[The following is a transcription of an audio tape provided by William O. Tolman to Sherry Hofhine Davis in 1977. Taken from Judson Tolman: Pioneer, Lumberman, Patriarch by E. Dennis Tolman, Second Edition, pages 75-78].
I am recording this for Sherry Davis. It is Tuesday, the 27th of September, 1977. By way of introduction, in connection with the Thomas Tolman Family Organization, may I say that it has been a process of evolution to bring this organization to its present status. When I became an officer in the family organization, in the late 1930’s, it was called the Judson Tolman Family Organization, because Judson Tolman was the first of three [four] boys baptized during the Nauvoo Period of the Church. He had a brother, Cyrus, who was baptized the following year, who was older than he and another brother, Benjamin, baptized, who was younger. (According to more recent research a third brother, George Washington, was also baptized in April 1845 and died in 1849.) It seemed to me that the families of these three sons of Nathan Tolman and Sarah Hewitt would become more involved if it was called the Nathan Tolman Family Organization. The Executive Committee approved this (1951) and so the change was made. [There is no written record that the organization ever bore Judson’s name. Naming it after Nathan was first approved in 1935 under David R. Tolman.] When Judson Tolman died in 1916, shortly before his death, he asked his daughter Myra to carry on the genealogical research program for the Tolman Family. This she did for forty-three years, receiving very little help from us members of the family. Yet, we knew that we could go to any Temple of the Church and find family names to take through the Temple. In 1957,1 started teaching genealogy classes for the Brigham Young University. These were classes that were held off campus. The first class I taught was at Springville, Utah. From then until 1960, when I moved to Bountiful, I had taught about 3,500 people in these classes, as far south as Tucson, Arizona and as far north as Portland, Oregon. The more I taught, the more my testimony increased concerning this great program of the Church. During that period of time, often I would visit with Myra Tolman Patterson, when I would drive from Provo to Salt Lake City. She was a great inspiration to me as she repeated faith-promoting experiences which she had had in connection with this program. Early in January, 1959, this great woman went to the LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City. The doctors had diagnosed her health problem as cancer. She suffered great pain during her next three and a half months. It is hard for me to understand why one who had done so much should suffer as she did. And, on the 19th of April, 1959, she passed away. Because of the serious condition of her sickness, the Family Executive Committee met under the direction of Bion Tolman in the Board Room of the Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, across the street, South from Temple Square on the Sunday morning of April Conference. They asked me to take Aunt Myra’s place as the family genealogist of Nathan Tolman Family Organization. I said, “Bion, I would be glad to do this, if you would give me three people to 75 help me.” He said, “three people? What do you want three people for? Aunt Myra has been doing it alone for forty-three years. And you’re teaching genealogy for the Brigham Young University. Why do you need three people to help you?” I said to our President, Bion Tolman, “It’s a long story, and I don’t have time to tell it this morning, if we’re going to get across the street to the morning session of General Conference.” I got my three people. One of them was Genevieve Tolman Hofhine. And, with two other volunteers (Avin C. Tolman and Austin S. Tolman), I started meeting once every month, trying to decide what to do with Aunt Myra’s records. (Two others were soon added—L. Devon Mecham and Phyllis Tolman, as secretary, making five members of his committee.) No one in the family organization knew what she had done or where she had been in her research. We had to evaluate these two problems before we could go ahead in this program. During the next three and a half years, we came up with several ideas. When we would get back, in the next meeting, we knew that our previous ideas were not the solution. Finally, in the latter part of 1962, we finalized the idea of indexing all of her records on a card similar to the Temple Record Index Bureau Card. As soon as the cards were printed, we called for the cousins to meet in a Family Work Day to index these many volumes and boxes of records. The first Saturday, when we met at eight o’clock, and planned to meet until five, we only had myself and my wife and the five members of the genealogy committee present. The next month, the number doubled and the month after that they doubled again. The family was becoming activated. As we went forward with this program, I told my cousins, if they would meet religiously, every month, that miracles would happen in our family genealogical program. The first miracle, I suppose, was our decision to index all of Aunt Myra’s records. The second miracle, which happened about the time we decided on the index card, was in the form of a letter (August 1961) which I received from Fair Acres, New Mexico, signed by Fred Burton Tolman and his wife, Arlene Kelly Tolman. They said, “We are gathering the Descendants of Thomas Tolman, who came to the United States in 1630, ten years after the pilgrims landed. We wonder if you would be interested in helping us. We understand that you are the genealogist for the Tolmans in Utah.” I answered the letter and received another one. I answered it, and we corresponded several months. (In her first letter, Arlene said “the L.D.S. Church and its people are a wonderful group” and she had many friends among them who had helped her and she “would be more than glad to help them with any data” she had.) Later, Alvin Tolman, who lives in Murray, Utah, took his vacation and went to Fair Acres, New Mexico to visit these non-member cousins. They found them living in a one-room home. No running water. They pumped their