HISTORIES OF
JOHN HENRY BOWLER &
LASINA TRUMAN
THE LIFE OF JOHN H. BOWLER
by Metta ChadburnJohn Henry Bowler, third son and fourth child of James Samuel Page Bowler and Matilda Hill Bowler was born December 23, 1869, at Nottingham, England. He died December 9, 1950 in St. George, Utah. He was eleven years old when his family left England and came to America and the Land of Zion. The family moved to Hebron and while there, John herded cows, sheep and carried mail to assist with the family finances and pay for their immigration.
The family lived in several places including Parowan and Panaca and then went back to Hebron. In the history of James Samuel Page Bowler he says,” Having sold the house in Panaca to Mr. Rich, I was requested to send the deeds to him in Pioche, Nevada and would then receive the money there, which I did, entrusting all in the care of our son John, just a boy. Bless the boy, he held to the deed until he received the money and though a stranger in the mining camp, late in the evening, more than fifty miles from home, he went to Panaca with all speed and passed the night in a chicken house. He reached home late the next night after traveling through a foot of snow. A lot of things could have happened to a young boy in that kind of weather and making that long trip on horseback and alone. He was certainly a faithful
son.”About 1888, the Bowlers came to Gunlock and bought a piece of land, but they did not stay. In Gunlock at that time, John met Lasina Truman. On April 17, 1893, they were married in Gunlock, Utah. On Feb. 15, 1899 their marriage was solemnized in the St. George Temple. After John and Lasina were married, they rented a small piece of land and a cabin in Gunlock. They were not able to make a living in there and so in about three years they moved to the Wise Ranch in Muddy Valley, Nevada. They stayed there only about a year or two. Their son Henry Bowler recalls an incident or two while they were there. “Somehow, Pa got his shoulder thrown out of place. No medical help was available and he was suffering severely. We went to St. Thomas, but was not able to get help there. On our way home, Ma was driving the buckboard, when kerplunk, she went over the only rock in the whole valley and smack, went Pa’s shoulder. When it quit hurting enough to investigate, they found his shoulder had caught on the board running across the back of the buckboard and had thrown Pa’s shoulder back into place. They were delighted, though it was unusual medical treatment.
Soon after this, they came back to Gunlock and while living in Gunlock, spent one or two summers living with Grandma Truman in Hebron.
About this time, Pa got kicked with a horse. It drove the ball of his hip through the socket. Doctors at that time didn’t seem to know how to handle it. Some suggested taking the hip from an animal and replacing Pa’s hip with that. They were living down to the Truman Field at the time. One night we were all down at the corral, milking cows when a flash shower came up. All ran for the house, leaving Pa on his crutches to get to the house as best he could. Again, he had a freak experience. In his haste to get out of the rain, he jerked his leg some way and back his hip popped into place. He was so thrilled, he walked the floor most of the night for fear it would come out of the socket again.
While they were living at Gunlock, Pa was working at Shem, when he fell down a thirty feet mine shaft and was laid up for some time. He didn’t feel too badly over this as he never could figure out how he came out of this experience alive. During these experiences, Henry and Ma did the farming and Nellie took care of the house and took care of Pa.
In the meantime, the family had increased. Besides Henry, Mary Elizabeth, Ellen Matilda (Nellie), Jacob Samuel, Milton Albert, John Franklin, Richard Truman, Lottie, Willard Lewis, and Metta made up ten children. Of these, Mary Elizabeth, Jacob Samuel and John Franklin, died soon after birth. The others are all living (1964).
In December, 1906, John and Lasina bought the Bigelow Ranch, and moved there the following February. They sold most all of their property for the down payment and began farming in earnest. The previous owner was Will Bunker. He rented them his stock. They traded for an a team of old horses and some more stock.
A large well planned orchard was just beginning to produce. Many varieties of peaches, pears, plums, apricots, cherries and apples were in the orchard. Besides the fruit they raised, the Bowlers produced hay, alfalfa seed, dry beans and beef to sell and make payments on the Bigelow Ranch.
Henry remembers; “by this time, our financial status was much improved and we were very encouraged in our outlook.” This didn’t last long, however, as about this time, Pa was stricken with rheumatic fever and all winter, he was bedfast. It was about a year before he was able to work again.
