Oral History Program Eric W. Pettit Interviewed by Janice Dawson 29 July 1976 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Eric W. Pettit Interviewed by Janice Dawson 29 July 1976 Copyright © 2014 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in University Archives. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Pettit, Eric, an oral history by Janice Dawson, 29 July 1976, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Eric Pettit. The interview was conducted on July 29, 1976, by Janice Dawson, in East Layton, Utah. Pettit discusses his earlier days, during the 20’s and 30’s and the floods that occurred in the Layton area. Vera Pettit also participates in the interview. JD: Can you tell us a little bit about the floods in East Layton and how they affected the people around here? When was the first one that you remember? EP: The first one I ever remember was around 1930. It might have been a year or two earlier, and we were living over where Ross Folkman is now, and we could hear the noise in the canyon as the big rocks banged together coming down the canyon, it was a terrifying thing to hear. So we got in our car and drove over about a quarter of a mile north of Folkman's place there. By that time the flood was beginning to pour off across that area where all those houses are now1. JD: Now which canyon did this come down? EP: This came down the south fork of Kays Creek and it was burying everything up. In fact right now there's a mahogany growing there, just a little bit south—north of Jack Williams place. That slipped clear down from pretty well toward the top of the mountain and still lived. It was burying everything up. It came down like waves, just like waves of the ocean. JD: This was mostly water then. EP: Water and mud. JD: And mud. EP: Mud and rocks. There were great big ten ton rocks rolling along just as though they didn't weigh anything. It would of course bury everything up as it travelled and it would reach so 1 far and then as you looked back up the canyon, you would see another big wave coming. It—that would come right on down and would go over the top of the previous one and reach on down toward the west a little further than ever. After watching for a little while we heard that there was one over by Adams Canyon where Jim Love lived, so we drove over there. He had a barn on the east side of the road. JD: Now is this south of the other canyon? EP: Yes, this is south where the Love house is now. And when we got over, his barn was on the east side of the road, and it was all crushed down. The flood had crushed that down and was beginning to come across the road. As we watched Love's, the Love boys brought their dad out of the house, he was quite crippled and it was hard for him to walk, they got him in the car, but he couldn't get on the road. The flood was covering the road so they had to head down through the field to the west. And they naturally figured that the flood was going to take their house, but instead of that, it was all over with and they got half way across the road and that was the end of it. Now they've built a wall there, a little wall that was supposed to keep the floods out, which of course wouldn't amount to anything. When one of those floods come, hardly anything would stop it. There's evidence that these floods have been coming down these canyons long before white man was ever in this area. You can go along the mouth of these canyons, along the Wasatch Front and see the evidence where there's been floods come down, and then the oak brush has finally grew up amongst the rocks and my belief is that someday the floods will come down and those houses along on the north of Folkman’s over to Bud Wright, the policeman's place, are going to be buried right up. JD: They built these new homes right in the wash. 2 EP: Right where we watched the flood come down. You could have bought that ground for a dollar or two an acre after that flood because no one would ever think of building on that area, and now there are houses all there. JD: Nobody remembers the flood now, do they? EP: They tell you that they put terraces there, they don’t let the sheep denude the area up there, but when one of those floods come, those clouds come in from the west along the latter part of July or August, seem like they can’t get over the mountain and they unload. The way it was when that flood came down before, we had about a week of rainy weather, and then we had this great big cloud that came along and couldn't get over the mountain and it just dumped it out there and down it come. JD: A regular cloudburst. EP: A regular cloudburst it was. JD: About how long did the flood last? You say you drove back and forth, it must have lasted quite a while. EP: Well, I guess it had been coming down for about an hour or two, anyway. It must have been several hours, perhaps, for it to get down from the top of the mountain down to this lower area where it buried the highway right up where the old Mountain View road is now. It was buried right under. JD: With mud and debris I guess. EP: Mud and rocks, and then for months after that it stunk terrible, the vegetation rotting, I suppose, a very strong odor there for quite a while. JD: Did it do quite a bit of damage to people's homes along in here? 3 EP: No, there was very little damage to the houses, along here. It seems like those old pioneers avoided building in the mouth of the canyon and so that there was very little damage done. These floods sometimes came down in the daytime and sometimes at night. When it happened at night it was a terrifying thing because we could hear the rocks banging they come down the canyon, the great big boulders. Down in Centerville, my mother-in-law, Mrs. Brewster, had a place up on the east bench in Centerville, and we'd had about a week of rain. Now their place was not in the area of a flood, it was really in a pretty safe place, but it had been raining for about a week and then, that—right in the daytime a cloudburst broke right on the face of the hill. Not up a canyon, but on the face of a hill it broke. And that came right down through their yard and carried their dog, and the dog kennel and a few things right down into the orchard to the west. They finally found their dog with a chain wrapped around a tree, it didn't drown him. It was mostly water that came down