water by hand out in the front of the house. They were poor people, yet they had an interest in the genealogy of our fathers equal to no one that I was acquainted with. In further correspondence, I asked them if they would like to go to the New England States and do research for our family. I asked them how much it would cost. They said, “Nothing. We can live as economically in the New England States as we can in Fair Acres, New Mexico.” In 1965, these two wonderful cousins who are now in their 66th year, came to Bountiful, Utah, where we honored them at a banquet. Four hundred cousins turned out for this occasion. They couldn’t believe it. Fred said, “This is impossible. The largest group that we have ever had as a family together was ten people. How could you gather from this area four hundred cousins?” Elder Theodore M. Burton, Assistant then to the Quorum of the Twelve, with his wife, attended the banquet and he spoke to us afterwards. These two wonderful cousins also spoke to us for a few minutes. After spending two weeks in Bountiful, they left to go east to the New England States to do research among our non-member cousins who would not even let a Mormon in their house. Charles R. Mabey, previous to this time, after he had retired as an attorney and a former Governor of Utah, took a trip to the New England States. He went through the States of New York, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Maine and knocked on every doorof a Tolman that he could find in the directory. And, he said to me in 1960, “Will, every door was slammed in my face. I did not get one opportunity to talk to one Tolman. And when I was coming through Augusta, Maine, I turned to my wife and said, ‘Afton, when I get outside of this city, I’m going to take my shoes and socks off and wash my feet against the Tolmans in the New England States. They can all go to hell as far as I’m concerned.’ And then as we drove down the main street of this city, there was a large banner sign across the street that said, ‘Arlin C. Tolman Automobiles,’ advertising a new model of cars. My wife said, ‘Charles, why don’t you stop and see this man?’ ‘No, Sir! I’m not going to be insulted by another Tolman as long as I live.’ And then my wife said, ‘Now Charles, you’re going to stop.’ And, Will, when your wife talks to you like that, you sit up straight and pay attention—and I turned over to the side of the road and parked in front of Arlin C. Tolman’s place of business. I went in and introduced myself as a cousin from Utah. This busy man took me into his office and spent hours with me. And, Cousin Will, he knows more about the history of the Tolmans than any man living, as far as I know. I am too feeble to go back and get a copy of his records, so I want you to promise me that you will go back and fill this assignment for me.” I promised him. When Fred and Arlene came to Bountiful, in 1965,1 asked them to fill this assignment for me by proxy. When they arrived in Augusta, Maine, they inquired for Arlin C. Tolman. They were informed that he had passed away two years before. Fred said, “Our hearts sank within us, but we inquired, ‘Is there anyone who would have his records?'” “Yes, maybe his son, Arlin C. Tolman, Jr. Would have them.” They got his address. They knocked on the door. Fred said, “I am Fred Burton Tolman, your cousin from New Mexico.” He said, “New Mexico, that’s out West, isn’t it?” “Yes.” But all the Tolmans out west, he thought were Mormons and so his next question was, “What church do you belong to?” Fred said, “I was born a Presbyterian, but I’m not active.” Arlene said, “I was born a Baptist, but I’m not active in the church.” He said, “Come on in.” Arlene said, “Do you have your father’s records?” “Yes, I do.” “Can we see them?” “Yes, you can.” And she said to me, “Will, you won’t believe it. He took us to a bedroom where they pushed the children out on the back porch and that room was literally filled with boxes of the records of Arlin C. Tolman, Sr. In her excitement, Arlene said, “When can I start copying these?” And, he said, “You can’t copy these.” “Why can’t I?” “You would never live long enough. You don’t have to copy them. When you get back to Fair Acres, New Mexico, you write to me and I will send them all to you, post paid.” Fred and Arlene are now working on these records at their home in Stirky, Arkansas, where they now live. And when they come next Summer to our big Thomas Tolman Family Reunion, they tell me that they will probably bring about 80,000 Family Group Sheets. I should insert here why the name was changed from Nathan Tolman to the Thomas Tolman Family Organization. In our contacts with Fred and Arlene Tolman, we thought it would be well to include them in the family organization and, because Fred’s ancestors go back to Thomas, the brother of our Samuel Tolman, who was a grandson of our immigrant ancestor, Thomas Tolman, we felt that it would include our non-member cousins, if the name was changed to (that of) our immigrant ancestor. And so, the name was changed, April 8, 1962 and then, in 1972 we incorporated under the laws of the State of Utah, the Thomas Tolman Family Organization, as a non-profit organization. As the cousins met each Saturday, once a month, indexing the records of my great aunt, Myra Tolman Patterson, we realized that most of her records were incomplete and as we finished indexing the work of this marvelous relative of ours, we realized that she had done research for about 200,000 people on our ancestral lines. What a tremendous tribute to this great aunt of mine! What a tremendous challenge to our family, to finish the work that she began. And so, I have asked the family members who live in the area from Hyrum, Utah to Provo, Utah to help me get 60 cousins to volunteer to be genealogical research secretaries and train themselves, under my direction so that they can direct the research throughout the United States and Canada or direct, I should say, 600 of our cousins throughout the United States and Canada as they accept one of these families on the records of Aunt Myra and Fred and Arlene Tolman…(Judson Tolman: Pioneer, Lumberman, Patriarch by E. Dennis Tolman, Second Edition, pages 75-78).
