I may have mentioned in a previous post about my great grandfather passing away in 1920 from the Spanish Flu. This has been in my mind because of the current pandemic we are living through. I knew I had a written memory about this incident from my great Aunt Clara, my grandfather Clyde's sister. I looked all over for it and finally found it and I wanted to share it with all of you.
Clara Clyde Christensen entitled this,
Hyrum's Death (Hyrum Smith Clyde 1861-1920)
Sunday, in Sacrament meeting, a fellow sang a solo from the hymn "I Need Thee Every Hour." And I was lost in my memories for the rest of the entire meeting...It took me back to my Mapleton-Springville home in early February, 1920. To my father's funeral service. Only once in my life did I ever see my father in church--the time they had a farewell party when Grover was ready to leave for his mission in the Southern States. But somehow we always knew that my father did have a favorite song, one to be found in the church song book called, "I Need Thee Every Hour." And at the funeral it was sung from the porch of the house, while the singer stood there beside the casket, during the Spanish Influenza Epidemic following WWI. Wilford, who'd brought the body home the night before, was unable to get out of bed to attend the services; he was in our parents bedroom and could hear the services. Mother, Etta, Cornell, Blaine and Bill and Grover were all down with the Flu in Storrs, Utah, as well as Ed and Hannah who lived there at the time. Two of Etta's brothers, the wife and several children of another brother had died or were dying. Dewey, Ora, and Harry had come from Logan for the service. (I did not get the flu). Friends, relatives, and townspeople who were able to be there, stood in the snow on the front lawn, facing the casket and the porch. No chairs to sit on; it was too cold to sit, anyhow. All wore flu masks of layers of folded white gauze, tied around the back of the head with white cotton twill tape. I do not remember a single word or thought that was spoken there. But I do remember that song! And I never see the title or hear the song without thinking of that day and of my father, and wondering what there is in that song that touched him.
And I remember the Carnesseca family, who had come from Corsica, off the Italian Coast, and who depended on Hyrum to teach them how to farm and to live in America, and on Elenora to help them when they were ill, or when mamma was pregnant, or when they needed help with sewing as well as show them that a wife's place in America was in the nursery and the home, and not in the fields. These two immigrant parents stood off to the side of the lawn by the grapes-and sand-burr-patch, crying bitterly and openly. Mrs. Carnesseca told my mother later that Joe had warned her "Now don't go over there and 'carry-on.' Don't you dare to cry!" "But," she added, "when he started crying I knew he couldn't get mad at me for doing it." (Those Carnessecas taught me to sing, "O Sole Mio". Not on funeral day, however. My word! It's been a thousand years since I heard that song).
Clara adds: One thing I’m very sure of: when he died at age fifty-eight he had a full
head of black hair (No white in it.) No
bald head was his. My father was said to
have shaved his mustache off when I was born because I was a girl. I never saw him wearing a mustache.
People in the memory above: Mother--Eleanora Jane Johnson; Etta--Etta Palreyman Clyde, my mother's mother (she passed away just two years later from breast cancer). Cornell, Blaine and Bill--Etta and Wilford Woodruff Clyde's sons. Grover, Dewy and Harry were my grandfather's (Wilford Woodruff Clyde) brothers.
Etta's father, Richard Palfreyman also died in 1920. I wondered if it was also from the flu, but family search said:
·
·
Cause of Death
Endo
Carditis (Chronic) Died at age 69 years 11 months, 26 days
·
The end of WWI came about largely because of the Spanish Flu. Every country involved in the war were losing soldiers to the pandemic. The first country to admit they were having problems was Spain. None of the countries wanted to admit that they were losing their fighting power. I think that the Spanish flu fizzled out after it killed everyone who was susceptible to it.
This is our fifth Sunday of home church (not counting conference). When this all started I had no idea it would go on this long. I know we are not out of the woods, yet. It will be interesting to see how things will return to "normal" or if they will ever return to normal as we knew it before.
This week, in the Come Follow Me, we talked about King Benjamin's speech. He was a king who served his people, unlike most worldly kings that we know of. He taught us that when we are in the service of our fellow men, we are only in the service of our God. We were encouraged in the lesson to find someone to serve this week, so I determined to do this. I got out of bed one morning and got on line to try and find out about making face masks. (I had to wait until Friday to do this). There were so many people interested in helping that their site was down every time I tried to get on. Now, every DI that has masks to sew has filled all of their quotas, so there are no more masks for me to make (they need to be made by their standards and with their fabric to be appropriate for medical use). The same morning I decided that indexing was a good service, so I attempted indexing. I kept doing dumb things like loading a Japanese language batch. I finally got a good batch and started working on it. After 2 entries, I saw that I was on entry 1 of 20. I couldn't figure out what had happened to my other entry, so I pressed the garbage can to start over. Then it said I was on entry 1 of 19. I didn't want to completely delete people, so I went out of it and tried again. This time the batch looked a lot harder to index, so I gave up. I finally settled for making embroidered towels for my ministering sisters, and putting a gift card with them. I still have two to deliver (I also made one for my companion). The ensign this month mentioned that sometimes the best service happens in our own homes. I do know that for our sanity and spiritual well being, we should be thinking of ways to serve.
Thankfully we had a couple of sunny days this week to get outside for a breath of fresh air.
Max and Mav received at home haircuts this week from mom. Goodbye to Mav's beautiful curls for a time.
 |
| They also found a huge spider. Max looks a little worried. |
 |
| Nick, Ori, and Effie in their new sweatshirts |
It's official, no Aspen Grove trip this year. We have to go back into the lottery for next year, so we don't know yet if we'll be going. I got everyone's sweatshirts done. They say 2020, but we'll have to use them for a future activity.
I've been sewing like crazy because it keeps me busy. Ruby wanted new shoes for her birthday, so I'm sending the money up for her to be able to pick them out. I also sent her a unicorn shirt:
 |
I think she liked it!
|
Congratulations to Matt for getting voted one of the HR professionals of the year in Utah!
2020 has been hard for some, but for Caitlyn it's been pretty great so far. She has school and work to keep her busy, and now her missionary "friend" is home (2 1/2 months early). They've been having fun together ever since, even though he was supposed to quarantine for 2 weeks. They went up to the Salt Flats yesterday. Caitlyn said someone was getting married there, and someone else was proposed to. It looked like the marriage was for an LDS couple. It must be so disappointing for so many to have the temples all closed.
Roy and I also went hiking yesterday. We drove down to Stansbury Island, to an area where petroglyphs have been found. We left the cameras (phones) in the car, but this is what we saw (from the internet). There were a lot of drawings on the rocks, but most weren't as clear as these. It was a pretty short hike, maybe 3 miles round trip. The biting gnats have begun to come out and we got a few bites, well, Roy got more than a few, but it was worth it. Next time we'll take bug spray.
We got a new swing for our backyard. You are all welcome to come over and try it out. Just let us know if you want to come over.
There is a lot to be grateful for. 2020 will be a great year. It's already an interesting year. We will add 3 grandchildren to our family in 2020. One of them will be born next week to Elise and Andy. We think they are naming him Harvey (since they went through Hurricane Harvey last year in Texas). At least they won't name him Covid or Corona (since they are going through that this year in Georgia). All in all things are wonderful and we are still living "after the manner of happiness."
