LARS ANDREAS HALVERSON

LARS  ANDREW(ANDREAS)  HALVERSON (PEDERSEN)

and

Peder Halvorsen

ANE MARIE (Mary) PETERSON BOLE

by EUGENE  H. HALVERSON

My grandfather, Lars Andreas Pedersen (Lars Andrew Halverson) was born July 25, 1863 in Lille Gronheden, Volstrup Parish, Hjorring, Denmark, the most northern county in Jutland.  He was the fourth child of Peder Halvorsen and Johanna Marie Jensdatter.  This blessed event happened during a time of great national disaster and suffering, War had been declared. 

The king had died (Frederick VII) and a new King (Christian IX) felt he had to make the Duchy of Slesvig a part of Denmark, to free and to protect his people from the rulers in Slesvig and Prussia itself.  The Duchies of Slesvig and Holstein along with Prussian and Austria was waiting for an excuse to declare war against Denmark. 

His father, Captain Peder Halvorsen was sent to Slesvig to fight another war over Slesvig for another King.  Because of the impending war the family had recently moved from Sindal to Lille Gronheden not far from Saeby where they thought the family would be safe.  The family consisted of  Peder, Johanna, three children, Halvor, Jens and Karen Marie, and Peder's mother (Anne Pedersdatter Christensen).  Peder's sister, Maren and her husband, Ole Knudsen had also been living here.  It was quite a family gathering.  I have no idea how big the original Lille Gronheden farm was.  Andrew was born soon after the move. 

188-50 War medal

But there was no safe place in all of Denmark when Germany won the war, all of Jutland was occupied and in time came to loot their village, they had forced their way into the Halvorsen Home three separate times to steal all of their possessions, food, clothing, and bedding.  Karen Maria said, "At one time Mother was so desperate, she killed their cat, skinned it and walked several miles to sell it for money to buy food.  Jens said, "Our parents had to struggle to find food and clothes for us all,  but they did the best for us they could.  The children herded geese and worked in the fields.  When the War ended Peder resigned his commission in the Army to become a carpenter. 

Andrew was about ten years old when his brother Halvor and Jens left for New Zealand in 1873 and 1874.  Andrew was fully grown and out of school in 1882 when his sister Karen Maria (Mariah) and his eleven year old brother, Niels immigrated to America. 

Lars Andres  Ane Mary  Mariah  Martena  Tom
Peder   Niels   Johanne

The Mormon missionaries had been preaching the Gospel to the Halvorsen's and Mariah was the first to accept these messages.  She was told to "Flee to Zion" and the servants of God would wait on them.  There would be someone there that would help her find a new home, where people of one heart and mind dwelt in righteousness and there would be no poor.  They would all be Brothers and Sisters.  This new Church would also provide them passage money for her to go.  America was never the land of milk and honey that the Elders said it would be but they all stayed with the Church. 

Two years later, Mariah had found a way for Andrew and Thomas to immigrate, to where she would meet them and help them.  All four had agreed to pay or work off the passage money later that their sponsors had given them.  I know who sponsored three of them, but we are not sure about my own grandfather (Andrew).    We are told that he herded sheep for some (Sorensen family?) from Manti for a year. 

It took three long years for the four to save enough money to send for their parents and two remaining sisters, who came in 1887.  Aunt Mariah and Neils H. Jensen, her husband from Goshen, met them in Lehi.  As far as I know none of the boys were there, they were working for farmers near Mariah's home in Goshen or maybe Pymyra.  Sometime later we see them helping their father build a home on a piece of ground that Thomas owned on the corner of 1850 West 5000 South just north of Ed Banks home and east of the Ottesons (across the road from the Church).  It was a two-room adobe brick home.  This is where Andrew met the beautiful Mary Peterson Bole.

Mary Peterson Bole was born on the Bol Farm where her father and grandfather were born on in Denmark.  This is Mary's own story as written in The Springville (Utah) Herald on June 12, 1952 of a family who heard the Gospel in their native land of Denmark, and forsaking all migrated to Zion. 

GRANDMA'S STORY

"I was born March 17, 1870 in Oudrup, Denmark, which was about five miles from the sea.  My father's name was Christian Peterson and my mother, Mary Sorensen.

