John Toone: Martin Handcart Company Leader

 As near as I can determine John Toone was the captain of 100 in which Isaac was a member as part of the Marting Handcart Company

John Toone heard the missionaries, and new what they preached was true, however did not join the church until five years after as he was entrenched with the Methodist Church and unsure what to do.  When he decided to be baptized, his wife followed shortly after.  John and his wife were acquainted with hardship as two of their first five children died young.  He and his family emigrated to Utah in 1852.  John Toone played the cello.  He managed to transport this in the wagon when he came to Salt Lake.  At one point he used the instrument to calm a group of Native Americans who came into camp.  He settled in the Avenues area of Salt Lake City.  He was called on his first mission in 1854, and had just been released for health reasons when he traveled with those who would join the Martin Handcart Company.  For the first part of the trek he traveled with the Jesse Haven group as the sub-captain.   This group combined with the Martin Handcart Company in Florence, Nebraska.  While in Florence, Langley Bailey’s mother came John Toone seeking a blessing.  He declined saying he could not raise the dead.  Subsequently Franklin Richards gave Langley a blessing, promising he would make it to the Valley.   

Brother Toone played a prominent role in the performing arts community of Salt Lake City.  He was instrumental in the construction of the Salt Lake Theater and played in the Mineer Band.  He also served the community as school teacher and doctor.  He was instrumental in administering vaccines when they were first available.  He relocated to Croydon, Morgan County Utah, but still continued to visit Salt Lake regularly to perform and visit his children. 

Mineer Band, John Toone on right with cello

Taken form "Tell my Story Too by; Jolene Allphin and Langley Bailey writings from LDS.org

Book Review: Devils Gate, I do not recommend this book.

 

Roberts, David, Devil’s Gate: Brigham Young and the Great Mormon Handcart Tragedy, 2008, Simon and Schuster, New York.

This book I cannot recommend. It advertises itself as a book of the Mormon handcarts, but spends most of its pages as an antiMormon book. The contention of the book is that Brigham Young was a man set on greed and power, who lied freely to absolve himself of any guilt with regards to the handcarts. Brigham Young expressed his desire to build up the Kingdom of God as his motivation for helping the pioneers cross the plains, and the use of handcarts allowed them to help more people than otherwise. That true is an economic question, but where you could help a couple thousand, instead of a few hundred, that was Brigham’s motivation, no greed, not power, even though they did hope people would come to Utah to help build Zion.
Roberts does not seem to have any concept of spiritual motives. The idea of building Zion I imagine is very foreign to his nature, and he had difficulty accepting other motivations. He gives himself away in the acknowledgments in which he thanks a Mormon researcher, “Ardis realized early on that my conclusions about the handcart tragedy, nineteenth century Mormon history, and Brigham Young himself would be seriously at odds with hers.” I think Roberts had drawn his conclusions before he began investigating, and minimized anything which was contrary to this conclusion, and played up anything negative.
This is evidenced by his handling of the pioneers themselves and their journals. Mormon diarist who were positive, or write anything upbeat about the handcarts were obviously “fanatics.” He uses sarcasm against some of those who suffer, based on their earlier being for the handcart plan. I personally had difficulty reading the book, until I just took it this is how someone who is a “jerk” would write the story. (I actually thought something stronger.) As an example he quotes from John Jaques rarely and he was the Martin Company historian. He does use his reminiscences because the “fanaticism was mellowed out of him.” (p 23) His major sources of information with regards to the Willie company is people who left the church and wrote derogatory accounts.
The author’s coup de grace is a letter which was written by William Willard to Heber Kimball which announced the arrival of the Thornton to New York, and that it was expected in Iowa in June. The letter was stamped received in Salt Lake July 30, 1856. The author argues that this letter proves Brigham’s lying when he said he did not know of handcarts on the plains until Franklin Richards brought word the first part of October. In my research Brigham never said he didn’t know there were companies in the East, he had assumed they had wintered in the East however. This makes sense as the Church had cautioned against any company leaving the Florence after August 1.  Both the Willie and Martin Companies left Florence after August 1, (P.A.M. Taylor in Expectations Westward, also a nonMormon author but not one with a point to prove.) Roberts spends another part of the book saying there was no date set after which immigrants should winter in the East.
The author does let the pioneer’s stories come through from time to time, and in those places the book is very moving. However some of the “background” stuff he puts in the book seems to over shadow this. The author quotes, and talks about anything negative ever said about Joseph Smith or Brigham Young. Some of his sources include Bill Hickman, (excommunicated from the church and saying anything negative he could think of about Brigham Young so as to beat a murder rap against himself. Authorities went along with this but then realized, too late to convict Hickman, that there wasn’t a case against Brigham Young) Fawn Brodie, (whose work has already been discredited as she printed every rumor about Joseph Smith she could find) and Will Bagley (who carries a great deal of anger against the church for whatever reason who knows.)
The strangest chapter is the author’s personal experience, “The Mormon Mayflower.” The author went to Mormon Handcart Visitors Centers and asks, “Who’s to blame.” The question seems so inappropriate, especially when the author wouldn’t accept anyone’s answer anyway, as the only right answer to him was “Brigham Young.” Sometimes bad things happen. There is no guarantee in life. He challenges a group about the rescue at the Sweetwater saying the story was untrue, not explaining that the story is basically true, but in the way it is normally told some of the particulars are incorrect.
If you want to read a book, that concludes before it starts that Brigham Young is a liar, then I guess this book is OK. I read for the handcart stories, and then determined I could go to primary sources which the church makes available, which the author does say to his credit are available via the internet.

