Today marks a wonderful day in history! It is the 80th birthday of my dad, Robert Rolland Tingey. Happy Birthday Dad!!
We recently celebrated his birthday by surprising him with a party at Bobbi's house. 35 of us were there waiting quietly in the basement. Mom told him some believable store that they needed to leave church 15 minutes early. Knowing him, that would have to have been quite a story! It is safe to say that I think he was surprised!!
Everyone had a great time. He retold some stories and shared his testimony. Mel had a slide show that sparked a lot of memories and laughs.
Mom also surprised everyone with a printed copy of his life history. After reading through it and being completely amazed, I had alot more questions and assumed that others would too!!! So here is my idea ... why not create a blog that people can contribue to, ask questions, fill in the blanks, post pictures, etc.
This is my first attempt at a blog so it may need some revizing! So let's get started celebrating this truely amazing man!!
Childhood
I grew up in Perry, Utah and our home was located across from Calls drive-in on Highway 89. My parents had a choice of sending me to school in Brigham City or to Perry. They decided to send me to Central School in Brigham City, which was located west of the Brigham City Tabernacle and now the Brigham City Temple is located there. We had to find our own way to school which meant I had to walk all of my grade school years and it was a three mile round trip. One winter the snow was so deep that the road was closed with snow drifts of five to six feet high.
The principal at Central School in Brigham City was
Mr. Gunderson. He had an unusual way of
disciplining students. He would usher
the first student who misbehaved into his office which was near the
classroom. He would tell the student
what he was going to do and asked the student to go along with him and make as
much noise as possible. Then he took out
a whip that he called The Cat of Nine Tails.
On the end of each whip strand was a small iron ball. Mr. Gunderson brought out a wood plank and
would beat on the plank with the whip making a very loud noise. The misbehaved student would cry out because
of fear. All the kids in the classroom
could hear what was going on thinking that the misbehaved student was being
killed. The rest of the students were
just scared to death. There was little
disciple problem after that example.
When World War II started the United States Government
bought a large parcel of ground between 700 South and 1100 South to build the
Bushnell Hospital. This hospital is
where all war victims were sent who lost their limbs during the war. Before the War started the land where the
hospital was built was an entire fruit orchard. Mr. Higgins, who lived in that orchard was
so nice to me, he even helped me walk home every night after school. The reason I needed help is that there was a
family with two teenage boys who were mean and would wait to catch me and beat
me up. I was a small boy during my grade
school years. School was fun and I
enjoyed it very much, but there was a bully in school who picked on me during
recess. His name was Bruce Keyes. One day I got so fed up with him that during
recess I stood up and punched him in the nose and blood went everywhere. From then on he never bothered me again. Marble tournaments were a great thing to do
during my grade school years. The
principal would sweep clean a large area of ground and mark off a large circle
then the school kids would shoot marbles on an elimination method. It usually took three weeks to complete the
tournament. I was very good at playing
marbles and I loved playing the game.
I had several good friends my age that lived in
Perry and their names are Boyd Hirschi, Lawrence Wright and Mim Davis. Since we all lived close to each other, it
was very common that we played at each another’s places.
I remember an experience that happened at Boyd
Hirschi’s house. We raked up a large
pile of dried leaves and played in them.
We left for a while and did something else and when we came back we saw
the large pile of leaves and decided to dive into the pile. When I dove in I came up crying because I had
rolled onto a pitch fork and it was sticking out of my back. It hurt so bad that I almost passed out. Boyd called for his dad who came running and
pulled the pitch fork out of my back. It
had punctured my lung and air was coming out of the hole when I tried to
breath. Boyd’s dad put a patch over the
whole and rushed me to the hospital. It
took several days for this to heal. The
doctor said I was lucky to be alive. The
pitch fork had three prongs: one was completely broken off, one penetrated my
lung, and the other prong went under my arm.
Had the broken prong been attached to the fork, it would have pierced my
spine.
One day after goofing off at Boyd’s place, I left to
come home in the late afternoon. On my
way home I got so tired that I layed down in the hay field just south of my
home and fell asleep. When I woke up it
was very dark so I went home, but when I got home no one was there. My parents were gone somewhere so I just went
to bed. Several hours later my parents came
home and they were in a panic because they could not find me. They had the police out looking for me. I could hear all this noise in the kitchen so
I came out of my bedroom to see what all the fuss was about. When my parents, the police and neighbors saw
that I was okay, they felt such a relief and wanted to know where I had
been. I retold my story to them and they
all laughed, but when they all left my parents did not laugh and I got in big
trouble.
One of my daily chores was to milk three cows in the
evening during the summer months. The
cows were in a pasture at the end of what was called Davis Lane. My job was to bring them up the lane from the
pasture so I could milk them. One of the
cows was very slow and I wanted her to move faster, so I took the cow’s tail
and made a kink in it hoping the cow would move along. All at once the cow’s tail broke and the tail
just flopped back and forth. I was very
scared. Several days later my Dad asked
me if I knew anything about the cow’s tail and I played innocent and said, “No.” It took months for the tail to heal and when
it was healed it had a large lump in it which did not look right. I felt badly that I did not confess to
breaking the cow’s tail.
The Utah Power and Light Company was up-grading
their electrical system through Perry by replacing the old glass insulators on
the telephone poles. The glass
insulators were obsolete. They were
putting these old insulators in piles under the poles. They were so pretty with their stained green
color and they were fun to play with. My
brother Nolland and I gathered up an armful of them and brought them home to
play with. With my arms full of
insulators, I let them fall from my arms and being glass falling upon each
other, a chip from one of the insulators hit Nolland’s eye and cut it
severely. When I saw blood coming from
his eye I was so scared that I went and hid.
Nolland was taken to the hospital and the doctor removed the piece of
glass from his eye. The doctor said he
would probably be blind, but with time his eyesight returned. The pupil in that eye is still enlarged but
he can see just fine.
I remember many times homeless bums traveled the
highway in front of our home, and they would
stop and ask for food. My Mother would
fix a meal and send them on their way.
She never worried about being robbed or molested. This was a very common occurrence when I was
a kid.
My dad and I were cultivating tomato plants next to
the highway. I was riding the work horse
to keep the cultivator between the planted rows of tomatoes. My dad was walking behind the cultivator to
keep it straight. A man stopped and came
over to my dad and asked a very interesting question. He wanted to know if this road went to Salt
Lake City, Utah and he also wanted to know if there was another route to get
around Salt Lake City. My Dad asked, “Why do you want to avoid Salt
Lake City?” He said he did not want to
be trapped by the Mormons. He proceeded
to tell all these crazy stories about how bad the Mormons were and he did not
want to encounter them. He was scared to
death of Mormons. My dad replied,“ You
are speaking to a Mormon right now!” I
remember this man almost had a heart attack.