through there, not too much rocks and mud. JD: This wasn't a typical canyon flood like-- EP: This wasn't a regular canyon, one that came out of a canyon. It hit the face of the hill there as you go through Centerville there you can see the face of that hill above those places where you figure was really a fairly safe place. But it happened that it broke there that day after the ground was softened up with the rains. JD: Do you recall anything about other damage in Centerville or Farmington along the front. EP: Not there, to the north of this area where we live (that would be over by Weber Canyon) came down there through Schmaltz's place and filled the canal full. I remember them having to get a dragline out to clean the canal out. And of course up in Willard there were 4 a lot of floods up there that did a lot of damage, but so far it seems like no houses that I know of were buried here, but they were in Centerville. JD: Do you recall any loss of life? EP: No, I'm inclined to think there was one or two in Centerville, because when that flood comes, and if you're too slow in getting out of your house, you can’t get out and wade through it because it's several feet, three or four or five or six feet of mud and rocks, just impossible to ever wade through it. So if you don’t, and yet, if you get out in time, you could keep ahead of it. It doesn't come fast enough, but what you could keep ahead of it if you are an ordinary able person, you'd be able to keep ahead of the flood alright. JD: That's interesting. What about cleanup after these floods? Did everybody get together and help each other, or was it just each man for himself? EP: I don’t remember any help from the government or anything like that it was well all I remember was every man for himself. A place or two the government took over, or the state, whichever it was, took over and built what they called retaining walls about eight feet high, it was more of a thing, I think, to ease people's conscience that lived in front of a canyon, like Love’s, Jim Love’s. He was right in the mouth of a canyon and they built that one there, I suppose to make them to be able to sleep at night. JD: You know there have been floods down Dawson Hollow behind our place, what do you know about any of those? EP: I don’t know. They must have come, I believe those must have come before white man was ever in this country because all the evidence, it was long ago, Because the trees grown up since then it would take maybe a hundred years or so before a tree would grow 5 up through that muddy, barren sort of material and the trees that are grown up are getting quite old so it must have been a long time ago that it came down. JD: Well, he had a pretty susceptible place right where he was if it had come didn't he? EP: Yes, so there would have to be an awful large one to get that. JD: Do—don’t you feel like there was any great changes in the landscape or any permanent damage to anything around then? EP: I don’t think so. I don’t think there was very much permanent damage in this area. Of course the road, highway, was buried up and maybe a few pastures or something, a pasture that was damaged, but I don’t think there was any great amount of damage right here. JD: Is there anything else you'd like to tell us about the flood or any other natural phenomena around here? You mentioned a snow slide. EP: Well, some years ago I remember a snow slide up Weber Canyon. It slid down from the south side of the canyon and went clear across the river and up over the road and up the other side. And it dammed the river up for quite a long distance, the water backed up the river there for quite a ways. And after that the railroad used to have a man stationed there in a little cabin up on a hill to telephone down to stop the trains in case of a snow slide coming down. Now some time ago there was also a slide, a snow slide, that came down over in Uintah from the mountain. We'd had a very deep snow that winter, it was quite deep, and then it turned warm. JD: Do you recall what year this was about? EP: I don’t remember, it must have been somewhere in the area of the time when the snow slides--the cloudbursts were coming, somewhere about that many years ago and it--we'd 6 have that, it turned warm after a very deep snow, it turned warm, and then it turned cold again. It froze the snow so hard that you could walk on top of it clear to the top of the mountain if you wanted to. Well along came a lot of snow after that deep snow, and on that icy surface, it started from the top of the mountain above Uintah there. It started right from the very top of the mountain and came right down carrying rocks and trees and it came almost to the Old Post Road, within about a block of the Old Post Road, and when it stopped, it must have been about the height of a telephone pole, fifty or sixty feet high, and clear across the canyon. If it would have come just a little bit further it would have got some houses, but it stopped before that happened. I thought that would take a couple of years to melt all that snow it was so deep, but it finally disappeared. JD: That's interesting. Do you feel like the weather was worse in those days? Do you think we had—? EP: Yes, I believe we had more snow in those days. I know I used to drive a school bus, I was the first one to drive a school bus up here. Before that they hauled them with horse and wagon. Alma Nalder had a deal, a contract with the school board to haul the boys and girls in a wagon. I ran the first truck here, I had to make an agreement with Alma Nalder to haul it when I couldn't run the truck and because they knew how deep the snow got, and I believe the snow used to get deeper. I know when Mrs. Walton died it was about three foot deep on the level right along by Irie Wall's place, and from there down to the church house it was to the top of the fences. They had Joe Bugger, the blacksmith down in Layton, build a big V snowplow and they hooked about ten teams onto it and came all the way up the road trying to push that snow out. It was a monster snowplow. You can 7 imagine what it would be for about ten teams to be pulling it, and I just believe there was more snow in those days than what we get now days. JD: Do you think the rains were worse too, the cloudbursts you know, like caused these floods? EP: I guess we haven't had those