(The following are excerpts from William Odell Tolman: Patriarch, Genealogist, Teacher compiled by Loraine Tolman Pace, First Edition, 2009, pages 2-3)
I was born in the little country community of Island, seven miles north of Oakley, Cassia, Idaho, 11 July 1910. The name Idaho comes from an Indian word meaning ‘gem of the mountains.’ Dr. Nielson delivered me. My first home and the place of my birth was a log house with a dirt roof. When it rained we had to shovel dirt back on the roof. The ceiling was of calcimined cheesecloth and the carpet was woven cloth that was tightly pulled over the straw that covered the living room floor. By today’s standards we were poor as a family when I was growing up, but we never went hungry or cold for lack of food and clothing. In the summer we mostly went barefoot. We wore patches on our overalls. I remember the ice house, the cistern, the meat shop, the games we played as youth.
My sister, Naomi, records the following in her life story: “I recall very plainly when my brother Bill was born. What rejoicing! Mother had three girls already so we were plenty thrilled when we were told it was a boy. We really spoiled him too. I used to press his clothes when he was only eleven or twelve and take him off to dances, so proud to have a brother along.”
The early excitement may not have lasted for everyone. My sister, Armenia records, “We would cut paper dolls out of Montgomery Ward Catalogues. We especially liked the ones with pink dresses on. Our brother Bill would tear them and we would have to wait until the next catalogue came before we could cut more.”
In a letter dated June 8, 1958 from Armenia to me she said, “Something else you might want to know about yourself when you were little. You used to go to sleep almost anywhere you felt like it, under the bed, in a ditch, on the harrow, etc. I helped find you many times. Mother would think you were in a creek or lost or something.”
Left to right: Armenia, Naomi and Emma with baby brother, William O. Tolman. They are the children of William Alvin and Hattie Naomi Tolman Tolman, gc of Joshua Alvin and Mary Jane Gorringe and Jaren and Emma Briggs Tolman, ggc of Cyrus and Alice Bracken and Judson and Sarah Lucretia Holbrook Tolman.
I was named and blessed by my Grandfather, Joshua Alvin Tolman.
