HMA: In his own words

[Found this on my old computer as I was cleaning up the hard drive. Figured that I had ought to post it here for those that may not have seen it and for posterity.]

Life History of Howard Marshall Arnett
(June 8, 1917 - June 16, 1994)

Dictated 19 November 1965.

I, Howard Marshall Arnett, was born in Lowell, Cochise County, Arizona on 8 June 1917. My parents were Thomas William Arnett and Annie Gale, I was the second child of six born to this couple. Marvin and I were both born at Bisbee (Lowell). After I was about three months old, we moved to Franklin, Arizona.

My hair is light brown and my eyes are blue. My average weight was about 160 pounds up until I spread out about three years ago. Of course, now I'm a lot lighter since I've spent all the afternoon in here working on this stupid little tape recorder trying to get it fixed so that we could record. And it's been a grinding, grueling affair. It really has just taken the weight off of me.

My first recollection as a young child was when we had moved to Franklin and had lived in the old house on Granddad Gale's homestead, which was down in the field. One morning, Marvin and I were in bed when we looked up into the ceiling and saw that it was on fire. The old house had an old shingled roof but they had never gotten around to ceiling it. They had used flour sacks for the ceiling. Mother had built a fire in the kitchen stove and it had caught these flour sacks on fire. Of course, we saw this and told mother about it and she got excited and ran outside yelling at my Dad was at the upper end of the field doing the chores. She shouted so loud that Uncle Will heard her who was some three-quarters mile in the distance. He came running too and they quickly put out the fire.

Also, I remember that my Granddad Arnett lived with us most of the balance of his life, ever since I was born. He had a stroke and became paralyzed and was unable to get around and had to he helped considerably. He lived several years, after this stroke. My dad and granddad were not members of the Church at this time, in fact my granddad never did join the Church here.

Dad had a work team. He let Marvin and me ride them. We'd hang on to the harness. After a day's work Dad put us on. The horses were tired and sweaty. I remember the horse would shake to get off the sweat. We learned to ride horses early.

I started to school when I was five, Marvin was six. Mother took us to school and of course, she had other little ones with her. She had gone to enter Marvin into school, but while she was out with some of the other little ones the teacher gave me a pencil and a desk and when mother came back into the room I was enrolled too, so they just let me go with him. We started to school in Franklin, Arizona.

Also I recollect that after starting school that we had to walk about two and a half miles to this little two-room schoolhouse. It had a big room and a little room. I remember Carl Gale who was a big boy, went to the 7th or 8th grade at the time. He lived just down the road from us and he was our first cousin, however, he delighted in teasing us. He would threaten to cut off our ears and we would run all the way home as hard as we could go to keep him from cutting off our ears. By the way, he is now a State Senator from Greenlee County and has been for years.

Old Grey was the first horse we ever had. Marvin and I rode him two miles to school in Franklin. We'd tie the horse up at the fence that was in front of the school. Some rode burros - Carl Gale and Phil Stewart did. We rode a "Cadillac" - Old Grey. There were six or seven burros and horses tied to the cedar post fence by the bar ditch. Every school morning we'd get on Old Grey and turn him toward school. He'd kick up one leg - really balky. We'd spur him then he'd kick up both hind feet. He was 'camp-stuck'. He didn't want to go. He knew where he had to go. Then Dad would get on him and warm him up. After school was out, Marvin and I would get on him. Old Grey would run as hard as he could toward home with me and Marvin clinging on for dear life!

My first teacher was Miss Doutro, an old maid teacher, about sixty years old, who had never been married. She was a kind old lady. I guess a pretty good teacher but it didn't take much on me. She taught the first four grades. I stayed with this old lady through the fourth grade. And then when I was promoted to the fifth grade, old Mr. Stone was the big room teacher and he was kinda noted for his meanness, and I was kinda noted for being afraid and I didn't want to go in there but I went in for awhile. He beat me over the head with a pencil and I went back to Miss Doutro's and finished that year back in there. I was fortunate, though that he didn't stay. He went away from there about the next year. We had other teachers of course. In the seventh grade they put me back up with Marvin. He, Lewis Moyers and I graduated together from this little two-room school. I was eleven, Marvin was twelve. Marvin was 13 and I was 12 before school started that fall. In the meantime we had moved to Prescott. Dad took mother up to visit, we liked it so well, we wanted to stay, especially mother. So Dad came back and got our stuff, leased the place out and he went to work in Prescott on the railroad. We started to school at this big school, big to me anyway, compared to the little two room one we had come from. There in this school they had a real bad deal of initiation the whole year round. Those great big old seniors would take us little fellows and sit us on the water fountains and use the paddles on us continuously. I was scared to death the whole year, never done a darn thing, don't even know why I went. While we were there in Prescott Dad took sick, real bad sick with pneumonia, was in the hospital, and out of work for a long time. He was near death many times. He finally regained his health and got better but meantime the cupboard got kinda bare. Mother used to make popcorn balls and us kids would go down on the streets and peddle these popcorn balls. It was quite an ordeal at the time, however looking back, I don't think it hurt anything. We were in Prescott one year and starved out, of course.

