Hello, we are your pioneer ancestors...

We heard the gospel from our neighbors, from our sons, from traveling missionaries. We embraced it, we feared it, we threw whitewash at the elders, we never believed it, we knew it was true the minute we heard it. We were baptized in the ice, we wanted to go first in the water (but our husbands insisted it was their right), we were healed of being a cripple for 13 years, we waited, we could miraculously speak English after coming out of the water. We were persecuted by the neighbors, our husband was killed, our wife and child died soon after we converted, we started packing to move to Nauvoo, our husband started abusing us, we were scared to join the Saints, we canvassed the countryside sharing the gospel, our parents kicked us out of the house. We later became members of the Reorganized Church or Seventh Day Adventists. We never joined the Mormons and couldn’t understand our children who did, but came to Utah anyway. We stayed faithful to our foundational religious conversions all our lives.

We came to Kirtland and donated money to build the temple, we were part of the early gathering and mentioned in the D&C. We were killed by the mobs in Missouri. We heard about the gospel and met the Saints in Nauvoo. We died at Nauvoo, we were married and started our families there. We packed up with eight other families to come to Nauvoo, we took the children and escaped England, we worked as a missionary and waited, we had a dream and knew it was time, we were compelled to gather. We died at Winter Quarters. We gave up friends and families, livelihoods and lives.

We were Methodist ministers, we were state legislators, we had written treatises on religion, we knew nothing about religion. We were learned, we were illiterate. We were raised by a black nanny, we had never seen a black person. We were wealthy and brought gold coins sewed in our skirt. We said goodbye to family and lands we'd never see again. The scenery would not ever feel the same in our Zion. We came via the Perpetual Emigration Fund, and sucked on peach pits for sustenance. We found gold in California. We sailed to Australia and back. We rescued a child and were rewarded with our heart’s desire. We left riches, we found riches, we left poverty, and we found poverty.

We were friends with Joseph Smith, we never met him. We saw the mantle fall on Brigham Young, we guided and moved and built for Brigham, we disagreed with Brigham. We married at Brigham’s command, we defied his instructions. He spoke at our funerals. We walked across the plains and joined the Saints in Utah. We rode the train and arrived in Salt Lake City. We were bitten by a rattlesnake and miraculously healed. We brought the rocking chair our husband made before he died in Winter Quarters. We rode an ox cart, we sailed on a ship. We saw dolphins, we interrupted a Civil War battle at sea. We met soldiers on trains. We got cholera, we nearly died, we were healed, we got seasick. We were ill the entire trip, we thrived on prairie adventures. We kept a pet kitten that was a skunk.

We were old grandparents who died on the way, we were young mothers who died in childbirth, we were teenagers who thought crossing the plains was a lark, we were pregnant and weary. We were Revolutionary War veterans, we lived to see airplanes fly overhead. We were handcart pioneers, we were handcart rescuers. We were a babe carried in arms. We were the leaders of Brigham’s vanguard company, we had never seen an ox before and put the yoke on the wrong end. We were an old grandma kidnapped by our son in Nebraska--we escaped. We joined the Mormon Battalion and crossed the plains more than once.

We spoke German, we spoke Danish, we spoke Swedish, we spoke Gaelic, we spoke Welsh, we spoke Norwegian, we spoke English with a British accent. We were proud Wikings, we were loyal American Patriots. We learned to write in the Deseret Alphabet, we never learned English. We returned on missions to our homelands, to England, to Denmark, to Vermont. We were brunette and blond, gray haired, white haired, blue eyed, and brown eyed and heterochromic; mustached and bearded, scarred, sunburned, and freckled. (I don't think anyone was bald.) We kept prolific journals and none at all. We lied about our ages, our illegitimate births, and our previous spouses; we had dreams about the ones we’d left behind.

We loved Salt Lake City, we hated it. We stayed and settled. We left and went back to Iowa, to Scotland. We died the day after arriving. We spread out and farmed in Brigham City, in Logan, in Idaho which we thought was still in Utah. We went down to Dixie when called, and named our son St. George. We settled in American Fork, in Provo, in Scipio. We were scared of the natives, we were friends with the natives, we spoke their language and delivered their babies. We returned east and then west and were on the move.

We built stills and opened bars (and were told to close the bar when called as bishop). We were called to work in the vineyard and the cotton fields down south. We planted asparagus and onions, and tomatoes. We quarried the stone to build the temple, grander than anything we'd seen. It was a miserable land, nothing like the big cities of Europe we knew. We were silver miners, lawyers, barbers, and bookkeepers, but mostly we all became farmers. We women worked as lacemaker, postmistress, midwife, milliner, cook, and teachers. We wore bags of caterpillars around our neck to help the silkworms hatch. We took lake water and dried it for salt. We saw the railroad come, we helped build the railroad, we came on the railroad. We died getting too close to the kitchen fire, in a buggy accident, in childbirth, of old age, being kicked by a horse. We went blind.

We stayed married for many years, we divorced our husband, we took more wives. We married feisty young plural wives who fought, and we regretted it. We took our younger wives on missions, we married wives on missions, we stayed married to our first spouse only. We had 2 children, we had 18 children, we had 25 children, most of our fifteen children died at birth. But we all did have children, because you came through our lineage. We died on the same day as our beloved spouse. We buried children and spouses and parents and dreams. We still believed in everlasting life.

We sang, we farmed, we cooked, we sewed, we learned, we dreamed, we built. We played checkers and mourned Queen Victoria’s death. We liked astronomy and noted comets in our journal. We wrote home to England, we had relatives visit from afar, we went to South Carolina to settle a brother’s estate, we never had contact with our past again. We had smart horses who knew tricks, and special china plates. We learned telegraphy as a teenager, we were wrongly imprisoned for murder, we were murdered, we lived through an earthquake, we drove cars. We made bricks and chairs and families and tabernacles, we did genealogical research, we played the zither and started a choir. 

We were mayors and housewives, patriarchs and apostates. We were immigrants and refugees, we had interfaith marriages and marriages with foreigners. We went to jail, we went to the temple, we went home, we went to heaven. We were ever faithful, we were never faithful. We saw miracles, and we pleaded for miracles that never came. And we are all part of you.

Thanks for celebrating all 90 of us (Cramer & Wells pioneer ancestors) today!