In 1914, Henry was called on a mission to the Southern States. He was there for thirty months. The family lived on the Bigelow Ranch until most of the children were married. In the fall of 1922, John and Lasina moved to Veyo. The next year they bought the Jim Tellus place which they had rented the previous year.
John H. Bowler was very active in the Church and held many church positions. He was a very honest man. At the time of his death, the bank president told the family that John Bowler’s word was as good as his bond. He didn’t get to attend school much, but his father taught him. He was very good at figures and wrote a beautiful penmanship hand. He loved to read and liked to work with figures. John H. Bowler was born with a special gift for business, financial dealings and money management. He started with nothing and with hard work, careful planning supported his family and accumulated property. He was very kind to people less fortunate than he was. Their home was always open to anyone needing a home and love. George H . Howarth was such an example. He came to them destitute and homeless and lived with them for eighteen years.
John H. Bowler was really loved by the young people of Veyo Ward and by his grandchildren and great children, and all of his family. One of his special talents in life was that of a peacemaker. He lived his religion every day of his life, not just on Sunday all of his good deeds were done without fanfare.
reklaw2@comcast.net
History of Lasina Truman Bowler
LASINA ALMENA TRUMAN WAS BORN SEPTEMBER 11,1873 AT MOUNTAIN MEADOWS, WASHINGTON COUNTY, UTAH. MOUNTAIN MEADOWS IS LOCATED BETWEEN VEYO AND ENTERPRISE, UTAH... ON APRIL 17, 1893 SHE WAS MARRIED TO JOHN HENRY BOWLER, AND ON FEBRUARY 15, 1899, THEY RECEIVED THEIR ENDOWMENTS IN THE ST. GEORGE L.D.S. TEMPLE... SHE DIED AUGUST 13, 1959, AT HOME IN VEYO, UTAH... SHE AND HER BELOVED HUSBAND, JOHN HENRY BOWLER, WERE THE PARENTS OF: GEORGE HENRY BOWLER, MARY ELIZABETH BOWLER, ELLEN MATILDA “NELLIE” BOWLER, JACOB SAMUEL BOWLER, MILTON ALBERT BOWLER, JOHN FRANKLIN BOWLER, RICHARD TRUMAN BOWLER, LOTTIE BOWLER, WILLARD LEWIS BOWLER AND METTA BOWLER.
The following vignettes and remembrances on the life of Lasina Almena Truman Bowler were contributed by Lasina’s youngest daughter Metta Bowler Chadburn and granddaughter Ferral Leavitt, Jones, whose mother was Lasina’s middle daughter, Lottie Bowler Leavitt Ulrich, and granddaughter Helen Bowler Gardner, daughter of son, Milton Albert Bowler.
Ferral Leavitt Jones:
Some of my choicest memories in this life are the ones spent with Grandma and Grandpa Bowler. With my father dying when I was only four years old, that meant I spent the next four years with my Grandmother Lasina and Grandfather John Bowler. What a wonderful influence they were on my life.I don’t ever remember getting a spanking, but I did know I was to mind when they asked me to do something. They taught me bow to pray and to love my Heavenly Father. Honesty, hard work and punctuality were only some of the attributes they lived by and they passed those same attributes on to me.
I remember Grandma getting up at the same early hour every morning, building a fire in her large kitchen cook stove and cooking a big, hot breakfast. I was always in charge of setting the table and we were all expected to kneel around the kitchen table for our early morning prayer. We ate together as a family and I never recall anyone being late for breakfast.
Grandma and Grandpa had a big round table, always full of people, many not family, but always welcome. I still have the spoon dish, as we called it, a lovely glass bowl-like dish which sat in the center of the table full of teaspoons, so we could each help ourselves. This spoon dish is special to me. It brings back the memories of those childhood days around the table at my grandparent’s house, each time I look at it. I can still see Grandma and Grandpa sitting at that table with Grandma getting up and bustling around the kitchen.
