The Rambling Guy – The Holladay Years
When I look at mini me, I see a young man who was terrified all the time, blind as a bat (I’d be in the 2nd grade before it was discovered I needed glasses), but in spite of the tremblings he heeded the promptings of his internal call to ramble to the edge and engage the dreams in his heart and he did fly. As I get older I find glimmers of the dents in my personal evolution, hiccups in my gallumps of becoming me. I want to remember both those I recall with clarity and those that haunt the edge of my ability to recall.
So, I think I was always afraid – afraid of any and all imagined possibilities. But what thrills me the most is my terror didn’t stop me – night sweats, bullies, the dark and chronic shyness and constant stress – I kept listening to my pre-mortal “soul voice” and line upon line, precept upon precept I step out. I found me, a me I still like.
I don’t think I was born with fear, I was taught, I think through my Mom’s theory of child care. I had premonitions that there was something wrong with my mind’s instinctual reaction to the dark and unknown aspects of life. But it wasn’t until September 23rd 1965 that I began the revelation as to why.
I was getting married to the most beautiful woman in the world – Paula Jean Larson. We had been in love for at least three years and now in spite of an uphill drag to the altar – I must add that none of the resistance came from the two of us, Paula and I were about to trigger the next stage of our pre-mortal promise – we were making our commitment to each other eternal in the Salt Lake Temple. I don’t know why, but our marriage was being sealed by a member of the Temple Presidency. To my surprise I knew the man and he knew my family.
President Selvoy J.Boyer.
My folks knew him as the British Mission President, from there Post war days in England and I had met him when he Presided as the President of the London Temple while I was on my mission in The Central British Mission. When I visited the London Temple he and I had a memorable meeting and he didn’t know he knew me or I him. He was now a temple sealer in the temple. Brother Boyer was an exceptional servant of the Lord.
I think in an effort to celebrate the quality and guilelessness of my mother’s faith, he told a story. He said he had been impressed by how often he saw my mother serving as a genealogy name gatherer in London and he felt prompted to ask her where her children were, this was probably in 1946 or 1947 before we left England and came to America. My Mom told him she had left Richard and me in the hands of the Lord or in other words alone and unattended in her home (If I have it right her babies were 120 miles away). Elder Boyer said he was alarmed and send her home immediately. Even though President Boyer was trying to celebrate the goodness of Mom, she was offended and embarrassed, but Aunts and other relative have validating the truth of my mom’s assumption that God would keep her babies safe and that Guardian Angels would watch over us, but my phantom memories tell me they didn’t change our diapers and if and when Mom got back our diaper were fully loaded. As I had reflected on my mental mirages (Fragments of Memories)- I Sense me standing in my crib, diaper soaked, scream crying and worried about my little brother Richard – After Brother Boyer’s story these memory made sense.
Another memory fragment is about me wandering, yeah rambling. I was lost. I don’t know where, but Somewhere in Holladay, Utah (The spelling is right, the city is named after a pioneer from Alabama name John Holladay). I think we were living in a transitional place. I remember it as a chicken coop with dirt floors. We were all in bunk beds and mom gave us baby bottles filled with warm Postum. I can remember trying to stay of the dirt floor. I don’t think we were there long, but I think I wandered off from there. I was in a recently harvested field. The stubby ends of grain stalks were everywhere sticking into my ankles and the field was endless with a bob-wire fence running down the right hand side.
This isn’t the Coop, but it’s about right
This isn’t the fence, but it reflects my memory.
I have no idea how I got there, but I was about four and I probably just wandered off. I had a strong impression, maybe it was a voice that told me to walk towards the fence. With the faith of a child I listen and walked to the fence and saw down below on a old dirt road a group of men gathered. They looked up and pointed, “There he is.” I can remember being gathered up in someones arms and there being a lot of excitement about me being found. I wasn’t scared, just confused. I was on one of my early “Walkabouts.” I didn’t feel lost, the sun was out and I wasn’t afraid.
Another time I was riding in the back seat, I think it might have been my Uncle Karl Wiscombe’s car, when I just reached out and pull the handle of the door and the door flew open. I hung onto the handle and I could remember seeing the ground speeding below me, 2/3rd of me was hanging in space and the balance with my feet was clutching onto the floor of the car. My cousin Jean Wiscombe grabbed me and pull me back in. Again confused. My cousin Jean confirmed that this had happened.
