Strength Of The Lind Brothers Remembered

1917: Back L-R: Herman & Raymond; Front L-R: Oscar & Philbert

In 1966, Junelle and I and our family moved to Heyburn, Idaho, where we became acquainted with Elmer Heiner.  He was raised in Oakley, Idaho and was well acquainted with the John Peter Lind family of Lynn, Utah.  He was about the same age as my father, Philbert and Uncle Raymond.

I was visiting with Elmer one day and the topic of the conversation became centered around the strength of the Lind Brothers.  He was telling me how strong they were.  He said that on occasion, he would haul grain from Lynn to Oakley with horses and wagon.  On one trip that he made, he had spent the night in the Lind home.  After eating a hearty and delicious breakfast that Grandma Lind had prepared, he started for the corral and barn to get his team ready to leave.  Dad and Uncle Raymond said that they would go and help him.  As they approached the corral, they saw there was a yearling heifer in the stackyard.  Dad ran the heifer down and caught her, Uncle Raymond picked her up around the legs, carried her to the corral fence and lifted her over the fence  into the corral.  Elmer said the heifer probably weighed at least 400 pounds.  His comment was, “I would never have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.”

On another occasion, two men were trying to load a fifty-five gallon barrel of oil into the bed of a pickup.  They had a plank they were trying to roll the barrel up into the bed of the truck.  They would almost get it in and it would get away from them.  Uncle Raymond watched them for a while, then said, “If you will move, I will help you load your barrel.”  He walked over to the barrel, picked it up, and lifted it into the pickup.  It weighed about 450 pounds.

Some deer hunters borrowed a horse from Dad to bring a deer they had killed off the mountain.  After they left, Dad said, “Let’s go for a ride and see if we can find a big buck.”  We rode over the mountain to Chadwick Basin and Kimball Creek, we didn’t find the big buck, but we did find the two hunters trying to load the buck they has killed onto the horse.  They were really struggling, Dad offered to help them.  He picked the buck up and threw it over the saddle and tied it on, the hunters looked dumbfounded.

Our Trip To Yellowstone

In 1940, after the alfalfa hay was all in the stacks and the fields watered, our family (Philbert’s) and Uncle Raymond’s went to Heglar Canyon, east of Malta, Idaho to buy timber to build two A frame derricks.  After talking to the man who ran the saw mill and making arrangement to get the timber, we headed towards American Falls.  When we got to Highway 30 at Cold Water Camp, Idaho, they stopped to decide what to do and which way to go.  All of the older kids wanted to go to Yellowstone Park.  The folks, said they were not prepared to go to Yellowstone, they didn’t have enough ready cash to make that trip.  We had all of our camping gear, so the kids didn’t see why we couldn’t go.  It was finally decided that we would go as far as Blackfoot and see if they could cash some checks and if they could, we would go to the Park. 

Just outside of Pocatello, Uncle Raymond’s car overheated and stopped.  We received permission to camp in a freshly cut alfalfa field.  There were a lot of trains running on the railroad tracks, just across the road south of us.  There was an airport just north of us, they were training pilots, just prior to World War II.  They flew just as long as they could see in the evening and started as soon as they could see in the morning.  We, Country Kids, had never seen so many planes or trains.  We lay on our stomachs with our hands under our chins and counted the cars on the trains as they went by.  Between the planes and trains and kids counting, I don’t think any body got much sleep, but we had fun.

In Blackfoot, Dad and Uncle Raymond both got them a hair cut from Wayne Bird, who had lived in the Junction Valley some years earlier.  He was glad to cash a check for each of them, so we were off on our great adventure.  I don’t know how Aunt Mildred made out, Nila was only a few weeks old and they didn’t have disposable diapers back then.  At night they would pull the cars side by side, away’s apart, we would lay out our beds between them.  Dad and Uncle Raymond would sleep, one on each end, Aunt Mildred slept in the car with Nila, I don’t recall where Mother slept.  We kids just slept and didn’t worry about a thing.  Our meals were cooked over the campfire.

