William Jordan Flake - Brief life sketch

William Jordan Flake and Lucy White Written by Lucy Turley for her Family History page in her Book of Remembrance William Jordan Flake, born in Anson County, North Carolina 3 July 1839. He was three years old when his family moved to Mississippi. Here his folds joined the church and soon moved to Nauvoo. Here William saw his first temple. A youth of eight years he walked the entire distance across the plains to Utah. In 1851 he moved with his family to California. While swimming one day he dove from a stump about 8 feet high and struck the ground in shallow water. His head was knocked back so he could only look upwards. The physician told him that he would never be able to get it down again. He walked around bent over so that he could see going forward. He worked for months on his neck and finally got it straight. He returned to Utah at the time of Johnston’s Army. He settled on a cattle ranch at Beaver. There he married Lucy White in 1858. In 1877, in answer to President Wilford Woodruff’s call, he left with a wagon train and herds of cattle for the Little Colorado region of Arizona. The colonists lived in their wagons that winter and were forced to cut up sacks and canvas for clothing. In the spring William traded cattle for the James Stinson ranch. He was told the ranch was just large enough to support his family but he wanted a Ward of the Church there so invited other Saints to join them. They were very poor for a while but finally were able to bail up. In 1878 Erastus Snow of the Council of the Twelve Apostles visited them and they formed a town called Snowflake. (Name came from combining Erastus Snow and William Flake.) Also organized a Stake and Wards there. When Apache County was created in 1878 Snowflake was temporarily the County Seat and the first term of court was held in the Flake home. Noted for his generosity William Flake furnished thousands of free meals to neighbors, business men, and chuck line riders alike. He established the Thanksgiving-time custom of furnishing free wood and free beef to every widow or needy person in the community. Hale and hearty in his old age he rode the range until a short time before his death at the age of 93.

-Contributed By Laron Kent Billingsley, on FamilySearch

William Jordan Flake- Following the Prophet

From "To the Last Frontier," written by Lucy Hannah White Flake, William Jordan Flake's wife In the winter of 1873 William (Jordan Flake) was asked by Brigham Young, the Great Western Colonizer, to go with a party of twelve men on an exploring trip to Arizona. They had pack horses to carry their bedding and provisions and each one was mounted on a good saddle horse. They crossed the Colorado at Lee's Ferry, traveled south, passed the San Francisco Mountains and into the Upper Verde Valley. They passed through the vicinity of where Flagstaff is now located. They encountered deep snows and extreme cold weather. The snow in one place was so deep it was up to the shoulders of their saddle horses. The men took turns breaking the trail through these drifts. The lead horse would make six jumps then drop behind to catch his breath while the second horse would take six jumps. In this way they traveled all day. When Brigham Young sent the party out, he told them that they would have grass for their horses every night. The men had great confidence in his word and faith in his promises, but on this day it looked impossible for this promise to be realized. About four o'clock in the afternoon they looked down into a valley and there saw a small patch of green grass where the wind had blown the snow away. They headed their poor tired horses for it and that night they had the promised grass. After about two weeks of this intense cold and hardship, the men decided they had had enough of Arizona and started to return. At a certain place Adam Greenwood and William turned off to come to Beaver. Provisions were scarce and as they were only two days from home they gave what they had to the others who still had several days travel ahead of them. By night William and his companion were pretty hungry. Brigham Young had also promised the company that if they would not waste game which was plentiful in those days, that they should have meat when they needed it. They hadn't seen any game for two or three days and were getting hungry for meat. The two men had camped for the night. Had unsaddled their horses, built a campfire and were wondering how they were going twenty-four hours more without food. As they sat there warming and resting their tired limbs Adam said, "Bill, President Young promised us meat when we needed it, didn't he? Well, we need it now, if anyone ever did." "We will get it," my husband answered, confidently, "I never knew of one of Brigham Young's promises to fail." "Well, this is the one time when his promise will fail to the ground," said Adam. The two men were hovered around the fire. The sun was setting. Suddenly they saw at a distance a big white hare standing in the snow. William said, "Well, Adam, there is your meat." Adam remarked, "Bad as I want meat, I wouldn't go that far through this snow after it. If we are to have meat tonight, it will have to come to us." I have heard William tell many times how that big mountain hare came as direct to their fire as an arrow could fly. When it got near enough he hit it with a hard snowball he had made; it gave one jump into the air and was lying there in the snow kicking when he went to it, picked it up and wrung its head off. They had plenty of meat for supper and breakfast. They reached home that night.

