SOREN C. SORENSEN

By S. Calvin Sorensen

While we were making the move to Holladay, mother phoned me at Becky's mother's

house and asked me to come immediately because father had suffered a stroke. I arrived at their home on Twelfth East in time to ride to the hospital with him in the ambulance. He never regained consciousness, with mother at his side all the time, for one week before he died. He was seventy-three years old. I don't believe he ever saw our home in Holladay.

I missed the association of a younger father. Even though he was older he was so good to me. Because of his own love for cars, I was one of the few that had access to a car “called mine” that was available on the weekends, but I was always required to walk to East High School about a mile away.

One of my favorite activities with him was the trips to Canyon Lodge at Yellowstone, which had small log cabins heated only with a wood burning stove. He would take me along with Gordon. Sometimes we went with a group of friends that had more fun playing practical jokes on the few guests that came from other parts of the country during the depression years. They had a free run of the lodge and the employees were very friendly. The fishing was great in Yellowstone Lake, and the chef prepared the fish for our dinners. We could bring home twenty large trout per person that were shared with our neighbors.

Even though Dad enjoyed some very influential people, a favorite friend was a neighbor, Ted Chamberlin, probably because of his sense of humor and they shared their love for Canyon Lodge. One of their more sophisticated members of their High Priest Quorum expressed that he had never been a recipient of receiving fish that they brought home from Yellowstone. Ted had him walk several blocks to his home with the expectation of receiving “trout” but ended up getting a can of sardines.

Ted was a fire adjuster and was required to check on fires in the city, sometimes in the night. His dog would let the neighborhood know when there was a fire because it would sit on his front lawn and howl. On one occasion he ran into Dad visiting with other well-attired associates on the sidewalk downtown. He approached them in dusty casual clothes and was unshaven and asked Dad for some money to get something to eat. Dad pulled out a twenty-dollar bill and gave it to him, then Ted went on his way. The other men were amazed that Dad would give so much money to a “vagrant.”

There was never an activity that I was involved in that he didn't check out the details. When I joined a fraternity, he went completely through the fraternity house and became acquainted with some of the members that were amazed that a Dad was that interested. When I was on the dairy farm, at nineteen years of age, he visited me frequently and loved to share the dairy experience. We were always concerned about the fact that he would get in the bull's pen. When I asked Becky to marry me, which he very much approved, he made a visit to see “Max,” Becky's mother, to assure her that Becky wouldn't be making too much of a mistake marrying

me. And when I was in basic training at Camp Hood, Texas, he had contact, some way, with the captain.

He was very industrious, a quality that was passed on to his children which were highly motivated in whatever they did, and I see this quality carry through to his grand-children. He, and mother, always wanted the best for their family and they achieved it by being thrifty as well as by hard work. They were both products of conversion to the Mormon faith and were dedicated and conservative about material things. There were many things done to help other people.

He was good to me; he was good to Becky; particularly while I was in the army. He built four duplexes along 15th East. One for each of my sisters and one for me which blessed our lives. Becky lived in one side of the one built at 1509 Downington Ave. and had the income from the other side while I was in the service, we lived there until we moved to Holladay and Becky's mother lived there for a time until we moved to California. It was put into trusts that helped our boys and Becky Ann get their education and a down payment on a home. Thanks Dad!

I was born a year after Soren and Lillie and their family moved to Salt Lake, so I missed the Ephraim experience, however I have had many contacts that have related to good things that happened there and the many good people with roots there. I received my first name, “Stanley,” from Dr. Stanley Anderson, a close boyhood friend of my brother, Horace.

Thank you Dad, for coming to America with your family when you were only eight years old. For being industrious, always doing the best you could, whether it was working in the Pharmacy and being available from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. or later, for having the courage to go into your own business of groceries, then hardware. You moved up the line traveling as a salesman for Dinwood Furniture Co., Strevell Paterson Hardware and ultimately Malleable Iron Range Company of Wisconsin.

Then, with the help of Horace, you established and nurtured through the depression years, one of the outstanding businesses in Utah. It gave Morgan, Gordon, Bill Stucki, then ultimately myself and many good employees, the opportunity to be a part of South East Furniture Co. in Sugar House. This blessed many families.

You served the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints not only in assigned callings with the bishopric in Ephraim, on the High Council of Emigration Stake, the service you gave on the Church Welfare General Board, but you did many unsolicited good things for many members, without recognition.

In recent years, I have appreciated pictures of you when you were younger and think of what a great young man you were and what a good looking couple you and mother were. I always thought I would be satisfied with near baldness if I could have the lock of hair across the middle of my head as you did. I am proud of the heritage left by my 100% Danish father. Memories have grown greater since we have been separated and I look forward to seeing you again.

Thank you for being such a good father!

LILLIE MATILDA ANDERSON SORENSEN By S. Calvin Sorensen

Thanks to Bonnie Gudmumdson for many details

John and Mari Ane must have favored their fourth child, the first to be born after he returned

to Ephraim from his mission to Sweden, to give her such a “poetic” name. She arrived on May 7, 1878. Lillie's sister Anna said that she looked like a little Indian papoose because of her olive complexion. (Mabel inherited her darker complexion.) As a child she was nicknamed “Squaw.” She loved to catch and care for birds by putting them in various parts of the house.

