Lorenzo Freeman Bingham as told by his daughter Blanche

Blanche Bingham is my dads mother, my grandmother. I share this story with you and it points out a couple of important things. 1- Even a short story left for posterity has value. 2- This article is now linked to Family Search Family Tree for anyone to find. Until now it has been in a file my mother left to me, not to be seen unless you had the file.Other information is in the same hidden state. Blanche is the daughter of Lorenzo, she is my grandmother. He has 2 grandchildren still living. I copy it exactly and have not corrected any grammatical errors.






















My father was a very kind man. He always could find time to help a neighbor. After working from 10 to 14 hours a day. There was no union at the time and there was street cars and horses and carriages. So most of the time they could ride as far as the street car went and then walk. My father was a lovely tenor singer. When we children were little he would sind, or read to us and and one or the other ofus would keep him busy getting drinks of water. It didn't matter how tired the poor dear was he would wait on us and I know he wasn't so thirsty as we enjoyed him to wait on us. He always fixed our shoes by half soling them. When  we had company mother was getting dinner he would tell that what a good dumpling she could make. He liked to tease my mother. She would tell him after company was gone that she would like to see and taste his dumplings. He would just laugh, put the smallest child on his knee and sing funny songs to them. He loved the church but never went very often but always upheld the principles of the church. I think on account of his smoking his pipe that kept him from going to church; and maybe his work. Most of the time he worked as a laborer. He cut annd put up ince for the summer. That was the only way at that time to have ice in thie summer. My father said that that when he was a young man that there wasn't money for everything so they would all take soemthing they had grown such as squash or a pples or potatoes or onions to pay ones that furnished music to dance by. The dances were always church dances and they would dance all night or until 4 o'clock in the morning every one turned out --old and young-- they would bring their babies, put them to bed in the windows or in corners on chairs. single ones came on horses with a sack of whatever he had and the families came in wagon and buggies wrapped up in quilts and hot rocks and straw. My father said next morning Grandpa would call them to get up to do the chores and he owuld say he was so sleepy and grandpay would say, "those that danced had to pay the fiddler", for his to get up. Father was a man of love for every one and he had charity. It's a shame that he hadn't worked on genealogy for as soon as he talked to anyone he'd ask them who their parents were. He would laugh and tell them he knew them very well and then he would have a long talk about some of the fun things they had done. He always enjoyed living over his childhood days.

Some Great Bingham Posts, Recently Up On Bingham Family Research Blog

I recently had a fun day posting documentation and stories about my Bingham ancestors on the Bingham Family Research Blog. I then linked them to FamilyTree. Here are the links and titles of those postings:

Kent Smith: Husband to Blanche Bingham Funeral Program

Emma Adams White Guthrie 96 Bithday Announcement - Newpaper with photo

Lorenzo Freeman Bingham Birthday Announcement Newspaper with photo

Emma Adams White Guthrie Life History

Life Story Blanche Rebecca Bingham

Sarah Rebecca Guthrie Bingham Story

Erastus Bingham = My Great Great Great Grandfather

From Blanche Rebecca Bingham 2 handwritten stories

Click this, the link to the Bingham family research site.

Sometimes Our Parents & Grandparents Hid The Truth, Even My Grandmother Blanch Bingham?

Our Grandmother Blanche Bingham had a rough life at times. I wrote previously from her writings as an old lady, how she said she was lonely. Click Here We have other writings where she said how happy she was. We are told things we are having a hard time verifying. Her first husband, Grundy, seemed to be a bigomist, so the story goes. I was told as a young person this marriage was anulled. We see in her writings the word divorce. Then she married Cragun and it seems those were hard times. Simeon Cragun, my grandfather died. At that time my father, Royal Cragun was the oldest at home. He was a responsible type person and went to work, foregoing any higher education, to support Grandmother and his younger siblings.

Yesterday, my sister Nancy called. Being the bloodhound detective she is, and prompted by the recent Who Do You Think You Are show, decided to check out the bigamy story.  She called and asked me to go to Ogden, where many of these events likely took place. It seems the dates of marriages, births, etc. aren't matching up.

Seeing the document beats hand me down stories.

Ahah, I have one of Grandmothers marriage certificate in things I got from Mother. It saves a lot of effort to have the documents easily at your fingertips. So now I refer you back to the article: Be Ye Therefore Organized, click here for that. It's really a great feeling.

Here is one of the documents you wanted me to research, Nancy: front and back. Click the link below the certificate to go to SlideShare.net where you can, and I did upload the document. A larger photo is at that site.

Kent Smith Blanche Bingham Marriage cert

View more presentations from Larry K Cragun is on a family history mission

Kent Smith Marriage Cert

View more presentations from Larry K Cragun is on a family history mission

The Interesting Impact of A Journal Entry

Grandma Blanche Bingham on the left

It has been a blessing to me that my mother spent a lot of time collecting family history items. My sister Nancy has been given most of them, but I have a few things.