My Father in Clarksville, Arknansas During WWII Studying Radio.

 After having served ab out a year as a radar technician, dad went back to training to become a radioman.  He had spent some time in Chicago at Herzl colleg, and then moved on the Clarksville for more advanced study.  This was 1944.  Dad and another sailor had to repeat the course but he did graduate as a radioman.  From here he would continue to study radio at Treasure Island in San Francisco.

Recent pictures of the university where he studied.

Arkansas 2019: Our Last Picture of Grandpa Pohlsander

 Grandpa Pohlsander passed away in May of 2022.  The last time we visited him he was full of stories about WWII and Germany.  Some of the stories I have put on family search. https://www.familysearch.org/en/tree/person/memories/LF3C-9WW

He sat and talked for some time.  When we first pulled up, Grandma saw Sheri and said "Oh my favorite daughter."  But then thought she was Elizabeth.  Unless she recognized her as her daughter.  

Massasoit is my Tenth Great grandfather

 The most famous leader I am related to is Massasoit.  This is according to the Family Search activity famous relatives.  My grandmother is Melissa Shaw Wardle.  Then from her to the Atwood line; then Turrell, and then the Cogswell line which descends from John Starkweather who is the son of John Starkweather and Ann Pauquunaukit Wampanoag who is the daughter of King Phillip Massasoit and the grand daughter of Great Chief King Sachem also known as Massasoit.  Here is a look at his history.  Massasoit was at the first Thanksgiving feast and was always friendly towards the English newcomers.  However after his death, his son Prince or King Phillip made war against the English, killing many.  This was a year-long war called King Phillip's War.  He was eventually betrayed and killed by the English.  Princess Ann, as my eighth great grandmother as full-blooded Native American would mean I am about 1/2000th Native American.  I don't that is enough to show on a DNA test.

Massasoit

Princess Ann

Cutler's Park: Death of Sarah Ann Ashton

 Sarah Ann Barlow Ashton was a Martin handcart pioneer.  She had walked across most of Iowa pregnant, about 300 miles starting at Iowa City.  After reaching Winter Quarters they had a brief respite as they re-outfitted.  They travelled only a short distance the first day out of Omaha, reaching Cutler's Park.  The diary of John Jaques documents the death of Sarah Barlow Ashton in Cutler's Park.  Cutler's Park had been a Mormon settlement during the winter of 1846 and is only a couple miles from Winter's Quarters.  Sarah Ann passed away in childbirth,  The baby, named Sarah Ann Ashton, would only live a couple weeks and died on the plains of Nebraska.

I visited Cutler's Park this last summer.  The plaques are at the corner of Mormon Bridge Road and Young Street, just west of the Winter Quarters Temple.  The plaques talk about the story from 1846.  There is a large cemetery there now, but the Cutler's Park cemetery is on private land, and you have to get special permission to visit.  The plaque includes the list of those buried there from the winter of 1846-47.  There is no mention of Sarah Ashton who died in 1856.  

Audrey Chase: The Life Story of Audrey Melissa Wardle Chase: Chapter 8: Parenting Friends of Roger, Roger's Mission, Move

 After Roger graduated from high school, he enrolled at I.S.U. in a general program. He played football. He made many new friends on the football team. At Thanksgiving we invited a lot of them for dinner. We had about 30-35 people. It was a great day. 

