The History of Thomas Jefferson Thurston • By his Daughter Cordelia Thurston Smith in her seventy-sixth year, 1921 . My Father Thomas Jefferson Thurston and his Twin George Washington Thurston was born in Fletcher, Vermont in 1805. To Peter and Hannah Butler (Wheeler) Thurston. His half brother W.H. Wheeler was the vice President of the United States. When he was young the family moved to Ohio, what was then called the Western Reserve. It was heavily timbered and game such as moose, deer, and wild turkeys,were plentiful, Father became an expert in trapping fur bearing f",e.\rJ animals.,His father purchased a large farm, cash was t o get , they sold their furs and it has been told that they sold eggs for a dollar a bushel. Father used to amuse us children with his hunting and trapping stories. • At the age of twenty-three he met and married my mother Rosetta Bull. Father heard of the murder of Joseph Smith and could not believe such a thing could happen in a land of freedom, the press said he was evil and guilty of teaching false and blasphemous doctrines. Father was well versed in the bible and decided to find out for himself about this Golden bible and strange religion. Ere long two Mormon missionaries came to preach in the district school house, he went to listen was very interested and invited them to his home. Father, Mother and all of the family that was old enough to be baptized 1were. They immediately sold their place and received a good price for it. They went to Navoo, taking many scattered saints with them who had been unable to take part in the gathering, among them was Phinias Young and family, his sister and her family, both being siblings to Brigham Young . • ~8~ In Navoo the people were very poor and many were sick. There was much e1istress and want among them. Corn was only twenty-five cents a bushel, yet people couldn't buy it.Father and my Brother went down to the river and cut logs, Then they made a corn crib and filled with corn and gave the word out ~ "o'jv publicly in meeting thatnn need of bread could come and help themselves, and as it became necessary he replenished the supply. Thus he fed many people. He also gave his means freely to finish the Temple where he and mother received their endowments before it was destroyed. He also gave freely of his means to fit out the company of pioneers who started out in the early spring of 1846 with President young. In fact he gave until President young would take no more and told him, "Brother Thurston, you have given more than enough, you will need all that you have to get away from here with your family. I fear that the mob will . ome upon you before you can get away." Father replied"! will get away from here alright, and not very far behind you either." Father then took my oldest brother, George, and started for Missouri with a good horse and buggy, and says he traded with almost every man he met, He first met a man with a team and wagon, rather heavy, who was toiling along over very muddy roads. He accosted him in a neighborly sort of way. They chatted a few minutes and he bantered him for a trade. The man looked at his outfit and and finally decided it might be a good thing to do as as he was a traveling salesman and father's light rig would be better. Father continued to trade. He traded for everything and anything, cows, oxen, horses, mules. clothing, bedding, wagons and wagon bows and covers, buying and selling all the time and always to his advantage. He said it was perfectly marvelous to him & ow everything tuned to his advantage and surely the Lord blessed them and in a very short time they returned to Navoo. with an outfit consisting of five good wagons, three good yoke of oxen and • cow for each, and when they left Navoo they took with them two families besides themselves to winter quarters, and provisions and food stuff to last all for one year. When about to leave Navoo a man came and bought his place and paid him fifteen dollars more that Father had paid for it, This seemed wonderful for almost everyone left their homes unsold. We finally arrived and settled in south Salt Lake City. I remember how we got our first start of potatoes. Father brought some seeds balls from the potato vines, They were about the size of a small fruit called the ground cherry and like them full of small seeds which he planted the next spring(1848). and they grew. From those seeds we raised our start of potatoes, The first crop amounted to about 2 quarts. Father brought them to • the house in a small pan. They were all shapes, sizes and colors. the sizes ranging from a chestnut to a peanut. Some were as long as double peanuts but smaller around and all were as full of eyes as they could be. They were treasured for seed the next year, Not until the third crop was harvested did we taste a potatoes. I remember my brothers used to bring segos s home after herding cows on the Jordan river. We then moved to Centerville where father built a cabin and was a successful farmer. I have seen him refuse gold for grain in hard times saying"If you have money you will find some one to sell it to you. mine is for the poor who have no money." Father was probably one of the first men to get timber from the tops of the • mountains in Utah which he did from the steep mountain above Centerville. From the Mountain Top he went over far enough to see the beautiful little Weber Valley. It was early summer and that little well watered and well . ooded valley was in strong contrast to with the hot, dry and then almost barren Salt Lake. It reminded him of his old home in Ohio. He went over to explore the valley. He and three friends went over and camped for three days. They found the valley well watered, streams stocked with fish, the country covered with grass deer, fowl and game in abundance, They found plenty of timber and also found very good building rock. There was one problem however, the valley was surrounded with high and rugged mountains. The narrow canyon through which the Weber River flowed seemed the only opening through and none but the Indians traveled it, their trails sometimes winding half way up the mountain side, over precipice masses of rock to avoid the narrow passes where only the river could find its way in the canyon below. • In the winter of 18 5 5 Charles S. Peterson and two sons and son-in las Roswell Stevens, Father and one son, two Englishmen-John Cousins and Thomas Bedington camped and started working on a road. Later that spring Jedidiah Morgan Gant sent three men with two teams to assist in putting the road .through. In the spring of 1859, father sold our property to President Brigham Young for seven thousand dollars, taking his pay principally in cattle, sheep and horses, which he took into the valley on the Weber where the Territorial Legislature had granted to my brother-in law Jedediah Morgan Grant and my father Thomas Jefferson Thurston and my oldest brother George a large section of land for herd grounds. It consisted of all the south end of Weber Valley from what was to be designated as Line creek (and still bears the name) and from 9where it emptied into the rive. It followed the east fork of the river about two miles, then struck across eastward to the mountains, thus encompassing Round Valley, I don't remember the other boundaries, This scope of country jt5' . as granted them for herd ground. This law can be found in the first volume of the compiled law as of Utah. Father was the first bishop in Morgan county, presiding over the valley for several years. He took up and improved one of the best farms in the county and at one time valued at thirty thousand dollars. When he became old he turned his farm over to some of his children. He took his second wife Elizabeth Smith Thurston and some of the younger children to St. George where his life's labor was brought to a fitting close working in the temple. He died and was buried there, being eighty one years old. When he died his record showed that he had been baptized for 6,822 persons and had done more temple work that any other person at that time in the Saint George Temple. He had been endowed for 2,106. of course, much of - his was done by proxy but he paid one dollar a name for the endowment work that was done. In writing of Father I have tried to give as correctly written sketch of his life as possible. He was a great and good man, and my mother loved and honored him and taught her children respect and obedience to him. He was intellectual, exceptionally well versed in the bible and in ancient and modern history; he was a beautiful penman, writing like copy plate. He was the father of twenty-four children. Yet father had peculiarities of which I have written with love and the best feelings toward him. A plaque was placed and dedicated as Thurston Peak iR in honor of this great pioneers efforts in opening up and helping to settle Morgan County . •