William served as the Family Genealogist on the Thomas Tolman Family Organization Executive Board in 1959 and served in that position until his passing in 1980. He believed the key to genealogy and family history work was “to get a lot of people to do a little.” When he received the many boxes of records that had been accumulated by Aunt Myra, which he first estimated to be over 200,000 names, he had to determine what to do with them. It was decided that Myra’s records must be indexed in order to know what research had been done. Beginning November 1962, Saturday work-days were established to put the record onto index cards. An average of twenty-five relative same each month, with a record month of seventy-five. In the spring of 1961, William received a form letter from cousins in Fairacres, New Mexico. That letter was followed by a personal letter dated 28 August 1961. He answered, and a chain of letters resulted in a personal visit from Fred and Arlene Tolman and an exchange of genealogy data, between 1965 and 1967, that amounted to about 25,000 new family group sheets. William was truly a visionary man and by the mid to late 1970s fort-three secretaries had been called to keep in touch with fifty-nine governing board members and 192 research chairmen. As William taught classes and traveled to conferences he heard enough said stories about family records that were lost or destroyed or would not be shared to convince him that the Tolman records needed a home of their own. The result was the building and dedication of the Thomas Tolman Family Genealogy Center on July 7, 1978. William and Opal Tolman became the caretakers to the center and hosts to the family family members. (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, pages 77-78).
On April 8, 1962, William motioned that the Nathan Tolman Family Organization be changed to the Thomas Tolman Family Organization after our immigrant ancestor. William often expressed his love for all of his cousins regardless of their faith or background. (Note: Judson Tolman formed this organization in 1903 and named it the Nathan Tolman Family Organization after his father. The organization has always been closely tied to the Family History and Genealogy program of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, page 98).
(From the minutes of a 7 April 1968 semi-annual meeting of the Thomas Tolman Family Organization). Genealogy reports were given by William O. Tolman And Arlene K. Tolman. William expressed his concern that the records we now have are carefully checked and proven. He also stressed again his concern for a permanent home for the records. (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, pages 147-148).
(From the minutes of the 1969 Thomas Tolman Family Reunion Business Meeting). William O. Tolman expressed his appreciation to the family and the part they contribute to the work we are trying to do. He encouraged the promotion of the magazine and the importance of an up-to-date mailing list of the family. It was decided that the family should incorporate as a non-profit organization for doing business. The executive committee was also empowered to decided on property to purchase and facilities to be built so there will be a suitable place for the family records. (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, page 152).
In the April 1969 semi-annual meeting LeVirl Tolman reported that the old Judson Tolman home had about 2 acres in Bountiful and 7 acres in Davis County and was to be sold between $47,000 and $58,000. LeVirl was asked to follow through on any leads. LeVirl E. Tolman reported at the October 1970 semi-annual meeting that the Judson Tolman property, which the family have been interested in acquiring, had been sold. Other properties were considered and in April of 1973 it was announced that property was purchased at 2937 South Orchard Drive in Bountiful. William O. Tolman was offered a house at no cost if the family would move it. A foundation basement was poured and the house was moved on top of it to provide the framework for the upstairs apartment of the family center. (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, pages 149, 156, 174).
When the Tolman Genealogy Center was dedicated July 7, 1978 it was completely finished and paid for. It was estimated that over 21,600 hours in volunteer labor and nearly $70,000 in donations from the family had been contributed (the equivalent of over $255,000 in 2016 dollars). Six hundred and forty-six attended the dedication service of the new family genealogy center, a very unique holding for a family organization. (Thomas Tolman Family Organization: A Hundred Year History, compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, 2003, page 216).
28-29 Jan 1977: We’ve started moving into the Tolman Family Genealogy Center in the upstair’s living quarters. The carpet isn’t laid yet and cupboards still need to be built, but we feel we need to be here to protect the home and records and begin moving the research forward. (William Odell Tolman: Patriarch, Genealogist, Teacher compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, First Edition, 2009, page 447).
William O. Tolman was integral to indexing the family records and proposing to the Thomas Tolman Family Organization Executive Board to build a home to house and safeguard the records. His journal is full of multiple entries documenting the hundreds of hours he personally volunteered to the construction effort. He and his dear wife Opal were the family home’s first hosts. William inspired cousins to work on the family records including monthly family work days on Saturdays. He committed countless hours to “proving” the family records and teaching others to do the same.
(Contributed by the Thomas Tolman Family Organization). Visit FamilySearch to learn more about William Odell Tolman and other ancestors. Also visit the Thomas Tolman Family Organization to find out how you can get more involved in family history.