Grandma’s food always tasted so good. Even after I was married, I would go to their house and have a “Lumpy Dick” supper with them since my husband Lorin didn’t like it and I couldn’t make it taste like Grandma did. Grandma could go outside, catch a chicken, kill it, clean and pick it and serve it for dinner. She thought nothing of this feat which is certainly not part of a woman’s routine today.My grandparents were generous and freehearted. They were always taking in and nurturing people less fortunate than they, even though they had very little in the way of material wealth. One man they took in and who lived with them until he died was an Englishman, George H. Howarth. We all loved him. Grandpa Bowler found him in the hills above the Bigelow ranch where Howarth had been left as a caretaker at the General Steam mine. That winter was fierce with an unusually heavy snowfall and George ran out of food. He left the mine and started out of the mountains on foot to get help. When Grandpa Bowler happened upon him, Howarth was almost unable to walk and was lost. Grandpa put Howarth on his horse and brought him home for Grandma to nurse back to health. George H. Howarth never left the John and Lasina Bowler home. When he died he was buried beside the two people who had taken him in and loved him as one of the family and whom he loved.
There was also Aunt Esther Hunt, Grandma’s sister, a victim of “child-bed fever,” and deserted by her husband. She was an invalid and needed lots of care, but I never heard Grandpa or Grandma ever complain about taking care of her. She needed them and they willingly took on the responsibility of giving her a home. She had a son, Stanley who also stayed with them until he was old enough to be on his own. I remember one duty I and my cousin Helen shared was to take Aunt Esther to the outdoor privy, since she was unable to walk alone. We also stayed with her on many Sunday’s so Grandma could go to church. In fact, anyone who happened to be at Grandma’s and Grandpa’s house helped out with Aunt Esther. In our family, everyone helped one another.
Grandpa Bowler was a good businessman. They didn’t have much, but he managed what he bad, loaning money, some of which I’m sure he never got back.
He loaned Lorin and I money on several occasions and taught us how important it was to pay our debts and pay them on time. I can still see him sitting at his desk doing his bookwork and opening the top drawer of his desk to give us a lemon drop, which he kept for himself and all his grandchildren.
In those days, which were the 1930’s and part of the 1940’s, we always did things together. It took us all to do the washing, ironing, cleaning and bottling fruit. We always washed on Monday. Grandpa always said if he died on Monday, Grandma would still do the washing. She had to have it done and on the clothesline before anyone else in town or her entire day was ruined; plus it had to be snowy white. After I was married and lived across the street from them, I also had to wash on Monday. If I didn’t, both Grandma and Grandpa were over to see if I was sick.
On the days we bottled fruit, I remember a lot of us getting together to do it. I was the one to wash the bottles because my hands could fit inside the bottles to scrub them clean. We heated the water outside in a big tub. That’s where the bottle washing took place. I remember one time Grandma, Aunt Blanche, Aunt Metta, Mama, Helen and I, bottled 300 quarts of fruit in one day.
In those days we raised our own fruit. Grandpa had a beautiful orchard with all kinds of fruit and nuts. It was one of our favorite places, but it took a lot of work to keep it up. We all had to pitch in and do our part.
George H., as we called George Howarth, took over raising the garden after he came to stay with my grandparents, which was sometime in the 1930’s. He raised beautiful strawberries, which they sold. I made extra money picking strawberries every week.
I enjoyed evenings in Grandpa and Grandma’s home. It was a time for the family to get together and visit, tell stories and catch up on happenings around the country. There was always company, which meant news about relatives and friends on neighboring towns and ranches. In the winter, most of the long evenings were spent playing cards, mostly “Rummy”. I didn’t care much for card playing, but if they didn’t have enough players to make an even number, I filled in. We made ice cream when it snowed and popped corn and made molasses and taffy candy. There was much laughter and love in my grandparent’s home.
Most of my memories of Grandpa and Grandma took place in Veyo. Walking to the store or church with Grandma always meant I had to trot to keep up. She was a fast walker and today, both Helen and I remember trotting beside her as she “hustled” to the store or church. Grandma could not bear to be late for anything. She always said, “If it’s worth going to, it’s worth being on time.” To this day, I hate being late for anything.
Metta Bowler Chadburn:
During my childhood, we lived in Gunlock and on the Bigelow Ranch. I was five years old when Papa built the rock house on the ranch and it is still standing today, lived in by his great-grandchildren. Papa broke his hip during the time we lived there and I remember Mama and Henry hauling hay, harvesting the crops and irrigating for more than a year until Papa recovered and was able to be up and about.One of my earliest memories is about Mama and Papa riding horseback to Ox Valley to check on their cattle. They would put me behind Mama on a horse called “Old “Puss” and up those steep hills we would ride. We’d stay a couple of days in an old shack seeing about the cattle and then go home.
