The Story of My Life By Rachel Blair Harrison Detton A daughter of Albert E. Blair and Sarah Rachel Stocks, I was born October 16, 1887, at Lewiston, Cache County, Utah, the oldest of nine children (six boys and three girls). I was born in Grandmother Stock's home, a mile north of Lewiston bank corner. Although I remember very little of my early life in Lewiston, I do remember that old home and also the little log house in which our family lived in Lewiston. In 1893 we moved to Lund, Idaho. At that time there wasn't a single family between the Gentile valley and Bancroft. Thus I lay claim to being a pioneer, for that country was certainly a wilderness. Our stock fed on unclaimed land, and I recall watching for our horses to come to the water hole so that we could catch them. The cows came home nightly because we kept the calves penned up. As more families moved into the area, a ward of the church was organized. Membership included thirty or forty families from a wide area, and my father was the first bishop. The first school was opened when I was nine years old. A man by the name of Morris taught in a log cabin for three months each winter, and I was able to attend two of these short sessions. I finished the second grade after we had moved to Layton, Arizona, where there was a pretty good grade school. The move to Arizona, when I was twelve years old, enabled my father to get work as a carpenter. Two years later he followed this trade to Clifton, Arizona, a mining camp. This move came just after the birth of my youngest brother in 1900. I remember the occasion very well because it was up to me to care for our now large family while mother was in bed. Father had gone ahead to Clifton, and although a midwife came once each day to care for mother and the baby, there was still plenty to do for a girl not yet fourteen. Mixing bread and washing for nine of us was a day's work in itself, but we managed somehow. As soon as mother was able to travel we joined father. Schools in Clifton were very poor and attended by a mixture of all races and ages; therefore, it was decided that I should go to work instead of continuing in school. I had already had some experience working out. The year before, I had been employed in a rooming house at a salary of seventy-five cents a week. I remember that figure well; each night as I walked home I passed a store window in which a beautiful, white feathered fan was on display. Often I stood there for a few moments longing for that bit of luxury—worth exactly seventy-five cents. Although we needed our money very badly, my dear mother decided to indulge her wage-earning 13-year-old. I was allowed to buy the fan with a week's salary. I must have cut quite an impressive figure thereafter, I in my white ruffled dress with the pink sash, my white silk parasol, and the beautiful, foolish, extravagant fan. My new employment in Clifton was in the hotel. For two months I washed dishes, and then I started to work in the dining room. There I earned $15 a month. I was thrown into contact with all the various types of men who worked in the mines and smelters and was very self-conscious. I shall never forget the humiliation of my first day there. I wore a yellow and green striped dress made of calico. My mother had picked up a remnant somewhere and had made it for me. The bright colors coupled with my auburn hair prompted one of the men to call me "Irish". There was nothing insulting about the nickname, but my fourteen-year-old pride was injured and I went home in tears. I never wore the dress again, but I couldn't shake the name. For the three years I worked there I was called "Irish". There were only six or eight LDS families in Clifton, but it was there that I gained a testimony of the Gospel. Frequently I visited other churches; but, within a short time father, who always kept in touch with the authorities, was made Presiding Elder over a branch of our own church. There were so few of us that everyone worked. As a mere youngster I was made secretary of the Y.W.M.I.A. How well my second grade education qualified me for this position you may well guess. In 1902 we decided to move home to Lewiston. Before our departure, however, father was stricken with typhoid and nearly died. Although we used all our savings, father was still determined to get us home. He was especially concerned about me lest I should decide to marry outside the church. It was decided that the family should go on ahead of him. We did no sin September. Back in Lewiston I found all the girls my age in the seventh or eighth grads. The teacher, Dr. J.M. Bernhisel, let me start in the fifth grade. I did fairly well until I was forced to quit in January because mother had a stroke. For the remainder of the winter I cared for her and the younger children. Father had been unable to return home as yet, because he had scarcely regained his strength after his bout with typhoid when he got smallpox. For weeks we had no work from him, and then a friend of his wrote to tell us of his illness. In the meantime, Grandfather and Grandmother Stocks did all they could to help us, but still I sometimes thought the burden would be too much. The winter passed, however and early in April father did come to us. On April 9, 1903, my youngest sister was born. It was that spring that I met Herb—Herbert Henry Harrison, son of Antrim Byrd Harrison and Mary Jane Hendricks. I had gone to Richmond with Riley Lewis, his cousin. We had had dinner with Grandmother Hendricks and were leaving there when we met Herb. He jokingly inquired if there were more like me in Lewiston and this bit of nonsense impressed my strangely. I saw him again on July 4th in Lewiston when