cloudbursts since then. We've wondered—every year we wonder whether this will be a cloudburst year or not. It doesn't seem to rain like it did then. JD: We had one a couple of weeks ago I thought was going to cause a flood. EP: Yes, we had one then that was really, if that had of kept up for a few hours we might have had a cloudburst then. JD: That didn't compare with the ones you had in the twenties. EP: No, and of course that came then and hit our lower area pretty heavy. I don’t suppose it could have been up the canyon very bad or we'd have seen something of it coming down. JD: I almost expected to after that. Well, let’s talk a few minutes about the entertainment back in the twenties and thirties and, oh even earlier. What did you do around here mostly for entertainment? Was it mostly at home, or church related, community related? EP: Well I can remember when I got a radio and that was really something. I was in the log cabin then so that must have been along about 1926-27, something like that. We got a radio and some of the neighbors, Irie Wall and a few of the others, would come over at nighttime and listen to that radio. It was the most marvelous thing on earth. There was a big horn that reached out from that radio and we would hear those programs and we were really hearing something in those days. JD: Do you recall any of the programs? 8 EP: Amos and Andy was one of the programs that used to come on. What was on for many years, I think my wife can remember another program or so. VP: Mert and Marge, and there was One Man's Family, the fights, the neighbors used to come in to hear the fights, boxing. It didn't start until six o’ clock at night in those days. JD: You just had several hours of broadcasting each day then. VP: Uh huh. JD: That's interesting. VP: And after a while it came on at noon and all day long of course. JD: Tell us about the other types of entertainment you had. There was a lot of dancing in those days, wasn't there? EP: Yes, there were dances over in South Weber, and of course in Layton, and that was one of the big entertainments. We didn't seem to go to Saltair or anywhere like than then. JD: Did you ever make it to Lagoon? Was Lagoon a big attraction then? EP: Lagoon was going alright and I suppose we must have gone to Lagoon. We went to Lagoon once in a while, but-- VP: We danced there, there was dancing there on Saturday night. JD: Can you think of anything else that you used to like to do? You know you hear how people used to have oh, hay raising, barn raising projects, or quilting bees or things like that. Was this considered entertainment or was it just kind of glorified work? EP: That was really before our time. JD: You didn't do so much of that. EP: No, by that time people were more on their own. 9 VP: We used to get together for showers. All the neighborhood would gather. There was always a baby coming or somebody getting married, so we would have a shower. JD: Well that was really a form of entertainment. VP: It really was as we all went. Nobody stayed home from those. It was just real nice to know we were going to have a party. JD: That was something to look forward to in those days wasn't it? VP: It was. JD: What about the depression? What kind of effect did that have on your life? I'm sure it had an economic effect. VP: We lost a house full of furniture over that. JD: Is that all? VP: Yes, tell about that Eric. EP: Well, we built a new house where Folkman is and got furniture, which the way things were going we knew we could pay for it alright, When the depression came we couldn't meet the payments, and so we told them in Salt Lake that they had better come and get their furniture, so they sent a man out to get the furniture. When he saw the—he took the furniture and loaded it onto the truck and there was only one thing left then and that was the baby crib, our baby was laying in the crib and he says right now, he says "I don’t care what they say, I'm not going to touch that baby crib, I'm going to leave that right there with you." But we were really ahead of the game by letting them take the furniture because we couldn't meet the payments anyway. 10 VP: Tell her about how we went right down to Salt Lake the next day and bought used furniture which was really nice furniture, as good as what we had, and we had the cash to pay for it and we got ourselves out of debt. JD: That's the best way to do it. How many children did you have then? EP: We had two boys and two girls. JD: And you were farming at this time, right? EP: Yes, I was developing an orchard there. I'd bought this land and was clearing oak brush and planting fruit trees. VP: We had goats to eat the oak brush. EP: We used goats to clear our land. We tried plowing with a Ford tractor and that wouldn't do it. Along about that time tractors didn't have bulldozers on them, they were just beginning to think about putting bulldozers on them. Those caterpillar tractors they were using for farming. And then the county had a caterpillar 30 and they had a blacksmith make a bulldozer for that and that was right handy to push the snow off, instead of having a bunch of horses on a snowplow they came along the roads pushing that off. VP: Tell her about the goats. EP: We used goats to clear the land. They loved to eat brush. They would leave the grass grow as long as they could get brush to eat and they'd smother that oak brush out and then in about two or three years we could just plow it up with an ordinary plow. It rotted very quickly when it was left green in the ground. It just seemed like it would rot quite quick and we could plow it up and plant orchard. And all that land we cleared, Ross Folkman has hay all over that land. I planted apricots and grew apricots for several years and cherries, but now it's just in hay. 11 JD: Now what about irrigation, I'm sure you had to irrigate this didn't you? Where did the water come from? EP: I irrigated the land below the ditch. But the land up where the trees were, I didn't irrigate the apricot, I cultivated. It seemed like if I let that ground get dry and you couldn't find any moisture, and I'd go through it with a spring tooth and cultivate it and a few days later you could just dig down six inches and find wet ground. Seemed like it would bring the moisture up. It may have been because we had more rains in those days, more