Biography of My Father, John Evans Bowen
(1855-1942)
By John Evans Bowen,
Jr.
George Gary Creer's
Great Grandfather
For the
last several years my sister Mollie and brother David have insisted that
I, the oldest son, John Evans Bowen, Jr., am the logical one to write a sketch
of father’s life. Being the prince of
procrastinations I felt time was running out for me, and so by force of will I
begin this task.
Father was
born at Minersville, PA, July 12, 1855.
He was the fifth child and the third son of David and Jane Foster Bowen
In order to
get a proper and true setting and picture of his life and background, we shall
have to cross the Atlantic Ocean and get a glimpse of an industrial city of
Llanelly, South Wales. It was here that
his parents spent the first years of their married life. The Bowen family is one of the oldest of the
city of Llanelly and has played an important part in its industrial
development.
While
serving as a missionary in the British Mission from 1910 to 1912, it was my
privilege to have visited Llanelly and made the acquaintance of a number of
descendents of grandfather Bowen’s parents.
I learned that William Bowen, my father’s grandfather was an expert
blacksmith and mechanical engineer. His
son John, after whom my father was named, was an outstanding engineer and
inventor. He was a consulting engineer
and traveled considerably throughout Great Britain. He and his father William did the engineering
and blacksmith work for the shipping docks at Llanelly, as well as the
engineering and overseeing of the construction of the Copper Works and The Old
Castle Tin Plate Company. These were the
most important factories of the town when I was there. Llanelly was then a city of about 30,000
people.
The Bowen
family was of good sturdy Welsh stock, respected and honored in the community.
Jane Foster
Bowen, mother of my father, was born at Dowlas, South Wales but later moved to
Llanelly and was married to David Bowen in 1844. She was also of Welsh blood,
and was a very charming, modest, refined and sympathetic personality. To those who knew her best she was the
embodiment of those virtues that constitute true womanhood.
David and
Jane Foster Bowen became converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints and patiently endured the jeers and ridicule of those who joined the
unpopular faith at that time. Although
they were in comfortable financial circumstances, they decided to leave their
native land and migrate to America and thence to Utah.
They sailed
form Liverpool, England in April of 1855.
During this voyage an incident happened that detained them from going
directly to Utah. It seemed a great
misfortune at the time but turned out to be a blessing in disguise. While at the docks at Liverpool, Grandfather
Bowen lost the bag containing all his money.
So on landing in America he was without money to continue westward with
the rest of the Saints. He was,
therefore, compelled to seek work. Being
a skillful blacksmith he was soon engaged to make chains and sharpen tools for
a coal mining company at Minersville, Pennsylvania.
It was while living here that father (John Evans Bowen);
their first American child was born. Had
it not been for the incident of losing their money, the family would have gone
directly to Utah. Had they done so they
would have arrived there during the summer of the severe war against the
crickets that caused so much suffering and sacrifice among the Saints.
During the
summer of 1856 father’s parents made arrangements to go west with the
Saints. They were well equipped with a
four-ox team and wagon. The gathering
place was Iowa City, Iowa, the railroad terminus at that time. They were under the leadership of Captain Dan
Jones as far as Newton, Iowa. From there
they were led by John Hunt. They began
the long journey across the plains a few days after a handcart company led by
Captain Martin had started westward.
Their progress could have been fairly good had they not been purposely
held back of the handcart company in order to encourage them and to render aid
in case it was necessary.
The
approach of winter brought with it the usual vicissitudes and hardships,
especially for their livestock. The
grass was snowed under, and it was necessary to cut down trees as provender to
keep their oxen alive. As winter
progressed, however their stock became poorer and weaker. It as not long before the four-ox team was
reduced to one surviving ox. Another man
of the company, John Lewis, also had one surviving ox from a six-ox team. The two surviving oxen were hitched together
on Brother Lewis’ wagon and the two families traveled on to Fort Bridger. All of grandfather’s supplies and wagon, with
the exception of bedding and personal affects were left at a place called
Devil’s Gate. The families were met by better-equipped outfits sent out from
Fort Supply and Salt Lake Valley by President Brigham Young. Their weak, worn out cattle were left at the
Fort and the families were brought to Salt Lake City by the new outfits.