Ane Marie (Mary) Peterson Halverson

"They were farmers and also had cattle and sheep.  Just east of the old home there was a large hill that sloped quite steeply to a point, and at the top there was a hole or depression that was filled with water (the Bol, Boel, Bole, Bowl name came from this puddle of water) the year around.  The children used to climb the hill and in the summer, the water was shallow enough that we could wade in it.

"In the northern part of Denmark where we lived the summer were short.  The sun rose about 3 a.m. and went down very early.  The weather was damp and foggy.  It was quite hard to get the grain and hay dry enough so that it could be harvested.  The winters were cold also, and it became dark at 3 p.m.

"I went to school until I was in the Third grade.  When I was nine years old the Latter Day Saints missionaries came to our home and my parents became interested in their message.  My mother, while visiting in Aalborg, was baptized in the sea.  They had to break the ice to baptize her but she suffered no ill effects from the experience.

"Two years previous to this time, my father and five of the children had emigrated to Zion.  

"The Mormon elders had been to my grandfather's home several years before this time, but he was very bitter and would not listen to them.

Lars Andres & Mary Peterson Halverson

My father's sister, Christiana, who later was married to Frederick Twede, loved to hear the gospel and she would go at night, under a pretense of going to a party, to hear the elders preach.  She and her mother joined the LDS church, and Mrs. Twede (Christiana) pulled a handcart across the plains.

"I recall my Grandfather Peterson (Christen Pedersen), who was a small man and often wore a loose cloak.  As children, we used to follow him about as he went to stake the dry cattle out and we would get under his cloak.

"At the age of ten years I accompanied my mother and the twins, Pierre and Niels, to join my father in Great Salt Lake.  We came from New York by train, arriving in Utah on June 24, 1880.

"I recall that I was not seasick on my voyage to this country, and each evening the missionaries would come and conduct prayer.  This was strange to me, as we had never had prayer in our home.

"Upon arrival in Salt Lake, we stayed in a big room of a building in the tithing yard.  We stayed there for about two days and then moved down to Pleasant Grove.  (there was no one to meet them)

"Father rented a farm from Bishop Hunter of Salt Lake and we lived in a two-room frame home that Bishop Hunter built.  It was about a mile west of town.  During this time, I helped to herd cows and milk them and helped with the housework.  We did not know anyone who lived in Pleasant Grove, but one day a man who had been our neighbor in Denmark, and now lived in Levan, passed our house and recognized father.  It was a happy reunion.

"During our stay in Pleasant Grove, I was baptized into the LDS Church.

"Just east of our house there was a nice pasture and every summer the Indians camped there.  They were friendly and never bothered anybody.

"There were quite a number of Danish families living in Pleasant Grove, and I recall an interesting incident in connection with a conference held there.  President Lund was in attendance and began to speak to the people, when an old lady who did not understand the English language very well stopped him and said, `President Lund, could you please speak to us in our tongue?'  President Lund immediately changed into the Danish tongue and spoke words of hope and comfort to those who had forsaken their homes and native lands for the LDS gospel.

President Stephen L. Chipman was present at the time and he shook his head in wonderment to see President Lund change from one tongue to another without effort.

Andew  Mary James  Myrtle

"After I was in Pleasant Grove three weeks I went to Big Cottonwood to stay with my father's cousin.  I worked nine months helping with the children and housework.  

"We moved to Mapleton in November 1883 to a one-room frame home on the site where Mary Allen built her house.  There was a granary attached at the corner of the house.  We arrived there at 9 p.m. and the carpet was pulled back and there was straw on the floor.  We pulled up the old carpet and swept up the straw and put up a stove.  The pipe on the stove was too short so we had to put it through the window.  I remember my Grandmother Peterson (Anne Marie Poulsdatter Pedersen) stayed out in the wagon all wrapped up until we had the house warm.

"My father purchased 20 acres from Lucian Hall, which was one-fourth mile west of the old homestead where they lived many years.  We went up to the bottom of the old slide and hauled cobble rocks and built a 2-room house.  Riding a horse around in a mud hole made the mud.  The water was drawn from a hand-dug well.  The well was about 20 feet deep and it never went dry.

"I attended school one winter for about four weeks and about five weeks the next winter.  My teacher was Hannah Friel.

"One of our closest neighbors was Richard Thorn and his wife and I remember we did not have a cow and they told us to come and milk one of theirs.

"Of our 20 acres of hand, most of it was in sagebrush.  My father plowed the ground with a hand plow and I followed behind pulling the sagebrush and piling it.  We hauled about 150 loads home to burn.