My dad talked to him about how false his ideas were about the Mormons.My parents lived in Perry and we had a choice of going to the Perry Church or to Brigham City 6th Ward and they chose the Brigham City 6th Ward. The bishop of the ward was Richard Hansen and my dad was his counselor. Every Sunday Dad would go to early meetings and I remember as a deacon riding my bike from Perry to Brigham City to go to church. During my years as an Aaronic Priesthood holder, I held a lot of different positions.
When I was fourteen years old we moved into Brigham
City in the old Tingey Homestead located at 500 South 200 East. This is the home where my dad grew up. My dad was very poor. Lorenzo Smith was a neighbor and owned a
grocery store on Main Street. He gave my
dad a $1000.00 to buy the old Tingey home.
He told my dad he could pay the money back as he was able to do so. When my dad went to the bank to get the
$1000.00, the banker could not believe Lorenzo Smith would do such a kind
deed. My dad slowly paid the loan back
with no interest.
Two of my best friends in Brigham City were Lowell
Anderson and Lynn Richards. Lowell
Anderson lived one block west of my home.
One year the school was having a Sock and Hairdo Day dance. The year I was in the 8th grade, Lowell and I
decided to go to the dance. We spent one
afternoon experimenting with food coloring and I chose to color my hair yellow. It did not look very good so I changed to
blue coloring. If you mix yellow and
blue you will end up with a color of GREEN! We went to the dance and I won 1st
place. I had lots of fun but everyone
wondered how I would ever get the color out, and I was very nervous. When I got home that night I kept washing and
trying to remove that color, but it did not all come out. It took weeks before it all washed out.
Another friend I played with was Lynn Richards. One day we were playing at the mouth of
Brigham Canyon and there was an old flour mill where we decided to play. We found a small box of dynamite caps, and
being young kids we did not realize the danger of these caps. We took them home with us and showed them to
Lynn’s dad. When he saw these caps he
was startled and told us how dangerous they were. He explained all that we had to do was bump
them hard and it would set them off and could kill us all.
I was twelve years old when I had my first Scout
camp. The Scout master was Douglas Baird
who was a state highway patrol officer.
Our Scout group climbed the face of Willard Canyon. The Scout leaders had made arrangements to
take our packs up the back side in trucks so all we carried with us was some
food to eat along the way. Hiking the
canyon was fun, and the older Scouts would lead out while we younger Scouts would
follow. The canyon was steep and fun to
hike. The older Scouts would kill
rattle snakes and then coil them and leave them in our pathway. When we came along we thought the snakes were
alive and scared us to death. When we
arrived at Willard Peak Camp Ground, all our packs were there except mine. Somehow the leaders left my pack at
home. I don’t remember who it was but
two of us Scouts slept together in a tent at night. There was one car left at the camp sight. That night a Scout leader was going back home
and we sent word with this driver to see if they could locate my pack. The next day my dad brought my pack up to
Willard Peak. My pack was leaning behind
a tree where all the others had been sitting.
All the packing had been done in the dark and no one looked behind the
tree where my pack was.
The Bird Haven Scout District had a Scout trip each
year called the Kit Karson Hike. I went
on that hike for three years when I was 13, 14 and 15. The first trip was up the Beckler River just
outside of Yellowstone Park and from there we hiked into the park. It was a two week hike, it covered 60 miles
and we carried everything with us to last for two weeks. The most fun was the place called the hot
pots, halfway up the river. There were
three large pools of water. One was
perfect to swim in, one was too warm, and the last was way too hot. While camping there, we had bears come into
camp almost every night so we had to put all the food up into the trees. We were not afraid of the bears, it was just
part of the hike. The river ran close by the hot pots and the fishing was
really great. I was the only one who had a fishing pole, so I would go fishing
and I caught lots of fish. We all enjoyed eating them. Therald Quayle was one
of the guys who hiked with us and he wanted to fish but did not have a
pole. I suggested that we tie a line and
hook it on his finger and sure enough, he caught a fish. That was a true fish story. The next year we went for two weeks in the
Wind River area and the following year we went for two weeks in the Uintah’s.
When I was about twelve years old, my dad took me to the tabernacle for the Priesthood session in Salt Lake City, Utah. Heber J. Grant was the president of the Church. When he stood to speak and during his speech all of a sudden he was standing in fire. I told my dad what I was seeing and he did not see what I was seeing. I will never forget this experience. This was a testimony to me that Heber J. Grant was a prophet of God.
My father loved fly fishing so every Saturday we
would go fishing up Logan Canyon or Blacksmith Fork. I gained a love for fly fishing by watching
my father. When I got old enough to
drive the car, my brothers and I would do the driving and my dad would sit in
the front seat. My dad would prepare his
fishing gear while I was driving and then he was the first to be out fishing. He laughed at us for being a little slow.
When it was deer hunting season, my dad and mother
took all the boys hunting at Grouse Creek where we stayed at Aunt Mae’s
home. Our dad sent us hiking up the
canyon to arrive before daylight. My
brothers and I could hike faster than my dad so he encouraged us to go ahead
and then he would catch up with us. We
were on top of the ridge and saw four large bucks. We told our dad that we would go where they
were headed and tried to cut them off. Dad would sit on the ridge and watch. The deer circled around and came back down
the same ridge that we were going up and they came down the draw close by my
dad. He raised his gun and shot five
times but we heard no shots. Later when
we were together we asked him why he didn’t shoot and he said that the firing
pin in his gun was broke. Later he
started to laugh and explained there was nothing wrong with his gun and
expressed he had a bad case of “buck fever!”
Dad was a great teacher to us. He taught us to be honest, truthful, and to
never cheat anyone. In the fruit
farming business, he would give extra fruit to the customers rather than to
short change people. Dad’s favorite quote
was “One boy a whole boy, two boys a half a boy and three boys no boy at all.” He said when you work, always give a full day’s
work and don’t be lazy and complain about your job. Just do it, make it fun, and develop a
positive attitude. If you say you will
do a job, then do it. As a child we did
not have a lot, but I always had fun with what we had.
One day my father was backing a hay mower into the
barn. The horses were doing just fine until the mower got inside the barn and made
a clicking sound scaring the horses so
badly that they bolted and went right through the barn knocking half the
building down. I was outside the building
when all of this happened. My father
used some language that I had never heard before. It took quite a while to calm the horses
down. It was a very funny experience to
see the building come tumbling down.
When I was a teenager I always had a job working on
different farms. School was let out for
two week in the fall for beet thinning and harvesting. During the beet season I worked for Mr.
Reeder in Corrine. We would thin beets
with a short handled hoe bending over for hours at a time thinning the
beets. We would thin beets so they were
spaced every ten to twelve inches apart.