Another time I can remember falling of a tree that was laying in the water I slipped off the tree into water that was deep, cold and over my head, but again hands grabbed me and pulled me back safe onto the log.
Again, this isn’t the log, but it was kinda like this.
When we first got to America I remember sleeping in Aunt Glad’s (Gladys) house and watching and hearing the trains rush past in front of her house. I was sleeping on the second floor and had a great view. I loved listening to the clickadeeclack of the train and its whistle blowing as it headed south. I still love that sound. These are my four year old’s memories.
I still love trains. My dad would draw trains for me to keep me quiet in Church.
I have lots of memories of my Holladay, Utah days. This is Chris, Me, my cousin Joy, Richard (4 or 5), my best cousins Bill and Marie hiding behind Bill. This is, I think, the car my mom crashed (more about that later).
Now keep in mind that the mini me you see in this picture above had terrible eye sight, but I remember seeing a UFO (An Unidentified Flying Object). Just imagine this little boy on the tricycle looking up into the sky and seeing a ball of fire roaring, it made a roaring sound, just above me in the sky. It appeared to be the size of a volleyball but I watched it flashed across the horizon and disappeared. The memory is vivid – Even now. Now this wasn’t at twilight it was in the middle of the afternoon, but I can’t remember anyone else saying they had seen it too, but I didn’t ask, I was very shy and I didn’t want to appear foolish.
As suggested I remember my folks having a car accident. I assume it was in the car pictured above. My dad was teaching my mom to drive and she hit a telephone pole. The electric power line was ripped from the pole and fell across the car. My dad knew they were in trouble, in real danger of being electrocuted and he jumped out and pulled the torn wire off the car. I think he was burned really badly because his hands were wrapped up in bandages like boxing gloves. I sensed he felt real foolish about it. When I asked he claimed to have no memory of it, the boxing glove bandages.
My dad had a motorcycle in England and a car, but I can remember him getting around on a bike in America before we got the car and that brings up one of my favorite stories.
This isn’t my dad or my family, but dad was just as creative in getting a family of five from place to place.
We loved the movies, or as they say in England “The Pictures.” I only remember this escapade happening once, but dad took all of us to the movies, at the Holladay Theater – on his bike.
This is the Theater at 4850 South Holladay Blvd. It was called the Holladay Theater in the 1940‘s. Dad brought us in one or two at a time.
I loved the Holladay Theater. I used to pass it on my way back from school. I loved looking at the movie poster in the poster box on the right in the picture above. This is a poster from the right time period and of my boyhood hero. I used to see my reflection in the glass and try to wrinkle my forehead just like Roy, I couldn’t. My love of movies started very early.
I’ll talk more about Roy Rogers later. But back to the story about how dad got us to the theater. He would ride back and forth with his passengers on the cross bar or handlebars of the bike. He brought me in first. It was early evening and still light and he told me to wait to the side in front of the theater. I waited nervously, for it seemed a long time and then dad arrived with Chris on the crossbar and Richard on the handlebars. They joined me and the three of just huddle down below the front sidewalk. I wasn’t as nervous now because I wasn’t alone and we waited pensively together. And then it happened we could hear our mom wailing from at least three blocks away. Kind of like a bunch of coyotes howling at the moon, but with a lot of terror in it. Everyone could hear her, I wonder If they thought it was a fire truck. We three just tried to hide in our bunker below the sidewalk.
Finally the good ship Violet pull into port and the siren stopped.
Dad staggered up to the ticket window bought our tickets and signaled to us and we buried ourselves in the entering crowd. I remember the movie as being black and white and scary, but even more than that I remember listening to my dad wheeze along with soundtrack. I don’t remember a bike ride home in the dark, maybe one of the three Nephites showed up with a truck and loaded us up and took us home in one trip. Therefore, I think getting a car was a big deal. By the way, my dad’s shop – The Tick Tock Shop would be moved into the foyer of this very theater. The rest of the theater, the seats and screen would become a garage.
We lived with my Grandpa and Grandma Grundy for a while (As noted a long time family tradition). I think we lived in the basement. I remember several other things that happened at the Grundy house in Holladay. The first was a sledding accident. As I have mentioned I had really bad eyesight and one day I decided to go sleigh riding. There were no sledding friendly hills around the Grundy house, everything was steep and full of trees, but that didn’t stop me. I grabbed my sled and looked for the closest down hill I could find and over the top I went. I rocketed down the hill pell-mell and then I saw an old bob wire fence peeking just above the snow. I crank my sled hard to the left, but too late and the bob-wire clawed across the right side of my face. And that’s why I have scar right in the center of my right cheek.