This morning I came upon several pages of what is from a notebook from my Grandmother Blanche Bingham, perhaps a crude journal. They are hand written and in places it is difficult to read.

They leave me with a tender feeling about my grandmother. She discusses the positive things about the spouses of her children. She gives their maiden names. She tells how many children each had.

She is brief about her marriages but says some things about them, such as her first husband left her and how many years later she married.

I remember my grandmother as an old woman. She died when I was a teenager. My memories of her are good. I remember the apartment she lived in, in Tacoma Washington. We lived in Idaho.

The final part of the first section of these pages is what I want to publish today. "I am alone and try to keep myself busy sewing and house work. I love my church work and lady friends and enjoy my children. My health is not good but I try to keep happy. I like to go to the temples and do temple work for the dead. I hope I can finish out my generations and do more temple work. I know that heavenly fathers spirit is sure with you in the temples and it such a restful happy feeling. My prayers have been answered many times. I have sick children and grandchildren. I have been alone and no phone. I have prayed to Heavenly Father for help and the children would be healthy and resting and they would be alright the next day."

Grandmother has been gone many years now. I wish I could have given her fewer alone times. I know my aunts and uncles living in Washington State tried, but it seems she still was lonely.

I thought I knew my grandma - but thanks to a handwritten entry I know her better now.

Life Story of My Grandmother Blanche Bingham Cragun Smith

The Life  Story of

BLANCHE REBECCA (BINGHAM) Grundy/Cragun/Smith

Born 20 January 1886 Passed away 28 March 1964

And the brief history of 

Wilbert Simeon CRAGUN

This account was tape-recorded by Bertha SOUTH Cragun (wife of Blanche’s son, Royal W. Cragun) and given to another of her son’s (Howard Blaine CRAGUN).    I, Ruth WOOD Cragun (wife of Howard) am documenting it as it was previously typed. The quotation marks identify verbiage quoted in the recording. Additions of fact, by both Bertha and Ruth are made and are noted.  Individual Ordinance Summary #000-6648-8974 

“I was a happy child and so was my sisters and brothers. My mother (RUTH: Sarah Rebecca GUTHRIE Bingham) was a wonderful housekeeper and cook. The house was always full of good smelling food and was always clean. That was what made our home—a mother there to greet us with love.

 Mother made our mittens and coats and we had leggings but I don’t think she made them, but she may have. When we came home from school she always had a little lunch for us and if it was winter we could go out in the snow and play fox and geese or make butterflies. We came in wet and cold and hungry. My mother knew how to make a child, or a man, happy with good food. We had three good meals a day and lunch after school, which would be whatever we wanted. We all grew up happy. When I was a little girl I used to go with Aunt Mary Farr (Papa’s sister) and the other wife of Lorin Farr when they had to help me on the seat in the Ogden tabernacle.

There was 9 of us children. 6 girls and 3 boys:  I worried over my Mother long before I should. for I was always afraid she would die. When I was naughty Mother wouldn’t let me kiss her goodnight and that would break my heart. Mother could trust me with her babies and never worry. I was the oldest child. I remember my mother telling of me, and my brother when we were just little tots, that Grandpa gave me a wax doll. Beautiful doll, and quite a big one. At that time wax dolls was the best dolls made. Grandpa gave my brother (he was not 3 yet) a carpenter set and when spring came we went out to play and he was the Dr. and he was going to make my doll well. Mother said she heard screams and she ran out just in time to see my doll’s head fall over the chopping block.

 I guess I had bad luck with my dolls because when Ella was big enough to run around, while I was at school, she had another of my wax dolls and chewed the cheeks off of the doll. I was a blonde with reddish shades in my hair and it was curly. I had 16 curls about 12 to 14 inches long and freckles on my cheekbones and over my nose.

My first date was with a boy that was my cousin. He also was a great grandson of Lorin Farr, the first mayor of Ogden. Then soon after that I fell in love with Reuben B. Grundy, and 2 years later was married to him. Mother taught me housework so when I married I could keep house and take care of my children”. (RUTH: And I believe it was also because Blanche was a devoted daughter and her mother desperately needed added help with the children).

“We had a lovely son we named Reuben Bingham Grundy (later in life he used the name Cragun - his stepfather’s name). My husband Reuben left me for another woman. My cousin fixed up a divorce and in 1 month I was a widow, which at that time there wasn’t many divorces. The grief caused me to lose twin girls at about 3 months pregnancy. I always wanted twins. After the divorce I had to leave my baby sometimes, but most of the time I kept him with me while I did house work. On 6 Feb. 1906 I married Simeon Wilbert Cragun.”

