He
was born on December 27th, 1918 in Salt Lake County, Utah and was
the fifth child out of seven to be born to Florence Elizabeth Smith and John
Tripp Bringhurst. Grandpa attended Granite High School and graduated in 1937
and then completed two years at Utah State College afterward. He served a two
year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the
Spanish-American mission from November of 1939 and returned in May of 1942. A
few weeks after he returned from the mission he married his high school sweetheart,
Pearl Davidson, in the Salt lake City Temple.
Grandma
Pearl was born January 6th, 1919
and Died April 9th 2013 . Just like Royce, she was also born
in Salt Lake City. They both lived in
extraordinary times in the history of the world. Both were born during the
devastating flu epidemic of 1918 to 1919 and the Great Depression. Pearl and Royce,
both graduated from the same high school and were married at the outbreak of
World War II. Great Grandma Pearl also received an education, and earned a bachelor’s
degree from UC Davis at the age of fifty-seven. Pearl raised six children,
moving and supporting her husband while he served in the United States Air
Force during the war. He flew sixty-five combat missions in B-25 bombers over
Italy, France and Germany as a radioman, bombardier, photographer and
navigator.
“I
remember worrying that dad would start having nightmares again because he was
watching war coverage.” -Marla
After serving in the war, Royce
decided to continue in furthering his education. After a six year absents from
college, he received a bachelors in agronomy in Utah State University in 1947.
“By 1950, he had completed master’s and
doctorate degrees in agronomy and genetics from the University of Wisconsin. He
took a faculty position at UCLA in 1950 as an avocado geneticist, and
subsequently moved to UC Davis (California) in 1953 to become a strawberry
geneticist.”
My
Great Grandpa ended up developing about thirty different strawberry varieties
which produces more than seventy-five percent of the nations strawberries. This
is why their house was covered in strawberry décor while I was visiting and
since I found that out, I have always thought my grandpa is the coolest. Every
time I take a bite of a delicious red strawberry I can’t help but think of him,
and talk about him to those around me. Even though I haven’t gotten to know grandpa
very well on Earth, this fact makes me feel a little closer to him since I love
plants and want to work with them someday.
Royce
didn’t start out with strawberries, and came a long way until he had much
success. He had an avocado orchard.
“Dad
used to bring crates of avocados home. I
hated them. Mother used to make avocado
tacos--we could get tortillas in Los Angeles.
I'm not sure what happened, but one day I decided I loved avocados, and
have done so ever since. Of course the
crates of avocados disappeared when we moved to Davis.” –Marla (Daughter)
“Dad's
avocado orchard was nearby. When I was working at UCLA medical center his
orchard was the parking lot (double decker) that I parked in. There were still about 4 avocado trees left
on the edge of it. I will never forget the day mom made avocado
ice cream. I think she only did that one
time and froze it in the ice cube trays.
It is really amazing that we all love avocados…” –Marla
Royce and Pearl had my grandmother,
Jean, first. Florence, Marla, Ann, John and Margaret came afterwards.
“
I remember my birthday was not all about me for the first time in 6 years
because everyone was coming to see mom and the baby. When mom was pregnant with John, I promised
God that if he would give us a boy, I would make sure that Ann was not treated
as badly as I was when she was born. Mom
had had at least 2 miscarriages between me and Ann and I remember going with
her and dad to the Dr. many times when we lived in LA. I always waited outside in the waiting
room. It seemed to me that I spent lots
of time waiting.” (Marla)
“We
lived in badger village. The living room
and kitchen was mom and dad's bedroom.
The house had one bedroom and the bed took up the whole room. We girls
were in there with a small dresser.”
They
had an ice box where the ice man would come by and deliver ice and put it in
the top of the box. It would melt into a tray on the bottom of the ice box and
had to be emptied regularly. When the ice man would come the kids would climb
on his truck and get ice chips to suck on. He delivered the ice with large
forceps. Milk was also delivered in glass bottles and cardboard caps and sat in
a metal box by their front door. When the weather was cold, the milk would
freeze and rise above the tops of the bottles, making it look as though it had
a large neck sticking out of the top of the bottle with a cap on its head. They
would leave the empty bottles outside in order for them to get refilled. The
house also had a stove where a coal man would come once a week and send coal
down the coal shoot, because that was how the house was heated.
The
Wisconsin’s game would ring throughout the house followed by the kids singing.
If
you want to be a badger
Just
come along with me.
Opera and the Wisconsin’s game was something
that would play in the house every Saturday.
“We listened football games and opera on Saturday, but we
also listened to baseball games. I think
dad always liked to have some kind of mental diversion (he also loved the
music). I still do not really enjoy an
entire opera but I do love parts and have been to many when I lived in LA and
San Francisco. I think it was just
always on so loud that it bothered me.”
“An
eclectic array of listening materials.” –Florence
Royce
and Pearl were extremely poor, but the kids hadn’t a clue. Royce was pretty
good about finding things to bring home for the family from the university that
they could eat.
“Remember
the live turkey he brought home that laid an egg for us? I don’t actually
remember eating that turkey because we named it and we thought it was a pet. One
Sunday we had nothing for super but bread and water - literally. Dad assured us
that he had eaten it all the time growing up which was probably true. He and mom were both quite thin in those
years.”