storms perhaps in the winter time and filled the ground full of more water, it may have been that. But I grew lovely, big apricots without any irrigation. JD: Do you think there were springs in the area? EP: No. We drilled a hole we drilled down there with an auger forty feet and we have struck damp ground occasionally and some quite wet, but yet again there were no springs. We—over where Coonradts live2 there was another man living there, Breesock—Jack Breesock lived there in those days and he got me to help him dig a well and we went down about thirty or forty feet with the well and never struck any water. And then the next spring the vegetation that grew on the ground we pulled out of that well, there was vegetation grew that we'd never saw before, a new kind of vegetation. The seed must have been in the ground because we had a man build our house, our rock house3, and he drilled wells down by the lake shore and he told me that several hundred feet down he struck a redwood log. So once upon a time this land, this must have been filled in with fill many thousands of years ago perhaps, after the ice age or something, but anyway, we've heard that the government at Hill Field, when they drilled several wells, they struck logs way deep down. 12 JD: Redwood you mean. EP: Redwood. So it must have been either floated in when Lake Bonneville was here unless it could be that redwoods may have lived here in those days. It might have been that kind of a tree growing here. They thought it looked like a redwood. JD: What did they ever do with these samples? Were they given to a museum or anything? EP: No, I guess because it would just be fine material, they'd brought up with a drill. Then may have a record of it in--all these wells that were dug, it was required that you should keep a record of the material they struck so they must have a record of that in the state. JD: That's interesting. You mentioned the ditch. Where did your water come from for this irrigation ditch? EP: South Fork of Kays Creek. At times they could turn both Middle Fork and South Fork into the ditch, but we had the ditch there, and of course when the flood came down it buried the ditches right up. We had to make new ditches. JD: Now in those days there—wasn't any water available in this area from the Weber River was there? EP: No, there was no water—not this high. They would have had to have pumped in order to get it up from the Weber River. At our place, where Willis Walton lives now4, the government drilled wells there. There was a well drilling deal on for a while. They drilled a well down there at Willis Walton’s, and I think at about a couple of hundred feet or more they struck some water, not a great deal, but they struck water. And then they drilled another well, right, just north of F 0 lkman's about 300 yards right close to the Valley View road, in our place then it was. And they drilled there and they went down several hundred feet and never struck any water. 13 JD: It would be hard to farm like that now wouldn't it? Without extra water like we have. EP: Yes. JD: Let's go back to the depression for a minute. Do you remember any other effects it had on your? I mean did you come through it financially all right? EP: Yes, we came through. They organized a job deal for the people who wanted to work and I got a job down to Farmington on a drainage deal there. I was foreman on the job and we got along, we got along alright, everything was cheap. I remember years ago we could buy a loaf of bread for a nickel so that was pretty— JD: Helped to live on a farm, didn’t it? EP: When we got 9₵ or 10₵ a pound for beef, boy, we really thought we had it coming good. JD: That's when you were selling it, you mean? EP: Yes, on the hoof, beef on the hoof. VP: We had to go and borrow on our life insurance, though, to tide us over for a while. EP: For several years there we would borrow on our life insurance and then pay it back in the summer time when we had us some crops. We were growing cherries and cherries were paying pretty good then. They got to paying pretty good. JD: What did they sell for then? EP: They were selling for about 26₵ to 27₵ per pound, and we were only paying a cent or half a cent a pound for picking, maybe a cent and a half sometimes, where now it’s around 6₵ to 7₵ for picking. And we'd buy arsenic lead to spray the trees for 14₵ a pound, now when you buy that spray it costs you $3 a pound, so that things were much cheaper. JD: It's interesting to note though that they can’t get rid of their cherries this year and they've gone down to 7₵ a pound. Quite a difference. When the depression was over and the 14 new deal came along, do you think that changed your life in any way? What do you recall about that? EP: The new deal didn't seem to affect our lives much. I can’t remember that it made any difference much to us. Along about 1937 Mr. Will Forbes had a place that I'd tried to buy for—before I ever bought the one where I was living. I tried to buy it and we never could make a deal but finally he got a federal bank loan and couldn't meet the payments and he begged me to buy it. So in '37 we bought the place that was a good mile north of the place we bought there first, where Folkman is. In 1940, after having this place for three years, we decided then to sell our house and the farm that I'd cleared the land and had the fruit trees growing. We decided to sell it and build over on the Forbe's place5. About that time the highway department decided to build a new highway and make it a little further west than what it originally was, I suppose to get away from those flood conditions and so on, and the surveyors came in to go through the Forbes place here with the surveying, they found out there was beds of peat. One place it was twenty feet deep of straight rotted, like rotted manure. They wondered what they were going to do about it, so I told them if they put a drag line in they could throw all that peat back on my place, scoop all that peat out and replace it with gravel and rocks which they decided to do. A reporter from the Salt Lake Tribune came out and got me to hold a chunk of peat of about twice as big as your head in my arms, and they took a picture of it and then they put it on the front page of the Salt Lake Tribune and the heading was "For Peat's Sake". Then they went on to tell a little about this peat and how the trucks and cars and things begin coming out to buy peat for their gardens. From then on I went right ahead and sold many yards of peat. JD: Well, that was a good ad wasn't it? Now did you put in fruit trees on this new property? 