Mama was an excellent teamster. During one summer of my childhood, we had been to Gunlock to church. As we came out of the church building, Mama looked up at the sky and said, “hurry up, get in the wagon. See those clouds, there’s a storm coming.” All of us kids piled in the wagon and Mama cracked the whip at the horses and we took off. The road followed the Magotsu Creek bed after it left the Santa Clara Riverbed, which was a rough jolting ride in an iron-wheeled flatbed wagon. That was the wildest ride I ever took. Mama whipped those horses and we literally flew up the creek road. Just as we reached the Bigelow ranch which was three miles north of Gunlock and situated on a hill above the forks of the Moody and Magotsu Creeks, the storm broke and the biggest flood of the season came roaring down those creeks. We’d have never made it home to Papa who was laid up in bed with his broken hip, had Mama not been such a good teamster.
But she was more than that; she was a wonderful mother and made the best “salt-rising bread”, in the country. Today that is a lost art. Her soda and sour milk biscuits melted in your mouth and she made them every morning for breakfast. She was also famous for her pies. During the married life of Lasina and John Bowler they lived in Moapa (Nevada), Gunlock, the Bigelow Ranch, and Veyo. Mama spent a good part of her childhood on the “Truman Field,” where her mother lived and raised her family. That farm is now under the water of the Gunlock Reservoir.
Helen Bowler Gardner:
My earliest memories of Grandma Lasina include first: Every afternoon, after her morning chores were done, she put on a clean, washed and starched and colorful percale apron. Then on one of the days we went to the store, with Ferral or I trotting beside her to keep up, she would buy an all-day sucker or some small treat. If she had time, (and her free time was limited), she did her visiting with neighbors on those afternoons trips. She loved candy and usually had a small cache, which she kept, in a ceiling high cupboard with glass doors, which stood, in her front room.Grandma was a hard worker. During the years I was ten, eleven and twelve years old she took the job of cleaning the schoolhouse at Veyo and making it ready for the beginning of the school year. She asked me to help her. Each year we spent two days scrubbing the building, cleaning the windows, cleaning and preparing the stoves and scrubbing, scrubbing, and polishing. For that we were paid twelve dollars and each year, Grandma split it down the middle with me fair and square. I used that money to buy cloth for school dresses. My mother still made all my clothes back then.
Grandma made the best molasses cookies in the world. Since we lived north and through the field about a quarter of a mile, we had a trail, beaten by our feet, which went straight from our gate to my grandparents backyard gate. My brothers, Dean, Elwood and I would go down through that field to get molasses cookies more often than we were supposed to. Grandma had a special fondness for Elwood because he was such a handsome little boy who had longer eyelashes than any of us had ever seen. He got an extra cookie.
One day Aunt Metta dressed him up as a little girl and took him to where Grandma, Grandpa and my Dad were working. My Dad looked at him and said, “Whose pretty little girl are you?” None of them knew Elwood. This was a family joke for years. Aunt Metta was a great prankster.
I loved to look at my Grandma Lasina. I thought she was a beautiful woman. She had black hair, which she wore in a bun on the top of her head, snapping black eyes and she laughed a lot. Her face, with beautiful high cheekbones and olive skin reminded me of the pictures I’d seen of Pocahontas, the Indian maiden, who became the wife of the Pilgrim, John Smith. I remember asking her once if we had Indian blood in our family and she sputtered and choked and said, “Whatever gave you that idea?” “Because you look like an Indian,” I told her with the candor of the very young. ” But I think you’re prettier than Pocahontas.” She forgave me and to this day, though I have heard other family members say there is Indian blood in our family, I do not know that for a fact, however, many of us do have high cheekbones.
One Sunday afternoon, my mother washed her clothes and hung them on the line after dark. She was planning on bottling fruit the next day, which was Monday and she didn’t want to have to stop and wash. When Grandma got outside to put her washing on the line, she looked up through the field and saw my mother’s wash there before hers was hung out. Up though the field she came and was only mollified when my mother, Blanche Holt Bowler explained she had washed the evening before.
Grandma was generous and a soft touch. She loved to give gifts and to get them. There was an endearing, childlike quality to her which brought out a great protectiveness and a feeling in all of us, but she was also self reliant and independent. If you were her friend, you were without fault. If you were lazy, she had no time for you.
