Back in the Land of the "Saints" - Salt Lake City

Well...we are still pursuing the never ending genealogy quest. This summer, it's been another branch of John's family--the more refined, less eccentric group. It never ceases to amaze how these Mormons have documented their family trees. We had to do a presentation to a group of about 30 cousins on the Neslen side (mind you, we had never met any of these people). The request was made by a cousin that John had been in contact with - trying to get family info- and tempting him with the info we had gotten in Lowestoft, England last summer. So, we started to pull together the bits and pieces that we had. J was busy scanning and trying to put together the story. In the meantime, John sent me to the "DUP's" (Daughters of Utah Pioneers) (it's a 4 story building crammed with all sorts of family memorabilia. It's a bit like going into your grandparent's attic- except they've taken all the stuff you'd find there- and put them in display cases). Well, they also have a "library" --with literally thousands of file folders where they've collected information on individuals - from newspaper clippings to biographies to diaries. It was here that we discovered (last summer) a diary written by a distant relative detailing her life in England, her conversion to Mormonism, her travels to the US from Liverpool to New Orleans, her journey across the plains to SLC and her life in 1850's SLC -- 258 pages of her journal!!! To net it out- I walked out with about 60 pages of info about this family. It's actually really interesting stuff- bios done by family members (some of them done years ago - so the info is based on first person contacts). It makes these intricate family trees so much more interesting --you actually feel like you know a bit about these people and their lives.

We decided to stop by Cousin Leigh's house to discuss the presentation beforehand. He invited us over on a Sunday afternoon -for lunch. We arrived to see a rather modest house and a charming couple in their late 60's. There were lots of pictures of Jesus and Joseph Smith and the LDS Temple everywhere. We’ve found that since there's no drinking, food becomes extremely important --and you typically arrive at someone's house and are immediately shown to the dinner table. Leigh and his wife, Fern and two of their sons were there for lunch (two of their 14 children!!!) The food started coming--and coming--and coming. They had steak, chicken, fish, lettuce salad, jello (of course- green with pears in it), fruit salad, tuna pasta salad, potato salad, some kind of hot chicken casserole... I think that about covers it, but we were gob-smacked! Needless to say, we spent quite a bit of time passing platter full of food. We did a bit of planning for the presentation-- then it was time for dessert-- ice cream and cookies!

So, now we at least knew Fern and Leigh. We arrived on Tuesday night for our big presentation at Leigh's brother, Gordon's house. Gordon is a retired doctor--obviously a very successful one based on his house. They had the most beautiful garden and backyard pool. They had a big screen monitor set up for us and as we struggled to figure out how to work a Vista PC, the cousins started dribbling in. There were at least 30 people in the living room--all looking at us. We did a little photo show on Lowestoft and then got to talk to them. John did let out a "Damn" during the presentation--but laughed it off. Guess they knew we were Gentiles (as if his shorts weren't enough-- it was in the high 90's and John was the ONLY one in shorts!!). After our little show- we had lemonade and cookies/brownies in the backyard. We felt like Japanese tourists--they must have taken a photo of us- individually- with each and every cousin.

Back to Utah's "Dixie"

We dropped Gordon off at the airport on Saturday morning and we headed north, making a short stop in St. George, Utah. Not much to see here except a few LDS sites, including Brigham Young’s winter home. The pioneers used to come south to “Dixie” to get away from the brutal SLC winters. We, on the other hand, were in Dixie for the summer – 110 degrees (but it’s a dry heat??!!)

Heading “home” to Salt Lake, we had a “Check Engine” light and warning buzzer. So, we pulled off of I-15 and got on the phone to Spartan. They told us that it would be OK to drive with a “Check Engine”, but if we got a “Stop Engine” – IMMEDIATELY stop or we would damage the engine. We pulled back onto the highway – and within a minute, the “Stop Engine” came on. Fortunately, John and Gordon had fixed our transfer switch (it had melted –yes, the switch controlling all of the power coming into the coach- melted!) so we were able to use the generator to power the air conditioners. It was blisteringly hot. We called Good Sam Road Service and within an hour or so, we had a towing company arrive. They looked at the problem and thought they might be able to fix it—it turns out that when we had run over a blown tire tread in the road, it had ripped a hole in the coolant hose and all of the coolant had leaked out. So, they made a trip back to their shop in Fillmore, Utah and came back to repair the hose and add coolant. Once they finished, they had us follow them to Fillmore to top off the coolant and make sure that the problem was solved. We FINALLY made it to SLC (a LONG LONG Day. We got set up and realized that we had no white wine-- and the State Liquor store was closed. So, we broke into the red wine supply, had some soup and salad and watched The Daily Show---and surprise, surprise--the Fart Machine came alive-- ON IT'S OWN!!! We're just sitting in the coach and suddenly- out of nowhere-- a Fart!!

