Mary Beck Earl (1912 -2006)
To all who have made it possible for me to live and know the joys of living I lovingly dedicate a brief story of my life.
I was born on an early winter evening of December 19, 1912 at our home on Conway Court, between 6th and 7th South and 3rd and 4th East in Salt Lake City, Utah, to my mother, Vermilla Smoot Beck, and my father Edward Robert Beck.
I had a sister Vermilla Beck Pope who would be two years old the following March 1st.
Because it was so close to Christmas and a Mother’s stay then, was 15 days in the hospital my father asked my mother to deliver at home. Her sister Edna Smoot Iverson was a practical nurse and lived only a few houses away. They put the brass bed in the living room by the fire. My father was so pleased he had Z.C.M.I. a department store, send to mother a beautiful dusty rose satin down quilt.
Aunt Edna called Doctor Gil Richards who had his offices at the Salt Lake Clinic, then located on South Temple between State Street and 2nd East. Being a friend of the family, it was suggested he come for dinner. I was told he was dozing in the big black leather chair, the great fire burning bright, when came the dear patter and “Millie” the mother gave birth to Mary Isadora another daughter.
I was told, I was born with a veil on — a thick covering of skin over my whole head. The doctor put his fingers under my chin and lifted it off. He said to my Aunt Edna, ‘Millie will want this, save it for her.” They put it on a newspaper on top of a hot water heather, and of course it dried up and could not be saved. Because I was born at home the doctor, nor my parents ever registered my birth– only a poem written by my mother, in her own handwriting, which says “and her big sister was not even two,” gives me the date of 1912. My sister Vermilla was born at the L.D.S. Hospital and her birth recorded the 1st of March 1911.
Two years after my birth a brother Edward Robert Beck was born. Two years later another brother Jack Campbell Beck, and two years later a sister Audrey Margaret Beck Lieberman. The last of five children.
Being born only a few days before the New Year, with no birth certificate they forgot and put the year 1913 on my Baptismal record, also school and my marriage licence carries 1913.
It was a shock when I was older to add another year.
Mother and Father moved to a duplex on 7th South between 4th and 5th East on the North side of the street. They lived in the East side of the duplex. Her sister Jen Smoot Spetique and her husband Will lived in the other half of the duplex. Must of been a good time for them. Mother said they put Vermilla in her buggy and would push her over to town for a day together. She remembered watching her mother as she joined them for the fun. The little puffs of dirt that her long dress made as she walked for it was not until they reached the City and County building that there was side walks. Mother would dress Vermilla in what they called a white Maderia dress. Aunt Jen and Aunt Edna would take her to the other side of the duplex, feed her bread and Jam, smear it over her face and then return her for mother to clean her up. You would have to know my family to understand this was a way of expresing their love and fun for each other.
My first memory is of living on the Avenue’s on L Street at the top of the hill on the East Side. Mother read us stories of the Sand Man from a book. I can still see in my minds eye the picture of him a little elf of a person with a bag of sand thrown over his back. He sprinkled magic sand in little ones eyes and then they would go to sleep. I can remember pulling the curtain aside so I could see him coming up the hill.
Mother loved horses, and had one named ‘pinto’ as a child. When we lived on the Avenues someone had ordered a load of coal and it was always delivered by horse and wagon. It was winter, the streets were covered with Ice and snow. Mother looked out the window and saw a load of coal being brought up the hill. The horses had a hard time on the ice. The street was covered with snow and ice and no matter how the courageous animals tried they could not get a footing and pull it over the top. The driver was cold and angry and sat on the seat, beating the horeses with a whip over and over and over again. Mother could take it no longer and flew out the front door and ordered the man to stop. Her father, William C.A. Smoot, was a police man in Sugar House and before she left the house she called him. In a short time he was there with other men to help the animals pull the load over the top. I can remember how proud I was of her.