I was working in one of the booths. He soon persuaded me to desert my post, and we spent the afternoon together. I remember that we saw the ballgame and then stood in an old buggy to watch the races. With my parents' permission I went with him to the dance that evening, and the whole complexion of my life had been changed in a day. The illness of my mother continued to keep me from attending school regularly, but by 1905 I was in the seventh grade. It was planned that I should go to Logan that winter to take a preparatory course and study music, but again circumstances intervened. We had moved to Weston, Idaho, some distance from Herb's home in Richmond, considering the modes of transportation then. By then we were very much in love, and I missed seeing him often. Mother was no better, and we had very little money. I was disappointed that I could not go to school, and I was not very happy. When Herb came by buggy to see and learned that school was once more out of the question, he stated simply but with conviction, "Then we're going to get married." We did—in the Logan Temple, November 15, 1905—and were supremely happy. We worked for Grandfather Hendricks for $30 a month. In March of 1906, my new husband was called to the mission field. On June 4th he left for the Central States. I was almost bedfast at the time—facing a choice of staying in bed or losing my baby. It was not an easy thing for me to see Herb go, even though we both agreed that it was right that he should. It was a long two years for me, but we were richly blessed. Our son, Herbert Blair, born August 25, 1906, was twenty-two months old when his father returned. In December of 1908, my dear mother passed away. We went to Kimball, Idaho, to be with my father and the children until other arrangements could be made. It was there, on June 7, 1909, that our daughter, Sylva was born. WE were delighted. Soon after our baby came, Herb got work in Lewiston and we moved back with our little family. He worked for George Hendricks, Ether Telford, and Bergesons until the year 1912. Then in September, he started to work for M.J. Swinyard in his store. Our third child, Wayne A. Harrison, was born January 10, 1911. Glen D. was born November 25, 1912, and William Moine on November 10, 1914. In March 1916, Herb went to work for Joseph Anderson wholesale of Salt Lake City, and we had to move to Logan. We remained there for only a year during which time our last baby, Darwin Henry, was born and died. After his birth, November 27, 1916, I nearly lost my life. The Lord took our baby when he was only two months old, but I was spared to be with my husband and other children. Again in March Herb changed employers and started to work for Anderson-Taylor Co. We returned to Lewiston, and in 1920 bought a home there. How good it was to have a home of own—even it years of work were to be required to pay for it. One of the many things which Herb and I had in common was a love for music. He served as president of the choir for years, and we shared a great love for this work. Soon after our marriage we discovered that his rich tenor voice blended well with mine, and we began singing duets. Nothing in our marriage drew us closer than making music together. We traveled many miles to sing at funerals, and during the terrible flu epidemic of 1917-18 we sang at as many as three funerals in a single day. Once we sang at two during a single hour—a number early on the program in Franklin and one toward the end of a Lewiston funeral. I have often wished that we had kept a list of the funerals for which we sang – they numbered in the hundreds. At the time, however, it did not seem unusual. People requested us to sing and we sang. It was on way in which we could serve. The one song which we were requested to sing more often than all others was "In That Beautiful Land". Fred Elwood brought it from England, and as far as I have been able to learn it has never been published. Most of the copies through this country were taken from one he sent to us. I love that beautiful song dearly, but I shall never be able to sign it without Herb. I had joined the Relief Society in Arizona when I was only thirteen years old, and during the intervening years had never let my membership lapse. I had served for several years as a visiting teacher, but in 1922 Bishop A.W. Hyer called me to be president. He called this position "The First Lady of the Ward". I had been Y.W.M.I.A. president for two years, but I was released from this office and sustained as Relief Society President on September 24, 1922. This office necessitated much cooperation on the part of my husband and family. When there was sickness or death in the ward, my house and children were often neglected that I might help. Never did Herb complain, however, and he helped me in every way he could. I could never have shouldered the responsibility without him. I served in this capacity until June 17, 1928, when poor health forced me to resign. Soon thereafter I was sustained as chorister of the Relief Society and the Singing Mothers. It was in 1926 that Herb's sister, Elsie Harris became too ill to care for her new baby daughter, Mary Jane. We welcomed this little one into our home when she was only three months old and brought her up as our own. Of course she knew and sometimes visited her own family, but we were father and mother to her. In March of 1931 a series of gall bladder attacks were climaxed by a serious illness, and I was taken to the Budge Hospital in Logan. After four weeks of treatment I was operated on for gall stones. The gall bladder had ruptured, and the doctors picked stones out of my liver never believing that I could survive. I