The beet rows were so long that it took only four long rows to equal an
acre. We also topped the beets in the fall using a beet knife that had a hook
on the end of it so that we could cut off the tops of the beets. We
would stack them in rows so that we could pick them up and toss them into a
dump truck. It was very common to throw
a beet over the truck in hopes that we could hit the other workers on the other
side. That was not very smart but it sure
was a lot of fun.
There was a man whose name was Alf Olsen who had a
cherry orchard in Perry. I was hired to
move ladders for the pickers and it was a great job because the pickers were
all girls. He would bus many loads of
workers from Logan to his orchards and most of the girls were all my age. I got to know a lot of them and it was
fun. I even thought I met my soul mate
with a girl from Wellsville. I dated her
a few times and her name was Ms. Leishman.
I participated in the athletic program at school and
did very well in running and pole-vaulting.
I took several places in these two events.
There were about seven or eight of us boys who decided
to slough school one day and go skiing. We had a great time at Snow Basin. When we went to school the next day the truant
officer called the group of boys into his office and expelled us for three
days. For some reason I did not get
called in with the rest of them and no one spoke up and said I was with
them. I lived in great fear for weeks,
but nothing ever happened.
I was a class officer of the FFA Club when I was in
high school. One of the requirements was
to have a project and my project was raising chickens. I raised 100 heavy breed chickens and it took
sixteen weeks for them to grow from babies to maturity. After raising the
chickens to maturity, we killed 75 of them.
It took our family all day long to kill and bag them. We
rented a cold storage unit to keep the chickens in for our winter food. We kept
the rest of the chickens to lay eggs for us. I was required by the FFA to take my chickens
to the fair where I would earn ribbons at both the county and state fair. I was responsible to display many different
exhibits. Sam Gordon was the advisor to
the FFA and he asked us if we could find more exhibits. Therald Quayle and I spoke up and said we
could do more for the exhibits, so that night we went to a neighbor’s melon patch
and picked two beautiful melons. We took
them to the fair in Salt Lake City. The
judges were very impressed with our melon exhibit and we received a first place
ribbon. One of the judges expressed a
desire to come to Perry and buy some watermelons, but since we stole them we
were scared to death. Thankfully, they
never came to Perry but I did learn a great lesson, it is not worth it to lie
or steal.
The Ski Lift
During my senior year in high school,
David Kotter, John Holmgren and I would often go skiing north of Mantua. The skiing was very hard because we had to
hike up the hill to make a run downhill. We would spend all day skiing fifteen
runs. One day the three of us were talking
to Olof Zundel who owned a clothing store in Brigham City. We told him of our sad skiing conditions and
said that it would be nice if we could have a ski lift. He told us that Brigham
City had an old ski lift that was used during the war time. He told us to call
Don Chase who was over the city parks and recreation for Brigham City. He told us to put our name on the city
council agenda for the upcoming week.
The three of us met with the city council and proposed that we would do
all the work if they would supply the materials which they had and also
maintain and operate the lift with our help.
We sat through the rest of the meeting waiting for a decision and near
the end of the meeting they rejected our request and said they did not want
anything to do with it. We left the
meeting feeling sad that everything was over.
The three of us went to Dave Kotter’s home. About 10:00 p.m. we got a
call from Don Chase and he said that the city had an offer for us and that we
should come to the next city council meeting.
We felt there was hope for us.
When we arrived at the city council meeting, Don Chase explained that
the city did not want anything to do with the ski lift, but they would sell the
lift to us and the cost was $1.00. We made the transaction and signed our
names. This was completed in the fall of
1950. During that fall we worked every
weekend getting ready to open our ski lift by winter.
When the first snow fell we rolled out
the rope which was 1600 feet long and tested it by pulling one of us up the
hill. When there was weight on it, the
rope pulled apart and was no good. We
contacted a company in Salt Lake City to see if they had enough rope to replace
the bad rope and they did. It cost us
$150.00 for the new rope. We did not
have the money so we went to First Security Bank to get a loan. Leo Hansen was the president of the bank so
we met with him, told him our situation, and he just laughed at us and said,
“NO!” We went back to Olof Zundel and
told him our story. He said there was a new bank being organized and the
president was Rudy Keizer. We made an
appointment with Mr. Keizer and told him of our situation. He also laughed at us and we said that you
were no different than Leo Hansen and he then said,” I will loan it to you.” He wanted to know how soon we could pay the
loan off. We said we could pay it within
one year, so we signed the agreement. He
wrote out a check and signed it for $150.00.
This happened on a Monday. We went
to Salt Lake City and got the rope. We
came home and rolled out the rope and everything worked out great. We opened the ski lift on a Friday evening
and all day Saturday and half day Sunday.
On Monday we had made enough money to pay off the $150.00 note at the
bank. We were in the ski business but we
could see that we had to have more than a verbal agreement on the land. The land was owned by Mr. Spike Jensen who
lived in Mantua. He was an alcoholic and
when we proposed a ten year lease of $100.00 per year he was so happy. We got an attorney to write up the lease and
we all signed it.
I loved skiing and went to most of the local ski
resorts: Beaver Mountain, Powder
Mountain and Snow Basin. I went skiing
at Snow Basin with my friends. We were
skiing down Wild Cat and at the bottom of the run there was a large pine
tree. David Kotter was going down one
side and I was on the other and racing down the hill. Another skier came by and I had no way of
missing her. I fell down knocking my front tooth out.
I graduated from Box Elder High School in 1951. That fall I went to Utah State with my friend
Therald Quayle. We lived in off campus
housing near the Logan Temple. During
this time the Korean War was on and I had to join the ROTC. I had enough money to finish fall and winter
quarters. When I quit school in the
spring I had to turn in my ROTC uniform.
Once I quit school I was immediately drafted into the military service. I reported to Fort Douglas in Salt Lake City,
Utah. I went by train to Fort Ord,
California the next morning. There was a
group of men from Utah that were drafted the same time I was and several of
them were from Brigham City. Some of the
men in that group were Boyd Hirschi, Lawrence Wright, Ellis Christensen and me. Carl Ashby was from Tremonton, Utah and
George Simpson was from Kamas. We all went through basic training together at
Camp Roberts, California. Boyd Hirschi
and I were in the same platoon. I was in
the third squad and Boyd was in the fourth.
We trained together for the sixteen weeks of basic training.
Army Life When we finished basic training I was assigned to a special secret school which was held at Alameda Station near the Oakland Bay area. This was a six week course. I had to check each piece of paper and pencil every day and everything had to be memorized.