15 EP: On this new property I put in apples, and pears, and cherries and different fruits and then when they built Hill Field why they bought a lot of soil from me for the lawns down at Hill Field, because I got to selling soil and I sold soil and gravel and peat. That turned out better than the fruit because finally the fruit game got so it wasn't hardly worthwhile bothering with it unless you were into it in a big way. Our little orchards were not much good. JD: That's interesting. How do you feel about life in general? Do you think it was better back in what they call the good old days or now with all our modern conveniences? How do you feel about it all? EP: Well, in those days, I remember when I used to go up Weber Canyon when I first came out here along about 1912, and we'd drive the cattle, I leased a ranch up through Weber Canyon, along about 1914, and it was along about the time of the first world war, and we'd drive the cattle up the canyon in the spring, the flocks of sage hens would fly up almost like a cloud going over the sun. Thousands and thousands of sage hens would fly up. Now of course it's very seldom that you see a sage hen. It was said that they begin running herds of sheep up on the mountains then and the sheep would tromp the sage hens nests our or scare them off the nests until the eggs wouldn't hatch and finally it got so there were very few sage hens. It was, and the Weber River, when I was a little kid there living up through Weber Canyon along about 1913 or 14, I've looked over those holes in the river and it looked like the whole bottom of the river would move there were so many thousands of fish there in the river. But finally from being, from water running out irrigating the farms and the hay fields and so on, and the trout and all the other kinds of fish would come out along with the streams of water, until finally it got so the way it is now, 16 they have to plant them all the time. There were lots of things that were interesting in those-- When we were living along this mountain road there were very few deer. I guess the pioneers had killed them all off. But now there's quite a few along here. But I sometimes wish it could be back the way it was of course. When my wife had to go to the hospital to have her first baby I took her on a stone boat. Just a kind of a bunch of plank fastened together on a skid and I had one horse hooked on the front of it and I took her down to where we could go from there on with the truck because, down to Dan Adams, where I left the truck, because from there on the snow didn't get so deep. It always got about twice as deep up on the mountain road, as it did down in Layton. So it was a little harder to get places but then we could get on the Bamberger train and go, there used to be the Bamberger train that run regularly through there and we could get to that and get to Salt Lake or Ogden. JD: Now wait a minute, how did your wife get to the hospital and where was the hospital? EP: The hospital was in Salt Lake. JD: You went clear to Salt Lake. VP: We went on the Bamberger. EP: We went to the Bamberger and from there to Salt Lake to the hospital. JD: Then she made it in time. EP: Made it in time. JD: That's good. Well, would you trade our modern conveniences for those days again? EP: Well, I think it’s sure nice to have these nice cars and air conditioned and all that, but it all depends on who you're talking too. I'm one who likes the outdoors and nature a lot and I enjoyed the wildlife a lot here then. We'd go to Yellowstone and it was a dirt road all the 17 way and you could camp anywhere you wanted to. You're allowed almost all the fish you wanted and so there was those advantages I had but yet again I guess with the ladies the modern conveniences are really fine. JD: Well, nature is kind of retreating in the face of our advances isn't it? Do you have any other incidents you'd like to tell us? EP: Yes, if you want to know a little bit about bootlegging days. JD: Oh, that would be fun. EP: When prohibition came they ran the liquor down from Evanston, Wyoming, because Wyoming was still open. JD: Just a moment, what year was this? EP: 18-1920, 18 or 20 somewhere about that time. They'd run the liquor down from Wyoming in their big cars to Salt Lake and they came right along this Mountain Road with it, and evidently one of these bootleggers must have figured he was going to get caught, because he hid a case in the oak brush along with a little bit south of Jim Love's place and some years later. I guess it must have been thirty years later. Ted Simpson was working on the grader, cutting a road from the Mountain Road down towards Kaysville. And as he went along with the grader, out came three or four bottles of Old Crow whiskey, out of the oak brush on the grader blade. And the next pass they made along there, out came the whole case and Ted Simpson stopped at my place on the way home that evening, he had a couple of bottles of Old Crow whiskey and he wanted to open it and see what it tasted like. It was bottled in a very old bottle with a lead label on the top and the bottom of the bottle—it was concaved up about two inches or more, I guess to make it look like there was more whiskey than there actually was in the bottle, but it was a dark green bottle, and 18 of course something like that would sell for a pretty good price now. But those are little instances that happened along here. The snow used to get so deep along this Mountain Road that I remember that one day two cars could only pass and they sent a big caterpillar out from Salt Lake, the state did, pushing the snow out all along the Mountain Road, it was a monster cat. Allis Chalmers, I guess the biggest one they make—had about a fourteen inch blade and he was going along pushing everybody's driveway full of snow and it made quite a job for us to shovel the snow out afterwards. JD: Now tell us some more stories about this prohibition era. EP: Well, of course, in prohibition days, why, there was a still in every canyon. I knew a lot of stills all the way along from Weber Canyon clear along