We were all glad to get back home. We moved back to the old place in Franklin before school started in the fall. We started school then in Duncan. We liked that considerable better, having grown a little too. While in Duncan High School, I became interested in sports, being a kinda small school, didn't have much trouble making the team. I played football, basketball, and was on the track team too. My high school days were nothing to really brag about academic wise, always had trouble with my grades seemed like. Liked Algebra, did pretty good there. I had a real good principal, who kept me in High School. I thought an awful lot of this principal. He made it possible for me to stay in school, he tried everything to keep school interesting and help us find jobs to buy Levi's to wear to school. His name was Wes Townsend. Thought an awful lot of him. Marvin and all the kids liked him; he had the respect of everyone that knew him. Marvin and I graduated from High School in 1935.

Of course Marvin and June had gotten married the year before and they finished High School after being married. So all three of us graduated together in 1935.

After '35 I went to work on the threshing machine. Marvin and I both worked on the threshing crew and the pay was 75¢ a day for a ten-hour day. I got smart real quick and could see this CCC Camp over there where they were paying a dollar a day and your board. I joined and was in there about seven months, then I went on a contract with a four-horse team that I had bought. I went to Morenci with Uncle Will (my mother's brother) and went to work up there with the Phelps Dodge Company. I worked up there for about seven or eight weeks, I made more money than I'd ever seen before. Came home with about four hundred bucks in my pocket. Seemed like I had gotten "filthy rich" over night. I had my team to pay for out of that, so it didn't leave me too much even then. Also, I did a little stint in the mines, and also worked for the motion picture house there as a projectionist. Worked for Vernon McGrath, the Standard Oil Company. I was working for him at the time the World War II broke out. Of course, it didn't take long for them to round me up. They thought I'd be a likely prospect for good "canon fodder" I went into the army 2 January 1942.

I've got this far along in my history and haven't even mentioned my brothers and sister. Marvin was the oldest, then came myself, then Charles came along two years later, Fred made his appearance two years later on after Charles. Then there were my two sisters, Doris and Dorothy. We all lived quite close together, as was the custom in those days. Times were never too good. We really couldn't tell much difference when the depression hit from before it hit. However, I guess things were a little harder from 1929 on. It seemed to me as far back as I can remember times were pretty rough. We had some, oh kinda hard places to live in, did without waters most of our lives. We had to haul what we used. The old houses that we lived in weren't too good, had no modern facilities at all. However, after I got out of High School we bought a place just over the line into New Mexico. We moved up there and proceeded to build a house. In the meantime we were living in an old adobe house that was there, and one night the side of this adobe fell out during a warm rain. That left us right out in the open. We moved from there into an old chicken coop that we had hastily renovated, poured a cement floor in and stayed in there until we could get this other house up that we were building. Of course, from then on things begin to ease up a little and we began to have a little taste of this stuff that we call modern conveniences. But mother finally passed away without having anything too nice