 Roger was again having a great time—but doing little studying. His grades were poor. He had to retake some classes because he failed. It was just a terrible year for me because I was so worried about him. I had hoped he would go on a mission, but when he became 19 he was not interested in going. He started school again the next year. He wasted so much time and money on classes where he didn’t study!

 Roger worked for Talent Search at college, as Dale had done. All through high school and college Roger worked for the Pocatello recreation department, full time in the summers and part time during the school year. 

Roger always had lots of friends around. For a couple of years he and his friends played games at our house on Sunday evenings after church. Many kids lived with us, beginning with a friend Dale brought home. I can’t even remember all of the kids who lived with us for a semester, or a few weeks, or a month or two or for a few days. I got so I was never really sure who I’d find sleeping in the basement bedrooms.

In December of 1972, Roger asked me if two boys could come and live with us until basketball season was over. They were Rick Edwards, a ninth grader, and his brother Jeff Edwards, a tenth grader. Roger had gone with the boys’ older sisters, Lynette and Derra Lee, all through high school. He had been sort of a big brother to the boys. The boys’ mother and stepfather were moving to a small farm west of Blackfoot and the boys did not want to go with them. They were both playing basketball and wanted to finish the season. None of the four children got along with their stepfather. In fact, the girls had already moved out. Rick and Jeff moved i. Only Roger and I were at home so we had plenty of room. They stayed for 7 ½ years. They left for some things for a while but it was 7 ½ years before they moved out permanently. I learned to love them both. I consider them my sons. Their mother gave me $50 a month and then $60 to help with groceries. But I largely supported them. I did their laundry, helped them with their studies, let them use my car as my own sons had done, attended their games and did all the things a mother does. Their own mother bought their clothes. 

At the beginning of the second semester, another friend of Roger’s moved I with us. Dale Morrow lived with us during the school year until he graduated from college two- and one-half years later.

An ironic thing happened. As soon as Roger had gotten these three fellows moved in to our home, he began to think about going on a mission. When he went, the three boys stayed with me. I was glad to have them all. I’d really been lonesome without them. Derra Lee also came and lived with me during this time for three years. Lynette lived with us a little too. 

The only bad thing was that Dale and Jeff didn’t like each other. We never had any real problems, but they were not friends. 

Having Jeff and Rick with me was great. They each had lots of friends who were at our home. They also each had steady girlfriends who were around a lot. Jeff decided to run for student body president. I helped him with his campaign as did some teachers. He won and was the student body president at Pocatello H.S. his senior year, 1974-75. It was great for him!

The fall of 1973 I transferred to Pocatello H.S. to teach English. I had been at Irving for nine years teaching English and literature. I had such dear friends, especially Sharon Fleischman and Sharon Call. We all went to Poky together. Sharon F. went first. She found out they needed another English teacher and told me. I went two weeks after school had started. Then a couple month later Sharon C. joined us. She had planned to lay out that year, but changed her mind when a position at Poky became available. We taught together there for eleven years. Ronda Black was also teaching there. I had taught her in fifth grade many years before. The four of us became such fast friends and had such good times together! We still go to games and dinner together. We think alike. Once Sharon Call told me that she had quoted me to someone. We really laughed about it because I had not said what she credited me with. But she said, “I knew what you thought about it.” And she did. We four still do not have to express our opinions vocally to each other. We just all think about the same. We are also four opinionated, confident, vocal persons. When we are together, we have two or three conversations going at the same time. It’s stimulating! We all taught English, too. We were all working on advanced degrees, but so far, I am the only one who has gotten a masters.

I found some other dear friends at Poky, but they were not a part of our little group. There was Beryl Taylor, Arlin Walker, Louise Hunt and Karen Hunzaker. I truly liked and admired my principal Dale Hammond and Dick Fleishmann, Sharon’s husband, who was vice principal. It was a great faculty—not a single person I didn’t like. 

Jeff and Rick, reared in the same home, were quite different. I tried to get them to go to church and take seminary. They had been reared in a totally inactive L.D.S. home. Weekends, and especially Sundays had always been the time when they rode horses, skied and worked around the barns. After they came to live with us they saw me going to church all the time, and Roger frequently. Rick began to attend church too, but Jeff always had some excuse.