John saw that the children had the best things available. Oranges were very scarce and a luxury but he always had one for each of the children on Christmas. He never forgot a birthday; they had the nicest toys he could buy.

Lillie evidently did not remember if her grandmother Anderson's given name was “Matta” or “Martha,” probably because she was only four years old when her grandmother died. She did have a fond memory of walking to her home just a half block away, and was given a lump of sugar and her grandma let Lillie sit in a large red rocking chair.

Then, when Lillie was about six years old, the roof was blown off their home. Her father and brother, John, were up on top putting rocks on the corners of the roof to hold it down when it came off. It carried her father with it. His back was injured and, as a result, he always had a small lump on his back.

Her father continually had a group of children with him when he went to the farm to work. They had fun and he would often cook a nice dinner for them on a campfire. Another treat for Lillie was going with him to the Ephraim Co-op at night (where he was manager) and let her thread the button machine with buttons to put on the shoes so they wouldn't come off.

Although her father was a good provider and they never lacked for good food or clothing, the children never saw money. If they needed anything, he would trade wheat or vegetables, or if the children wanted candy or a ride on the “donkey-driven” merry-go-round, they took an egg for payment. If he gave them money, her father used to say, “I wouldn't dare spend it; I would have to save it for taxes.”

When Lillie was nine years old she was with a group of friends who decided to go out for a treat. She didn't have any money, but her older brother John said, “Here is a dime for you. You go with the girls.” She was so excited that she put it between her teeth to be sure not to lose it while she put on her coat. In the excitement, she swallowed it.

A friend who lived near invited Lillie over to her house to try some wedding cake. In those days it was the custom to have “dark brandied” wedding cake that was kept under a glass dome for fifty years, then served at the “Golden Wedding” celebration. Her friend lifted the glass dome from her newly married uncle's wedding cake and, after several sessions, she and Lillie hollowed out the cake. They often wondered what happened at the Golden Wedding when the guests were invited to help eat the cake.

Lillie's youngest brother Ernest died when he was less than a year old on September 12, 1891 and her mother, Mari Ane, died just three months later leaving the balance of a family of eight; Lillie only thirteen years old. Two years later, her father John married Stina Mickelson, a widow with two daughters. There is a picture of Lillie and her sisters sitting on the porch with their father; Stina sitting on the side of them. There was, no doubt, some adjustment with a stepmother.

During this time, Lillie went to grade school and a half-year at Sanpete State Academy, which later became Snow College. Then, at the age of sixteen, she came to Salt Lake City to work for a family with nine children. Here she did the washing, ironing, cooking, and cleaning for $12 a month.

“Lillie Matilda Ander..son Married Soren Christian Soren..sen”

(Even without music, the occasion guaranteed “harmony”) She had known Soren all of her life. At the young age of nineteen, on August 25,1897, they

borrowed a black horse and, no doubt, a buggy belonging to the druggist that Soren worked for and headed to the Manti Temple to be married. After going halfway, they had to turn around and go back for her recommend that she had forgotten. There was a dinner party that night but no honeymoon because Soren had one day off and the next day he was back to work at seven in the morning.

After they were married, they lived in the two rooms above the drugstore where Soren worked. H. P. Larsen, Soren's employer, raised his salary from $30 a month to $35 and then let them have the two rooms for the extra $5 per month. There was no water in the apartment and all water had to be carried upstairs and then back down again.

Lillie's father gave them a cow, her stepmother gave them a rocking chair, and her sisters and brothers gave them a table and four chairs. They bought a Monarch stove and a bedroom set for the $35 Soren had saved for the wedding. During the time they lived above the drugstore, Soren continued to work each day from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. except on holidays and Saturdays when the store didn't close until 2 a.m. when there were dances. Then, in the middle of the night, he often had to get out of bed and go downstairs to get medicine for people.

When their family grew with Horace, Fay and Lucy, they moved into a small house nearby and they later decided to build a home of their own. They bought the cheapest bricks they could find for the outside, Lillie held the light while Soren hammered the nails. They painted the house with paint samples. With three rooms, plus a kitchen and pantry, the house cost $800.

Soren, on his meager wages, had saved $600 which left him short $200. Since there was no bank in town, he went to a neighbor, Metta Johnson, and asked to borrow that amount. She sent him into the bedroom to bring out the box kept under her bed for ten $20 gold pieces. Soren asked, “Don't you want to count it?” She responded, “You've counted it; that's good enough for me.” When Soren returned the $200, he offered to pay her interest, her reply was, “If I couldn't help a neighbor, I wouldn't be worth much.”

With the arrival of their sixth child, Maynard, in 1915, Horace was 16, Fay 14, Lucy 12, Mabel 7 and Morgan was 3 years old. Life was good for Soren and Lillie. However, in October 1918 there was a challenge to the family when the Flu epidemic broke out.