As I mentioned before I went into the army in 1942. I was inducted in Phoenix, Arizona. They sent us to Fort Bliss, Texas, which is in El Paso, Texas for processing. From Fort Bliss we moved to Tucson, Arizona where we went for basic training. After basic training, we turned to duty at Tucson and stayed there for a considerable time. We went from Tucson to Murock, California thinking that we were going over to the Pacific. Some change of orders made us move back to Tucson again thirty days later. Then we received orders to go to Fort George Wright in Spokane, Washington to an Armory school. From there we were reassigned to a little place called Eurphrates, Washington, which was an airbase. It had no buildings yet. From there we went to Lewistown, Montana. I spent the winter there and from Lewistown we went to Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, where we embarked for overseas. We went to North Africa and landed at Casablanca. We were on the water some two weeks. From Casablanca, we went across the northern part of North Africa which was some 2200 miles, traveling most of this distance by jeep. The main part of the company went by the old Narrow Gage Train, which was known as the "Forty and Eight" (forty men or 8 horses). We stopped at two airbases on the way across and did duty there, bombing the enemy. From Tunis we went across the Mediterranean Sea on an L.S.T. boat over into Italy. We first landed at Naples, however the harbor had been bombed the night before and we were unable to dock in there so we went back around the "heel" (Italy is shaped like a boot) to Toronto, Italy. We moved up into Italy, near a little town named Foggia, which was an air base of ours. We stayed there the remainder of the War, never moved anymore as we could bomb most any place the enemy had from this airbase with our bombers.

The war was over finally after I had been in some two and a half years or more overseas. I was flown out the next day after VE Day from my squadron to Naples. I then caught a boat back from Naples. Arrived in the States about the first of June, 1945. I was real anxious to get home as it had been almost three years since I had a furlough or had seen my folks. However, while I had stayed in Tucson, one evening I had gone into Church. There was fireside chat afterwards where I met this little girl named Ethel Clifford and became acquainted with her. I had a date or two with her before I left Tucson and was quite anxious to get back to see her also. On my furlough I managed to make contact with her someway and went over to see her... after getting back from overseas.

Here are a few of my experiences I had in my army career: I had never seen what you'd call real cold weather. However, the winter that I spent in Montana was extremely cold! One time the mercury was at 30 below zero, and stayed that way for about a week. Another time it dropped to 40 below zero. Then when the weather warmed up to about zero and the wind started to blow, they called it a Chinook, which is known as a hot wind. Anyway it was real cold to me! We went from Montana to Camp Kilmer and was only there a few days when we boarded a boat for Casablanca. We were all "diked" out in our winter clothes, long underwear, wool suits, wool uniforms. When we disembarked in Casablanca we found the exact opposite there. If it was one degree there it was 130 degrees at least, terribly hot. We got off the boat and had to march 8 miles to our Bivouac area, and of course there we were with our wool clothes on. The reason they gave for not changing these clothes was that we were fooling the enemy. Of course as we marched along, it didn't take long before one began to drop out, then another. They just fell like flies. They couldn't take the heat...with all these wool clothes on. I decided that instead of foolin' the enemy, they were foolin' us!

We were two weeks on the boat without baths. The bath that we had on the boat was with salt water. This didn't do much good, that time we didn't have any soap. When we got in to Casablanca water was kinda scarce and we were on ration there for about six weeks, just enough to drink. After about six weeks of this in Casablanca, which was about 2 months without a bath, I got on a bath detail, I got to go into Casablanca for a bath. We lined up, had two lines which looked like about half a block long, when we got to the end of the that block, there was another full block around the corner, and another yet before we got up to two little drips of cold water. However, being that long without a bath, it felt really good. When we got through bathing, a buddy of mine said, "Arnett, if we just had something good to eat now, we'd feel wonderful." So we went to one of those little sidewalk cafes. An Arab girl had learned enough English to say "Eggs and Chips" so we ordered these eggs and chips. She wanted to know if we wanted soup, we said, "Sure, we wanted the works!" She brought this soup out in these earth-colored bowls, we dragged the spoon down through there, and found these dog-goned grasshopper legs. We had seen these dirty looking Arab ladies gathering up these grasshoppers and putting them into gunnysacks. I thought they were trying to get rid of them. The grasshoppers were so thick there at this time, you could hardly walk without stepping on them. They were like a black cloud in the sky. And here these women were gathering them up making soup out of them. My buddy looked up at me when he saw those and said, "Arnett, I'm not hungry, are you?" I answered, "No, let's get out of here." So we pulled out, guess they are still holding our order!

I got so hungry eating those darn C-rations. One day I bought a handful of marbles (potatoes) on the black market. Paid $14.00 for them also $1.00 per egg. Boy, did these taste good.