"We had two horses and two cows and a calf and we planted some crops that spring.

"One winter, I recall, my father made 175 pairs of wooden shoes, and sold them to Mapleton residents for $1.00 per pair for men's and 75c for women's.  He had learned to make them in the old country.

Lars Andreas Halvorsen (Pedersen)

"I recall the families living at Mapleton then were the Fifields on the old Marshbanks farm.  Tom Williams lived in a dugout.  Mr. Malstrom lived where Rebecca Hall lives; Steven Perry a half-mile south of the meetinghouse.  Lucian Hall lived in a cellar that was walled up with brick.

"During those days we used to visit friends we had made in Palmyra and I became acquainted with Andrew Halverson, whose parents came from Denmark.  We went together for about two years.  He came to see me on horseback.  During the winters we used to get a group together for a sleigh ride.  We were married in 1889, when I was 19 years old.  At that time I made my own clothes, made bread and did the cooking and carded the wool while mother spun in on the spinning wheel.

"After our marriage, we lived in a house west of the old C. O. Law place until he road east of the Lewis Nielson home was opened.  Then we built up the lane.

"My husband engaged in farming all his life.  About the time our second child was born we moved to Redmond and live there three years. 

"The land at Redmond was poor and the prices for farm produce was bad.  Money was very scarce.  I recall butter sold for three pounds for 25c.  Eggs were 4c per dozen.  We couldn't even get a spool of thread for a dozen eggs.  Wheat was three bushels for a dollar.

"It was hard in those days to get enough money to pay taxes.  We could get script at the store for produce, but seldom saw any money.

"While were living at Redmond, I had to wash out our only clothes after my husband and two children had gone to bed.  We lived in a one-room home and my husband would get up early, make a good fire and finishing drying the clothes.  He would push the flatirons on the stove and I would get up and iron the clothes.

"Coming to Mapleton from Redmond, we lived on the site of the Lorin E. Harmer corner, and then moved to Palmyra where we lived for about four years.  From there we moved to Mapleton to the Aaron Johnson home, where we have lived more than forty years."  (Idaho was left out)

WHAT GRANDMA DIDN'T TELL;

Religion had divided the family: her Father, Christian Bole, Aunt Christiana and her Grandmother, Anna Marie had joined the Mormon Church and were determined to come to America.   While Her Mother Maren, her Grandfather and even Grandma did not accept this New Church until long after the others had immigrated. 

Christian Peter    Hannah Boel

Grandma remained with her mother and twin brothers in Denmark, she I'm not certain if she ever expected to see the rest of her family again.  Two years later Grandma's Mother was baptized into the Mormon Church the four of them immigrated to America to unite with the family again.  During the separation her father, Christian Boel had married, Hannah, the maid. 

She never told who provided the money to come here, some believe it was her father others believe her Mother sold the farm in Denmark.  Soon after arriving she was sent to work for a family in Big Cottonwood.  She said it was her father's cousin, but He had no relatives here, Aunt Christiana said we had none.  This had to be a sponsor who had to be repaid. 

Her mother would always stay separated from the family but would live near them first in Pleasant Grove and later in Mapleton where she lived in a dugout.  Grandma lived with her mother in the dugout here for two years.  She tells how the walls, ceiling and furniture became covered with frost in wintertime.  Grandma would never tell the reporter about dugout, her stepmother or how poor they were. 

 We all knew that Grandma had a very meager opportunity for schooling as she was needed at home.  Still I was quite surprised to hear from Aunt Mary Halverson Bowen, Grandma's youngest daughter that Grandma never learned to read and write English although she could speak English very well.  Grandma could do arithmetic and was able to vote.  Andrew was well educated in Denmark and mastered English soon after his arrival in America.  Believe it or not Andrew's name in Denmark was Pedersen not Halvorsen; the two brothers who immigrated to New Zealand kept the right name.  When he changed his name from Pedersen to Halvorsen is unknown to me I know it took several years to decide how he was going to spell Halvorsen.  First Andrew was teaching in Church out of a red church history book in Mapleton and Redmond.  His name was written as Halvorsen in this book.  Then he wrote Halverson on his marriage certificate in 1889 and Halvorsen on his Declaration of Intention on March 26, 1892.  After 1894 Halverson was always used.