She, my mother was a little person, five feet with beautiful auburn hair and always a warm glow about her…Not thin, just a round soft figure…her cooking was so special. I can remember as a child with five children buttering a whole loaf of bread, putting it on the broiler and toasting it for breakfast. She always made us hot chocolate and we were aloud to “dunk” our toast. Mother and Father were always very strict with our table manners. I can still at 77 years of age recall her words “Mary elbows off the table, put your napkin in your lap. They were not paper. Sit up dear and lean over, put your knife and fork and spoon across your plate.” She explained, “now dear you can go anywhere, eat with kings and queens and not worry about your manners.” We always had to say “May I be excused” before we could leave the table.
My father was a white collar worker. I can’t remember of him ever sitting at the head of our dinner table without a white shirt, tie and suit coat on. He was tall and handsome. My girl friends used to ask me if he was my brother. I can remember him taking me in his arms and teaching me to dance. I loved to dance and do to this day of 77 years. We always had a lovely home. In my father’s business of selling cars, Cadillac’s, Lincoln’s and worked for Ford Motor
Company for many years. He was able to make certain deals for we enjoyed a Persian rug, a beautiful baby grand piano, lovely large dining room set and wicker furniture in the living room. Mother had a gift for sewing and so we were always dressed in fashion.
I can remember I had a girl friend Norma Packer, we were in school together. One day I asked teacher and Norma to come home with me to dinner….because of a program at school it was dinner time. They accepted an can remember how gracious my dear mother was. Two guests unannounced, the home always clean. Our dining room was a long beautiful room, with dark woodwork, a china closet built in one end and by window on the south, with a window seat. A large oval shaped dining room table with a beautiful Tiffany light over the table. I can still see the purple and dark red grapes and green leaves that made up the design. Mother always had a white linen table cloth on and she welcomed us with open arms. She had us sit down, bless her heart she opened 2 cans of pork and beans, cut up frankfurter and heated them together, fixed a green salad, opened a bottle of her canned peaches, can still see them in the fruit dish. She cut up slices of her home made bread and jam. Can’t remember the dessert she served if any but what a blessing to have such a beautiful mother. The best part was after they were taken home she never once said to me “not again Mary.”
When mother did her house cleaning I remember the dining room with curtain stretchers. What a temptation to run my fingers over the clean stretched material
They were wonderful parents.
I remember a birthday party mother gave for one of we girls, Vermilla or I. She ordered from Snelgrove Ice Cream. It was a strawberry Cupid doll made of a mold. Oh how I hated to eat my doll.
It was about this time that mother bought our first talking dolls, cloth bodies and if you laid them on their backs and then turned them over they said “ma ma”. She would take every one into her beroom to see them. We could hear the “ma ma”, but could not see them until Christmas.
Because of mother’s health, having been born with asthma she was told a lower climate could help her breathing. We moved by Union Pacific train and lived in Sautell and Ocean Park, California. Returning to Salt Lake as soon as her health would permit.
Because of moving so many times I attended many schools. Highland Park Elementary, Forest School was on 21st South and 9th east, has been torn down. Woodrow Wilson in Sautell Californa, close to where the L.A. Temple is built. Irvine Junior High just above 11th east on 21st south. West High, South High which will close this year. We attended the first year South opened.
I started school while living on Parkway Avenue in a lovely home. We attended a two room school house set in a field. No other homes were in the area, somewhere by where our daughter Joan Patricia Earl Iverson now lives on Glenmare Avenue. There was a coal stove in each room and in the winter it took all day to dry our shoes and long stockings.
I was there when Highland Elementary was built, and attended classes. It is now a Private School called “Cardizon” on 27the South.
Friends were easy for me to make and were an important part of growing up. Patricia Roberts in California, Gladis Rag, Norma Packer.
We had all the conviencences in our home but can remember of living on Vine Street just off of 21st south in Sugar House. We had a coal stove in the kitchen. My mother had beautiful dark auburn hair and always braided it each morning. As she lifted the lid on the stove to pour a little grease from the frying pan, it caught fire and her braid, that had fallen over her shoulder was burned. When I returned from school that day I saw my mother for the first time with short hair. My father had her buy a new hat with the hopes it would make her feel better.