I have mentioned before this girl Ethel Clifford in Tucson, whom I had a few dates with before going overseas. When I got my furlough the first thing I did was look her up. You couldn't say that our courtship had been a hasty one in nature because some two or three years had elapsed between the time I had met her and the time we got married. However, date wise we didn't get to see a lot of each other. We did write back and forth. When I got home on my furlough I knew what I wanted, and it didn't take me too long to persuade her that I could do something for her that no one else could. However, I still got to prove that, I guess. Anyway we were married on the 23rd day of June 1945. Of course, I was still in the army, having to report back by the first of July. So our honeymoon was kinda a short one. I was to report back to Santa Anna, California where I was to receive my orders and have a permanent assignment. Ethel didn't go with me to California as we didn't think we would be there more than a few days. I was traveling on army orders anyway. I got my reassignment from Santa Anna to Salina, Kansas. When I got stationed at Salina, I sent my wife word and of course she came and there is where we really got acquainted. We enjoyed this little stint over there, my assignments in the army didn't amount to too much, the war was drawing to a close. The Germans had already given up and the Japanese on the verge of it. My duties weren't too rigorous there in Salina, at the Smoky Hill Airbase. We had an apartment in town and seemed to have a lot of fun. I loved my wife and still do more than she could imagine. However, I guess I don't tell her so often enough, but that is the cold and simple truth.

I was discharged from the Smoky Hill Airbase in Salina, Kansas and sent to Fort Bliss for mustering out pay. Then Ethel and I moved to Franklin, Arizona. Our first home was in the old adobe right on the New Mexico line which at the time the Arnett Brothers had bought. Then we moved from there to a little house in town (Duncan, Arizona) and as I recall our first son was born there in September 15, 1946. He was born in the hospital in Safford, Arizona, but we were living in Duncan at the time, in the little house by the mill across the street from Brother Matheson. We moved from there back to Franklin to a little cement block house that my brother Charles had built for his new bride. They had gone back to school in Provo, Utah. From there we moved down to the "old Kirby Place" when we had dissolved our partnership with my Dad and my brothers. We then had bought this "old Kirby Place"

We lived there the balance of our stay in Franklin. Harold, our second son had been born during our stay at the cement blockhouse. Larry and Jeff were born during our stay at the "Kirby Place". We now had four sons!

In the year of 1954, we moved to Mesa, Arizona, stayed there one year where I worked at the Western Auto Store in Chandler. Vernon McGrath and Raymond were running it. The pay was about half of what we needed so we had started to dip into our savings from the little place we had sold in Franklin. I could see that this was a downhill proposition, our income wasn't meeting the out-go so we moved then to Blythe, California. Marvin and I had gone over to the Arizona side of the Colorado River near Blythe known as Cibola. We had found a brush patch of some awful big mesquites and salt cedars, so we decide to cut out a ranch out of the wilderness. We came to this place in the year of 1955 moving here in the month of May. Was it ever hot here in Blythe!

It was quite a struggle building this ranch. Had to build a canal to get water, took me about 5 months as hard as I could go on the bulldozer, this canal was about 2 3/4 miles long. We cleared about 600 acres. Things seemed to look easier than they really are. When we got into the actual work of this thing, the expense seemed to be more than we could meet and at no time did we ever have enough money to do the thing that we needed to do. We have just been scrapin' by ever since. This place had no cotton allotment, the government was regulating our crops. I lived to see the government putting their hand into our affairs, taking our free agency from us. This also made it difficult for us. We went into a partnership with this company known as Cibola Land and Cattle Company, trying to strengthen both our positions, by pooling our debt. But this didn't seem to give us much strength. It was a hard and discouraging proposition.

Then on September 17, 1964, I stood on that ranch and watched my brothers die!

The week before this day Bryce Miller, our manager called me and said they were planning to come over from Phoenix. Perry Chisum was going to fly them over. We were to have a company meeting there on the ranch. Marvin, Fred, Perry, and Bryce were flying over. Bryce wanted me to know so that I would make sure the runway was in good condition. I went over the runway with a drag scraper, spent almost a day with the scraper. Bryce called over on Wednesday evening asked about the weather, asked if we had had any rain and the condition of the strip. I advised Miller the strip was ready, and there had been no rain. I was to meet them at the strip at 9:30 a.m. the next morning.