Little Grandma   Christian Pete Boel

Aunt Mary said, "Father and Mother were married in the Manti L.D.S. temple, they went with "Aunt Hanner" and Grandpa Boel in an old wagon drawn team of horses, it took them four days.  The families traveled by horse and wagon and camped along the way.  They were married July 17, 1889 in the midst of a terrible depression.  Their first home was in South Mapleton - a one-room rock house with a dirt roof.  The home was at the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon, just below the Powder Plant.  It was called "Skarpenswee" a Danish name for sharp penetrating wind, "Oh how the wind would blow in the morning".  A few months after her marriage to Andrew, Mary's mother, Maren came to live with them and stayed until her death 34 years later.  Maren from now on was either called "Little Grandma" or "Lump Sugar Grandma."  James Andrew was born 14 April,  1890 and Myrtle Christena on 3 Sept., 1891.  They were still babies when the family moved to Redmond. 

We know they tried to buy the farm because they had to pay taxes on it.  To pay these, Andrew loaded his wagon with red salt from the mines there and left for Salt Lake.  He would travel as far as his horse could go, pull into a farm, and ask for work to obtain food for himself and his horse and move on the next morning.  It was a long three weeks.  This is when he bought bolts of fabric and a treadle sewing machine for Grandma that she mentions in her story. 

They stayed in Redmond three years.  This was where Chris was born in 25 Sept., 1893.  It was just too hard to make a living there so they moved back to Mapleton where Raymond was born 26 Jan., 1896.  As hard as it was to just survive, Andrew and his brother Tom found time to make adobe bricks for the Mapleton Church.  The Church and a school was built in 1893, 1902 the City was incorporated and named Mapleton before this it was called Springville Bench 

The family moved to Palmyra to be near Andrew's parents and his brother and sisters; Thomas, Mary and Martena.  There were family dinners and visiting and "neighboring".  Good times were enjoyed.  This is where Harvey was born 7 March, 1899 and Eliza 13 July, 1901. 

Andrew still had difficulty making a decent living for his family, he was again searching for a decent farm, so they moved back to Mapleton where Joseph Lund was born 3 Jan., 1904. 

Aunt Maria her husband Nels Jenson who lived in Ucon, Idaho was well aware of Andrew's plight.  They had found a very nice farm for Andrew with a brick home on it next to their home.  Andrew, heeding the call of his sister, loaded the wagon with their belongings and the four oldest children left for Ucon.  It took three weeks, the children walked all the way.  Grandma and the three younger children came on the train later.  Harvey can still remember looking down into the Bear River Gorge below.  Andrew refused to go in debt to buy this farm.  Aunt Maria said, "You have the children to make a go of it, you can not lose." 

Mariah & Nel Jensen

Instead of buying they rented a farm with a two-room log house  with a dirt roof, the Old Uncle Henry Place.   They lived here for two years harvesting hay on about thirty acres of land.  Andrew wasn't happy here either.  The soil was poor, sometimes the soil and the seeds would simply blow away.  My father, Harvey said, "I used to go with my Father and brothers to a ditch or canal to get water.  We would take the barrels and fill them with buckets of water.  In the winter, we would chop a hole in the ice and hope the water wouldn't freeze before we could use it. 

"Uncle Andrew lived on the Old Uncle Henry Place , one half mile east of where he lived.  In the fall of 1905 Uncle Andrew and I built our first home (the Peter Halvor Jenson Home).  We hauled lumber from a small sawmill in the hills thirty-five miles east of Iona, the house was built out of green rough sawed lumber." 

Somehow Andrew would always find time to help family, friends, and neighbors.  Everyone that I talked with, tells of his good deeds.  They all loved and admired him. 

James  Ray  Halverson

Harvey said, this might have been where the family lived when Andrew was cutting and hauling logs to a steam-powered portable saw mill.  When a large bear began to bother his horses, Andrew set a trap for him.  Only only three toes but caught when he came to work the next morning the bear was in the trap.  A very angry and threatening bear was waiting for him, he had no gun, so Andrew took the wagon tongue from the wagon and killed his bear with it.  He made a long coat with deep pockets from the skin.  His children loved to put their hands down into these warm pockets. --- A recently found handwritten history said,  Andrew worked as a freighter for a lumber company hauling lumber for them and farming. 

Both of Andrew's parents died in 1905 while the family lived in Ucon.  Peder died in Martena's home in Goshen and Hanna died in Thomas' home in Spanish Fork. 