Edward Thomas Jordan 1856-1907

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Dolores Jordan - George Jordan - Edward Thomas Jordan

George Ernest Jordan

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Dolores Jordan - George Jordan

"Spike" the umpire

This was a letter written to George Comber for a school project in which his grandfather told him about 
"WHAT TOOK PLACE IN OUR COUNTRY WHEN I WAS A LITTLE BOY" 
Story written by George Ernest Jordan 
January 6, 1966 

I was born in Pocatello, Idaho April 3, 1898. My mother (Mary Jane Peake) was washing and hanging our clothes, when I decided it was time for me to enter this world. We didn't have a doctor to deliver me, so my mother had a mid wife. Which is a woman who helps women in childbirth. My parents didn't have very much money. We lived across the railroad track near the railroad yards where my father (Edward Thomas Jordan) worked. When I was a small boy just eight years old my father was hurt in the railroad yards and died (July 3, 1907) My mother had a large family, 5 girls and 6 boys. When my father died he didn't leave my mother very much money, so we all had to work so we could live. I sold newspapers on the street corners, shined shoes and I would turn all the money I earned over to my mother to help feed and clothe us so we could go to school. 
I worked ever since I was 10 years old and I did plenty odd jobs. I was a pin setter in a bowling ally, messenger boy for the western union and I used to have a little red wagon the I pulled along the Railroad yard picking up lumps of coal that fell off the railroad cars, as they were switched from one track to another so we could keep warm and cook our meals. We didn't know what gas was at the time. We didn't have electric lights, we would burn kerosene lamp. We didn't have a bathroom like you have now. We had to take our bath in a wash tub (metal) my mother used to wash her clothes in it. Our toilet was outside. We called it a privey or outhouse. We didn't have running water so we had a pump and metal zinc. We had a kitchen stove that would bun wood and coal and had a reservoir that we would get warm water for our baths or heat water in a bucket. There was no such thing a Electric Lights, telephone, radio, television, but we had one of the fist old Edison phonograph, silent movies, opera houses and road shoes, and how we enjoyed them. 
When I got older I worked for the railroad as a call boy (calling freight train crews) then checking cars (car clerk), freight clerk, manifest clerk, E&F timekeeper, etc. When I was 15 years old I was considered one of the best swimmers and high divers around Ogden Utah. I made high dives of 65 feet from the 31st Bridge over Weber River from a moving freight train. Also every Sunday night at Lagoon, a pleasure resort, I did a FIRE DIVE from 35 feet into the swimming area of the lake. For instance we danced the 3 step, 2 step, one step waltz. 
In my life time the following have been invented. Telephones, Electric Lights, automobiles, airplanes, radio, television and motorcycles. 

 George / George (on the right) waiting to get a baseball signed

 George with his 2 youngest children: Bob and Donna / George the baseball umpire (middle)

 George (2nd from left) with siblings Leroy, Edward and Georgina Jordan

Ethel Estelle Ray

Alicia Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Horace Henry Flake - Ethel Estelle Ray

Ethel with great-grandchildren Shawn Peden, Tanya, and Lance Cleveland

Ethel with daughter Veoma and great-grandchildren Lance and Tanya / With son Les and his family

Osmer Dennis Flake

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Horace Henry Flake - Osmer Dennis Flake

Brothers James, Charles, and Osmer Flake

Osmer Dennis Flake by Brian A. Warburton

Osmer “Oz” Dennis Flake was born 6 March 1868 in Beaver, Utah, to William Jordan Flake and Lucy Hannah White. When Oz was nine years old his family attended the dedication of the Saint George, Utah temple and while there his father was asked to move his family to Arizona to build an LDS community. On 31 October 1877 the family began a three month journey to their new home and in the summer of 1878 Oz’s father bought a ranch and began organizing a community. Erastus Snow, a prominent Mormon leader came to survey the area and the name given to the community was created by combining the last names of Snow and Flake, thus becoming Snowflake, Arizona. Oz helped his father raise cattle, but in 1884 his father was sent to prison for unlawful cohabitation (polygamy) and Oz, then 16 years of age, took full responsibility for the ranch at that time. He left home in August 1889 and went to Provo, Utah, to attend Brigham Young Academy, but had to return home the following spring when he ran out of money. On 11 March 1891 Oz married Elsie Abigail Owens and in October of that same year they traveled to Manti, Utah where they were sealed in the Manti temple. After his marriage he worked as a store clerk and on 4 April 1895 he was appointed clerk of the District Court for Navajo County, Arizona.

