Life history of Lula Irene Haderlie Jenkins
Lula Irene Haderlie 
1893-1978

PHOTOS

     Lula Irene Haderlie was born in the family home up Tin Cup canyon, near Freedom, Wyoming on November 27,1893 to Charles Henry Haderlie and Annie Barbara Schiess. She was the eighth child in a family of thirteen children. The following history was written by herself --

     When a few months old I was very near choking to death with croup. My dad was away working. My Uncle Lue Frank was staying with us. He was out milking the cows. Mother called to him to come and administer to me, as I was choking. He said he would come when he got the cows milked; he wasn't in any hurry. Well, I got well of that. When I was four years old, I got whooping cough real bad. My brother, Edward, who was three years younger than I died from it. When I was eight or ten I was very sick with a high fever. There were no doctors in the valley so we didn't know what I had. When I started getting well, my hair nearly all came out. Mother sent for one of the Nelson boys to come up and cut my hair off. When he got there I was long gone. I wasn't about to have my hair cut off. My hair came back in and I had beautiful long dark brown hair.
     I grew up on a farm, helping inside and out. As soon as my two sisters and I were big enough to sit on a milk stool, our brothers turned the milking over to us. They said it was a girl's job. We would milk the cows and separate the milk and make butter to sell. Mother had a big barrel churn and we would have to turn it until the butter came. One day the lid came loose and all the cream spilled on the floor which was quite a loss. Snakes would come right into the house. We used to have a cellar pit to put milk in. One day Mother went down and there was a snake in the milk pail.
     I went to school in a one room school house with one teacher for all eight grades. I got to the eighth grade and quit. We couldn't go to school all of the time as we were needed at home. We would walk to school part of the time, which was 2 ½ miles away, where the Ed Croft house is.
     I had one dress. I would wear it to school. Saturday mother would wash it out so it would be clean to wear to Sunday School. We would go to Sunday School in a big three-seated buggy. In the summer time we would walk. There was a one-room building where we had Sunday School and meetings, on the lot where Lyle Jenkins lives. My two older sisters and I walked down to town several days to learn a song to sing in Primary. After spending a lot of time learning it, we decided we wouldn't go to the meeting to sing it. So we stayed home. I was baptized May 31, 1902 and confirmed June 9, 1902.
     When I was older, I worked for Eddie Jenkins in the summer in the hayfield and milked cows for $2.50 a week. I also worked for May Jenkins in the summer. We didn't have much in the line of recreation. Once in a great while, a traveling show would come to town, or there would be a dance. Once in a while on Sunday afternoons, we would walk to town to visit the Luthi girls or they would come up to our place. To celebrate the 24th or the 4th of July, we had rodeos, races for the kids, and a program in the morning. We always had a program on Christmas Eve, too. For Easter, the kids started hiding eggs before Easter. Then the night before Easter we'd bring them down and boil them in water with onion skins. That colored them brown.
     The Indians had a trail over Dad's place right close to the house. One day mother asked me to do something and I didn't mind her, so she said she would give me to the Indians. Along came some Indians so Mother told the chief to come and take me. I ran and hid until they left. Mother wouldn't have given me away. She just wanted to scare me so I would mind her. Mother was left alone so much when we were small, and we were all frightened of the Indians. We had an Indian scare. They were coming to kill us. Everybody took off in wagons for days, and went up in the narrows. The Indians didn't do anything so we came home. The Indian squaws would walk through Dad's fields, tromping down the crops and then they would help themselves to what they wanted from our garden. Dad had a little shack with a grinder in it. The Indians use to come down to sharpen their hatchets and knives. The shed had a dirt roof and my brothers would sit up there and sift dirt down the Indians' necks. It's a wonder they didn't scalp them.
     We did all kinds of things to earn money. We killed turkeys and hung them upstairs during the winter to keep them from freezing before we could take them to Montpelier to sell. We boiled buckets and buckets of water to scald pigs so that their hair could be scrubbed off. Then the pigs were sold as meat with their skin still on. We would have to ride all over the hills for the cows at night, as there were no families living farther up. The hills were not fenced, and the cows could roam all over.
     We never had fresh fruit. We had to eat dried fruit or service berries. I never tasted an orange until I was grown.
     When I was twelve years old, my parents' home burned down on Christmas morning. We didn't save very much. I was barefoot when we found out the house was on fire. We had just come in from milking and our feet were cold so we had taken off our shoes. We had to live at Uncle Jake's [Jacob Schiess] until they could fix a place for us to live. Dad fixed up an old wood shed which was very cold. The boys slept in a sheep camp until they could build a house. We would have to go and do the milking night and morning.
     My dad was a polygamist. He married the only two sisters in the Schiess family. They lived in Providence, Utah. My dad was called on a mission to Europe and when he came home the law officers were waiting to get him for polygamy, so he disguised himself as a tramp. They were going to put Dad in jail if he didn't get rid of one of his wives, so he had to get out of Utah. He brought my mother to Freedom and Aunt Bertha lived in Providence, Utah. We lived up Tin Cup, where my brother Gilbert Haderlie now lives, until we had to leave the county because of polygamy. We moved to Star Valley and several years later Aunt Bertha and her family moved here.
