Luther M Winsor Journal Starting May 27th-August 31st 1900

Luther Murkins Winsor at age 13 in 1897, three years before the start of this journal. 

Title Pages

Luther was 16 year's old at this time and working at various jobs as were his father and brother Andy. He starts here with his job at Daniel Pages' farm where he has been carrying supplies to the brick layers:

Modern example of a hod carrier

Definition of hod carrier. : a laborer employed in carrying supplies to bricklayers, stonemasons, cement finishers, or plasterers on the job.
General-purpose assistance is what a Hod Carrier provides. You need physical strength to mix, pack, and carry bricks, stones, mortar, and other construction materials necessary for the project.











"From May 5th up to present date carried brick hod on Pages' dwelling house."

Sunday was a day off, and Luther and his friends took on a challenge on the 20th.

"On Sunday 20th in company with H. Tenham, Sam Halterman, Sam Woodward, climbed highest Mountain around Pages' ranch which is around 8,000 feet"

He had $5.05 surplus money at the start of this job.

On Sunday, May 6th he and a friend went to Pinto to an " 'orster' supper out in the pasture. Supper cost $.30 per man." Likely this was an 'oyster' supper, oysters being a popular fancy food at that time. A new shirt and day book were purchased, then a Sunday of rest.

Then we see him working Through to June 1st. He often makes note of how much wind there is. A hard wind would really impact the outdoor workers.

By Sunday, June 3rd, his work on the house is done and he received $38 for his work, plus another $20 for his work in the brick yard. Back in Pinto, he bought a $2.55 pair of shoes and hard candy? Then he seems to break in the shoes on a 15 mile walk home from Pinto to Enterprise.

On June 6th he finishes the milk 'seller' (cellar?) and then goes with his father to Pages' ranch again. There followed an enjoyable time singing "and etc. with the Misses Amie, Eva and Dellie Page until 12 o'clock"
He took his father to an iron mine and gathered something-wood? on his way home. He ate breakfast and dinner together at the castle at BP.  I wonder if he is referring to the fort at Pipe Springs, which was nicknamed 'Winsor Castle' in honor of Anson Perry Winsor, his grandfather, who built the fort and maintained the Bishop's tithing herds, producing butter and cheese for the workers at the Saint George Temple.

On the 8th he stayed at home in weather he describes as "quite warm".  On the 9th he cleaned and whitewashed the east bedroom. At that time homes were heated with wood and coal, cooking was on coal or wood stoves and oil lamps and candles were used for light. All this produced smoke so that soot grimed the walls of the home, especially the kitchen. As a result, the walls needed periodic cleaning and a fresh coat of whitewash. Whitewash was made with water and lime or chalk and was not durable, but it was inexpensive. I think of Tom Sawyer whitewashing the fence and rooking his friends into doing the job for him, even paying him for the privilege. In the journals of Amy Irene Wooley, written in a similar time period, she often complains about having to whitewash the kitchen and wishes whitewashing could be entirely done away with.

On Sunday the 10th we get another glimpse of the social life of the time. "In company with S. West and Amelia Adair went to spring creek where Julia West and S. Adair met us, then went to Alger's ranch. Got home at 11:20. (S. for Sister?)

On the 10th it is cowboy Luther who goes out on horseback to help gather up the milk cows from pasture and afterwards rode with friends, eventually traveling to Modena and on to Nevada.

By the 12th he is working with the railroad section men. He returned by handcar to Modena with 5 bottles of Port wine.
A handcar was a way to travel on the rails that was much faster than walking. The handcar was hand pumped to propel it along the tracks.

On the 13th he stayed in ? and ate dinner and supper with Laura Canfield.

On the 14th he took a load of freight to the state line. That is a dizzying number of different jobs in just a short time. Work seemed to be plentiful and varied for a young hard working boy with the strength, energy and basic skills needed to do a number of utilitarian tasks.