did recover, however, and after a year regained my normal health. Then it was Herb's turn. He became ill with asthma and for two years grew progressively worse. Operations were performed to get rid of growths in his nose, but nothing gave him more than temporary relief. On August 23, 1935, he passed away. Even then I was grateful to see him spared more suffering, but to accept his going was the hardest adjustment of my life. My fine family helped me, of course, and the Lord sustained me in my grief. For a while I sold Avon products in an attempt to support myself and Mary Jane, who was still very young. Just a year after I became a widow, however, I went to work for Mr. Theurer in his store. What a blessing that job was! I enjoyed my work there, enjoyed my work there, enjoyed my association with the people of Lewiston, and I also gained some measure of security. I was able to get our debts paid and to be independent. I was unable to continue in Relief Society work, but I was given the job of Sunday School chorister, and I enjoyed that very much. Without Herb my life lacked the fullness we had shared, and my children soon established homes and families of their own. Nevertheless mine was not an unpleasant lot. I kept busy and contented firm in the conviction that my husband waited for me and expected me to live worthy of being reunited for him. On April 4, 1946, I married Joseph Detton. He was working for the railroad in LeGrande, Oregon, but soon he was transferred to Pocatello, Idaho, and was able to come to Lewiston each weekend. I continued working at Theurer's. At sixty-five Joe retired and spent his time remodeling our home. It is now cozy and comfortable, and we enjoy it very much. In 1951 I quit my job at Theurer's – almost reluctantly after so many years – and Joe and I went to Texas. He had work in Amarillo where his son Dory lived, and we remained there for more than two years. That was very much like a mission experience for us. We labored in the small branches where LDS people were few, and we associated closely with the full time missionaries who labored there. Joe served as First Assistant to the District President and as Superintendent of the Sunday School in Amarillo. I was in charge of the singing in the district and also served as a counselor in the Relief Society. Life with Jo has been an entirely new phase. We have had more time and fewer responsibilities than each of us had earlier in life. Annual railroad passes which he receives have made it possible for us to travel quite extensively and inexpensively. Since our marriage I have experienced the thrill on several occasions of traveling by air. I have visited places I never dreamed I would be fortunate enough to see. We have visited all of the Western States, and one of the high lights of our travels was a trip by ship from Seattle, Washington, to Victoria. We are able to visit our children – his eleven and my five – in their various homes; we share an interest in church work and are both active in various capacities; we enjoy our home, now equipped with every convenience including television; and, in short, our life is a happy one. I feel very blessed of the Lord. All of my life I have been closely associated with the Church. Many are the mistakes I have made, and many are my shortcomings. Nevertheless, my life – the happy times and the hours of sorrow – has proved to me the priceless ness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that it is true; and I know, too, that if I can but be found worthy I shall receive the blessings promised to me and Herb in the temple on the long ago day we were married. Reunions are so we will not forget each other but know and love each other more. I wish we could all be here to enjoy each other and get better acquainted. Joe and I had a grand visit with Moine and Family last year in august. We surely enjoyed our stay with them. I can still see them all in the car as they waved us bye. They went their way and we ours. Now my Dear Ones, I want to leave you my testimony. I know that God lives and that He and His Son Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith, the Prophet in the Sacred Grove and told him that the true church was not upon the earth, that he would be the one through which the true church would be restored. Until that time people did not know that we were in the likeness of God. I know the Gospel was restored in its fullness. We have the word of the Lord in the Bible, the Book of Mormon, Doctrine & Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price. I know if we will read and study these books we can gain for ourselves a testimony of the Gospel if we read with a sincere heart asking God to make known to us, if these things are true. We are promised in the Book of Mormon, Moroni 10, Verse 4…."And when ye shall receive these things, I would exalt you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father in the Name of Jesus Christ. If these things are not true, and if you shall ask with a sincere heart with real intent, having faith in Christ, He will Manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost. Now I have tried this promise and know for myself they are true. I also know if we seek the teachings of the Gospel and keep the commandments of God, we can work out our Salvation in the Celestial Kingdom of God. My prayer is that we all may be loving, kind, forgiving, tolerant of each other in all of our weaknesses. May we all strive for perfection and be able to over come all evil. This is My testimony to all my posterity. Love for all. May the Lord help us always, I pray in the Name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
contributor Marigay