Oz was called to serve an LDS mission to the Southern States leaving his home, pregnant wife and three small children on 6 December 1897. Upon leaving he said, “To leave my dear wife and children is the greatest sacrifice that I was ever called on to make.”2 After traveling to Salt Lake City to be set apart as a missionary and to receive instructions Oz traveled by train to the Southern States headquarters in Chattanooga, Tennessee. When he arrived in Chattanooga he was very tired and wanted to rest, but instead he was sent the same night to his area of labor in Mississippi. Once in Mississippi Oz and his companions spent much of their time traveling from house to house preaching the gospel and holding meetings.

Anti-Mormon sentiment was high in Mississippi at that time and Oz often met with persecution and even threats. In one town the Mayor told them not to go door to door because “There was men in this town who would kill us…and they (the city officials) would extend us no protection.”3 But the missionaries also met many who were friendly and treated them well and their meetings were usually well attended. Tensions were high between those who were friendly and those who hated the Mormons. While in Yazoo County, Mississippi the missionaries found many who were interested in listening to them, but one day while they were preparing for an outdoor sermon Oz received word that he was to go meet a committee representing a mob that had been raised to run the missionaries out of the County. The mob threatened to kill Oz and the other missionaries if they did not leave by 2:00 that afternoon. The missionaries agreed and when they left Oz remarked “The people just cried. It was like a funeral all hated to see us go. They offered to defend us with their lives.”4 In 1899 Oz was called to serve as a Conference President, helping to direct missionary efforts in Mississippi. He was informed of his release as a missionary in early 1900 and on 26 February 1900 he began the trip home arriving there on 4 March 1900.

After returning home Oz went to work as a clerk in a store owned by his brothers and was also called to be the Superintendent of the Sunday School. After he returned home his wife, Elsie became seriously ill and by 1908 the doctors didn’t know what to do. The doctors suggested taking her to California, hoping that the better climate would improve her health. In February 1908 they traveled to Los Angeles, California and rented a room for Elsie and her parents. Oz had to return to Arizona to attend to business, but by March 1908 Elsie had sent word that she wanted Oz to come to her and to bring the children. Oz took the children to Los Angeles to find that her condition had gotten much worse and on 25 March 1908 Elsie died. Upon her death Oz recorded that he had been “Priviledged to keep the dearest, best and most dutiful wife it has pleased the Lord to send to earth…we tearfully bow to the will of the Lord.”5

After the death of his wife Oz earned his living by raising and selling horses and cattle and later was employed as a forest ranger. On 4 October 1911 Oz married Ethel Ray in the Salt Lake Temple. He served a short three month mission to the Central States in 1913 and on 7 November 1916 he was elected to the Arizona House of Representatives. He continued his involvement in politics throughout the years and in 1925 he served another six month mission to the southern states. When the Great Depression hit in the 1930’s Oz worked many odd jobs and spent a lot of time performing ordinances at the LDS temple in Mesa, Arizona. In 1942 at the age of 74 Oz was once again called to serve a mission to the Southern States. While on this mission Oz spent much of his time visiting with less active members of the church and also researching his family history. He returned from his mission 12 July 1943. For the rest of his life Oz continued to work on his family history and spent many hours performing ordinances in the temple. He stayed active and healthy most of his life, finally passing away 29 January 1958 in Phoenix, Arizona at the age of eighty-nine.