My Father talks of going to school in Ruby but nothing is known of the farm or what was done here, he was only a small boy at the time.  He still remembers the school, the Teacher(Old Man Steele) and the willow switches he used. 

In the spring of 1906, the family moved to Rigby where Andrew rented a farm with 100 acres of hay, ten acres of sugar beets and thirty acres of grain.  Uncle Jim said Rigby was all work and no play.

Andrew worked at the sugar factory at Sugar City during the winter months.  He would work 12- and 18-hour shifts. Merrill was born in Sugar City in 1907.  In his first year of life, he developed Whopping Cough, measles, and an abscessed breast.  Mary and Andrew worked night and day to save him. 

There was no school here they lived to far away.

Emma   Tom Halverosn

At times they must have been very poor.  Myrtle remembers Grandma making flour soup (thickened milk with a small piece of bacon).  She would tell the children "Now, Pa has to work very hard, so we'll save the bacon for him."  I remember Grandma used to tell me what weeds would make good table greens.  Jim, Myrtle and Chris were farmed out to do work for other families at a very early age.  Myrtle said "I would be so lonesome and homesick, but the family needed the money."

In the spring of 1908 another farm was rented in La Belle where they raised sugar beets and potatoes and life was better.  The children were able to catch up on their missed schooling.  The first year was a good year for farming and Andrew finally thought he was going to prosper, but next year in the fall of 1909 most of their crops were frozen in the ground, had lost everything.  Ten acres of sugar beets and five acres of potatoes were lost. 

Disillusioned with life here Andrew began selling all that he owned in preparation for the move back to Utah.  The move was delayed when my father, Harvey, came down with typhoid fever.  He was quarantined to a one-room shack while the rest of the family lived in a tent outside.  After the quarantine was lifted, they boarded a train to Lake Shore, leaving Jim and Chris there.  The children all remember the big train wreck at Pocatello and how the Beaneries ran out of food while were waiting for it to be cleared. 

I haven't really heard what Grandma's father (Christian Boel) did for them when they came back to Utah but he did come to meet them in a wagon. 

The family moved to a house in Palmyra near to be near Andrew's brother Thomas who was quite a success farmer here and helped Andrew to get a new start again.  I am told of how the two brothers worked together on a few farms in the area.  Mary was born the tenth of February 1910 in Palmyra, a month after arriving here and Arnold was born a few months later to Myrtle on the 6th of May. 

Andrew left the farm to work for the Utah Copper at the Magna Mills, he lived in a place called Rag Town.  I have recently found an old handwritten history by an unknown writer (possibly Uncle Jim) that said,  Andrew was an oilier at Garfield in 1913 and returned in 1923.   It wasn't to long before he sent for his sons, Jim in Idaho and Chris and Ray in Lake Shore to come up here to live and work with him.  We have a few photographs of Andrew and his sons there.  Rag Town, Snake Town, and Shanty Town were small communities near Magna that were built for those who worked in the mills and smelter that processed the ores from Bingham Canyon. 

Sometime in 1911 or 1912, when Andrew was in Rag Town, Christian Boel (Grandma's father) bought the Aaron Johnson farm and deeded it to his daughter Mary for taking care of "Little Grandma", his first wife, something he should have been doing.  He must have had Grandma promise to care for him too when he became old.  My Father said, "Christian deeded the home to Mother to keep the family here, Father would have sold it many times but couldn't".  Grandma she was so proud of her new house, it was hers and it meant an end to moving.  It was a wonderful gift but the gift did cause hurt and jealousy to come between her and her sister Elsine.  Somehow Elsine felt cheated, but there was nothing that Grandma could do.  The two sisters had always been close and now they were not talking.  Grandma felt very sad about this.  They never resolved their differences, when Elsine died Grandma got on the old Bamberger train and went to Salt Lake City.  She wasn't treated very well by the family and after the funeral she returned home with a heavy heart. 

Andrew and his brothers and sisters spent many years of their lives building a home for their father and mother (Peder and Johanne Halvorsen) and now expected their children to do the same for him.  This caused some bitterness between him and the older children, they felt like slaves.  These were hard pioneer times.  The older children grew up with a feeling of not being loved as they should and a little bitter because of a lost childhood.  I was amazed with the two views of Andrew by his children.  I had listened to my father (Harvey) for years and I was raised with the idea that Grandpa could never quite do anything right, that he was always chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  Now, after talking to Aunt Mary and Uncle Merrill I'm told of another Andrew that the younger children remember and love, I'm told of a hard working and well educated man who was loved by all. 