There were times in their little family where sicknesses would
enter into the lives of their kids. Florence had scarlet fever and her Dad
wasn’t allowed to come home for a little while.
“Dad would buy
groceries and leave them on the doorstep.
Mom would come out and pick them up after he left. I had a sore throat for forever. I would lay in bed and watch the neighborhood
children play.” –Jean
“I had polio when I was
three and I remember Dad lining us up and holding his hand up for us to kick
it. I am sure this is one reason I never
had problems with my legs, which seem to have been the only part of me
affected. He also had us touch our toes
to the floor. I got so I could put my
palms flat on the floor…I brought home mumps and it went through Jean and Marla
as well. Dad joked about fat cheeks. ” –
Florence
“As we each came down
with the mumps, mom and dad would diagnose it by giving us something sour to
eat like a dill pickle to see if it hurt our glands. It hurt!” -Marla
The house at 530 E Street in Davis, California was ‘The
scene of some important events’. They had a yard and an orange tree in the
backyard. “We ate and orange a day every day they were available. I remember
them as being mostly sour, as I think we ate them from the time they first
turned orange. Dad brought home field crates of cherries, apricots, peaches and
pears, which Mother canned (and we girls helped).”
Mom made great pie crust.
Do you remember when we would come away from potluck dinners at the
church and Dad would tell us "They forgot to take the paper plate off that
one" about the pie he had eaten.
“Remember the chicken
barbecues we had in Cecils' grove by Putah Creek? We caught tadpoles in the creek and ate the
best chicken--at least as I remember it.
That was such a nice place. We visited the Cecils one New Years Day, and
Jean, Marla and I got to ride on the horse--bareback. We were holding on to each other, and I guess
Jean had the horse's mane. We were fine
until the horse turned around and headed for the barn at a trot. Marla and I fell off. Marla was knocked out completely, and Jean
and I went screaming for Mom and Dad. I
never told them about the huge bruise I had on my right side. I may have broken or cracked a rib or two.”
(Marla)
“When we moved to Davis it was one of the hottest days in
the summer - well over 100. Our
furniture did not arrive the day we did so we stayed (at least some of us) at
the Brown's around the corner (I was so enamored of Dolly Brown's name that I
remembered them well and visited her a few years ago with mom in Davis at that
same house). The Browns remained good
friends of mom and dad the rest of their lives I think because they were so
kind to us then. The first place we stayed was in the apartment on 10th
street? That place was tiny and I do not
have good memories of it. We were only
there a few months and then moved to the Stebbins home on Miller Drive. That was a great house for us to play in but
scared me so much at night. We did not
stay there a year because the Stebbins came home early from their sabbatical
leave (they were getting a divorce). I
found out about that when I was an adult.
I just knew we suddenly had to find a new place to live in a hurry and
somehow mom and dad knew the Styles and we rented their house on E street. I have pictures of all the houses we lived in
in Davis that Jean and I took ones while she was visiting about 10 years ago.”
(Marla)
That house had caught on fire three times. One of them
was a Sunday and Pearl had been canning jam or jelly, using paraffin wax to
seal the jars. The girls loved to sneak pieces of the wax to chew, because
chewing gum was forbidden at the Bringhurst home. Royce was dead set against
it, and Pearl used to tell the kids that Aunt June “went bad” because she was a
gum chewer. Royce stayed home from
church that day and a piece of wax that had been left on the stove caught on
fire. He beat it out with a rolled up newspaper and threw the paper into the
garbage can under the sink. Later on that day, he smelled smoke and the
cupboard under the sink was set in flames. He managed to put that fire out, but
had he gone to church with the rest of the family they would have had to kiss
the house 530 E Street goodbye.
The second fire happened when Royce was out of town.
Pearl ran to her kids and said, “ Kids get out, the house is on fire.” They
trooped to the front lawn and watched the fire trucks arrive. It was caused by
the ivy around and over the chimney, and was minor. The neighbors brought
blankets to keep the family warm as they waited outside for the firemen to put
it out.
The third fire was the worst of them all. The family had
been moving the last load to 738 Mullberry Lane. Florence looked back and saw a
small circle. Jean and Florence shouted to their Dad in panic, “The house is on
fire!”.
“He ran to the phone, dialed 0, and said, “There’s a fire
at 530 E Street!”
It had taken a while for the fire trucks to find them
because Royce forget to mention that it was in Davis, so he ended up putting
the fire out with a hose. It was the same day the John got his finger cut
off. Ann had slammed the door of the new
bedroom in the new house on him to keep him from her toys. Next thing you know,
Royce and Pearl were rushing John to the doctor to get his finger sewn back on.
Ann didn’t really want to damage John, but she had the misfortune about a year
later of shutting the front door on his leg and breaking it.
These are just a few of their memories and adventures,
mainly in Davis, California. Marla, Florence and Jean are the ones helping
Great Grandpa Bringhurst come alive to me. Grandpa has a love for plants and
gardening and so does my Mom. I remember growing up gardening with her, and my
love for plants developed because of those times. That is something I think we
get from Great Grandpa, and I love it!
No comments:
Post a Comment