I'll never forget that morning, I woke up with the funniest feeling, I didn't want to go down to the ranch. I couldn't shake this feeling off. On the way down I had this feeling that something bad was going to happen, felt real uneasy about them, felt that they wouldn't arrive. The plane arrived roughly about 9:30 a.m. I remember thinking then, "There's nothing to these funny feelings, here they are!" I was alone on the ranch, the Mexicans (hired hands) had gone to San Luis for some kind of Mexico fiesta. We all toured the fields in my pickup, inspected the stock and horses, took in the whole place. We came back to the airplane, where we possibly discussed things about the ranch for about one hour before they were to take off. The plane had been left at the north end of the field. They climbed into the plane, Miller got into the left rear seat, Marvin got into the right rear seat, Fred was in the right front seat, and Perry at the controls. Perry taxied the plane to the north end to turn around to take off in a South direction, he revved the motors up. There was just a slight breeze from the south to the north. The plane started down the dirt runway, I saw Fred give his familiar wave of the hand to me, "See you later Howard", again this strange feeling flooded over me. The plane roared down the runway, actually I lost sight of the plane due to the dust. I was amazed that the plane was up in the air in such a short distance. I then observed one wing high in the air, I can't be sure if it was the right or left one, right after that it seemed like the opposite wing came up, I could never tell, I don't recall the motor cutting out, it seemed like it was under full power, the dust was so thick I lost sight of the plane, then I heard the awful crash. I stood there, for a second I had the feeling I wanted to run, I couldn't face it, I knew it was going to be bad what I would find. This feeling lasted for a few seconds, I knew I had to go and face what I would find. I jumped in the pickup and went toward the plane. The first thing I saw was fire in the engine compartment, the plane was in a north and slightly west position setting on its tail, on the west edge of the runway, the front of the plane was demolished, I stopped my truck back some distance, ran over to the plane. The first one I saw was Fred. The right door had torn off. I unbuckled his safety belt and lifted him out. I could see that he was already gone. The next one I pulled out was Perry Chisum, I could see he was badly hurt, I knew that he was alive, he was moaning. I then got out Bryce Miller, he was almost coherent and helped some. Before I took him out I had to cut a strap on the back seat. I threw all of this seat out. I realized I could not get the men out very far from the plane, the fire was still going, the grass around the plane was on fire. I knew I had to put out the fire. I couldn't get Marvin out, blood was pouring from his nose, I didn't know if he was still alive or not, now I'm sure he was already gone, but I didn't know this at the time and the fire was worrying me. I threw dirt on the motor, then remembered a 10 gallon can of water down at the camp by the river, I ran and got it. I was able to finally get the fire out. I still could not get Marvin out, he was so limp. He was not removed from the plane until the ambulance came. All this happened about 12:30 p.m. I helped Bryce over to the shady side of the tail, I said I was going for help, he said he was hurting so bad to take him with me. I pulled the pickup close by and finally, I don't know how, managed to get him into the truck. I drove back up to the Mesa camp, hoping some of the Mexicans were back, but they were not. I drove to the Bishops, a brother and sister who have a two-way radio to get in touch with Skip Camp. I used their radio, got a lady in Skips Camp, She radioed to Palo Verde for help. I then got an old mattress from Bishops and left Bryce there with Miss Bishop, then I returned to the plane after getting help on the way. It is 10 miles or more to the landing strip from the Cibola Bridge. I went back to the camp and got some of covers and blankets and covered Fred up. Perry was moaning about hurting in his back. I wiped the blood off his face with a cloth and water. I still could not get Marvin out of the plane. It seemed like a long time before the ambulance came. There was another man, I don't know who he was, who came from Skip Camp, after hearing about it from the lady I got on the radio at Skip's Camp. This man and I still tried to get Marvin out, but were unable to.

The ambulance finally arrived and also the Beaver Brothers, neighbors in Cibola. They put Perry, Marvin and Fred in the ambulance. After loading them in the ambulance, one of the Beaver Brothers said, "Howard, I hate to ask, is one of these men your brother?" I remember answering, "Two of them are." They picked Bryce up at the Bishops and came into Blythe hospital. I then had to call Mesa! I called Walter Wallace to go tell Norma and the families.

I am sure in my mind that the Lord called these brothers for a purpose. Even they had premonitions of going shortly before the accident. Looking back, they lived their lives fast and in a hurry, seemed they had to get done what had to be done. I was the slower going one, guess they both got provoked with me. Guess they had to get their jobs done here to go on to the next jobs for the Lord needs them for. They left good, strong wives who would and could carry on with their families. I'm sure the Lord knew this. It was two days later that my legs went weak and wouldn't hold me up.