After completion of the course I received a priority
for shipment to Korea equal to that of an officer. I was granted the right to fly rather than go
by ship. I was taken by bus with the
others from the class to Travis Air Force Base in California. We arrived at 6:00 p.m. and the flight was
not to leave until 6:00 a.m. the following morning. We were told to stay in the air terminal all
night where most of us fell asleep. I
woke up at 3:00 a.m. and knowing I had three more hours to go, I fell asleep
again. The next time I woke up, it was
6:00 a.m. so I ran to the run way to catch the plane as I saw it taking
off. I went to the flight officer and
asked him if my plane had left yet and the first thing he asked was, “What is your
name?” and I said, “It is “Tingey.” In
military language he told me off pretty badly. He did not believe me about sleeping through
the flight and said I had to meet the base commander, a one star general, at
8:00 a.m. When I reported to the General
he just sat at his desk and with his pencil tapped the desk without looking at
me. It seemed like a long time before he
said anything. He finally said, “Do you
know how hard it is to court-marshal you being an army person while under my
responsibility? “You will be on the next
flight out which will leave at 6:00 a.m.”
Every fifteen minutes I had to sign in until the flight left. I could not go very far from the flight
desk. The next flight out was filled
with officers and I was a first class private.
The flight schedule had already been made so the lowest ranking officer
was bumped off and I took his place. The
officer that was bumped was a captain. When he came to the flight desk and saw
his flight cancelled and that Private Tingey was in his place, he was very
argumentative. I flew from California to
Hawaii and from Hawaii on to Japan. We
made a stop at Wake Island in the Pacific.
I was sitting at the back of the plane and the flight attendant told me
that there was no dress code on Wake Island.
He suggested to all of us to remove our coat, tie and even shirt,
because of the humidity. I took his
advice and took off the coat, tie and shirt. When they opened the door the hot,
humid air just about suffocated us. Everyone
else began to remove their coat, suit and tie.
The military personnel took us by bus to the air terminal. All the military people on the Island were
dressed like pirates.
After leaving Wake Island we arrived in Japan in the
middle of the night. They gave me a bunk
and when I woke up that morning, all the men I started with back in the states
thought I would be court marshaled for the rest of my life. They were so surprised
to see me. We were in Japan three weeks before I was shipped to Korea. I went by a small boat that carried about 300
personnel. When we arrived in Korea they
took us by trucks inland to a side of a mountain where we were given our
different assignments. There were 2000
soldiers in Korea. I waited and waited
for my orders, finally my name was called and, to my surprise, I was assigned
to a medical unit (just like Mash on TV).
I was the only one assigned to the medical unit. A driver in a jeep picked me up and took me
to the medical unit. Upon arrival, I
reported to the colonel with my personnel files. He opened my files and in the top corner were
some initials indicating the special school that I went to and I was told that
I should never tell anyone. The
commanding officer wanted to know what those initials stood for. I told him that it was a secret and that I
could not tell him, so he dropped the subject immediately. He asked me if there was anything I would
like to do in the medical unit and I said, “Let me go to the ambulance
company.” I reported with my records to
the captain of the ambulance company. He
opened my files, saw the same initials, asked the same questions and I gave my
answer, “I cannot tell you.” He reacted
the same way as the Colonel did and stopped the interview. I was assigned to drive an ambulance.
Several weeks later I read on the bulletin board
about an LDS church service being held in Seoul, Korea about 50 miles from our
unit. I wanted to go to the services and
asked my commanding officer of the ambulance company if there was any way that
I could go. The officer said, “Yes” and
I was given a driver and a jeep and went to church. I went to church for the next three weeks and
on the fourth trip to Seoul, the jeep driver got brave enough to ask me what my
military rating was. I was dumb founded! It was not until then that I started putting
things together. The entire medical unit
thought I worked undercover in the IG Department because of that special school
I had attended. They thought I was there to see if everything was done
correctly. This is very common in the
military.
I was on my way to Korea when the 90 day truce was
signed. When that day came, everyone
figured the war would start again. That
night we were all dressed in military gear and were in our fox holes all night
long. The war did not start and what a
relief it was!!
I was in my
tent when the commanding officer of the ambulance company came in and said I
was to go home for an emergency leave.
My orders were to fly out as soon as possible. I flew to California where I was told my dad
had a heart attack and Dr. Bunderson had requested that I come home. My dad had serious health problems but it was
so nice that I got to come home. I was
home for one month and then I flew back to the same company unit. While I was gone, the commanding officer
raised my rank from private first class to corporal. This was very unusual. It was common to pull guard duty. One morning after being on guard duty, I went
back to my tent opened the door and it smelled very bad. The group got drunk during the night and
several of the guys had thrown up on the floor.
Seeing the mess and smelling the odor, I just shut the door and
left. I heard the sergeant who lived in
our tent yell out my name and told me to clean up the mess. I replied, “Clean it up yourself!” He later filed a report to the commanding
officer that I disobeyed an order and wanted me court marshaled. I was asked to explain what took place. When I told him what had happened, the
commanding officer sat up in his seat and yelled for the sergeant to report to
the commanding officer. The sergeant was
sitting in the waiting room. His name
was Brock. The sergeant came in and
chewed him out. The charges were dropped
from me and Sergeant Brock was put on probation. Sergeant Brock was after me all the time
giving me assignments in hopes that I would not carry them out. He did not like me.
I was given a new assignment in the ambulance
company. I was to be an assistant supply
sergeant. This was a great job and
before long they advanced me to sergeant of the ambulance company. I was to be over all supplies for the
company. Sergeant Brock, who did not
like me, now had to report to me to get supplies. I gave him grief in what he
asked for and in most cases I refused to give him his supplies.
We had a soldier in our medical unit who was very
unstable and he pulled guard duty. We
always checked the roster to see when and where he was assigned. We made sure of the password when he was on
guard to make sure we were never confronted by him because he was trigger
happy. He would ask for the password,
then start shooting if it was not given to him immediately. One night he was posted on the outer perimeter. On the other side of the perimeter was enemy
territory. We had a new supply officer
that had been assigned to us right out of West Point. This officer wanted all of those who were assigned
to guard duty to walk in military fashion.
The night that this unstable soldier was on guard duty he was assigned
to the outer perimeter. The officer
wanted to see if this soldier was walking in military fashion, so he went out
on the enemy side of the compound. This
area was nothing but a rice paddy. The
officer made a little noise which alerted the soldier to call out for the
password. All he did was yell, “Halt!” Then he started shooting. When you walk guard duty, you usually carry
two or three banana clips, each holding some fifty rounds per clip. This soldier shot all three of the banana
clips as fast as he could. The new
officer almost got killed that night.
With all the shooting, it woke up the entire company because they
thought the war was starting all over.
The next day when they investigated what had happened, the officer was
totally out of line and was reprimanded.
Within a day or two he was transferred to another location.
After this supply officer was transferred, we were
assigned a new supply officer and he decided that all supply sergeants would
sign a statement that we were in compliance with T.O.E. (total operating
equipment). I, being the supply sergeant
of the ambulance company stated that I was in compliance. Within a day or two after signing it, the
officer had set a date for a total equipment inspection. I knew that we had excess equipment and was
very fearful of the inspection. I took
my assistants and rounded up a 2 ½ ton truck and loaded all excess equipment
namely: walkie-talkies, guns, sleeping bags and many other items. Then we drove up the mountains on back roads
and tossed them in the river and bushes. What a huge waste.