James  Ray  Myrtle   Chris   Harvey
Eliza      Mary   Andrew   Mary      Joe     Merrill 

All the girls complained of the lack of clothes, they only had one dress and it had to be washed at bedtime for tomorrow.  This was the reason they all left home early, to obtain the many things they needed.  He wasn't tight, he just spent it as fast as he got it.  My father complained,  "I worked all summer long digging a ditch for the Irrigation Company.  When I got paid, Dad gave it to Uncle Tom and I never got it back.  Uncle Tom's horse was running loose, so the sheriff put him in a holding coral and he had to pay a fine to get him out."  Harvey also said,  "Dad when he lived in Rag Town spent all his earnings foolishly and I had to send all of my money back home to mother."  He would give the shirt right off his back if he felt the other man needed it more than him.  This was when he sent for his genealogy in Denmark. 

For many years both Vivian and I have been trying to find our many ancestors on the Halverson side of the family.  We copied the works of Clara Price, Lionel Jensen and others, but there were errors and some of the children were missing.  We had all seen Grandfathers Genealogy sheets but no one could read or understand it.  It came from Denmark about 1912 written in Danish, and divided into four parts; FARS SLAEGT (father's family), MORS SLAEGT (mother's family), FARMORS SLEAGT (father's grandmother's family) and MORMORS SLEAGT (mother's grandmother's Family).  The sheet is one foot high and seven feet wide, what a wonderful document and what a wonderful blessing it is. 

Grandpa and his brother, Uncle Tom spent a lot of time studying it and doing the temple work for their relatives.  We now have these relatives in my computer that was lost since Andrew died.  Aunt Mary H. Bowen said, "He paid relatives in Denmark to write this document for him, and it cost over 100 dollars.  100 dollars would have bought a small farm in those days.  This was when I had only one ragged dress and the roof leaked so bad in Grandma's house that they ran out of pots and pans to catch the leaks.  It is a treasure for me, my only disappointment was that it failed to follow Helle Christensdatter's Grandparent's line back to Norway, that would be very hard and expensive to do now.

Grandpa had been asked by the Church to write his history and to make a Journal, this he did but after he died it seems to have disappeared.  I think Aunt Mary either has it or had it.  Aunt Mary sent me a photocopy of Andrew's signature on a book I believe to be his Journal, I hope to see this one day.  I was hoping that it could solve so much of our family's history.

Many of the fine old heirlooms we all remember that were locked up in the guest living room was bought at this time.  The organ, sewing machine, china cabinet, horsehair settee.  Aunt Doris said, Grandma bought the sewing machine from a little old lady who lived by the Casteel Resort up Spanish Fork Canyon.  A fancy mineral water resort. 

With a house and a farm of their own and obtaining a little outside work at times, they now had an easier life, but life still had it's ups and downs.  Andrew devoted his whole life to farming.  He preferred farming to any other work, but it wasn't easy.  Harvey remembers that his favorite crop was sugar beets.  He tried to raise them in every place they lived, but he never had a successful crop.  One year he borrowed seed money from the bank and when Andrew harvested the beets, the Sugar Company sent the money to the bank - the harvest only covered the cost of the seeds and interest.  Andrew received nothing.

James in Montana

The bank also took 400 dollars that was in Grandma's name that her father had given her to bury him.  Grandma went after the bank manager but I don't know the end of this story, I hope Grandma prevailed but Christian Boel's grave stone wasn't a very fancy one.

Good land with water rights was scarce; it was difficult to buy and almost impossible to rent.  Andrew and his children were never able to obtain the good land and water.  His brother , Thomas, became a very successful farmer.  Most of his money came from sugar beets.  This may have caused Andrew's obsession with sugar beets.

Hazel Twede Baird remembers when Andrew and his boys would come over to their home to kill, butcher and scald their pigs.  They were so efficient that she was afraid of them.

Halverson home with Grandma and mary

Every morning Andrew would get up, make a fire and coffee.  He would then serve Grandma her coffee in bed.  Joe would do this for her later after Andrew had passed away. 