At this time I would like to mention my background in the church. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as was my mother and my father also. My father was not a member of the church at the time my parents were married. However, my mother was real faithful, had her children blessed. Before I was old enough to be baptized, my dad had also become interested in the Church and could see what it could do for he and his family. He requested baptism, this happened prior to my baptism so my father was made an elder and was able to baptize me into the church. My mother in particular, was faithful and active in the church, very strong in her testimony of the gospel. Was always diligent in serving the Lord. Had it not been for this, I question whether my father would have joined the church. She never gave up in anyway, always tried to do her duty. All of us had good training from my mother and father and good examples to follow. We were taken to Primary, and to all our church meetings as mother worked in all. Our folks were always there with us. Our activity was rather normal, however, as teenagers, we get distorted ideas and we don't always follow the examples and principles that are set before us.

Sometimes that leaves us with a lot of repenting to do later. I regret this part of my life, however I do feel real fortunate in marrying a good member of the church that has had a lot of influence on me becoming active again after my stint in the service.

After moving to Franklin, my first position after we were married was in the Sunday School at which time my brother Marvin was the Bishop of that ward. I was put in as the Superintendent of the Sunday School, worked there for some time. When they changed Bishops I was the counselor to Bishop Burrell, worked there until we left Franklin. After coming to Blythe, I was asked to serve as a counselor in the Branch Presidency. Served with President LaVell Hancock. Also served with Bishop Mortensen when the Branch was made into a Ward. When Bishop Mortensen was released, then served as a counselor to Bishop Neil John.

I might say here for the benefit of those concerned or might become concerned I'd like to emphasize the fact that church service is the one thing that you can get everlasting joy from and the only thing that I know of that will offer any real security. My testimony of the church is strong and I believe this to be the word of the Lord. I would like to encourage all my children to live it to their utmost, and really apply themselves to its principles.

Ethel and I had a civil marriage ceremony. We did not have time to make preparation in time to get married in the temple because of the service. Nearly a year later we went to the temple in February 1946. My dad and mother and Ethel's mother went with us. I am real happy that we have the promise of the Lord that we might have eternal life and that we might be sealed for time and eternity and that we have his part of the contract signed at least. We know that it is up to us now to live for these blessings. We are grateful for the fact that we might have our children through all eternity. I fail to mention in this other part of this history that while in Blythe a little girl came to our home, who we named Candace. She has been a great source of joy to us, especially me. I have really enjoyed this little girl. They are so different from boys. She is now eight years old seems to have a strong testimony of the gospel, has been baptized, in fact a lot of times, she helps us in the performance of our duties. We are very grateful for this. We love her. I might add also, in regard to my church work and responsibilities in it, my wife has been especially encouraging to me to do my duty. Has been real helpful in prodding me along with the things I should do.

Our children thus far are Clifford who is 19 years and plans to go on a mission in February, if the details can all be worked out. He is now at the Brigham Young University in his second year. Our second boy Harold, 17 years, who is a senior here at Blythe High School. Likewise he looks forward to going on a mission and attending college. Our third boy, Larry is now nearly 15, is a freshman in High School and plays football on the freshman team, doing very well this year in football and in his piano. Jeffrey is age 12, just had a birthday last Monday, the 15th of November and is in the 7th grade, doing well in his studies also in his music. Candace is 8 and is in the third grade, doing exceptionally well in school. I am extremely proud of my children.

I would at this time like to take a paragraph to draw this history to a close, while doing so I would like to give thanks to my wife for prodding me to get this done, I appreciate the effort she's put forth in this for me. I finally finished this on November 19, 1965. Of course, I'm still looking forward to another fifty years or so of life on this earth, I hope to accomplish many things yet in the future. I've had a good and enjoyable life, to me anyway. It's been fun, and I've observed many changes in world conditions. I was born during World War I and was in World War II, also the Korean conflict. I've seen since then the astronauts circling the earth and of course lived in the time of the A-Bomb and H-Bombs and at this time there is a conflict going on in Vietnam, which our country is engaged in. My hopes are that someday they will get these things settled and we will have peace again. However, I'm a witness to the prophecies and they are being fulfilled.

One of my greatest desires is that I will be able to continue in the faith and be active in the church and live to see and support my four boys on a mission. I have a desire that they will be happily married in the temple of God, also the same blessing for our little girl, Candace. I desire these things very much.

This history being written at mid point of my life you might say, I hope to some day add to this and make it more complete.