We had a unit from Turkey that was assigned next to
our medical unit and we often visited with them in the evening. One evening they came over and showed us an ear
that they had cut off of one North Korean soldier. The North Koreans feared the Turks the most
because they would not shoot, they would kill them with a knife and cut off
their ears for a collection. The United
States supplied the Turkish unit with their military equipment. One day we were down at the river washing our
clothes when a group of Turks came down the road driving two tanks. When they
came to the river they drove in and went completely under water. Shortly after the tank was submerged, the
crew of the tank swam up to the surface and were laughing and joking. It was funny to watch them. They left their tank in the river for over a
week before they were able to pull it out.
The secret school that I went to in Alameda,
California was training for soldiers that might be captured. We were taught how to send a message back to
the government and this is how it worked.
I had a fictitious girl friend named Sally. Her P.O. Box address was in Layton, Utah. I had to write to her once a month and I had
to plan ahead so that every fifth word would start the spelling of my
message. The message was very short,
only five to six words. During my
military tour, I had to write a letter each month to this girl. Someone would write back using the same
method that I had to use. I did this
until I was discharged and I was told that I was to keep this a secret. I was to be assigned to an infantry unit where
it would be easier for me to be captured.
When I got assigned to a medical unit it was a big surprise. I have kept this story quiet most of my
life. I don’t think the military will be
coming after me now!
The medical unit that I was assigned to was part of
the 25th Division and the home base was Hawaii. We had received orders that the 25th
Division would be transferred back to Hawaii.
Our orders were to pack up everything and they would be shipped to
Hawaii. I was the supply sergeant that
was in charge of the ambulance company to get everything packed ready for
shipment. The company had a very secure safe
that kept all of our valuable records.
The ambulance commander wanted to fill the safe with all of our
valuables. I felt just the opposite. I told the company commander to put our
valuable records in a box and just mark it supplies and to fill the safe with
junk. He took my advice and packed
everything up for Hawaii. When we left
Korea we sailed on a troop ship that had 5000 troops on board. The first day was great and then the waters started
getting rough. On the fourth day they
closed the hatches and everyone had to stay below deck. No food could be prepared and only crackers
were served. We started throwing up and
the smell was awful. I got so sick that
they put me in sick bay. Sick bay was
above deck and I was strapped in bed and above my head was a port hole. When the ship rocked from side to side I
could look out the port hole and see the water go over the top of the ship and then
rock to the other side. The storm was
called a typhoon. I have never been so
sick. While I was in sick bay they had
to feed me with IV’s and strap me in the bunk so that I would not fall
out. It was one of the worst storms that
I had ever been in.
Upon arrival in Hawaii I was stationed at Schofield
Barracks on the east side of Oahu. This
was the home base of the 25th Army Division. The first weekend leave, many of us drove to
Waikiki Beach in Hawaii and went swimming in the ocean. Some of the guys stayed outside for hours
without a shirt, but I had been told to wear a shirt. The next day many of the soldiers were in
sick bay with second degree burns. I was
glad that I had worn a shirt and did not suffer. Many of the soldiers were given disciplinary
orders for getting burned. When Sunday
came, several of us LDS guys went to the various churches looking for a ward
that had many young girls. The wards would plan many Luaus for us. Each week there was a social activity. There was a man named Abo who owned a dry
cleaning business just off the base. He
had several vans that he used for his business, and he was a member of the LDS
church. We became very good
friends. Most weekends he would come on
the base and pick up several LDS guys. He let us take his van for the weekend
which allowed us to travel the Island and have lots of fun. I became good friends with Wendell Zaugg,
from Clearfield, Utah, who was a member of the Church. He was assigned in the MP unit of the 25th
Division, so he drove an MP vehicle.
When he came to visit me he would park the vehicle in front of my unit
which was similar to parking a police vehicle in front of my place. All the guys in my unit were afraid of the
MPs which Wendell represented. No one
dared to do anything because they were afraid of his vehicle. While I was there, the Hawaiian Polynesian
Center was being built near the Hawaiian Temple.
There was a pass that we drove over to get to the
east side of the Island that was called Pallie. When we came to the top of the
pass, the wind became very strong. Many
stories have been told of this wind. One
story was that you could throw a rock over the cliff and be prepared for the
wind to blow it back. Another story was
that a man threw his small child over the cliff and the wind brought the child
back with no harm. When we had a free
weekend, we took our air mattresses and went about 25 miles from shore and
would just lie on them and float parallel to the shore. The ocean current would travel several miles
before it changed direction and went straight out to sea. It would move fast enough that one would have
to run to keep up with the person on the mattress. There was a marker on the coast that told us
when to come ashore. If you didn’t, the current would take you out to sea which
was very dangerous. There was one soldier
floating on his mattress and fell asleep and did not come ashore in time. He was caught in the current going out to sea
and when he woke up, he was miles from shore.
The coast guard picked him up about ten miles from shore and as a result
all personnel were forbidden to float on the coast again, taking away our fun.
President David O. McKay came for an LDS Conference
held in Hawaii. When he finished
speaking he invited everyone to personally shake his hand. We lined up and
waited for that occasion which was so special to me. That evening my assistant in the supply
company listened to President McKay. It
made quite an impression on him and he asked me many questions about the Church.
On New Year’s Eve the people of Hawaii set off many
fireworks along the coast. We were
invited by a member of the Church to sit on his roof to watch the
fireworks. We had to have a special
permit to get to the member’s home. The
fireworks were very exciting to watch.
On our way back home to the barracks, we made a mistake and started to
drive through town. We all had tons of
fireworks and would throw them at cars which caused a thick cloud of smoke
throughout the city. One person threw a
bandalo of firecrackers on the hood of our car. When the firecrackers started
going off, it blew spots of paint off the car.
Other guys threw M80’s under the car and it felt like the car was going
to blow up. We were glad to get through
town without any injury.
When it was my time to leave the military service,
we would line up for our orders. We
would line up alphabetically and Albert Santine was just ahead of me. He was one of the guys who went through secret
training service with me. During the
time we spent together he tried to get me to smoke and drink beer and I always
turned him down. When he saw me again he
asked if I had started drinking and smoking and I said, “What do you
think?” He said,” Good for you, how I
wish I did not have this habit.”
When I got on the ship to return home I was so
scared about getting sea sick and yes, I did get sick all three days going to
California. I met a friend on the ship
who was from Brigham City and his name was Raymond Birch. He was my classmate in high school and I was
surprised to see him on the ship. He was LDS and told me that when he got his
patriarchal blessing it said he was from the tribe of Dan. We became good friends and he helped me carry
my duffle bag off the ship because I was so sick. As soon as I stepped on solid ground, the
sickness left me.