Source:

http://lib.byu.edu/collections/mormon-missionary-diaries/about/diarists/osmer-dennis-flake/
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Osmer as the President of the Mississippi Conference, 1899

 Osmer is sitting behind the front-center man

Osmer / 4 generations: W J Flake, Osmer, Ada, and Larry

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See also:
https://books.google.com/books?id=SiQuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA78&lpg=PA78&dq=osmer+dennis+flake&source=bl&ots=Shz8_5GCi_&sig=WFIB1RJny4k4wuFwH1unsTjp_IM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=j9RCVd-cFtGuyATduICgAQ&ved=0CDwQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=osmer%20dennis%20flake&f=false

William Jordan Flake - on Wikipedia, plus links to 2 books

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Horace Henry Flake - Osmer Dennis Flake - William Jordan Flake

William J. Flake

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

William J. Flake
Born	William Jordan Flake July 3, 1839 North Carolina
Died	August 10, 1932 (aged 93) Snowflake Arizona

William Jordan Flake (July 3, 1839 – August 10, 1932)^[1][2][3] was a prominent member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who helped settle parts of Arizona, and was imprisoned for polygamy.^[4]

Life and career 

Flake was born in North Carolina.^[5] He eventually moved to Mississippi with his family, and in the early 1840s they became members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Flake moved to Utah with his parents in 1849 by wagon train. In 1850, his father was killed while examining a colony site in California. His widowed mother took the family and became one of the earliest residents ofSan Bernardino.

In 1858, William Flake married Lucy Hannah White and a year later started a cattle ranch in Beaver, Utah. Flake was called by Church leaders to enter into a plural marriage. He asked his wife to consider the decision, and after much prayer and consideration, she agreed. William Flake and Prudence Kartchner were married in 1868.

In 1877, he was called by LDS Church President Brigham Young to start a settlement in the northern area of what was then the Arizona Territory.^[6] William left with a wagon train and herds of cattle for the Little Colorado River region of Arizona and arrived in January 1878. Despite much hardship after spending 13 months on the trail and a winter living in stables and wagons, the settlement survived. In the fall of 1878, Erastus Snow, an LDS Apostle, visited and joined with Flake naming the town Snowflake: "Snow for me and Flake for you." Flake became a rancher and prominent cattleman, noted for his generosity and assistance to his neighbors.

In 1883, Flake was imprisoned in the Yuma Territorial Prison for a short time for unlawful cohabitation, a common charge used to prosecute LDS men under the Edmunds Act. After his release, he was asked which of his wives he was going to give up. He replied, "Neither. I married both in good faith and intended to support both of them." He had served his sentence and could not be retried on the same charges.

In 1959, Flake was posthumously nominated and then inducted into the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in the Hall of Great Westerners for his contributions as a colonizer and cattleman.^[7]

William Jordan Flake was the father of 15 sons and five daughters and lived to the age of 93, passing away on August 10, 1932 in Snowflake, Arizona.

Legacy 

When he died, the flag at the Arizona State Capitol was flown at half staff in honor of his contribution to the settlement of the state.

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200-page biography (including many photos) of William Jordan Flake by his descendant Ron Freeman:

https://familysearch.org/patron/v2/TH-303-41927-362-43/dist.pdf?ctx=ArtCtxPublic

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W. J. Flake's diary he kept while in prison for polygamy:

http://cdm15999.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/SCMisc/id/24773

Lucy Hannah White (wife of William Jordan Flake)

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Horace Henry Flake - Osmer Dennis Flake - Lucy Hannah White

--taken from the Smith Family Tree Book , published by W. Thomas Smith Listing the relatives of General William Alexander Smith and of W. Thomas Smith---Osmer D. Flake

Lucy White Flake: Pioneering Utah and Arizona
Lucy Hannah White was born in 1842 in Knox County, Illinois, the oldest of Samuel and Mary Burton White's eight children. Her grandparents and parents had joined the Church in England and emigrated to the United States to be with the Saints. Lucy was baptized in the ice-covered Missouri River when she was seven years old and walked across the plains with her family when she was eight.

Shortly after their arrival in Utah, the Whites, including Grandfather White and Lucy's uncles Dennis, Joel, and David, were called to settle a new community thirty-five miles south of Salt Lake City. In her 1894 autobiography, Lucy recalled that they "camped at a butifull spring one mile from the Jordan River. That place is now called Lehi. We spent the winter there, built log houses in the shape of a fort." In the spring a town was surveyed and permanent homes were built. "My Father built two log rooms a little distance apart and afterwards closed it in and made another room. We felt thankfull and happy in our new home. We did not have much to eat, but we always had bread." Lucy's mother, who had been a schoolteacher, "taught me my letters out of the Bible as [we] had not school book."