My older sister Vermilla found great delight in having treasure hunts. We lived in an apt. in Sugar House at the time. She would know of things she had that I wished I could have. In a metal can she lovingly placed them, took them to the Sugar House Park back of the Library in Sugar House, which is now a huge Auto Parking Place and burried them. She would return home draw a map an then ask me to find it. I really enjoyed the fun times we had together.
Mother saw an ad from Mamie Torkelson that she needed a job. Mother hired her to help with the chores around the house, and then in the evening we girls would do the dishes and mother would sit at the kitchen table and help Mamie with her school studies.
When we lived on Parkway Avenue in Sugar House I would walk to Sugar House to do the shopping. We had a little wagon. During those days the grocer did all of the filling of the goodies for you. You would tell him what you wanted and he would put it into the wagon for us. If you wanted a couple of oranges he would pick them out for you. We could stop at Grandma Mahali. She was a sweet lady in the neighborhood. Everytime we stopped she would give us something to eat, and arrange our fruits in the wagon.
While we lived on Parkway I was very fearful. Mother would leave Vermilla and I in charge. I remember that I sat in the front of the fireplace very frightened. The fireplace had book cases on either side of it. Many times people had tried to break in, because we lived so close to the prison. It was where Sugar House Park is today. The prisoners would come and try to get in so whenever mother went anywhere I was very frightened.
When we lived on the cosrner of 21st South and 9th East I was in the 2nd or 3rd grade. I lived upstairs on both corners. We moved a great deal. School was hard for me. As we traveled back and forth from California I found that the schools in California were behind the ones in Utah, and it was so hard for me to keep up on my studies. I was a dummy.
When we had Chicken Pox, I remember how we had to be quarenteened. It was dreadful. We had to stay in for such a long time. As we began to get better mother would let us go out onto the porch. On the porch was a sign about how long we had been in with the Chicken Pox. Mother would let us go out and tear a letter off the sign.
We moved from Sugar House to 1625 South on 5th East. It was owned by a doctor L.A. Stevenson and we rented it. The home was next door to Waterloo Ward (which has been torn down). A new building has been built in its place. My father was a member but never attended any of the meetings. Mother worked in the M.I.A. She made a big hit with the young girls and the boys felt important and needed. They taught them how to dance.
It was when we lived next door to the Waterloo Ward that I first met and fell in love with my husband Don Roy Earl. He lived at 1412 Denver Street and his mother who is 94 this 1977 year still lives there.
We attended West High together and South High the first year it was opened. After graduating from High School I worked for J.G. McDonald Candy Company. Later at the Paris Company a department store in Alterations. I always enjoyed sewing. After graduating from South High my husband Don served as a missionary in Hawaii, two years for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Returning in March we were married the following December on my birthday.
After work we would go looking for a place to live. Each apartment building smelled of all the evening meals that were being prepared and it really turned us off. We asked mother and father Earl if we could move into the home they were renting at 440 Sherman Avenue. The home belonging to my husbands father and mother.
It was while living there on November 18th, 1937 that our first son Raymond Don Earl was born in the Latter-day Saints Hospital. My husband was making $100.00 a month. He was a Lath and Plastering contractor for his father who owned the business. Bread was .05 a loaf, butter .25lb., milk .10 a quart, rent $25.00 a month.
After five years we had saved enough to buy a piece of property at 427 Edith Avenue. Fifty feet by 120 feet for $500.00. Paying cash we were able to borrow enough from the bank 7,000 to build us a home. It was while living here at our new home that our second child was born. A daughter Mary Julie Ann Earl Larson, in the Latter-day Saints Hospital, June 8, 1942. Four years later a third child, Joan Patricia Earl Iveerson was born, July 25, 1946. Four years later a fourth child was born Ralph Jonathan Earl, on February 24, 1950. Four years later our Fifth child was born, Jill Janette Earl Anderson, on June 11, 1954. The growin up years with our family were choice and happy years. Always told our children peace at any cost. Quarelling was never a part of my growing up years. Also that they all came from good Pioneer stock, so nothing was impossible.