Both boys had a large group of boy friends who did the same things the boys had always done on Sundays. Jeff stayed with his friends. They were no bad boys—in fact, were good boys—but they did not attend church nor have many goals. Rick, on the other hand took seminary and began going with a very active L.D.S. girl. She was a good influence on him. He hated to lose his friends, boys he’d known and played with since grade school. I felt badly about it too, but Rick decided he wanted to be a different kind of person, so he gradually did a complete turnaround. He graduated from seminary, advanced in the priesthood ad studied hard at school. He stopped running around with and of his old friends. Later he made good friends in the groups he now chose to associate with. It was fun to have the boys at the school where I taught. Rick had evidently thought about it q lot and finally decided he was making too much work for me and decided to move back with his mother and stepfather. I was just heartsick because I’d miss him and he really didn’t ant to go. His locker was outside my room where I could see him when he came to it. He packed everything he owned in an old jeep he had, came to school early and checked out and went out to the new high school, which was about 45 minutes away in time to enroll and go to his first class. About third hour and looked out of my room and there was Rick at his locker. I went running out to see what was wrong. “Audrey, I just can’t stand it.!” I went to class and walked around the school and realized no way was I going to that school. I’ll work hard at home to make things easier for you, but I want to stay!” I was of course delighted. The school he would have attended was a dinky rural high school with poor offerings. Pocatello H.S. was a superior school. 

Rick did work hard. He did well I his classes and was active in seminary from which he graduated. He was vice president of the seminary student body his senior year. He has always been a source of pride and joy to me. 

Jeff had a great year as student body president. I just couldn’t get him to go to church. In his senior year I asked him if, as a favor to me, he would take seminary. He said yes. He took it all year and liked it. I should have approached him that way sooner. He still ran around with his old boy friends and did some partying. Jeff played football and was one of the starters. He played in the backfield. He was very quick and very tough. He dropped out of basketball because he was too short. Rick dropped out too. But both boys were always jocks. 

Jeff did not attend church. He was never ordained to any priesthood office. Two boys raised the same, encouraged the same, but quite different. Jeff had a lovely girl he went with all through H.S. until the end of his senior year. Then he began going with Katy, a doll. Both boys were well liked. Jeff was more outgoing than Rick.

Jeff got a scholarship to I.S.U. for being student body president. He began the fall after he graduated, but he didn’t like it. He was never really interested in academics. He quit and tried several different jobs. He finally got a job with the railroad and made this his life work. All the Edwards kids are great skiers and ski at every opportunity. My own kids were not. I worked so much I didn’t have time to take them and besides I couldn’t afford it. 

After Roger moved the three boys in with us, he decided to go on a mission. I knew nothing of his decision. He wanted to do it all on his own with no pressure or influence from me. When he was presented to the people of the stake to be an elder, I was not there. I knew nothing about it. Roger and I were going to conference, but I was sick. Roger persuaded me to stay home and he went himself. No one mentioned it to me. I knew nothing about it until Roger received hi mission call. Then he told me and showed me the letter. I don’t think he’d have told me then, but he had to have my financial support. I’ve always felt badly that he did not want me to share any of this time with him. However, the important thing was that he was going on a mission, leaving July of 1873. He served one year in his mission. He worked a lot with the Indians and became a district leader and then a zone leader. After one year, the mission was split and his final year was in the California San Diego mission. His mission was wonderful for him. He gained a testimony of the gospel, developed a talent for leadership and helped many people.

I had begun working at a sort of fast-food place because I just couldn’t make it on my salary. It was a place where there was no tipping. I worked there two years. But with Roger leaving for a mission, I had to have work where I would make more money. I began working at the Highwayman Café of Althea and Ted Marshall. I stayed 8 ½ years and loved it all. I stayed until they went out of business. The tips were good and I liked the people—both customers and my fellow employees. It gave me plenty of money for Roger. In fact, I just stayed on after he came home from his mission. I worked three or four nights a week from five till eleven and Mon. and Wed. and from five till one on Fri. and Sat. They were open on Sundays, but I usually didn’t work, except on holidays. For the about twenty years I worked in cafes part-time, I always worked all holidays. We arranged our family activities around my work. However, holidays were always very busy and I’d be so tired when they were over that I could do little more. We were closed on Christmas but all other holidays I worked. I came to not like Mother’s Day because it was one of the worst days—but good tips!

