Oliver Guy Johnson

Oliver Guy Johnson

1893-1969

Oliver Guy Johnson was my maternal grandfather. Born in 1893, he passed away at Christmas time in 1969. He blessed us by writing his personal history. Over the next several days, I will be posting his history in installments. I hope you enjoy reading about this great man.

The Early Years—Part One

I was born May 19, 1893, at 91 West 6th North, Logan, Utah, the seventh child and the second son of James Christian and Mary Hansen Johnson. They had both come to Utah from Denmark. My father came to Logan in July of 1875 and mother came in 1869. I was born in the house that my son, Reed, and his family now lives in. My father owned land and operated a small farm where I was born. My father had been a railroad contractor, building the railroad grade in Idaho and Montana, but had quit it and moved back to Logan to be with his family before I was born.

The 20 acre farm where I was born and grew up, was also the home where my nine brothers and sisters were born and raised. At the present time (1964) there is a large L.D.S. Church where Father’s barn once was and there are seven business places and some twenty or thirty new homes. We always had cows to milk and horses on the farm. I soon learned to ride a horse and I have liked to ride horses all my life.

My first remembrance of my father was one day when he was sorting potatoes out in the potato pit and Mother let me out to be with him. I had been stung on the eye lid by a bee and my eye was swollen shut. I do not remember how or when I was stung by that bee, but I do remember that my Father ask me whose boy I was. When I told him I was Oliver, he said he didn’t think it was because Oliver could see with both eyes. My mother was very sick when I was born so it was up to my oldest sister, Hilda, to tend me until I could do a little for myself. She was twelve years old when I was born.

I finally grew up enough so 1 could do a few things around the farm like feeding the chicken and the calves and pigs. My mother kept my hair in long ringlets until I was five years old, but one day she cut them off and I was a boy.

When I was six years old, I started school at the Benson School which was on the corner of 4th North and 1st East Streets. I remember my sister Mable, who was two years older than me taking me to the teacher for the first time. This school had eight class rooms, four upstairs and four downstairs. I attended all of them in the next eight years. This is the same school where my sons, Nyman, Jim and Reed, and my daughter, Beth, took the first six grades.

A few of the boys and girls that I can remember (55 years later) of that first school class are: Joseph Keller, Herbert Kallstrom, Alonso Lindquist, Ernest Ruchti, Easter Lundberg, Lillie Hansen, Rebecca Jacobson, Carrie Jenson, Ina Barrett, Edward Barrett, Harvey Larson.

My father went back to his native land, Denmark, on a mission for the L. D. S. Church in 1902, leaving eight children home with their Mother. My brother, James, was 14 years old and I was 8. We took care of the farm; we milked the cows, put the hay in the barn, and did all the irrigating.

I went to the 4th Ward Primary and Sunday School and Religion Class. They do not have Religion Class any more. I gave the closing prayer at the exercises when I graduated from Primary in 1905. I went to church in the 4th Ward. Thomas X. Smith was Bishop with Thomas Morgon and Gustave Thompson counselors. Nora Eliason was President of the Primary. E. W. Robinson was superintendent of the Sunday School. They were the days when everybody walked to church, the good old days before there were any autos.

I was ordained a Deacon on December 9, 1905, by Fred Crunder Jr. We held our Priesthood meeting in the back room of the meeting house. I helped with the chores such as feeding of the calves and chickens and helped to keep the wood box full, for wood was all we had to burn in those days.

Next installment: The Pre-Marriage Years