Utah's "Dixie"

The weather finally turned – just about the time we were due to head south. We made a stop in St. George, Utah and spent the day exploring southern Utah. We did a loop, starting in Colorado City, home of the fundamentalist Mormon, Warren Jeffs. While Jean, John and I got an ice cream cone from the local store, Gordon found a 6 pack of Diet Coke. Since the fundamentalists don’t drink Coke, it was a bit suspect. After his first sip, he knew something was amiss---the expiration date was January 2007.

We drove through Zion National Park – and were blown away by the scenery. John and I had both visited it as children, but didn’t remember just how spectacular it is. We stopped for lunch in Virgin, Utah. Their claim to fame is their local law requiring all citizens to own a gun and ammunition for their self-defense! (The mentally ill, convicted felons, conscientious objectors and people who cannot afford to own a gun are exempt). Turns out that they had a quite looney-tunes mayor who not only loved guns, but also hated the U.N. Fortunately, the law had a few loop-holes, so the gun carrying populace can carry any kind of gun- including toy guns.

On our way to picking up a take-out chicken dinner in St. George, Jean and I stopped by the local department store and discovered “Frownies”! They claim to be the miracle cure for those pesky frown lines – eliminating the need for Botox or plastic surgery. Just put these magic flesh colored patches sprayed with a bit of magic water on your wrinkles- and watch them disappear in 30 days! Well, after a bit too much wine, we decided it was time to try them out. Thought we’d never stop laughing at the sight!

The British are coming!!!

We had 4 days to make it from New Orleans to Salt Lake City – 2000 miles. Thank god for the IPOD – we loaded it with podcasts and used the rest of the time to read Alice’s first draft of her novel. Enough said – we made it into SLC about 7 P.M. on Tuesday – with Jean and Gordon arriving the next day.

Gordon was flying in from Charlotte, N.C. – taking a much deserved break from his crazy corporate life –traveling from the U.K. to the U.S. to China, to Copenhagen, to Munich. He arrived on time – with news that poor Jean had missed one of her connecting flights (Manchester to Amsterdam to Minneapolis to Salt Lake) (Some idiot didn’t make the flight- so all the luggage had to be unloaded to get the bag off the plane). So, we took Gordon back to the motorhome and waited… her 7:10 P.M. scheduled arrival time turned into a midnight arrival. But, ever the trooper, she managed to rally for a few hours before crashing.

With the rain and cold of England, Jean likes to escape to the States for a bit of sunshine and warmth. But, she typically brings the English weather with her- at least for a while. On our trip to New Orleans, we encountered a hurricane – this time, SLC was giving us cold, damp, rainy weather. Quite a change from the typical sunshine and cool mountain breezes. Fortunately, we had a full agenda of Mormon sites to visit—and did a bit of re-arranging to make sure we did the inside ones first.

We gave them the full LDS experience – from the “Story of Joseph Smith” at the old Hotel Utah (now the Joseph Smith Memorial Building) to a tour of Temple Square, the Beehive House (Brigham Young’s House). We even managed to hear the Sunday concert of the “Mo-Tab” (the Mormon Tabernacle Choir). We took a bit of a break from all the excitement to spend an afternoon in Park City.

To satisfy the big machinery fetish for the boys, we took a drive to the Kennicott Copper Mine, the largest open pit copper mine in the world. While Jean and I scoped out the gift store and got a few copper trinkets, the guys were taking the full tour.