Lucy was ten when she was rebaptized and confirmed a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1852. Her father, a counselor in the bishopric, always attended general conference, but returned somewhat shaken after the October 1852 conference, "and told Mother he was called to move south three Hundred miles. Mother felt dredful bad for she had 1852 conference, "and told Mother he was called been seperated from her people so much and now we were setled so near them she thought it was cruel she had to go away so far." Mary gave birth to a son on October 14, and on November 7 the family loaded their possessions into wagons and "started to go where we were called Ceder City Iron County. Uncel Joel White and Uncle David Savage [and] Grandma White went also. We were three weeks on the Road and very cold wether."

The Whites were part of a large group of settlers sent south in 1852 to reinforce Cedar City and Parowan, where the danger of an Indian uprising had increased. Lucy found nearly all the residents of Cedar were "from the old World" and "were so differant from what we were used to when they talked to us we could not understand half [of what] they said. Oh! I was home sick, but we were called and had to make the best of it."

Samuel White purchased a farm and built another house. Lucy attended school in a log cabin which "had no floor or window. Logs with holes boared in and legs put in was our seets." Her father raised sheep, and Lucy learned to spin yarn.

In 1857 the Reformation arrived in southern Utah. [73] Lucy was ten when she was rebaptized and confirmed a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1852. Her father, a counselor in the bishopric, always attended general conference, but returned somewhat shaken after the October 1852 conference, "and told Mother he was called to move south three Hundred miles. Mother felt dredful bad for she had 1852 conference, "and told Mother he was called been seperated from her people so much and now we were setled so near them she thought it was cruel she had to go away so far." Mary gave birth to a son on October 14, and on November 7 the family loaded their possessions into wagons and "started to go where we were called Ceder City Iron County. Uncel Joel White and Uncle David Savage [and] Grandma White went also. We were three weeks on the Road and very cold wether." The Whites were part of a large group of settlers sent south in 1852 to reinforce Cedar City and Parowan, where the danger of an Indian uprising had increased. Lucy found nearly all the residents of Cedar were "from the old World" and "were so differant from what we were used to when they talked to us we could not understand half [of what] they said. Oh! I was home sick, but we were called and had to make the best of it." Samuel White purchased a farm and built another house. Lucy attended school in a log cabin which "had no floor or window. Logs with holes boared in and legs put in was our seets." Her father raised sheep, and Lucy learned to spin yarn. In 1857 the Reformation arrived in southern Utah. We were called on to repent from all our sins. If we had stole or injured any body we had to make it right. Then we were cathicised [catechized] then rebaptised for our sins. I was then fourteen. Was baptised in February. The chunks of ice was running in the Mill race where we was baptised. These were very inthuseastick times. Many confessions were made. Five months later word reached Utah that President James Buchanan had ordered federal troops to Utah to put down an alleged "Mormon rebellion." Brigham Young ordered the missionaries home and directed the abandonment of several outlying settlements. Lucy's father and Uncle Joel were sent to help bring the Saints from San Bernardino, California, back to [74] Utah. When they returned, they brought word of "a good stedy young man" named William Jordan Flake. "While all the others were so Wild and rude, they had much to say of this young marts good qualities and good behavyour. I said I want to see this young man when he comes." Two weeks later Lucy got her wish. William arrived driving a herd of stray horses up from San Bernardino. Uncle Joel invited him and several others home for the evening. Lucy noted, "We all liked his aperance very much." Tall and well-built, William Jordan Flake was nineteen years old. His parents had joined the Church in Mississippi, moved to Nauvoo, and in 1848 arrived in the Great Basin. In 1851 the Flake family helped settle San Bernardino under the direction of Elders Amasa M. Lyman and Charles C. Rich. William's father was killed when he was thrown from a mule, and his mother died of consumption in January 1855. Elder Lyman looked after William, his brother, and his sister. On 30 December 1858 William and Lucy were married by Elder Lyman and moved in with part of his family. When the Lymans moved fifty miles north to Beaver three weeks later, William and Lucy went with them. In the spring Lucy's parents also moved to Beaver. William freighted for Elder Lyman and was gone much of the time, so Lucy lived with her parents until October 1859, when the young couple bought