(BERTHA:‘Wilby’, as he was called, had two children (by his previous marriage to Mary Ann Clifford) still living at home at the time of the marriage. He and his brothers operated a large fruit farm in Pleasant View and shipped fruit all over the United States. The Cragun Brothers Wholesale Fruit and Produce firm was started in 1887. Wilby had his own farm and it was here that Blanche and Wilby started their marriage. Blanche was now mother to Reuben and  Hazel and Levi, Mary Ann’s children). She worked hard on the farm and while in the Pleasant View Ward taught Relief Society for a short time and was also 2^nd counselor in the Relief Society for a while. Wilby was active in community work and was called on often to administer to the sick. It was said that he had ‘the power of healing’. Hazel and Levi each married and started their families, then Blanche had a daughter, Viola, born here.

          Year after year the drought continued in Idaho and wheat was about 25 cents a bushel. The ‘great depression’ was also upon them and it became increasingly impossible to continue to live on the dry farm, so the family had to look for better support. Wilby's health was also failing  so, it was decided that they would move to Payette, Idaho where Blanche was able to operate a dining room in a hotel there. Land could be ‘homesteaded’ free of cost and Wilby wanted to see if he could make a go of farming in Idaho.

          While operating the dining room in Payette, the family became acquainted - and very good friends with - Kent Smith who was living at the hotel.  Viola was old enough to help and was a great assistance to Blanche in the dining room. The dining room in such a small town, with bad times and little money anywhere, wasn’t very good for rearing a family and they returned to Pocatello, where they hoped both of them could find employment. Blanche was able to get work, cleaning offices at the railroad depot and Wilby worked occasionally for the city and for the railroad. Kent later followed them to Pocatello where he lived in a one-room cabin near them.

Royal remembers Kent bringing he and Glenn a baseball bat to play with. One time he showed Royal a picture that he treasured of a beautiful woman – Kent’s mother – with black hair and snapping eyes. His mother had died at the time Kent was born. One time, while Kent was at work, their little house burned down and his precious picture, and all of his belongings were lost.  

Kent was an electrician, but much of the time he had to take whatever jobs he could find. He worked on the American Falls Dam when they constructed that. Reuben, now a teenager, worked on cars and owned one. Kent offered to help the family with groceries if Reub would drive them to American Falls, where he was working. They went over and enjoyed a little outing with Kent, in spite of some very rough roads they had to travel to get there. When the dam was

finished Kent treated the entire family to the big celebration the town had commemorating the completion. Howard was born by then and my, how Kent loved that baby.

He became so fond of him that no matter where they went from then on, Kent kept in touch and tried to be near to help whenever he could. The family went to Shelly, Idaho and helped Kent open an electric shop where he did contracting. This venture didn’t work out and Kent was deeply in debt to supply houses. He told them he could not pay but that if they would hire him, he would work out all of his bills and he did this.  The wholesalers were in Salt Lake so he moved there and paid off every cent.  

          About 1915, Wilby decided to turn the farm over to his son, Levi, and move to Idaho and take up dry farming. In order to homestead the farm in Arbon Valley, they had to live on the farm part of each school year. This made it difficult for the children to attend at both the Spring and Fall terms of school. There was year after year of crop failure and living there was very primitive. At first, there was only a dug-out in the hillside, then a large tent and finally a small home. End of Bertha’s comments) 

          “We lived in a place called Pauline, Idaho. We got our first car there. We lived in a place close to the mountain. Church was way across the valley, so we didn’t get to it very often. We went to the city in the winters, as the snow would get so deep the children couldn’t get to school. Sometimes it was American Falls or Pocatello, sometimes we got to go to Ogden. We were there the winter my little Vera died. How terrible not to have her! She was 6 years old when she died. My Father in Heaven has answered my prayers in raising my children. Many times I was alone on the dry farm – 120 acres – and just about all the men were away working, so us mothers were alone a lot. I never felt alone because I always had a prayer in my heart for God to keep us safe. I had sick children all alone and Father in Heaven answered my prayers, also when I had any of my grand children. Sometimes they would take very sick, no phone so I couldn’t get the elders, so God knew and answered my prayers. I know He is the living God and Jesus Christ lives. I had 6 children. My little Vera went to school from Sept. to March – then in 2 weeks she was dead (typhoid). My oldest child was Reuben, then next a daughter, Ella Viola, next Vera, then a son, Royal and a son Glenn and then Howard Blaine – the baby of the family”.

           

      

Blanche Rebecca Bingham

This one is confusing: The birth certificate has her name as Rebecca B Bingham implying her first name is Rebecca: I am her grandson and we always were told her name was Blanche Rebecca Bingham.