Quick facts from the Kennecott Mine web site: http://www.kennecott.com/
About the Mine
* Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Mine has produced more copper than any mine in history - about 17 million tons.
* The mine is 2-1/2 miles across at the top and 3/4 of a mile deep. You could stack two Sears Towers on top of each other and still not reach the top of the mine.
* The mine is so big, it can be seen by the space shuttle astronauts as they pass over the United States.
* By 2015, the mine will be at least 500 feet deeper than it is now.
* If you stretched out all the roads in the open pit mine, you'd have 500 miles of roadway - enough to reach from Salt Lake City to Denver.
About the Equipment
* The giant electric shovels in the mine can scoop up as much as 98 tons in a single bite -- about the weight of 50 cars.
* The newest shovels each cost $8 million and weigh 2.5 million pounds.
* The trucks that haul the ore are larger than many houses and weigh more than a jumbo jet. They stand over 23 feet tall and can carry from 255 to 360 tons of rock.
* The truck driver rides about 18 feet above the ground -- nearly two stories high.
* Each tire on these big trucks costs from $18,000 to $26,000 and lasts just 9 months.
* The crusher in the pit takes in about 140,000 tons of ore every day and grinds it into chunks smaller than the size of a basketball.
* At 1,215 feet tall, the Kennecott smokestack is the highest structure in Utah.

Mormon Immersion

A Sunday departure out of SFO at 5 AM– even at 5 AM, the traffic was going strong. It seemed like a never-ending drive on 1-80. People were so bored that they had pulled off by the side of the road and created words and messages with rocks. It was a bit like the old Burma Shave ads. At long last, we arrived in Salt Lake City.

This year, we had arrived in time for the Mormon History Conference. After getting our badges and conference packet, we were ready for our first session. John’s cousin, Claudia’s husband Richard was presenting his paper, “The Spencer Brothers in Nauvoo”. We sat in the row with Claudia, Ed and Cindy and Claudia’s sister. The presentation style is not what we were accustomed to after years of corporate presentations filled with animations and interactivity. Papers are read and the Q&A sessions after could be heated. History is “contested ground” for these Mormon historians. Even the smallest detail could cause a discussion.

In addition to the 3 day conference, we had signed on for a post conference session on the Utah War. We were surprised to see the crowds waiting outside Temple Square for the 2 post conference tours. Prevost buses showed up and we got started at 8:30. On the drive to Fort Bridger, everyone took the mike and introduced themselves. To amuse myself, I gave them names; “Chapel Lady”, “Really old guy”, “Polka dot lady”. There were lots of retirees, many of them working as docents at the Church Museum of History and Art. There were descendants of Orson Spencer, John Tanner, and George Q. Cannon.

We drove to Fort Bridger and had a picnic lunch. The church ladies showed up and set up huge pots of barbequed beef and beans. After a hearty Mormon lunch, we did a walking tour around the site.

From Fort Bridger, we drove to Fort Supply. After walking a “path”, avoiding the cow pies, we arrived at the remnants of the site – a few wooden posts in the ground.

At this point, I was struggling to imagine how much more excitement I could stand. I started to read the itinerary to John. When I saw a 6:30 AM breakfast, I said, ****(expletive). John turned to me in amazement and we both burst out laughing. I guess polka dot lady in front of us knew for certain that she had the “gentiles” seated behind her.

At the end of Day 1, we arrived at the Comfort Inn in Evanston, Wyoming. We got our room, got a bucket full of ice and opened our bottle of wine (smuggled in our luggage). We had an hour before dinner. At dinner, John snagged a couple to join us, the grandson of George Q. Cannon and his wife. They were a charming older couple. He must have been in his 90s and had great stories of his father and grandfather.

After dinner, we all met in the Comfort Inn for Richard’s talk. He spent the first part of his talk talking about history and its interpretations. He introduced and acknowledged us- as “non-LDS”. Now, everyone knew.

Monday AM – Breakfast at 7:30. We were the only ones filling up coffee cups. We drove through Echo Canyon, making frequent stops to gaze at old Mormon camps, fortifications from the Utah War, old “billboards” from the Pioneer days. Cameras were flashing, video cameras were rolling. We called it the “Mo-gasm”, the Mormon orgasm. We called the Utah War “the war with no clothes”.

We got back to Salt Lake City and had some great times with Matt and Jay (the guys who bought John’s mother’s childhood home)

and with Bear and Robin. We’re still amazed at the absolute creative genius behind the cakes at Bear’s Bakery – Mrs. Backers Pastry Shop. The custom molds and cake decorating tools created by Bear’s father allow them to create cakes that look like spring gardens.