to where you turn down towards Farmington—further. I suppose there was many more along there but I knew of a number along here because of the different talk there would be and talking to the prohibition agents or sheriffs who would come out and try to catch these bootleggers, the ones that were manufacturing a little good drink. JD: Did everyone just like to make their own or did they like to do it for a profit? EP: They, Max Florence, down in Farmington, was one of the notorious bootleggers. He even got in the temple once in Salt Lake with a camera and took pictures in the temple and was going to blackmail the LDS Church to give them the films, instead of that then the LDS Church then printed pictures of all the rooms in the temple, so he didn't make his money, but he used to say that whiskey was made to sell and not to drink. He was quite a notorious person. JD: Well there were a lot of the local people that probably kept some of these little things running too, I guess. 19 EP: Oh, yes, I didn't like to say that. JD: Not mentioning names, but I just think it was an interesting thing that happened during this era that these stills sprang up in the canyons. EP: Yes, a lot of the local people of course either made it themselves or they let somebody from Ogden come out here and make it. JD: On their property. EP: On their property, up above the property and anywhere there was a nice, good, clear spring water to keep the coolers going. So they had to condense the alcohol, and the alcohol would start coming out and they had to have cold water to condense it back into a liquid. So there were many that got along. That helped them during the depression days, they were able to boil off a little of that. JD: Well, that's interesting. Is there anything else you'd like to tell us? EP: This might be a little interesting incident to tell on this. In 1936 Dr. Stucki, an eye, ear, and nose specialist from Salt Lake, he was head of the Trails Association that put the markers all through the state, in regards to the pioneers, he came out to see me if I would consider going out and gathering up the Conner's wagons that were lost in the mud flats out west of Salt Lake. I talked to him about it and he said that the Caterpillar Tractor Company in Salt Lake would bolt 2x4’s, oak 2x4’s, about two feet long on each pad of the tractor so it wouldn't sink in the mud. And then the Utah Oil Refining Company would furnish the gas and oil, and they had a trailer I could pull behind the caterpillar, and we could go out there and gather these relics up. They hadn't been able to get out there with any other type of vehicle. They tried going out there with cars and with horses but there was nothing they could manage to go across these mud flats with. So we decided to arrange to do that. 20 Now this Conner Party came in one year before the Mormon Pioneers and because of them, they cut a trail from Huntsville down to the Great Salt Lake Valley which made it very handy for the Mormons that came in one year later, cause there was a trail cut and they got into the Salt Lake Valley in time to grow some vegetables before winter. The State Road Commission hauled our tractor out to Knowles which is on the road toward Wendover. And the Donner Party had left Grantsville heading for Pilot Mountain, which was about a forty mile trip. They had to go a little bit in a northerly direction, instead of going straight west to Wendover they had to head a little bit north and to around the end of Pilot Mountain. That's a little bit north of where the Bonneville race track is. And that way they were told that when they got to Pilot Peaks, that's where those two peaks were, there would be water. When they got about half way out there, about twenty miles, the wagons began to sink in the mud. We could see the wagon tracks that were still made ninety years before. The wagons had sunk so deep in the mud, and then the wind had blown a little different color material into the tracks. When we got close to the tracks, we stayed about fifty or one hundred feet away from them so that not to obliterate the old Donner Party tracks. We went there and got a lot of wagon boxes, wagon hubs. The wagon boxes wood was about fourteen inch material and about fourteen—sixteen foot long, and it was tongue and grooved and it was still perfectly preserved. It had laid there in the mud, mud and salt, for ninety years and was still good. And the wagon tires, which were iron, and they were very thick, I've never seen wagon tires as thick as they were, they must have been an inch and a half thick and when we picked them up they would break in two. The salt had eaten right through the iron, but of course the wood is preserved. Now that material is at the University Museum in Salt Lake. The Conner Party managed to get 21 through there without losing any lives. They almost lost their lives, they lost a lot of their wagons, they finally got over to Pilot Mountain and from there on they got along fairly well except that they got over to Conner Lake too late to get over the mountain and of course many of them perished there at Donner Lake. But that's another story. They, had a lot of trouble with the Indians, because Captain Bonneville had sent a party, when he was exploring the Great Salt Lake Valley, some few years before the Donner Party, he'd been exploring. He sent a Captain Walker west to find out about what there was west and these bunch of soldiers on the way back from California area, coming up the Humboldt River they came onto the Goshute Indians and just for fun they would lasso an Indian and go tearing down between the tepees with a lasso around his neck and until they pulled his head off and these Indians had been lying in wait for ten years it was to get even with the white man. And when the Donner Party came then they interfered with them so much by killing their oxen that they couldn't fight them, but they were able to sneak in at nighttime and shoot arrows into their oxen and drive them off and that was the downfall of the Donner Party was that. JD: Well, that's interesting. Did you find any relics out on the desert, anything besides wagons? EP: Well, no we didn't find much. Now the wind had blown there and made a raise of about a foot or two foot high and Dr. Stucki wanted to go out a year or two later and plow that all up because no