     Dad had 26 children: 16 boys and 10 girls. Austin drowned at the age of two years. Eddie died of whooping cough. Fred died of a hip disease when a young man.
     I met Raymond Jenkins one summer. He lived in Newton, Utah but he would come to work for his brother in Star Valley during the summer. I married Raymond on September 15, 1915 in the Salt Lake Temple. We went as far as Newton, Utah with a team and wagon and then went by train to Salt Lake City. Two days before we left Raymond got word that one of his brothers [Seymour] had died. In order for him to get to the funeral, he had to take the train from Soda Springs to Newton. My brother Luther and his bride-to-be, Joan Lindholm, were also going with us, driving their team and wagon. We were married the same day. We spent a week in Newton and then started on our way home. We came around by the dairies owned by Kunz. It was snowing and very cold. We stopped and Raymond went into the house to get something warm for us to drink. When he got in the house he passed out. So I was in the wagon, holding the horses and freezing. He finally came out bringing me some Postum and a roll.
     We came home and moved into a one room log house that belonged to Raymond's father, where Gary Hokanson now lives. There our first baby, Leona, was born on July 11, 1916. Then we bought a one room house from my brother John and moved it up on our farm where Earl Haderlie now lives. We lived there for four years. Two children were born there: Elva on Nov. 27, 1917, and Darrel on Jan. 18, 1920.
     During the flu epidemic, there was a quack doctor who came to Freedom that winter to stay and that is who brought Darrel into the world. Many people died from the flu. I was sick two days with the flu, then Darrel was born and I was over the flu. Raymond was sick in bed. He nearly had pneumonia. The children were sick in bed. Mabel Jenkins carne to stay and help out and she and her children got the flu. So we had a house full of sick people, all in one room. Any man in town, who was well, would come and milk the cows and do the chores. The flu hadn't reached Afton yet, so they sent down girls to help in the homes. We had a different one every day. Albert Ralph had just come home from his mission and brought the flu with him and exposed everyone in Freedom.
Uncle Jacob Schiess, Delores Ralph, Guy Robinson, Ida Clark and two boys, a Draney boy and a Warren boy, all died from the flu. They were all buried without funerals.
     On April 28, 1920 we decided to move our house back to town. We bought five acres of land from Ada Robinson, and added on another room and a shanty to our house. There was still a foot of snow or more and we had to move it on sleds.
     September 21, 1921 another baby, Wilda Marie, was born, who only lived six months. I found her dead in bed one morning which was an awful shock. We think she had quick pneumonia. The snow was so deep on March 10, 1922 that they didn't think we could get up to the cemetery. The bishop wanted us to bury her in our yard until spring. We didn't want to do that so they made a road up through Weber's so we were able to get to the cemetery.
     On November 14, 1924 LaVor was born; August 15, 1928 Lera was born. In the spring of 1929 we bought the farm where Darrel now lives from Clarence Chadwick. We had no neighbors. Maxine was born on December 17,1930 and Theron was born on January 22, 1933.
     In 1930 Glen Jenkins built a house, where Alice now lives, so we had some neighbors.
     1936 was a bad summer. We didn't raise enough hay to feed all of the animals. So that winter Raymond took the sheep to Iona where he bought hay and stayed there all winter to feed them. We had moved to town for the winter; I milked the cows and did the chores and in April, Raymond moved the sheep back. We would've been better off if we had sold the sheep instead of taking them to Iona.
     In the spring we moved back on the farm. In October 1940 Darrel went on a mission. When he came home, LaVor was drafted into the Marines in March 19, 1944. He was killed March 5, 1945 on Iwo Jima. That was a very sad time for us. His body was returned for burial on December 11, 1948. The snow was so deep there was only a one lane road to Montpelier where we went to meet the rain with LaVor's body.
     When LaVor was a baby, I became ill and was taken to Soda Springs in January, where I had my appendix out. We had only one doctor here at the time and he was a drunkard. After my operation, I got rheumatism so bad I couldn't come home. So I stayed with Carl and Lizzie Haderlie for a week in Soda Springs. After I had been home for some time, I had my tonsils removed and my rheumatism left me for years. Then it came back. We had gone to Soda Springs in a car but when I came home the snow was too deep so Raymond had Charley Nelson came for me with a team and sleigh. May 1945 we went to Ogden for major surgery [hysterectomy] as Dr. Treloar was the only doctor here at the time. He sent me to Ogden where I stayed with Leona and Elva who were living there at the time.
     Raymond became sick with arthritis. He became so bad, and after LaVor's death he developed Parkinsons disease so he couldn't work anymore. So we sold the farm to Darrel and built a house in town, where I live now. Lera went on a mission in June 1950. Raymond passed away June 5, 1955.
     I cooked at the school for five years and worked at the cheese factory for twelve years. I never missed a day on account of sickness.
     In early June 1971 I took my first airplane ride to Nebraska to visit my granddaughter, Mary Lou. I enjoyed the ride very much. On June 29, 1971 I had my first heart attack and was in the hospital a month. My family was very good to me and I love them very much for it.
     I was active in the L.D.S. church all my life. I was put in as a Sunday School teacher before I was married, along with Abbie Robinson. I taught Sunday School all my married life until about ten years ago. I was a teacher in the Primary, counselor in the M.I.A., secretary in the Relief Society, Visiting Teacher's advisor, Visiting Teacher, Relief Society Magazine representative, and at the present time I am a teacher in the Primary and a Relief Society Visiting Teacher. Now I like to spend my time reading, quilting or doing handwork. I also like to work in my garden and flowers.