Richard and Claudia really outdid themselves with an all day tour of the Mormon Trail. With a van borrowed from Weber State, eight of us took off for a day of exploration. The story of the pioneer trek is well known to the Mormons. From 1846 to 1869, more than 70,000 Mormons traveled west along the Mormon Pioneer Trail. The trail started in Nauvoo, Illinois, traveled across Iowa, connected with the Great Platte River Road at the Missouri River, and ended near the Great Salt Lake in Utah. The final 116 miles, from Fort Bridger to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake, were the most difficult. After after almost 1,000 miles of walking, the pioneers were exhausted, their wagons worn and their livestock weak. They had to travel through narrow canyons and over rocky ridges of the Wasatch Range, at time, lowering their wagons and livestock on ropes down jagged cliffs.

Richard and Claudia made history come real –taking us to the trails and painting a picture so real that you could truly imagine the hardships and dedication it took for these pioneers to finally make it to Salt Lake.

Rewind...back to SLC

A drive to the factory, just in time for our 6 am appointment on Monday to turn over the Essex to Ken’s team. Then, we were off to O’Hare to catch our flight to SLC to meet Alice. We had forgotten how unpleasant flying is…they’ve managed to make it even more awful than the cattlecar experience that we remembered from our corporate days.

We got into SLC, got our car, and arrived at the hotel just in time for our dinner with Claudia and Richard.

We had quite a schedule- touring the city, all the Eleanor sites, the Mormon history, and dinner with Matt and Jay, Robin and Bear. Alice got quite a bit of material for her book. Time flew…..

Before we knew it, we were back in Nappanee with a completed coach and off to Cleveland.

The Perils of Polygamy

Well, how can you possibly top Las Vegas? How about Salt Lake City--from Sin City to reddest of the "Red States" (one of only 3 states who still give GW a 50% approval rating). We had a blast here--alot of family research-and alot of meeting 'new family members'. We decided that we should wear t-shirts with "I'm related to Daniel Spencer....are you?". Seems like every time we turned around, there was another cousin lurking. We walked into the University of Utah/Marriott Library (yes, the president of the Marriott hotel chain is a Mormon) - and were getting some info from the curator ,Robin, on how to access the collection. She asked for a name to search and we gave her "Daniel Spencer" (John’s great-great-great grandfather who started the whole thing by converting to Mormonism). She turned, slowly, and said, "Are you related to Daniel Spencer?".....Turns out that her husband is, too.
We had Kate and Mary here for three action packed days--starting with Sunday morning and VIP seats (with "Cousin Mel" who is also an LDS bishop) at the Mormon Tabernacle Choir followed by an LDS Temple Tour, tour of Brigham Young's house, a visit to the cemetery to see the dead relatives and tour of the city. We had them running from morning to night.

The highlight for them was visiting the house where Eleanor, their mother, grew up. We had stopped by the house the week before -to introduce ourselves to the owners and offer them some old photos of their house. It turns out that two guys, Matt and Jay, bought the house- and they had just started to do the house history. They were thrilled to find early photos- and stories about the family living in it in the 1930's. So, they invited us all over for a tour of the house--and had a gorgeous dinner and lots of wine.

We followed up Robin from the U of U and got together with her significant other, Bear, and her for dinner. It was an instant match. We laughed through dinner and after a great meal, drove over to Spencer Avenue and walked around. Bear invited us to his bakery, Mrs. Bakkers Pastry Shop. The business was started by Bear’s father – who married a Spencer. He told us stories of his father, a German immigrant, falling in love with ‘a Spencer” and the hoops he had to jump though to marry her (including converting!!) He was a devout Mormon for the rest of his life, went on missions and raised his family LDS. But, on his death bed, he asked Bear for a bottle of Reisling wine…

The Bakery was amazing. Bear’s father created special tools for making icing into the most beautiful flowers – the cakes look like a florist’s bouquet. We got a tour of all the machines and a demo of how they create these gorgeous flowers. And, of course, we got lots of free samples!

Our month in SLC flew by—we had a social schedule that amazed even us. Dinners with Bear and Robin, with Matt and Jay, with Claudia and Richard….

Salt Lake City Wanderings

Salt Lake City was an absolutely beautiful city--lots of lovely neighborhoods with older houses and tons of charm. AND- there is no traffic and no crime. It was a bit like back to the 50's - where all the women are well dressed, the children are well mannered, the men wear white shirts and ties and no one locks their doors. The Church, however, does control EVERYTHING. You can't order a drink without ordering food in downtown restaurants - and you can't have two drinks sitting in front of you at one time. The women are gorgeous and many have incredibly large breasts (either natural or man-made). The city has one of the highest rates of breast implants in the country. They have something called an "endowment" ceremony in the temple. John said that "First they go to the temple to get endowed- then they go to the clinic for their other "endowment"".