My Mission
Soon after I returned from the military, I was called to go on a mission to the Northern States mission. Chicago was the headquarters. The mission covered all of Illinois, Iowa and part of Wisconsin. The mission president’s name was Isaac Smoot from Centerville, Utah. He was a rough, tough looking individual and his theme throughout the mission was about the second coming. When he spoke it was always about hell, fire and damnation. My first assignment was to go to the Tri Cities namely: Rock Island, Moline, and Davenport all on the Mississippi. There were twelve elders assigned to this area. We lived in a large apartment and some of the elders that I remember were Elder Bennett, Elder Oaklebery and Elder Muer. Elder Muer was the senior elder. During my first day of tracting with him, it was my turn to knock on the door and introduce us as ministers of the LDS Church. When the door opened a man standing there had his shirt on backwards which indicated that he was a minister. I was overcome with fear, so Elder Muer took over and did the speaking. I will never forget that experience. I remember going to a rich area in Moline, Iowa where there was a house on a large estate. We went to the door, rang the doorbell and a maid came to the door. We introduced ourselves, were invited in and stood on a rug in the entrance. She went inside to get the lady of the house and when the lady came, we were introduced as ministers. The lady of the house was very frustrated because she was an Orthodox Jew. She scolded the maid and demanded that we leave. She told the maid to burn the rug and to clean the entrance where we stood because it was contaminated. My companion and I were tracting one day when we were invited into the home of Mrs. Carpenter. I was giving the lesson on the Godhead. Mrs. Carpenter said, “I believe everything you say about the Godhead, that God, Jesus and the Holy Ghost are separate beings.” She really enjoyed visiting with us about that subject. I told her that her minister does not believe this doctrine and she was very upset that her minister does not believe it. I did something I had never done before. I challenged her to call her minister about this doctrine. She immediately picked up the phone and asked her minister about the Church’s doctrine about the Godhead. She was very quiet for quite some time as she listened to her minister talk to her. After hanging up the phone, she said she did not realize her Church did not believe that doctrine. She did say her minister was a good man, so I guess the doctrine does not matter.
I was transferred from Fort Dodge, Iowa to Cedar
Rapids, Iowa. We met a lady named Doris
Vellia who was eager to learn about the gospel.
This is her story. She lived next
to a lady who was a member of the Church but was inactive and her name was Mrs.
Winston. She was a granddaughter of John A. Widtsoe, one of the general
authorities of the Church. She had moved
to Iowa to get away from the Church and moved next door to Mrs. Vellia. One day the two of them were visiting and Mrs.
Vellia asked Mrs. Winston which church she belonged to and she replied with the
story about Joseph Smith. It impressed
Mrs. Vellia so much that every day they would meet in the back yard and talk
about the Church and its belief. Mrs. Winston
and Mrs. Vellia taught each other about the Church for several months. Mrs. Vellia was ready to be baptized so we
gave her the first lesson. She was
considered a golden contact. The mission
rule was that we were to teach both husband and wife, so she asked her husband
to meet with us and he said, “No.” He
was a devout Catholic and did not want anything to do with the LDS Church. He was a very abusive man and would beat
her. A short time later they
separated. I had the opportunity to
baptize her into the Church but her children were not old enough to be
baptized. Mrs. Winston became active. Her
husband was later baptized into the Church.
He was called to work in the branch presidency. The branch president’s name was Brother
Haggland and his wife was a Call from Brigham City, Utah. They had a large family of nine
children. When I came home from my
mission a few months later, Mrs. Veillia came to visit me with her family. They had all of their belongings with them
and moved to Idaho Falls, Idaho to live.
Shortly after that, she married a man by the name of Mr. Rock and they
were very active in the Church. Her two
boys went on missions. I visited her a
few times in Idaho Falls, Idaho.
In Moline, Iowa we went to a home that was beautifully
decorated in old English style. The
owner was a genealogist and had volumes of records of her family. She loved the book “Mans Origin” written by
Joseph Fielding Smith. All she could
talk about were her ancestors and her genealogy. Her last name was McCallister. We realized that we had a pamphlet on
genealogy and it was written by a McCallister from Salt Lake City, Utah. We
tried to connect the two names but she showed no interest in the Church.
College
After completing my mission, I went to Utah State to
finish my college degree in Industrial Education. I graduated in 1960 and started teaching that
fall at Box Elder Junior High School. I
had the summers off and I needed some kind of work to do. Wendell Zaugg, a close friend of mine was a
contractor in South Ogden, Utah. He
found me a job building homes. The main contractor was building 150 homes per
year. That was how I learned the trade
of home building. I worked for this
contractor for two summers. During this
time period, these constructions jobs were union jobs. The main boss would try each day to move us
around so the union bosses couldn’t find us. The boss hired three school teachers and we
all worked together. One day in our
second year of working there, the union boss found us. He told us we had to join the union of we
wanted to keep working. The cost was
several hundred dollars, which was about what we made in a summer. My friends said they had $20.00 in their
pockets so they would pay that up front, then they would start paying their
dues. We filled out the papers, but I
didn’t have any cash with me so I just signed the contract. The funny thing is we never heard from the
union boss again and we never noticed money being taken from our pay
check. I am sure the $40.00 cash went
into the union boss’s pocket. Wendell
Zaugg helped me build my first home in Brigham City located at 219 East 500
South. The home cost $15,000 dollars.
LouRitaWhile I was doing my student teaching at the junior high school, the shop teachers, Owen Westenskow and Norwood Hyer, wanted me to meet the art and home economics teacher, LouRita Geertsen. She was teaching a class in the old shop building upstairs. These guys took me to her class, knocked on the door and introduced me to her. They insisted we had to date at least once. We started dating and got married on August 14, 1959. I was interviewed for a job in California and was considering that contract. LouRita told the principal, Mr. Wayne Call, that we might be moving to California. Mr. Call did not want to lose her, and in the conversation with him, he considered hiring me for a position. He wanted me to develop a new program and wanted to know if I was interested. I had an interview with the state superintendent, Mr. Talbot. I was offered a contract and I signed it with great excitement. When I went back to college I told my friends that I had a job. They were surprised that I got a job so soon. The new program that I was to start was a craft program. I also taught general shop along with two ceramic classes. I taught general woodworking, electricity, electronics, and metal working. I worked hard to learn the ceramic program by myself. I had to leather work, lapidary, ceramics, silver casting and silver smithing. The craft program ended up being the main subject that I taught. There were some years I had to teach public health, science and math. During my teaching I taught one math class a year, which I really enjoyed. I taught adult education classes three nights a week for twenty-four years. The ladies in the community loved the ceramic classes that I taught at night.