As we left Yellowstone, we drove through the Tetons and down through Jackson Hole.  When we arrived at the Snake River, we were amazed to see the bridge we would have to drive on to cross the  river.  As I remember it, it was just planking on poles driven and used as piles.  Two sets of planking about three feet wide, with a gap of about three feet in the center.  There were no guard rails on either side.  The road going down the canyon was under construction and very rough.  I don’t know how many were afraid to cross this bridge, but I certainly was.  I remember putting a quilt over my head and praying that we would be safe.  If we were going to fall in the river, I didn’t want to know about it.  The dad’s were good drivers and made it across safely.

When we got to Alpine, Wyoming, we camped for the night.  Some of the kids soon found a pretty black and white animal.  We were busy chasing it, trying to catch it.  When people saw what we were doing they started yelling, telling us to leave it alone.  We chased that scared skunk through a fellows campfire, upsetting his coffee pot in the fire.  The man wasn’t happy at all with us, our folks, well, they were grateful that we didn’t get sprayed.  We did have a good time on the trip.

My Baptism

As I was coming up through the classes in Primary, I was taught the importance of Baptism.  I remember looking toward the time that I could be baptized and become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  The time was nearing that I would turn eight years of age and would be old enough.

The 28th of June was a hot summer day, we were putting up hay on the Lower Place, Uncle Alex’s old place.  We were stacking hay near the old curved shed, it was my job to drive the derrick team.  One of the difficult things about driving the derrick team, especially for an eight year old boy, was that the team soon learned how far they could go, before the big spring on the over shot stacker would yank them backwards.  The horses didn’t like to be hurried up to the end of the trail and then suddenly be pulled back by the spring.  The man on the stack would yell for the hay to be thrown back farther.  I would try to hurry the horses to throw the hay, but they would hurry only so far.  Uncle Raymond’s family was working with us, putting up the hay.

When the noon hour came, Mother and Aunt Mildred brought dinner down to us.  We sat in the shade of the haystack and ate our dinner.  I don’t remember what else we had to eat, but we had watermelon for dessert.  When we finished eating, Uncle Vance’s family came, he was our Bishop.

Daddy and I went into one of the buildings and changed into our white clothes.  We all walked down to the creek, by the bridge.  There was a beaver dam under the bridge, backing up the water.  Daddy and I waded out into the water, which was pretty chilly.  Daddy baptized me and when I came up out of the water, I was probably more frightened than cold .  My cousin Gordon, who was standing on the bank said, “Do it again.”  I certainly didn’t want to do it again and was angry at him for even suggesting such a thing.

The baptism accomplished, we walked back up to the shed, changed into our working clothes and went back to work for the afternoon.

The following Sunday, 7 July 1940, I was confirmed a member of the church by my father.  I have often thought since that, even though I was baptized in the creek on my birthday, it was just as valid and binding as if I had been baptized in a font in a church.  A very memorable occasion.

Nikken

There is an old story in the Lind family, that has been passed down through the generations of children.  It is from the old Scandinavian folktale called “The Three Billy Goats Gruff,” that was printed in 1841.  When John and Emma Lind moved to the Junction Valley in 1884, there were several streams of fast running water and later ponds and reservoirs that were built.  John and Emma, who had grown up in Sweden, told the old story of the old water troll, Nikken, that lived in the water and pulled little children in.  This helped keep the children away from the water when they were young.  This story was passed on and retold to the next generation of Lind children.  We were very careful to stay away from the creek as much as possible, even while fishing.

