of what was to become known as Oakley, near the point where the Good Creek entered the open valley. It was in October of 1881 we came to a cabin which had already been built by my brothers, who had come previously. It was built of logs with chinking in the cracks on the inside, and plastered in the cracks with mud on the outside. There were two rooms which were quite comfortable. At first we used the water from Goose Creek which ran near the house, but the next spring when the thaw came, it brought a large flow of water down the valley and there were dead cattle and other animals which had not survived the winter lodged here and there along the stream making the water undesirable for use. So my brothers and I set to work and soon had a well dug from which we were able to draw very pure and desirable water. We had only to dig sixteen feet and the water came in clear and cold. We used a chain over a pulley, with a bucket on either end so that when we would pull one bucket up, the other would go down – each empty bucket helping to pull the dull one up.
Our home was some distance down the valley so that we had some four miles to drive to attend Church services for a few years. Then there were sufficient numbers to make an organization so that we had a ward of our own, known as the Marion Ward. My brother Alex, and I were the only Deacons and we took care of the meeting house, keeping it clean and nice to meet in. We gathered flowers along the roadside and in the fields to make it attractive with large bouquets and we delighted in this assignment. The meeting house, for a while, served both as a place of worship and for holding the school during a few months of the year.
Our school didn’t amount to very much at first for we had neither competent teacher nor funds to employ one. I can remember going for a while, but the teacher would lie down on a bench and go to sleep while the pupils did as they desired. The period was so very short each year, with no grades or grading and I, having had some schooling before leaving Tooele, decided to give it up and go to work, so I had in all about what children now get through the third grade. I learned to read, add, multiply, and divide and wasn’t so different from most whom attended who ranged in age from youngsters of early age to adults of 25 and even more.
In Marion, I met again the young girl who had first attracted my attention when at school in Tooele, she corrected the teacher as to her name as before referred to. She had come with her family to the Oakley valley the year before we came, and their home was just one mile from ours. When we now met, she was just 13 years old, which was 3 years younger than I, our birthdays coming on the same day of the month, Jan 21st. I began taking her out right away and we courted for 5 years before we felt old enough to be married. When the time arrived, which we had set, we went in two covered wagons, Emerett and I, Dan Gorringe, his sweetheart, and his mother, to Logan, Utah to be married in the Temple. I shall never forget the time we had on the way. Dan’s mother was a little old English lady, who pronounced all her words in the quaint English style, to our amusement, and which caused her to almost lose her patience at times, but which all added to our good time.
We had to wait 2 days in Logan before the Temple opened for there was not enough work to require it staying open all the time; then the day came; we went into the Temple at 8 o’clock in the morning, and because of inexperienced workers, and the large number who were going through for the first time to be married, it was 6 o’clock in the evening when we were finally married and left the building. We really felt as though we were married, and I remember well saying to my wife, “Well, we are now sealed for time and all eternity,” she answered, “Yes, we are and I guess we will stay married,” and we did, working together here in mortality for 58 years, when God called her back home, away from me for a short time. Our honeymoon was our trip back home and we had a wonderful time. (As Grandpa was recording this, a faraway look was in his eyes, a smile on his face and he seemed about to tell some choice experiences but instead seemed to think it too precious to be told).
Before we were married, my father-in-law had given us a building spot close by their home. I had gone to the mountains, cut green timber, hewed it smooth on both sides down to about 5 inches in thickness, and then piled it up in neat piles to dry. I cut timber and had it sawed for all the lumber and shingles required, then my father-in-law and I built our home. My father-in-law’s farm was not the best soil, and the spot he gave us was covered with grease-wood, a sort of brush which grows on land which is not good for much else. When the brush was cleared off, the ground was so white it was almost blinding to the eyes. Oh, how I have learned to dislike that kind of soil.
Well, things worked out – my brother wanted to go to Canada, and sold his place, farm and home to my sister, Alveretta, who was now a widow; her husband George Grant, having been accidentally killed while on a rabbit hunt, and she sold us her old home. We gave my wife’s father his land back and sold him our house, which we moved up to his and I helped him fix it up to make a very comfortable home for him and his family, but he didn’t live long thereafter to enjoy it, for he died soon after it was complete, leaving my mother-in-law a widow at quite an early age to care for a large family, which she did graciously, and never married again.
We enjoyed our new home, not that it was much better built than our other one, but we had more room, which we were beginning to need, and we lived there until the spring of 1906, when we sold out and moved to Murtaugh. It was in October of 1894 that I received a call from the Church to fill a mission in the Southern States; we had two small children at that time and were expecting our third. I was to leave in April of 1895, so I spent all the winter of 1894-1895 hauling cedar wood from the hills west of home to do the family while I was away. I cut into stove length quite a lot, and then the deacons of the ward would come each week and chop enough to do until the next, and after three years, when I returned home there was still some left.
I was set apart for my mission and ordained a Seventy by Pres. Seymour D. Young, of the First Quorum of the Seventy at Salt Lake City on March 20, 195. He gave me a wonderful blessing and among other things said unto me, “Brother Tolman, if you will do your duty during this mission there is no miracle ever performed by man on this earth that is too great for you to perform.”
Visit FamilySearch to learn more about Judson Isaac Tolman, Phoebe Emerett Bates, or other ancestors. Also visit the Thomas Tolman Family Organization to find out how you can get more involved in family history.
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