While Roger was on his mission, Carolyn and her three boys, Steve, Chris and Adam, came home to live. Rick had been sent to Germany and there was no housing available for his family. They stayed with me for seven months. The house was full! Rick and Jeff shared a downstairs bedroom. Dall Morrow had the other one. Carolyn, the boys and I were upstairs. It was during this time that Rick thought he’d better move back with his folks but, as already stated, he didn’t stay. 

Steve was about four, Chris about two and Adam about six months. What a delight they were! I had the most food storage I’d ever had, but we used all of it, my money, Carolyn’s money and the token amounts from my foster sons. There were seven of us to feed. Carolyn did a big share of the work. I still taught and worked at the Highwaymen.

After Christmas that year, Carolyn and I decided to go to Salt Lake to see Ann. We had planned on taking my car, but at the last-minute Jeff needed it so we went in Carolyn and Rick’s new V.W. van. We had a terrible wreck on the interstate down near Downy. If we had taken my car, it probably would not have happened. The roads were not too back but we hit an icy spot and began to slide. It was very windy and just as we started to slide a very strong gust of grabbed the van. It was tall and a little top heavy. We were thrown into the air and then bounced back to the ground three times. We ended up on our side between the lanes of the highway. Carolyn was the only one hurt. She had a broken collar bone. One funny thing happened, though it wasn’t funny at the time. Adam was in a car seat in the second row of seats. We had a big bottle of cranapple juice on the floor near him. In the wreck, the lid came off the bottle and Adam was drenched with red juice. When Carolyn looked back at him, she thought he was covered with blood. The wind shield popped out and Stephen who had been on my lap was thrown into that empty space. We were bruised and sore but not hurt. The new van was totaled.

Carolyn went to the hospital and had a cast put on. The stupid incompetent doctor put her in a body cast from her neck to below her buttocks. It was agony and unnecessary for a broken collar bone. One arm was out of the cast. Carolyn worked at caring for her children as best she could. I remember her trying to hang up clothes. With her one hand she would lift an article of clothing from the basket, then hold it in her mouth, get a clothes pin on her one hand, and some way, get it fastened to the line. Rick was given emergency leave and the Red Cross brought him home for one month. 

 We really had a full house. Everyone helped. A couple of Rick’s sisters came and stayed with Carolyn while I was in school. They each stayed a few days, but there was little help from the Read family. 

The first cast broke and Carolyn went to a different doctor who knew what he was doing and took good care of her. After the month, Rick went back to Germany. Carolyn was still in her second cast when he left. After Carolyn and the boys had been with us for seven months, Rick found housing for them on the base in Germany and they left. It was a terrible trip for Carolyn. She was out of her cast, but having the sole care of three little boys all the way to Germany was hard. 

With her gone, our house settled back into it normal routine. Dale Morrow had graduated from school the previous spring and no longer lived with us. His girlfriend Debby was at our house a lot an spent a lot of time with us that summer while she attended summer school. She was a dear girl who has added much to my life. She and Dale married, lived in Pocatello and have two children. Dale is always helping me and doing nice things for me. Dale and Roger are as close as brothers. 

In 1975, Roger returned from his mission. He was glad to have Rick and Jeff with us. Jeff had finished high school and Rick was going to be a senior. Roger and Jeff have always been very close. 

That summer, I suddenly decided I wanted a different house. Our house was a good one, but would require a lot of work to make it the way I wanted it. So, I began looking. I found a house in the Indian Hills. I almost didn’t look at it because I knew it would be too expensive. I went on my own and asked the lady in it if I could look at it. It was new, had been lived in only seven months. The owners were getting a divorce and needed to sell. I loved the house, but still felt it was beyond my means. However, I contacted Richard Dixon, a realtor, and ended up buying the house. My old house would have been paid for in one more year, but I wanted a new one. My old house was sold for a good price and I applied most of it on the new house.

I did keep out $5,000 dollars which I invested in a special carburetor being promoted by the son of a friend of mine. Nothing ever came of it. My one attempt to invest and the only time I had money to invest came to nothing. I realized I took a chance, but I never felt too badly about it. I always felt if it went it went, if not it wouldn’t. 

Anyway, we moved in the new house in November of 1975. The three boys were with me. Roger and I each had a bedroom upstairs and Jeff and Rick each had one downstairs. There was only one bedroom, a family room and a bath downstairs. I had another room finished downstairs for Rick. It is the nicest room in the house. He slept in the laundry room until it was finished.