In the 1940's, the pipe broke that was turned to open the valve on the reservoir so they could get water for irrigating.  They had no way to open the valve, without getting someone to dive down the twenty feet or so, and place a charge of explosives on the valve and blow it open.  They found a young man from Burley, Idaho, who was willing to do this.  The kids sat on the hillside while Jake Hodge performed this feat.  Jake had been trained as a Frogman by the U.S. Navy during World War II.  When  Jake surfaced and came out of the water, the fuse was lit and we waited.  After what seemed an eternity, there was an explosion and water flew many feet into the air.  Water started going through the outlet into the headgate and out into the ditches.  All that Dad and his brothers could do was irrigate until the water in the reservoir was gone.  After the reservoir was empty, they had to put in a new valve.  A bunch of us kids were up to the reservoir one day while the men were working on the new valve.  We were playing down by the headgate, all at once this loud booming voice came through the outlet pipe it said, “This is Nikken, get away from the headgate or I will come and get you.”  We dispersed very quickly and stayed away from there so Nikken would not get us.  Nikken’s voice that day we learned later was Uncle Raymond.

I can remember as a youngster going out into the field and running as fast as I could to get over the bridge that crossed the creek.  I was sure that Nikken would grab me.  I believe that if grandchildren of John and Emma could be asked today, most of them would remember the story of Nikken.  I also believe that the story may have been passed on to the third generation and maybe even farther.

As a note of interest, Jake Hodge’s daughter Patsy married my brother Dwain’s son Jeffrey, they have been blessed with four children two girls and two boys.

The Porcupine - "our best pet"

The porcupine was probably the best pet we ever had.  I don't remember that he had a name, maybe "Porky."  My older brother, Oscar, brought a gunny sack to school one day.  After school he was going to Buck Hollow (on the East Mountain) to see Heb (Heber) Simpson.  Heb kept his sheep in Buck Hollow and Oscar was going to go see if Heb had any leppy lambs he could have.  Leppy lambs have been abandoned by their mother and need to be bottle-fed to survive.  The sheepherders don't often have time or supplies to bottle feed the lambs and so will give them away.  Oscar was riding his horse toward Buck Hollow and noticed a mother porcupine walking with two baby porcupines following her along.  Oscar got off his horse, picked up one of the baby porcupines and put it in his gunny sack to bring home - but didn't go to get any lambs.  I remember that night when Oscar pulled a little black ball about two inches long out of the gunny sack.  We could hardly believe what it was.  I think my parents were tickled about having a porcupine to raise.

My sister Ellen was about four years old and she donated her "Betsy Wetsy" baby bottle to the cause and we fed him with cows milk.  When we first got him, he had black coarse hair - kind of like horse hair.  As the porcupine got older, his hair grew to about one inch long and then the quills started growing up through the hair.  After the quills grew in, we couldn't pet him like we had before.  He liked to be petted on his head.  We would hold out our index fingers a few inches apart and the porcupine would come over and put his hands on your fingers.  Then we could lift him onto our laps and pet his head.  He was a very good pet and never tried to strike us.

I don't think Uncle Raymond was "tickled" we had him.  Uncle Raymond had just planted a row of pine trees and our porcupine liked them.  He'd climb up in the trees and nibble on the bark.  Uncle Raymond would bring him back to us in a bucket every now and then.

Laurel Hill was our school teacher and she began planning a pet show at school.  Our porcupine was about a year old and we wanted to take him to the show.  After school, we decided we didn't want to take the porcupine home and we'd play with him the next day.  So we walked around the school yard checking the fence.  We plugged any holes in the fence, so he would be safe and stay put.

The next morning we found him laying dead in the road.  He was in the middle of the road where there is the main road through the valley and then it branches off and goes over the mountain to Grouse Creek.  We were so sad.  We'd left him at school and he'd been trying to come home when he got hit.  Before school started that morning, we held a little funeral and buried him in the school yard.  We found out later that Curtis Nelson had been in Burley that day and was on his way home that evening and ran over our porcupine in an unfortunate accident.

Through the years, we had lots of wild animals as pets: coyotes, bobcats, owls, deer, and lots of lambs - but the porcupine was our favorite.  I think we tried more kinds of wild animals as pets than anyone else did.  The Baker's had deer pets.  Uncle Raymond's family didn't have wild animal pets, but one year he had the Brownies write us a note at Christmas time asking us not to chase Uncle Raymond's geese.