More strange SLC stories-- the houses are all HUGE. We got a chance to visit with Sean and Elle. They moved to SLC 4 years ago- and we went over to their house for dinner. The two of them (and their two dogs) have an 8 bedroom house with multiple living rooms, a huge kitchen, 2 offices, a three car garage and a huge yard. Now, they didn't buy it because they needed the space- but felt that they had to buy a house that size for resale purposes- 8 bedrooms are a minimum requirement for resale. These LARGE Mormon families..... Most of the women don't work. And, evidently they are the largest users of Prozac in the nation. With tons of children and a ban on caffeine- you have to do something. I'm not sure what the women do- but there are craft stores everywhere (I guess cross stitch and scrapbooking is one way to stay busy...and they can find new projects for the Monday evening "Family Night"- where the family gets together for scripture reading, craft making and family bonding)

Every year the Church holds "the Conference" where the President (who is also a Prophet, Seer and Revelator) comes out with his "revelations" for the year. Last year, he came out with the "befriend a Gentile" commandment (The term "Gentiles" covers everyone who is not Mormon--including Jews!) So, Sean and Elle are invited everywhere -- breakfasts, ball games, dinner parties. Personally, we think it's all part of a huge campaign to win over converts by letting them see what a wonderful lifestyle the Mormons have.

We were able to track down some of John's distant cousins on his mothers’ side. We found a web site for the Spencer family and used Yahoo to track down the "Spencer Family Organization" president. He was happy to hear from us and invited us to a 4th of July "Ward Breakfast" (Wards are like our churches- but they are all assigned geographically. You have no choice of what ward you belong to- it's all based on your address. And, they don't have clergy per se....the head of the Ward is a Bishop who is just a regular guy who receives the "Call"- no special training and no pay!). Well, it turned out that John's cousin, Mel, was Bishop of the Ward. So, we headed over to the breakfast. It was a bit like a Branson show- a little bit of religion, a little bit of patriotism and alot of family values. Mel, Joan and his family were really quite charming and they invited us back to their house and shared their knowledge about John's family. They then turned us over to the creator of the web site- another cousin, Ed . Ed and his wife, Cindy, invited us over to their house and we got more info and photos of John's great-great and great grandfather.

We spend most of our SLC time doing family research- visiting libraries (the Mormons have the largest genealogical library. We spent days in the LDS Family History Center, the Utah State Historical Society, the Utah State Archives and the LDS Church Archives. From the information we collected, we were also able to find a number of the Spencer houses and the gravesites of most of the Spencer clan. The cemeteries were strange. With multiple wives, you definitely got a sense of who was “top dog” among the wives based on their proximity to their man.
The Mormons provided us with days of entertainment and our visit was topped off by a visit from Brenda and John and their grandson, Dylan. They stopped in SLC on their way to visit their son in Idaho. So, we've had two busy days showing them the sites of SLC (our 2nd temple tour). They'd never had Indian food so we took them to "Taj India" for lunch. It met with mixed results. Evidently this place caters to a true Indian clientele- so the food was quite spicy for American tastes (perfect for us, but even John had a few beads of sweat and a nice pink glow to his cheeks while eating). I don't think that they'll be searching for their next Indian experience anytime soon. On their last night, we let them do the cooking and had steak, baked potato and smothered onions and drank wine into the evening.

The Mormon Miracle Pageant

Back on the road- we left Colorado and stopped in a tiny town called Manti, Utah. It's the home of the annual "Mormon Miracle Pageant" ...and we do love these strange Mormon pageants. With a cast of 500, it was held at 9:30 pm for 2 hours--and filled with Mormon families (they love their children- it seems that most of the couples have at least 4 children...) Since all the Mormons for miles around attend the pageant, we got a spot in the local campground- in the fields. The poor Essex was parked in mud with it’s wheels jacked up to make the coach level. We looked a sight- a 45’ motorhome in the middle of a field of tents and campers.

We had a bit of time to explore the area—lots of tiny Mormon towns with wide streets and nothing to do! Rain was threatening for the pageant, but managed to hold off for the entire performance.