*********

Postscript: Grandma Lula Jenkins passed away September 8, 1978 about 2:00 in the afternoon. She was in Afton, Wyoming with Jean Luthi doing some business and shopping. One of the things she did that day was to get her temple recommend signed by President Child. They pulled up to Nields Market to get some groceries when Grandma complained of feeling a little sick to her stomach. She told Jean to let her sit there for a minute then she would come into the store. When she didn't come in after a few minutes, Jean went back out to check, and Grandma had passed beyond, very peacefully. At the time of her death, she was still a Visiting Teacher in the Relief Society. She had been released from the Primary only the year before. On August 15, 1968 the Star Valley Creamery presented Grandma with a plaque for her many years of service, but Grandma was so mad at them for making her quit that she wouldn't even unwrap it. She was 74 years old at the time. When Grandma and Grandpa's children were nearly grown, they took one of their grandchildren, Irene, into their home to live, and she became like another daughter. In May of 1978, just before her death, Grandma flew to California to accompany this granddaughter and her husband through the temple. When she was 83 she rode on a snowmobile into Stewart and Lera's cabin near Alpine Wyoming. At the time of her death, Grandma still drove her own car. Lula was survived by four daughters and two sons. Also surviving were 29 grandchildren and 36 great grandchildren. One granddaughter, Betty Jo Jenkins, and two great grandchildren preceded her in death. She was also survived by 3 sisters, 2 brothers, 4 half-sisters and 5 half-brothers, All grandmother's descendants were to her funeral except for 3 grandchildren: one of which was expecting a baby [born the next day]. Because Grandma had wanted her absent grand-daughter to sing "How Great Thou Art" at her funeral, she taped it, and it sounded very good. The funeral was held September 11, 1978; a bleak, cold rainy day. After the funeral was over, the rain quit and the sun tried to come out. It was this way up at the cemetery and lasted until we were back in the church house; then it clouded over and rained and sleeted really bad.
     Among Grandma's possessions was a tribute written for her on some occasion. This tribute is enclosed. Also enclosed are the words to the song "These Hands" that her unmarried granddaughters sang at her funeral. The words fit Grandma as though they had been written for her alone.

TRIBUTE Written to Lula Jenkins

Lula Jenkins, so hard working, so unselfish, so compassionate. Tenderly through so many years caring for an ailing husband. Almost alone and unaided, kept the "Home Fires" burning. A constant source of strength to her husband, her children, and grandchildren.. Accepting all of her trials with patience and humility. Faithful in, thought and deed. Two of her children completed honorable missions in a foreign field. She has served for many years as a teacher in the auxiliary organizations. Children love her for the lessons she teaches and honor her for the example she has set for them to follow. Cheerful despite her trials.

THESE HANDS (sung at Lula's funeral)
These hands ain't the hands of a lady,
These hands are calloused and old.
These hands raised a family,
These hands raised a home,
Now these hands raise to praise the Lord.

These hands won the heart of my loved one,
And with his they were never alone.
If these hands filled their task,
Then what more could one ask
For these fingers have worked to the bone.

Now, don't try to judge me by what you'd like to be,
For my life ain't been much success.
Some people have power, but still they grieve,
While these hands brought me happiness.

Now, I'm tired and I'm old, and I ain't got much gold,
Maybe things ain't been all that I planned.
God above, hear my plea, when it's time to judge me,
Take a look at these hard working hands.