A boy who had returned from the army in Europe was in a barbershop with three friends when he took sick. The next day all three of them were sick; one of them was a neighbor. Morgan had walked to school with the neighbor's brother. Morgan became sick and the next day all the rest of the Sorensen children became sick. Maynard, then four years old, was the last to get the Flu and lived only four days.

Their were whole families that died. One of their neighbors were at the cemetery burying two children. When they returned home, their baby was dead, leaving them only two children out of five. Schools and all public places were closed. Students had to do their studies at home. The only doctor in town was also sick.

As their family grew, Soren and Lillie built three homes and remodeled another while they lived in Ephraim. Lillie did nearly all the painting inside all the homes. Each home they built had to have a vegetable garden and Lillie did the planting, weeding and watering, so they had enough vegetables and greens for the summer. They had a couple dozen chickens and raised a hog for meat for the winter.

Reading about the hog they raised, I need to take this opportunity to write about the experience we had with mother just a short time after Becky and I were married. We were living on the dairy farm in Woods Cross and with the byproduct of the milk combined with grain we had fattened a pig and had it ready to be butchered. Becky's mother-in-law, Lillie, found an opportunity to teach the “new bride” something that she had never been able to get anyone else in the family to do with her.

They bottled the meat, made “Finker,” Scandinavian name for head cheese, pickled the feet, cleaned the intestines and filled them with sausage and with the fat left over made laundry soap. In fact, we went many years using laundry soap made by mother. This has been a choice experience and I appreciate Becky's willingness to go along with mother on the preparation of something that was a product of “Lillie's” frugal life in Ephraim.

The ‘Jersey’ cow that was given to them by Lillie's father was exceptionally well cared for, washed, curried, brushed, and blanketed at night. Soren would milk her in the morning before going to work, came home at noon to feed her and then cared for her when he came home at night. Besides the milk and extra rich cream used from this special cow, Lillie made 14 pounds of butter a week, which sold for 14 cents a pound. Here again, this is important to me because the cows we had on the dairy in Woods Cross were also Jersey cows.

Lillie, with some help from the girls, did all their own sewing and baking; we couldn't buy things, so she made the small boy's clothes out of their father's clothes when he couldn't wear them any longer.

Laundry and baking starch was made out of surplus potatoes that were left over in the spring by grating the potatoes, strained them through a cloth and then letting the water with the starch seep through. She had to change the water a couple times a day until it was nice and white and then dried it out on tables in the sun.

Lillie told of Soren saving another $200 to go into business for himself selling groceries and candy. From there, it was hardware and furniture, after which he traveled ten years for Dinwoody

Furniture Company. By this time, Horace, the eldest of the children, was home from the Denver, Colorado Mission and was attending school at the University of Utah.

Soren was traveling both Utah and Idaho, leaving Lillie with the younger children in Ephraim. She wanted to move to Salt Lake City where she could at least have her family together, but Soren insisted that “we just couldn't leave our friends.”

Fred Morse, a life-long friend and then manager of Scott Hardware in Salt Lake City, told Lillie that he would help her convince Soren to make the move. Together they arranged for Soren to visit Salt Lake during a big celebration. When asked how he liked it, Soren said, “What a terrible place, there are too many people. You can't even get a decent meal.” It was difficult, but Fred and Lillie finally managed to get Soren to move to Salt Lake City in 1922; the next year, I was born, the only one of the family that did not have the Ephraim experience.

This move proved to be a great transition in the life of Lillie because they moved to 139 South 12th East, just a few blocks west of the University of Utah where her family would be able to get a good education, yet have a close family relationship. It also gave Soren the opportunity to work for Malleable Iron Range Company representing Monarch Ranges in both Utah and Idaho. The manager asked Soren, if being a Mormon, he didn't have more than one wife. “Yes,” he quickly responded, “but you send this check to my first wife.”

With Soren’s concentration on promoting the sale of Monarch Ranges on the road and Horace was attending the U of U, they decided to open a store for Monarch Ranges in Sugar House with Horace doing his studying at the store and selling ranges to anyone that stopped in. This was the starting of the family enterprise that became South East Furniture Co. Horace was soon married to Ethel and eventually Bill Stucki, Lucy's husband, did the janitorial work in the morning, sold through the day, and delivered at night.

Life was good for both Soren and Lillie and their family. They had the opportunity to build another home, this time, in Salt Lake, just a block away at 256 South 12th East. Lillie enjoyed her participation in the Relief Society of the University Ward and was a counselor for six years. During her life, she traveled to Hawaii, the Mediterranean, the Holy Land, Scandinavia, Mexico, Alaska and Canada, not to mention a bus trip in 1962 to the Seattle World's Fair with her sister, Nora. On her ninetieth birthday, she went to Disneyland.

Soren died in 1948. Lillie carried on with great influence on her family, and many others, for another twenty-eight years with a posterity of eight children (all living except Maynard), 28 grandchildren, 75 great-grandchildren and 3 great-great grandchildren ••• and many more since then.

Lillie stated, “I have always been grateful we didn't have much money when we were raising our children. We had to learn to work and it is a blessing to know how to work.” She made quilts for all 28 grandchildren.

Reproduction of booklet from November 1968