After LouRita and I got married, we went to
Yellowstone National Park and stayed at Canyon Village next to the Yellowstone
Falls for our honeymoon. That night
there was a terrible earthquake on Hebgen River which was a short distance from
where we were staying. We had never been
in an earthquake before and we did not know what was happening. At first we thought a bear was trying to get
in the cabin. I got up and looked out
the window and the pine trees were whipping back and forth. We did not know what to do so we just stayed
in the cabin until morning. Other people
in the camp area were packing up and leaving.
The next morning we visited with the camp host and he told us what
happened. Part of the mountain on the
river had broken away and slid down making a new dam, which is still there
today. We did not think much about the
seriousness of the earthquake so we went on touring the park for a couple of
days. It was not until we got home that
we realized we should have called our parents back home. We were only thinking of ourselves.
When LouRita was expecting our first child we were
so excited. We had a baby girl on
January 24, 1961, and we named her Alisa.
She was born with club feet so we took her to the doctor at Primary
Children’s Hospital. The doctor took the
baby and with his hands bent her feet straight.
Alisa cried a lot during this process.
After her feet were straightened, they were put in a cast and we brought
her home that same day. She wore a cast
for several months to correct her feet.
We had two more sons. Daniel was
born on April 20, 1962 and Douglas was born August 15, 1964.
Several years later, LouRita was diagnosed with
hepatitis, which was a disease of the liver.
We were sent to a specialist, Dr. Keys, in Ogden, Utah. After several months the doctor did a by-
pass of the liver. It was a successful
surgery and she seemed to recover well.
A short time later the hepatitis returned and LouRita did not
recover. She died June 24, 1967.
There was a group of school teachers who started
teaching about this same time and their names are: Elvin Mitchell, Ralph
Nielsen, Verl Allred, Val Bennett, Robert Osborn, Jay Valentine, Ted Houggard
and myself. We decided to become better
acquainted, so we and our wives got together once a month. We would meet at each other’s homes and have
an activity. I became good friends with
Robert Osborn and we went duck hunting and fishing several times. At this time in my life I started fruit
farming and I owned an old 8N Ford tractor.
I asked Robert if he could do some mechanic work on the tractor and he
made it purr like a kitten. About the
same time that LouRita had her illness, Robert Osborn got shot while deer
hunting on October 30, 1965. When
LouRita died, I thought the world had come to an end. I was so sad and lonesome.
Evelyn
In the fall of 1967, I went deer hunting at Grouse
Creek. My Aunt Mae Kimber was there and she was in charge of the single adults
in Brigham City, Utah. While in Grouse
Creek she told me that I must start dating again and she told me to go to the
next dance when I returned from deer hunting.
The dance was held in Tremonton, Utah and she picked me up and took
me. I did not want to go because I was
scared, but she took me anyway. I did
not like the dance because I felt like a piece of meat and all the ladies were
attacking me. When Aunt Mae took me home
that night I told her I would not go to anymore dances. She did not give up and said the next dance
would be held in Logan, Utah and I finally agreed to go one more time. Aunt Mae called and said she could not go but
told me that I had to go. I was already
dressed to go, so I decided to go all alone but I was so scared. When I arrived at the dance hall, the first
lady I met was Evelyn Osborn, and since I knew of her we danced quite a
bit. I asked if I could take her home
and she said yes. She lived in
Smithfield, Utah. We visited until about
2:00 a.m. and I asked her if I could take her out again, so we set another
date. After leaving her I was on cloud
nine. We visited a lot on the phone and
met as much as we could. It was a very
short courtship. She had three children
and I had three children.
We decided to get married on Dec 15, 1967. We had a short honeymoon to Salt Lake City,
Utah then we came home and the reality set it.
Evelyn’s personality was the only one that could take on such a huge
endeavor. I soon learned that I could
love another person as much as the first love.
She had a good positive attitude about life and was very organized in everything
she did. She was an excellent cook and
kept up with the washing and cleaning with hardly any effort. She was always a step ahead of everything so
home life went very smoothly. One day we
took all six children to J.C. Penney and we sat all six children in a row and
the clerk was startled that they were all our children. The clerk said that you guys must have been
busy to have that many children under six.
They all got a new pair of shoes that day. Each night before we put the kids to bed,
Evelyn would put all of their shoes in a row from youngest to oldest in front
of the fireplace. The next morning the
kids knew where their shoes were. The
kids loved Evelyn’s cooking and they always ate what she prepared. There was no piecing between meals or before
bedtime.
Evelyn and I moved into my home in Brigham City,
Utah. After four years we decided to
move because the home was too small and living next door to my parents was not
a smart idea. While living in the 11th
Ward, I was called to be the 2nd counselor and Tommy Rasmussen as 1st
counselor with Bruce Christensen as the Bishop.
Evelyn would take all six children to church alone, and soon there would
be seven. Melvin James Tingey was born,
February 10, 1970. We sold our home in
Brigham City, Utah and built a large home in Perry on five acres and the space
was great for the kids. We did a lot of
the building to save money, but Preston Keller was our contractor. It was heaven to finally be in a larger home
and away from my parents. We attended
church in the old Perry Church House. We
were a novelty to that ward because no one had moved into Perry for years and
with seven children, they loved us. We
went to church and took up a whole bench.
A short time later, Evelyn was asked to be a counselor in Primary and I
was asked to be a counselor in the Bishopric.
Bobbi Jo was born, July 4, 1974 while we lived in
Perry. That gave our family the official title of “Yours Mine and Ours.” A short time later, Tom Dinsdale was called
to be in the stake presidency and we got a new bishopric and I was first
counselor. During this time they built a
new church house in Perry and it was beautiful.
I have served in the following positions: counselor in bishoprics for
seven years, stake Sunday school presidency, high priest counselor, member of
the seventies quorum presidency, gospel doctrine teacher, gospel essentials
teacher, ward mission leader, Sunday school teacher, primary teacher and high councilmen. I was a Temple ordinance worker in the Ogden
Temple from 2009 to 2011. Evelyn and I
are currently temple ordinance workers in the Brigham City, Utah Temple.
After working in Ogden building homes, I didn’t want
to continue fighting the union for work. I started looking for other jobs to do in the
summer time. Ralph Nielsen taught school
in the shop next to me and we would talk a lot about jobs. Ralph kept telling me about farming and that
it would be a good summer job. He talked
me into farming. My dad was still living
and said he would teach me about farming. I rented a six acre parcel of ground for
$200.00. The ground belonged to Nathan
Wheeler. I bought a used 8N ford tractor
for $500.00 and also a cultivator. That
summer we planted tomatoes, cantaloupe, and watermelon. After the harvest that year, we paid the rent
and part of the equipment payment. Dad
and I were able to pay ourselves several hundred dollars. From then on, farming was in my blood. During this time, my brother, Nolland was
finishing college at Utah State and would help us out during the harvest. Nathan Wheeler had twelve additional acres he
wanted us to lease. I had no idea how
to raise fruit trees, but my dad said he could help me.