a log house and "went to Houskeeping." Their first child, James Madison Flake, was born the next month. "We had very little to keep house with but we were just as happy as could be. We loved each other and loved our home and felt truely thankefull." Their marriage was close and affectionate, but Lucy was troubled about their religious differences. "William was not religous, being brought up in California after he was twelve and haveing no father to teach him," she wrote. "This was some what of a trial to me but I loved him and prayed for him in secret." Whenever the teachers spoke to William, "he would say he was going to be religious when he got old." In January 1861 another son was born, but William and Lucy's joy turned to grief as they watched their sick baby suffer. Day after day he grew weaker and weaker. "It seemed like my   prairs did no good but still I kept trying to get my Hevenly Father to here me. Kept Praying but it seemed he could not here me." Finally, on March 20 little William died. "His death was the first trial of my faith. It seemed my prairs had always been answered before." Nevertheless, Lucy continued to pray and pleaded with William to join her. But praying did not come naturally to him, nor did he share Lucy's desire to be sealed in the Endowment House. In July William left on a three-month freighting trip west. In October Lucy attended general conference with her parents. William arrived during their stay in Salt Lake City. Lucy was very happy to see him and overjoyed when he reported, somewhat dismayed, that their bishop had invited them to go to the Endowment House. He was so surprised he knew not what to say. If the Bishop had told him he wanted him to go to England he could not [have] felt more surprised. He tried to get excused. Said he did not think himself worthy, but the Bishop would not let him off so he came and told me. I thanked my Hevenly Father. Knew it was in answer to prair. That night I was so thankfull I hardly slept. The 9th October 1861 we received that great blessing and was seled for time and all Eternity. Lucy returned to Beaver with her parents, and William to his freighting. She did not see him for almost three months, until Christmas day. The Church frequently called on William to freight goods to Utah from California and immigrants from the East. In December 1869 Lucy pleaded with him to pray before he left on his next trip. He promised he would when he got home. Lucy remembered the promise through the winter, and when he returned in March, "he knelt down and praid his first prair I ever herd him pray and I was thankfull and happy to know he was trying to do his duty a little better." Of the decision to enter plural marriage in 1868, Lucy wrote little—simply, "William concluded to take another Wife. I was quite willing." But Lucy's daughter Roberta recalled it in more detail, the way she must have heard her mother tell it many times. One night, after complimenting her cooking, William sat down with Lucy, took her face in his hands, and asked, "Lucy dear, could you share your husband with another woman?" I thought at first he was joking. and laughingly answered sure, if I could still retain first place in his affections. He bent his head over until his lips met mine. Each kiss carried the same thrill the first one had. He stood up, and pulled me to him and I noticed a seriousness about him that I had never seen before, as he said, "Lucy I have been counselled to take another wife, if you are willing." I could not speak, nor could I keep the tears out of my eyes. "Don't try to answer me now," he said in Iris gentlest voice. "I think I know how you feel. I have been struggling with myself for a week, trying to bring myself to ask you this. Think it over, pray over it as I have and then let me know." Lucy struggled for several days. She poured out her heart in prayer. She went to her mother—who gently refused to advise her. When William returned from his next trip, they put their five children to bed and took a moonlight walk. They sat down on a log and William put his arm around her. Then she asked, "Will, who is the young lady we are going to marry?" I felt his strong frame quiver, his arm tighten about my waist, heard the catch in his voice as he gasped, "WE?" "Yes, we." I answered in a voice I hardly recognized, so full was it of unselfishness and self-mastery. "We, of course," I went on. "We were made one a long time ago, you and I,—who are we going to marry?" I asked again. "Are you sure it is the right thing for us to do?" asked William in a trembling voice, and then I loved him as I never had before because I knew that he had been true to me. Then he told me his struggle had been as hard as mine. If he did not believe the principle was from God, he would never have considered it, but as there was no compulsion to entering into it, he had battled with himself to see if he were good enough to undertake it. I told him no one was more worthy, no one could make a better husband. Lucy spoke of the fine points of William's future bride, eighteen-year-old Prudence Kartchner, and then cried herself to sleep. Eventually, she