Later on
grandfather and family moved to Spanish Fork, which place became their
permanent home. Grandfather followed his
trade, but also acquired land in several areas surrounding Spanish Fork. It was quite natural that father should
become interested in farming and livestock raising. That schooling he had was received in the
public school system available at that time in the community.
As a young
man he was required to aid his father in the blacksmith shop and became
somewhat proficient in many phases of that trade. He learned to weld, to sharpen and point plow
shears, to make and fit horseshoes. In
fact, I’ve been told he used to shoe most of the racehorses of the area for a
period of time. He made clevises, chains
and the metal parts for the traces on harnesses. He learned to set tires. He could build hayracks, beet dump racks, and
do all the necessary repair jobs of ordinary farm machinery.
He was what
might be called a “handy man”. He was
handy with carpenter tools, and built such needed buildings as cow sheds, horse
stables, chicken coops, blacksmith shop and garage. Physically he was very agile and excelled in
some of the games and sports of the day, such as baseball, standing broad jump,
running broad jump, a game called “form and raiser”, and the common “catch as
catch can” wrestling.
Father
married Mary Ann Christmas at Spanish Fork on September 15, 1879.
From this union were born eleven children, five girls and
six boys. The girls all lived to
maturity. They were Jane, Mary Ann
(Mollie), Eleanor, Rosetta and Grace.
All except Rosetta were married and reared families. Mary Ann
(Mollie) and Eleanor are the only ones surviving today.
Of the
boys, John E., Jr. and David B., and George Foster are still living. Willie, who was next to me in age met with a
tragic death by being run over with a wagon on the way to the west field in
company with a hired man. This was a
blow to mother that seemed to sadden her throughout her life.
My earliest
recollections of my father were connected with life in a small light colored
brick house that stood on the northwest corner of the lot where Sister Mollie
and brother David now live in Spanish Fork.
This house belonged to my grandfather Christmas. His wife had died and grandfather lived with
our family, or perhaps it would be more correct to say we lived with
grandfather. I have a feeling of
nostalgia when I recall the luscious fruit that was grown on that lot. There were apricots, sweet bow apples, Early
Harvest apples, winter pear main apples, large damsel plumb, and plenty of
grapes in season.
As the
family grew father and mother found it quite urgent and necessary to have a
larger home and plans were made to build the house my sister Eleanor now lives
in. In this project father exhibited his
ability as a handy man. I recall he built a rack that was handy on which to
haul rock for the foundation of the new home.
The rocks were hauled form the mouth of Spanish Fork Canyon along the
side of the canyon road. With a
sledgehammer and crowbar father hued the rock form the quarry, loaded them
alone, and hauled them to the area where the house was to be built. I frequently accompanied them on these trips.
Father was
a hard worker, industrious, patient, and always had a job for me to do. He
tried to teach his children thrift early in their lives. There were children in our neighborhood, who
seemed to have no particular chores or jobs to do after school hours, and they
got into the bad habit of congregating and playing cards, and some of them
began using tobacco. This was very
repulsive to mother and father. To
direct my attention away from this environment father made a deal with me. He promised that if I would come home after
school and help haul manure, and other jobs that needed to be done, he would
give Eleanor and myself the returns from an acre of sugar beets. This was an incentive to be industrious. He had previously promised that if I would
save half the price of a calf he would contribute the other half and I could
buy a calf. This I did by thinning beets
for an old gentleman, by the name of “Dad” Gay.
I thinned fourteen rows of beets somewhere over in the Leland area and
earned $1.40. I had to wait till fall
when Mr. Gay received his beet check.
When he paid me I begged my sister Jane to sell me a calf for
$2.80. From this meager start I acquired
a few cattle that helped keep me in spending money when I was in high school
and college. When I got married and
moved to Carey, Idaho, in 1915, I sent Father $500 in February of 1916, and
asked him to buy calves with it. This he
did and with the cattle I already owned at Spanish Fork added to those he
bought; he brought me thirty-seven head of cattle. These added to those I got when I bought the
ranch set me up with about 100 head of range cattle.