doubt there was many relics or artifacts buried in that mud. Not really mud, and yet it was pretty soft, but we could have plowed it with a plow and he wanted to go out and dig them up and as far as I know there has been no one go out there since. But if there hasn't now you could run out there with a snowmobile and just like a top, it would be 22 no trick at all to run out there with a snowmobile, unload it at Knowles and slip out there and plow it with a plow, a small plow and it'd plow that up and no doubt find many household articles that were left there from the wagons. But all they got away with was just the smallest amount of stuff they could carry because some of their oxen stampeded and run out of water and they stampeded and ran off in the desert and all they found was their dead bodies later. There's just a few of them got, just barely enough to pull their wagons. JD: Well, that was an interesting era. I appreciate your information Eric. EP: Mr. Reid was supposed to have been the wealthy one of the bunch. He had quite a bit of gold. He understood they were going to kill him to get his money and he hid it on Silver Island and after, he was one of the ones who survived. And his children tried to get him to come back and show where that gold was hid and he said he would never go back over that trail for all the money in the world. So if you want to hunt for some gold maybe it is still out there on Silver Island. JD: Well, we'll have to go see if we can find it. Okay, thank you very much. 23 Footnotes 1. 1518 North Valley View Drive, East Layton, Utah 2. 2833 East Gentile, Layton, Utah 3. 2765 North Highway 89, Layton, Utah 4. 1363 North Highway 89, Layton, Utah 5. 2765 North Highway 89, Layton, Utah 24 ORAL HISTORY REPORT The subject matter of this series of interviews was planned mainly around the floods which devastated Davis County during the 1920's and 30's. This was of particular interest due to the recent disaster in Idaho at the Teton Dam and also in Colorado. There was a curiosity as to exactly what happened locally under such circumstances. .Because of the limitations of this subject other items of interest were also included, particularly reminiscences of the depression years. The problems of this period are so remote to our style of living today that it would be well for current generations to be able to hear these people describe just what it was like during hard times. This was also a period when social life was moving from strictly home and church centered activities to more commercial types of entertainment. This proved to be a unique experience, especially from the vantage of today's commercial exploitation. As the project progressed I became aware of a number of people in Layton who had been connected with the sugar industry and planned to include this information in the interviews also. I soon discovered that the number of people who not only lived during the flood period but who had actually seen this phenomenon was rather limited. Several contacts were willing to discuss this period, but when it came to putting it on tape they flatly refused to cooperate. It was rather frustrating also when people were helpful only to reveal during the interview that they hadn't actually been present at the time of the flood but were relating what others had told them of the experience. However, some of the problems they told of related to the aftermath were very interesting and there was still some good information obtained. 25 It was interesting to note that several of the people interviewed seemed to pass the depression era without undue suffering even though, as they related, they would not like to live through it again. This seemed due to the fact that they owned their own property, were able to raise a garden, and had cows and chickens. This might hold a message for people of the present day who are concerned about disasters of one kind or another. Although the information gathered about this period was not particularly unique, it was enlightening. Unfortunately the interviews with people connected with the local sugar plant did not work out as planned. There was one man who had been active in this business from its very inception and had worked as a boy in Canada learning the business. His father established the sugar plant in Layton and he had been active in the plant most of his life. However, he would not cooperate in the taping of the interview, probably due to a slight speech impediment. Several other contacts were either hospitalized at the time or were out of town. This is unfortunate as the sugar industry would make a particularly interesting chapter in local history. Although most of the interviews followed the general trends of the time there were numerous scraps of information that were fascinating which help to relate the broader view of history to the average people and give it a personal touch. The fact that East Layton was a stopover for travelers, especially those going from Morgan to Salt Lake, was interesting; and the comparative isolation of the community until the more recent times of the automobile was difficult to realize. A background history of one of the old landmark homes of the area proved enlightening. Also there are still people who recall Indians 26 coming through the area when they were children. An anecdote connected with the coming of the railroad through Weber Canyon was also interesting. Discussion of early entertainment revealed other facts. For example, the first ice cream cone of the area was called a say-so and cost ten cents. This was more than most children could afford very often having only 25 cents for the whole day's outing. The first merry-go-round at Lagoon was pulled by horsepower—the four footed variety. The popular bands of the era we-e a main part of entertainment at Lagoon and other resorts. One of the most enlightening discoveries for me was the information about the early phases of Lagoon and its predecessor, Lake Park, and how many buildings of the earlier park were moved up to Farmington to establish the present resort. Mrs. Hess had many interesting facts about early Lagoon as they actually lived for many years right next to the midway. She told of some of the early fires as well as the floods. Also, her reminiscences of Adelia Rogers were amusing. As the interviews progressed with the