was able to console herself with the thought "I had had ten years of blessed association with my man. That could never be taken from me. I was his first, and for ten years, his only love. If in that time I had not found a place in [77] his heart and life that no other could fill—then I had failed." In her own reminiscence, Lucy recorded the events surrounding the October 1868 marriage. Sister E[liza] R. Snow asked me was I willing. Said yes. She asked do you think you can live in that principal. I said am quite willing to try. My Mother and sister live in it and I think [I] can do as I was willing and she said Sister you shall never get old and she gave me a great blessing and ever[y] time she saw me that day she blest me. In the spring of 1874, William and Lucy "went in the United Order. Put in all our property. William was asined the stable to take care of." But in the fall he was called to work on the Saint George Temple. Lucy became seriously ill, and after several requests William returned to Beaver. When the United Order disbanded in 1876, William "gave up the stable...[and] commenced to work on his farm." By the spring of 1877, "We had a fine large house. We had geese, ducks, hogs, chickens, horses, and cows. We thought we was fixed for life." Then William went to the dedication of the Saint George Temple where he was called on a colonizing mission to Arizona. He had been a member of the 1873 expedition that had been unable to locate a suitable site for settlement in Arizona, so the prospect of leaving their comfortable home in Beaver for that desolate region was not appealing. "They gave us six months to get redy to go. … The thought of leaving my poor Widowed Mother … was cruel it seemed to me and William said he had rather go to England. He felt dredful bad but we was called and there was no other way." In August Roberta was born. In October William rebaptized his family as we wished to go and work in the Temple and it was council for all to get baptised before going … I was adopted to my Father and Mother. … This labor was a great comfort to us. … We recieved our second Washings and anointing. They said as we were coming a way so far we could recieve them but they never had given them to any one so young. … We were in Heven sure when we were working in that Holy place but when we get out Satan dubles his forse on a person trying to make up for the good one recieves." Returning to Beaver, William and Lucy sold their farm and in October 1877 loaded their eight children and belongings into five wagons drawn by nine yoke of oxen and seven span of horses. They also drove two hundred head of cattle and forty horses with them. The weather was dredful cold, colder than it had been. … Prudence had three very bad spells of sickeness. We had five men besides our familey to do for. Most all the work fell to me. I stood and washed clothes when the snow was very deep all day. There was a child … died. They called on me to wash it. Watter would freeze as quick as it touched the child. … Our stalk [stock] was so poor we had to leave them" on the range with Lucy's fifteen-year-old son Charlie. "On new years day the frost was so thick in the air we could hardley see the lead horses on our Wagons. … One day we onley traveled one mile." After three months the party arrived at the Mormon settlement of Allen's Gamp on the Little Colorado River. Roberta wrote that "the water in the river was so muddy that a barrel full of it left overnight would produce only about six inches of water clear enough to use for culinary purposes." Five times flash floods washed away the dams constructed by the Allen's Camp United Order. William became so discouraged that one day, according to Roberta, he "saddled up his horse, bade Lucy good-bye and told her there must be a better place in Arizona and if there was he would find it." Commented Lucy, "Some was tried with this, and said he was going to postitise." Then three-year-old George fell sick. "I did all I could with medicen and also with faith," Lucy wrote. My prairs did not seem to be herd but sevral times each day I went away from my wagon in secret and prayed. … Often had the Elders administer but it seemed they had no faith. … On the morning of July 6th '78 I was so deep in sorrow it seemed I could not bare it any longer. I went out in some brush out of site and asked my Father in Heven to take him home for I could not bare it any longer. My burden was hevier then I could bare. That prair was simple but from my hart. I went to him. He breathed a few times and passed a way so sweetley. My own hands made his clothes, dressed him, fixed some paint and painted his coffin. In one hour after he passed away his Father came. Had been gon three weeks. Had not herd from us or us from him. I truley was thankfull when he came. The next day, they drove five miles to Saint Joseph and buried their little child. On July 19 William moved his family to Silver Creek. When they arrived, Roberta reported, "all who were able jumped out of the wagons, rushed to the stream, bathed their faces and drank the first clear water they had since they left their home