August 2, 2011 farmhouse he grew up in. Partially hidden by trees, the building, with its wide porch, is behind the Ogden Nature Center's fence and used to be the center's headquarters. The nature center and Business Depot Ogden are on land Hodson's family once farmed, growing sugar beets, vegetables, "anything you could name." The Hodson family goes way back. His great-grandfather, John Hodson, helped build wagons for Brigham Young's trek across the Great Plains in 1847. John Hodson followed a few years later, settling in Layton. His grandfather, William Hodson, farmed near Kaysville, then moved to Ogden to be near the river, setting up on 17th Street, then 12th Street. William Hodson divided his homestead among his three sons. Carl's father, Delbert Hodson, got the center chunk that included the land Carl still lives on. In the 1920s, the area was barely developed. "It (12th Street west of Washington Boulevard) was one lane, dirt road. I was driving cows along there, and it was a dirt road," he said. "The county didn't have any way of servicing the street, so in the winter, they hired my dad to put four horses on a big wooden V, and he went up here opposite Washington Avenue (now Boulevard), and he cleared the road with four head of horses." Hodson began driving horses and doing chores when he was 7. He raised sheep, starting his flock with a ewe that got left by a passing flock and had two lambs. Horses, too. He remembers riding a Shetland pony in the first Pioneer Days Parade in 1934, using a saddle loaned by Cross Western Store, because "I was always riding bareback. I didn't know what a saddle was." In 1941, the United States government needed to build a military supply depot in Utah, and the Ogden Chamber of Commerce lobbied hard to put it in Ogden. Courtesy of Carl Hodson A photograph shows Carl Hodson's father's family in Marriott-Slaterville. "We didn't have running water here. When we had three kids, it kind of bothered my wife. She was city folk'.' Hodson said there were several sites with lots of open ground around the county, "but they needed to be close to Ogden," so his family's farm, and numerous other farms along 12th Street, Second Street and Harrisville Road got bought out. "They took all those homes, and for that reason, they appraised at half price, at best," he said. "Close to 90 percent of the people took it to court, but how can you fight government with government?" The military base was a mixed blessing. It cut his church ward in half, but on the other hand became a source of cheap labor for the farmland remaining. "They brought German and Italian prisoners to help on the farm. They'd pay them a little bit, I guess," he said. The work was hard. Thinning sugar beets "was a back breaker, stooping over a hoe all day, thinning beets. When you got home, you knew you done a day's work." He got married in 1941. For a place to live, he moved the wash house that had been next to the family farmhouse on the north side of 12th Street to the south side, where Hodson's house is now. That wash house is still there and is now the living room of his home. He has added to it over the years, but for years, that one building, maybe 20 feet long and half as wide, was the whole house. "We didn't have running water here. When we had three kids, it kind of bothered my wife. She was city folk, and they had toilets and running water, but we went out back." After three kids, they added on another 10 feet of building, making what is now his kitchen. Over the years, he dug a cellar, added more rooms and even put in a spiral staircase to the basement. His last year of farming was 1951. He and his brother had wives and flocks of children — Carl eventually had eight, his brother seven — so "he was the oldest, and I gave him his choice. He chose the farm, and I went out and found a job." For several years, he worked at the Amalgamated Sugar mill, hefting 100-pound bags of sugar. He worked at a Quaker Oats mill, making dog food. He finally ended up working as an electrician for more than 40 years. "I retired just in time. All this electronic stuff came along, I'd have had to go back to school," he said. But farming is what started it all, and he recommends it to anyone. "I'll tell you, there's not a better teacher than a farm," he said. "A farm teaches you to think for yourself. You've got to do it on your own and think things out, and it teaches you that there's work to do. Everything isn't easy." 234