The next page starts at the 15th and the start of more railroad section work at Beryl with a move to Lund the next day on the cowcatcher of the train. Can't you just visualize a bunch of them hooting it up riding on the very front of the train?
Sunday he worked awhile on a pump and wrote a letter to Annilie Adair.
The next week he worked at Lund, pumping water until 9 pm and worked the next two days on the pump and water leaks. The 21st he moved to Modena again to work on the pipeline between windmills, which continued to Sunday the 24th. Irrigation was critical for farming in this arid region.

The 25th -27th Luther was digging trenches for pipes. His brother Andy came from home on the 27th and on the 28th Luther went with the train to a sand pit at hot springs to load box cars with sand then went on to Millford. On the 29th he"  'sanded' 10 cattle cars before breakfast. Came out to Nevada. Worked there all afternoon, came back to modena. On 28th Andy went to work for J. S. Holey.
30th Worked on pipeline at pasture. "

"Aug 15th Started cutting corn fodder. Came home from Modena on 9th July. Spent 24th July (Pioneer Day) at Hebron. Went to Harmony on 1st August, came back on 3rd Aug. Attended a dance on night of 1st in Harmony"

Dances were a chief way for youth and older folk alike to gather and socialize and have a good time, and dances were fairly common events.

"On 1st work started on undercurrent dam. Sinking pipe to find bedrock."  Much of the summer's work  seems like a foreshadowing of  his life's work in irrigation and dam building as an engineer.

"Aug 16 hauled a load of Pine Wood"

"Aug 17th Stayed home. Hard wind all day In morning was unloading wood from wagon when a stick caught in glove finger jerking me off of the wagon but was not seriously injured."

"18th Worked on Farm cutting corn fodder laying. 'Bucked' until 2nd September."

I am assuming the hard wind flattened the corn in the field and they were cutting it from where it was bent over lying on the ground, gathering into bundles and hauling the fodder in on wagons. Bucking hay is a term for heaving bales of hay on or off of a wagon or truck, so Bucking fodder would be similar.

September 2nd and 3rd
The grape harvest was on and Luther worked for D. Hatch drying grapes and making wine. Southern Utah was a warm enough climate for grape growing and wine making was a common home industry as well as a farm industry. Brigham Young had encouraged the culture of grapes in this area. Grandma Eyring in Colonia Juarez over the border in Mexico had fine arbors of grapes along their property and was well known for them and for the products made from them.

He attended a conference, probably a local stake conference, which are now usually held 2 times a year. The fall fair was scheduled at the same time, which would have made it easier for outlying residents to come in for conference and attend and enter things into the fair at the same time. This was a social time and Luther says he was visited by a crowd of young people and went to the fair the next day. The next day there was an evening outing to Dodges Spring with a group of friends including May ? Will Josie, Eva Higgins, Owen Pierce, Aggie Wordsworth, Charles, Doug and brother Andy. He attended Balls on the 6th, 10th and 12th. Perhaps the traditional Green and Gold Balls that used to be an annual church social event. Green and Gold were the colors of the Young Men's and Young Women's Mutual Improvement Association being held at various wards.
The name has changed over time, but is basically the activity program in the church for youth. Luther says he met Miss Wordsworth, perhaps the Aggie Wordsworth from the outing to the spring.

Washington is a town 4.8 miles from Saint George. Starting on the 16th Luther starts work constructing a brickyard, getting tools from a field in Washington. This involves a lot of hard labor, digging a pit, setting up the yard, but when the work is done he goes with  the misses Wordsworth and Higgins on a 'raid' of the Winsor lot. He doesn't say what they are raiding, but we can speculate there was fruit ripe at this time in the family orchards, so that is a possibility.
Then the next day was spent in St. George with time in the evening spent in the company of the same young ladies.

Saint George is called 'Utah's Dixie', and many people retire there as it has a reputation for having a mild climate compared to Northern Utah and Idaho, but this is all relative as we see that the first snow fell on September 24th. The cold can be very fierce in this area in the winter. Luther goes back to Washington and finishes the brick yard, wetting down the sand pit and the work of producing bricks commences.