The orchard we rented had peaches, apricots, pears,
pie cherries, sweet cherries and raspberries.
We had two acres with open ground. We raised a large variety of
fruit. It was a challenge to find a
market for all the produce. The largest
buyer was, Glen Smedley who owned the OP Skaggs grocery store in Preston,
Idaho. He would drive down and buy a
truckload of 80 half bushel of peaches at a time. That was a great sale in those days. When the raspberry crop came on, I would pick
90 to 100 cases a day. I hired ladies
from Brigham City to come help pick.
Some took their pay with produce. My children were young but they also
helped with the picking. I had no
problem selling raspberries. Back in
those days we filled the raspberry cups to the brim, so the customer really got
a large cupful. I hired young boys from
the community to help harvest the cherry crop.
Boy, what a job it was to get them picked!
One day we read in the local paper about an orchard
and open ground that was for rent. The
owner of the proper was Mr. Peters and later Dale Dorius. My father had rented this property when he
was younger. We drew up a contract with
the Peters’ family to farm the 25 acre parcel of property. Most of the ground was open ground without
trees. On the property there were 200
peach trees and 300 pie cherry trees. In
the open ground we planted, peach trees, sweet cherry trees and pie cherry
trees. When we planted the sweet cherry trees,
I had Lyman Ward, Evelyn’s brother come and help me. We planted 300 sweet cherry trees. It became a very productive orchard. One year we picked 50 ton of sweet
cherries. During this time we had a
large amount of pie cherries and Nolland and I decided to buy a pie cherry
shaker. We built much of the equipment
and went into the pie cherry business in a big way.
We also rented another piece of ground on the west
side of the highway and it was the Billings property. There were about five acres of pie cherries
on the property. There was some open
ground so we planted it into field corn.
Boyd Nielson contracted with us to harvest the corn because he had a
dairy farm and needed corn silage for his cows.
The pie cherries became our main crop so with the
pie cherry shaker we could pick a lot of cherries. It became a tradition to harvest all of the
pie cherries. We hired Nolland’s
children, LaDean’s children and all of my children to help with the pie cherry
harvest. Each of the children would make
several hundred dollars during the harvest.
I also hired other boys in the area to help with the pie cherries. These were some of the most fun times my kids
talk about.
Nolland drove the loads of pie cherries to the
cannery during the afternoon break. When
Nolland returned, he had the tanks full of cold water and dumped cans of pop in
the water tanks to surprise the workers.
Many days Evelyn would bring treats to the workers like ice cream, popsicles,
and homemade maple bars. Oh, the kids
loved the treats!
One evening after the harvest, Mel took the tractor
and hooked up the trailer. He found some
old couches and lifted them upon the trailer.
All the workers piled upon the couches, and Mel drove them across the
street to the outside drive-in movie theater.
They had a great time that night.
About eight years later we purchased 12 acres of
land from Preston Keller, which was located two miles south of our farm
shed. There were pie cherries, apricots
and a few peach trees on it. During this
time, we rented property which was located west of Maddox Restaurant. It belonged to Jay J. Christensen. We planted fruit trees on it. We still rent this orchard and it very
productive. We rented another 12 acres
of ground from Dr. Jerry Capener. It was
full of sage brush which we were able to clean up. This orchard is our most productive orchard
today.
I taught school at Box Elder Junior High in Brigham
City, Utah for thirty-two years. I found
it took a great deal of time to organize the inventory so that I would have all
the supplies needed for whatever subject I was teaching. During the years that I taught school, I had
the opportunity to teach all of my children except Daniel. They were all excellent students and did a
great job. A most interesting experience
was when I had Melvin in my class. One
day Mel slipped up and called me Dad and the other students said, “Is that your
dad?” All of the students addressed me
as Mr. Tingey. When I retired from
teaching school in 1992, I was soon hired at Autoliv. This company makes the air bags for
cars. I worked in the chemistry lab
testing the inflators. We would collect
gases, liquid, and metals and would analyze them to see if they were within
specifications. I enjoyed this type of
work and it was much less stressful than teaching school. I worked five years for this company and
retired at the age of 65. I remembered
having taught many of these workers in junior high school.
One of our favorite summer activities was to go
camping for one week. Many years we went
camping to the Uintah Mountains. The
kids slept in a large tent and Evelyn and I stayed in the back of the
pickup. After a few years we started
camping at Tony’s Grove near Logan Canyon and we decided that this was our
favorite spot with many places to hike and play in the water. We hiked to Mt. Naomi overlooking Cache Valley
and we came to a large basin. The boys
worked hard to find a large rock to roll down the mountain and they wanted
their rock to be the winner. Back at
camp, the boys spent hours making a raft to float on the lake and the girls
would spend a lot of time catching frogs and chipmunks. We would give the kids a morning bath in a
small tub and after they were cleaned for the day, Evelyn washed all their
clothes and hung them on a line to dry.
She had lots of work to do to keep the family going.
Many years later when we became grandparents, we
took some of the older cousins camping up Ogden Canyon and they had a blast floating
the river all day long. We would take
ten to twelve grandkids at a time. It
was a great experience for them. Evelyn
and I stayed in our camper trailer while the kids stayed in tents. We put the girls in one tent and the boys in
another tent. The food was good and the
kids looked forward to her food and they would eat everything that was put
before them. We packed a lunch and we
would take them on a long hike then had our picnic. We looked for treasures and we found
seashells and rocks along the way. It
was fun watching the older kids helping the younger ones on this hike. At night we would have a campfire and I would
tell bear stories. I would make them up
as I told them. The kid’s most favorite
story was about the cinnamon bears and each time that I told it I would change
the story a bit. I would tell them about
the hunting story and the bear and the deer got killed at the same time. A few years later we went to South Fork of
the Ogden River and floated the river on inner tubes. They kids really liked this and they would
spend hours doing it.
As I write my life history, I look back on my eighty
years and realize that through the trials and hardships that I have endured, I
have had a wonderful life. After I
retired, we spent at least one month or more in the winter with many of our
friends, going to Yuma, Arizona. It felt
so good to get warm when we were in Arizona.
We loved seeing all the beautiful green fields of lettuce, broccoli,
cauliflower and spinach. These were some
very fun memories. I have many great
friends whom we love to play cards and games with. I have eight wonderful
children who live their lives the best a father could ask for. I am very proud
of each of my children. I love to work in the temple with my wife of 45
years. Evelyn and I have endured many
things in our lives but through it all I have always stayed active in the
church and I am grateful for my testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I know it is the one sure thing in this life
and it is so important that my posterity know that I have a testimony of the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. The church is
true, Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and Jesus Christ is our Savior. 