In 1920 there was a large flood that hit Mapleton.  It hit Grandma's house and caused a great deal of damage.  It caused the foundation to settle and crack.  This caused the walls also to crack and the drain to plug up.  Harvey and Joe being the only ones home at the time worked awfully hard to repair the damage but the foundation would never be the same. 

Aunt Mary remembers when her father would sing these old Danish songs to her mother at night.  The Danish language and customs were passed down to all the daughters and to Uncle Jim but not to my father and the other brothers.  Andrew also had dark hair with a redish cast to it.   

In 1923 Grandma's mother (Little Grandma--Lump Sugar Grandma) died, she had lived in her own room on the south side of Andrew's and Mary's home and was cared for and loved by them for 34 years.  A year later, Grandma's father, Christian Boel, moved into their home and was cared for until his death in 1926. 

Ray              Mary holding Mary          Andrew
Eliza                      Joe         Merrill

Two years later, Andrew died on December 9, 1928 of heart failure, this would have been hard on Grandma to care for them all but she did.  Andrew suffered for many years with congestive heart failure and kidney shutdown, in those days it was called dropsy.  He spent the last few years just laying on the couch.  For six years Grandma was caring for one or two sick or dying family members.  The news of his death almost had just about done Aunt Myrtle in.   Erma Lorraine said,  "Mother had always carried a feeling of guilt for having Arnold out of wedlock and she and her father could never talk about it.  Now he was dead and had never forgave her and told her he loved her."   

I have visited with the families of  all the Petersons and the Halversons that are left.  They remember Andrew and Mary with a great deal of affection.  As soon as grandma could see some one coming, the coffeepot went on the stove.  Most all of our cousins remember how happy and fun loving the Danish side of their family was.  A family gathering was indeed a joyous occasion for both young and old. 

Andrew will never be remembered as a successful farmer, but he and Mary raised some fine sons and daughters who were all loved and respected in the community.  He was mostly remembered for being a jolly, good-natured man with a warm chuckle.  

Mary Halverson Bowen said,  "When I came home from school father would be sitting on the chopping block if Mother wasn't at home.  He would not stay in the house alone".

AUNT DORIS said;  "Grandma had a large raspberry patch south of the old house.  This was very well until a few summers after Grandpa had passed away.  Joe and Merrill were trying to make thinks easier for her, also I imagine they hated picking the berries themselves.   That summer berries were picked and people just wouldn't be interested in receiving them for free.  So they hustled Grandma off to Aunt Em's and Uncle Tom's for the afternoon.  When she returned they had moved the raspberry patch and even had it plowed.  She seemed very upset with them but then I think she really seemed happy about it.  Grandma tried to have a few vegetables growing in her garden.   She also had beautiful roses and bridal wreath.   I never have met such a lovely person as she was."  

ERMA LORRAINE said,  "Grandma loved her family.  I remember how she would bring out the family picture and tell about each one of the children.  Grandma was especially saddened by Raymond's death from Scarlet Fever in 1918.  Eliza almost died from the flue at that same time.  Grandma was very pleased when Chris and Jose named their son Raymond, .  Grandma told me about waiting for Chris to come home from World War I.  Most of Mapleton's boys had already returned home, but she hadn't received a letter from Chris in over a year.  She grieved and prayed for him.  Then one day Chris came walking down the road.  That was probably the most ecstatic moment of her life.

"Grandma simply adored Andrew and he loved her too.  When he was dying, he asked Joe to promise him to always stay at home and look after his mother.  Joe did this and never married.  In later years, Joe built Grandma a new house with all of the modern conveniences.  Grandma loved her family and did everything she could for each one.  They in turn came to see her often until she died.  Aunt Doris said,  "We had a bell from her house to ours;  three rings was come right now, one was come when you can.     Dick slept there at nights"  Grandma was bed-ridden the last two months of her life and needed constant care.  It was just to hard for her to get up.  The doctor said she had a heart that didn't want to give up, but it eventually did.  On 12 March, 1956.  She was laid to rest next to her husband (with all the Halverson's) at the Spanish Fork Cemetery.   Joe, her son, promised his father he would care for his mother until she died.   His job done, Joe died a few months later. 

GRANDMA;  by Erma Lorraine Ashby Drummond

Bowls of red rubies

Drizzled with honey and cream

Grandma's raspberries

Hands made paper roses,

Gather tubs of sweet lilacs

for Memorial Day.

Scent of lavender

Awakens me.  Friendly spirit

has come to visit.