She loved to knit in her later years and knitted articles for many family members. She could really make those knitting needles click. She loved green tea and it was always served for the noon meal. Sometimes we would coax her to “read” the tea leaves in the bottom of the teacups, but this was not something she did often, I am still convinced she was psychic, but I also felt she was uneasy with her “gift” and did not use it often and tended to smother it rather than develop it. Her great-great grandson, Matthew Grimes, son of my daughter Bonnie and my first grandchild, had that same gift. At the age of eleven he and his younger brother Adam could communicate when in separate rooms without either one saying a word. Matthew was killed by a hit and run driver in San Diego at the age of thirteen, but before he died, he too had become uneasy with this “gift”.
In their later years, Grandpa and Grandma would spend their winters in San Diego, with their daughter Metta and for a time with Lottie who also lived there. Accompanied by George H., they also spent several winters in Fallon Nevada with their son Milton Albert and his wife Blanche. During their winters in Fallon, Nevada, they were able to visit with Henry Davis Holt the father of Blanche who lived with his daughter and son-in-law. At one time Grandpa Holt and Grandpa Bowler and others, had begun a telephone company whose lines ran from Pine Valley to Enterprise, Central, Veyo, Gunlock and on down to Mesquite, Bunkerville, and Moapa, Nevada. John Bowler and Henry Holt spent days reminiscing and re-living lot of their younger days during those winter visits, while Grandma Bowler sat and knitted, listened and nodded her head.
Always frank and open with her opinions and observations, Grandma Lasina often said to my Dad, “Dean is the best worker you’ve got, but Helen’s not bad for a girl.” Now that I’m older, each day I realize more and more how her influence molded a greater part of my development that I ever knew until I was older and she was gone. She was an exceptional woman of great strength and piety and I’ve thanked the Lord many times for his sending me into this world as part of the grandchildren of John and Lasina. I have been doubly blessed. All of her descendants have been doubly blessed.
It gives me great pleasure to be able to record this minute part of her life for she was truly a remarkable woman and one who made God proud.
Lasina Truman Bowler
Written by Mildred Bowler, May 1994When I think of my mother-in-law Lasina A. Truman Bowler our relationship reminds me of the Bible story of Ruth: “entreat me not to leave thee”. I felt so much love for her and from her.
Born in Mt. Meadows, UT September 11, 1873, and the youngest of twelve children. I have a feeling she was loved very much and must have had a very happy childhood. Her father dying when she was eight years of age must have been very hard on her. She told me she remembered sitting on his lap. She must have loved him very much.
Grandma Lasina was so unselfish. She was always doing for others. Whenever there was a missionary or missionaries from our ward she sent them money every month if only a dollar. Also, during the war she remembered the service men. We had the store at that time. I wrapped, ready for mailing, many packages of candies, cookies, banana cakes or fresh apple cake for her.
In her later years she made aprons and clothes pin bags for all her relatives and friends and she had many.
Grandma was very good with horses. She could harness them and drive a buggy for pleasure or wagon for farm work and transportation.
She was a hard worker and could do farm work, milk cows, and chop wood. Her laundry was done by hand on a scrubbing board. She dried lots of fruit, taking care of all things that provided food for the family’s welfare. She was an excellent cook. Her bread, baking powder biscuits, pies; banana and applesauce cakes were specialties.
Grandma was very prompt. She believed in being at church or meetings early or on time. She had a hard time when time went to waste at fast day sacrament meetings. She would usually be first to bear her testimony often using poems or little messages from books like “Minute Sermons” or “Golden Nuggets of Thought.”
Her church was her life. When I was put in as Relief Society President and trying to choose counselors she indicated she would like to help. She served faithfully. We worked well together although she was in her late 70s.
When Bertie Sue, my last child, was born, she was living close by with Metta. She would come up every day to help me, even at 82 years of age.
In my early years of marriage we had a lesson in Relief Society about families and children. When Grandma made the statement that not any of her children were spoiled it was a surprise to me as I had a different opinion of my husband, his sisters and Reva agreed with me. I learned a lesson from her. She loved her children unconditionally and didn’t dwell on their faults.
It is interesting to me to find out that in 1862 when pioneers in St. George were given lots by drawing numbers, my great grandfather Jessie W. Crosby and Lew’s grandfather Jacob Mica Truman were issued lots side by side at 100 West 100 South. The Crosby family owned the property until 1949. Jacob Micah must have sold his when he moved to Mt. Meadows.