people in the East Layton area, a pattern began to emerge—that of attendance at the Dawson Hollow School. Several had attended the school as youth and Mrs. Knowlton had been one of the last teachers there. This school had been built upon the property of my husband's great grandfather and the foundations are still visible today. This created a very deep interest in the history of this school and is a project which I wish to pursue in depth in the future. In fact it would be a worthwhile project to compile the history of all the early schools of Layton. Although material might be somewhat limited, a short history of the flood era would be a noteworthy addition to county history. Most of the available material at the present time consists of government documents which are sometimes very uninteresting and of 27 course are more concerned with facts than experiences. Such a more personal approach would have to be made within the next few years while there are still people around who lived through the experience. I feel very strongly that a comprehensive history of Lagoon and some or the earlier resorts would be of interest to many Utahns. A project such as this could easily expand to include Saltair, Liberty Park and other resorts in the area. I am not really aware of what has been done on this subject, but a consolidation of the material plus new additions and personal remembrances would make a fascinating addition to Utah history. As one will soon learn upon attempting an oral history project, there are many problems connected with it which must be overcome. One of the first hurdles is not in fretting people to talk to you, but in convincing them to talk in the presence of a tape recorder. Reactions here will be from hesitant cooperation to outright refusal to even discuss the project. Sometimes a pleasant discussion talking about old times in a relaxing atmosphere can convince people that the proposal is worthwhile. It is well to point out that the interviews will be entirely informal and that they will merely be asked to reply to simple questions in their own words about the selected subject. It is well to discuss with them what questions will be asked so that they may consider them in the interim. Most people are usually cooperative at this point; however, if they are still extremely reluctant, it is best not to go ahead with the interview. One woman I interviewed was hesitant through the whole process and when the interview was completed and transcribed she wanted to dispose of everything and forget it. This can be a very difficult experience for both parties. It is much better if each participant has a positive feeling toward the project. This attitude also makes for a better end product. 28 As was mentioned earlier, some interviews were in progress before it was learned that the person had not actually witnessed the event. This problem could be avoided with a more thorough questioning during the pre-interview period to try and discover their actual depth of knowledge of the subject. This is also why it is well to have several additional subjects to fall back upon so the interview won’t be a complete waste of time. Another problem was encountered when the person being interviewed would ask you to turn off the tape recorder and would then proceed to tell you about a particular incident and ask if that was what you wanted. When they told the story the second time around it had lost its spontaneity and became a more mechanical action, -his was disappointing several times and I did not know how to handle the situation. Perhaps mentioning this before the interview might help. One suggestion which I very strongly recommend is that the interviewer stop and transcribe the first tape or two before proceeding with the remainder of the interviews. Hearing your own voice and the speech problems you might have certainly gives you more empathy with those being interviewed and also gives you a chance to correct your own mistakes. I discovered this fact a little late and felt that my technique was certainly not very scholarly. I didn't realize how much talking I was doing myself with many unnecessary comments. I took my own advice to relax and enjoy the conversation, whereas I should have let the interviewee feel this v/ay and I should have been a little more reserved. However, I would like to point out that this relaxed attitude certainly helped to bring out some beautiful comments, particularly with Mrs. Hess whom I did not know personally. This would not have happened in a more formal interview. Perhaps sometimes the information revealed and feelings evoked are just as important as a 29 scholarly presentation. Even though this problem was stressed in the class periods before the interviews began, I think that each person has to experience it for himself to discover his own weaknesses. This is why you should at least listen to the tapes before further interviews. There were several aspects of this project which were difficult for me to accomplish. One was setting up an interview with those people who were strangers to me. However, once the initial contact was made it became much easier as most people who accepted the project were very friendly. Setting a definite time schedule also proved to be somewhat of a problem and if this was adhered to closely the project would certainly be completed more quickly and smoothly. However, the greatest obstacle was the transcribing of the tapes. The time required for this portion of the project was overwhelming. There is no solution to this except to hire the work done. So it is a choice of spending either the time or money in order to accomplish this most distasteful job. If there was one idea that struck me more than any other during these interviews it was the fact that there are so many older people who have wonderful stories to tell. They are eager to share their experiences with others. It is a shame that more of this cannot be accomplished. Of course it is a greatly time-consuming task to both gather and listen to oral history, but in my opinion it is one that is very worthwhile. It captures an essence that is completely missed in other forms of history. It is something beyond what the printed page can offer. Although oral history can never replace that which is written, it certainly deserves a place in our records of the past. 30