Father was
a lover of good livestock, especially horses, and during this active life he
owned some very good draft horses. In
fact, he was at one time in partnership with his brother, Uncle Bill, in the
purebred Percheron horse business. They
imported stallions direct from France.
These horses cost considerable money for those days. They proved to be too costly and did not pay
off financially. I recall one
outstanding individual named “DeVose” that father admired very much. Father used to care for him and groomed him
for the Utah State Fair. He was a blue
ribbon winner many times. Father also at
times exhibited at State Fairs samples of chains, clevises, hammers, etc., for
which he won prizes.
I cannot
refrain from relating an incident that showed the prowess of “Dad”, as I always
called him. It happened when we had
moved to the new home. It was not
completely finished and the room that was to be the parlor was used as a sort
of storeroom. One-day mother had
finished churning the butter with the old-fashioned dasher churn. After taking out the butter, buttermilk, and
was washing the churn she said to me, “Johnny, take the churn in the other
room.” Not paying much attention to what
was said, I took a chair near by in the other room. Mother said, “You stupid boy, I said the
churn.” I remonstrated, “You said the chair.”
This went on about twice more when father spoke up in a voice positive
and declarative, “She said the churn.”
By now I was near the door ready to run, but before doing so with down
right Welsh Juvenile stubbornness I finally said, “She said the chair!” and
dashed out the door. Before I reached
the middle of the road toward Oliver Swenson’s house Dad had me by the collar
and gave me a couple of good lashes across the buttocks with a razor strap and
convinced me that mother must have said churn.
By nature
father was quiet and reserved. He was
not a show-off nor was he bombastic. Yet
he had a sense of humor and was good natured and friendly. He was devoted to mother and his family and
was anxious that they live right and succeed in life. He did his best to give his children the
advantages of an education.
He was
interested in good government and was a “dyed in the wool” Democrat. During the fall of 1893 father was elected as
a city councilman and served for two years.
During this period the city pavilion was built. It served the city for many years as an
auditorium for public gatherings as well as a public dance hall.
Father took
considerable interest in the management of the West Field Irrigation
Company. On February 5, 1902, he was
elected a director of the Board and served for four consecutive years. He was then elected as vice president and
served in that position for twelve consecutive years. The records, as shown by the minutes of this
period, indicate that he was very much interested in improving the company’s
system of distributing water equitably by installing adequate measuring devices
and proper head gates. He favored
penalizing any person who took water out of turn thus depriving someone else of
his rightful use of water. He showed a
spirit of cooperation in helping to bring water from Strawberry valley into the
Utah Valley. In 1903 he was appointed to work with the state engineer to
supervise construction of their gates in company ditches. Records show he spent eleven days at this
work and received $2.50 per day for his services.
Father
enjoyed good health. He told me when he
was in his seventies that he never had been in bed with sickness till he was
taken ill with the shingles. This
disease was a very painful and weakening experience for him.
Although
Father was never very active in the church, he was always interested in seeing
and encouraging his children to adhere to the program of the church. At heart he was religious and saw the value
of the basic principles of Christianity.
He passed
away at the age of eighty-seven on March 24, 1942 at Spanish Fork, Utah and was
buried in the Spanish Fork Cemetery.
Notes by Jeneve Creer Gailbraith March 1979:
At this time all Grandfather’s children are dead except
Uncle John. I will list the children and
their birth dates and death dates of those I have available at this time. All the children were born in Spanish Fork,
Utah.
F Elizabeth
Jane 9 Feb 1881 2 May 1938
F Mary Ann
(Mollie) 18 Nov 1882 22 Oct 1973
F Eleanor 22 Sept 1884 4 Dec 1967
M John Evans 23 Mar 1887
M William
Christmas 3 Dec 1889 10 May 1894
M David Byron 31
Jan 1893 21 Oct 1975
M George Foster 25
Dec 1894 9 Sept 1970
F Joyce
Rosetta 5 Dec 1896 7 Feb 1928
M Dewey 5 Nov 1898 24 Dec 1898
F Grace 5 Nov 1900 28 Dec 1938
M Milton 13 Oct 1903 13 Oct 1903