That summer, I think, There was a the weed fire (There were fire trucks), but I believe that’s my brother Richard’s story to tell. I prefer to go to a more magical moment for me. I don’t know how I found it, but on one of my childhood “explores”(I think I was alone – another “walkabout”) I found, in the middle of summer, a path that led to the river bottom and I’d follow it down to a huge tree shadowed pond – It was magical. Frogs, birds, aquatic life of all kinds and absolute serenity. The sunlight play blissfully through the canopy of golden green. I knew this was a brush with heaven and I mentally sipped it into my soul. I sat there alone for a long time. I think I knew I would never find it again, but I was wrong, I would and did about ten years later (Look for this story when I run the Colorado River with my Dad, Richard and Chris).
This isn’t the place, but it is close to how I remember it.
Another story that resulted in scars needs to be told in this time frame. I have no idea as to how and why we got into this horrific situation, but we were living with Grandpa and Grandma Grundy at the time and my Mom, who was quick to jump at the opportunity to get out of the house, left Grandma Grundy in charge of us. I was five or six at the time and I guess by default I became the alpha male. Richard, maybe four, Chris about three and I wander into the back country behind and to the north of the house. We really wandered afar off for our age and we climbed up the hill to the top into farmer Gygi farm.
Farmer Gygi had an expensive game dog, maybe a Labrador, which had just had a litter of puppies. The dogs were too young to be touched or handled with out making their mommy mad. But my little brother Chris saw only baby dogs and he went for them.
The dogs were in a high fence area, but it had been left open. Chris was inside in a flash and reached for the puppies – I didn’t see it, but I heard it – savage!
All of a sudden one of the farmer’s sons showed up, rushed into the dog cage and grabbed Chris. He had been badly bitten by the dog, but he was alive. I guess we some how got to the doctor’s and Chris was patched up, but he would have a scar on his lip for the rest of his life. I always felt guilty about what happened.
Some how my dad and mom got us into our own home in Holladay Utah proper. For a kid with an active imagination it was amazing. Dad dubbed it “The Mansion,” but I remember it more like this picture. The homestead felt like it had been abandoned for awhile, but it had electricity and real floors. I liked it. And the backyard felt like a jungle. Grape vines covered everything It was shaded with green all the time. Old fruit trees were embraced by years of vines.
It felt like I was in a jungle
To the left of the house there was a huge field of wheat, like this.
It wasn’t this big, but it felt like it.
I remember hiking to school from “The Mansion.” From home to school seem like a forever walk and I was easily distracted. One of my favorite diversions was hidden garden that was right off Holladay Boulevard. I could peek through the fence and see it from the sidewalk. There was nothing for me at school and for a few minutes I could indulge my Celtic “Fairy People” nature and absolve myself into the water and green Eventually I meander through “downtown” Holladay to my Elementary School.
This isn’t the pond, it is suggestive of the seclusion and magic of it. There was an inclosed pond with a bridge built across it.
I would continue my forced march to school right passed the Holladay Theater, towards 4800 South and Holladay Blvd., cross the the intersection and then makes slight turn to the right and then up a bit of a hill – 2300 East.
Right down Holladay Blvd. through this intersection to my School
Today’s Holladay City Hall is in my Old School.
I would amble along until I stumble through the door and find my class. I have no memory of ever being taken to school and I’m afraid school had no appeal for me. I felt myself the alien I was I was still a little English kid who spoke with a “Brumee” twang (I sounded like Birmingham – all Blokes sounded of their cities be they Cockney or Liverpudean, Liverpool – think Beatles). But school always found me, I guess someone would “rat” me out to my mother and I find myself awash in words like “Disappointing,” “Daydreaming” “under achieving” but I had a secret – as I told you, I couldn’t see – hear yes, but I couldn’t see what they were talking about. Kindergarden, First and Second Grade washed before me as a blur before anyone realized – I needed glasses.
I think I tried, I wanted to be good, but I wasn’t from Planet America.
If one thing sticks out from this and much of first 15 years of my life – it was an overwhelming sense of being all alone. I will grant you, I was not out going, but I don’t remember any friends that I played with, just my brothers and my cousins – we few, we lonely few – foreigners.