in Beaver." When William and Lucy later met Elder Erastus Snow, who supervised the Mormon colonies in the area, "William told him what he had done and Elder Snow said, 'I wish we had hundreds just like you.'" Then the apostle proposed the new settlement be named after the two of them; thus Snowflake, Arizona, received its name. But Lucy's initial enthusiasm for Snowflake was tempered by the spring winds. In her 1896 diary, for example, she wrote: Monday, March 2, the wind blows all the time day and part of the time nights and I feel nearly sick. Tuesday, April 14, the wind it blows night and day, it is just fearful, The sand drifts like snow. … It seems lonely and dreary when the wind blows. Thursday, April 16, all well but the Wind gets worse and worse, night and day. Saturday, April 18 [William] and John came home this morning. The Wind was so bad Thursday they laid up all day and could not travel. The wind blows very little today which is so nice. I cleaned up all the rooms and had a bath and am going to town. Sunday, April 19, today is fearfull the Wind blows so bad. Thursday, April 30, this ends the month and I dont beleave there has been one day that the wind did not blow. It has damaged the crops and covered them with sand, filled up the ditches, and made it very unpleasant. [Only] our Hevenly Father nows what this wind is for. Monday, May 19, I am on the place all alone. It seems like this country is going to blow away. Friday, May 15, the wind blows fearful. The sand almost blinds one. The children cant go out to play. Occasionally depressed by the unremitting wind, Lucy kept busy with close family ties and callings in the Relief Society, Primary, Sunday School, and Religion Class. William [80] served as first counselor in the bishopric for thirty-five years. When federal prosecutions for plural marriage reached into Arizona, William declined several broad hints by the sheriff that he could avoid arrest. Instead, he served six months in the penitentiary at Yuma, returning in good spirits and "so fat …he had to ware Osmers Pants." (Osmer was their stout son.) Lucy recorded with pride that the Relief Society planned a combination coming-out and birthday party for William: "Sent invertations to all the setlments around, had such nice picknick, esays, songs, speeches, a sketch of his life," complete with a band, and "you never saw a purson so surprised in your life." Lucy's autobiography and journal provide illuminating details of early Arizona life that would otherwise be lost. Among the routine activities she chronicled one spring were: whitewashing the house; gardening and irrigating; gleaning wool from carcasses along the trail followed by the sheepmen, then picking, washing, and carding it to make a mattress; making underwear, shirts, and carpet rags; tending grandchildren; and preparing meals for her husband and growing sons. On one occasion she set down her day's tasks, which were typical of Arizona pioneer women generally: I will just write my morning chores. Get up, turn out my chickens, draw a pail of watter, watter hot beds, make a fire, put potatoes to cook, brush and sweep half inch of dust off floor … feed three litters of chickens, then mix bisquits, get breakfast, milk besides work in the house and this morning had to go half mile after calves. This is the way of life on the farm. Lucy's pioneering life was not easy. Five of her thirteen children died in infancy or childhood, and Lucy herself died at fifty-five. Still, the struggle for survival did not absorb all of her energy or prevent spiritual fulfillment: William and me fasted and went to fast meeting. Had a very good meeting. Uncommon good one. Such a good spirrit there. The Sisters had a good testimoney meeting in the afternoon. Twenty two pressant. I presided as Sister West was absent. It is a nice day and all is well. ------------------------------ Lucy's autobiography: https://familysearch.org/patron/v2/TH-301-42192-726-80/dist.pdf?ctx=ArtCtxPublic

William Jordan Flake

Alicia Kay Burk - Linda Kay Flake - Horace Henry Flake - Osmer Dennis Flake - William Jordan Flake

William Jordan Flake, the oldest son of James Madison and Agnes Love Flake, was born in Anson County, N.C., July 3, 1839, and now past the age of 82, lives at Snowflake, Arizona. Although only three years old when the journey was made, he has not forgotten the old time "Schooner" and the two mares and a horse which drew it when they left Anson County and settled on a small branch of the Tom Bigbee River in Kemper county, Mississippi. There his parents having embraced the faith of the Latter-Day Saints, or "Mormon" as often designated by others, they preferred to move to Nauvoo, where they could mingle with those of their religion. There he saw his first temple, was taken to the top where he could see all over the surrounding country. It was beautiful sight.

Here he first learned how quickly powder burns, when he took some in his hands from his father’s powder keg, and threw it in the fire. The flash so burned his face that all the skin came off and for months he had to wear over it a black cloth, with holes cut in it to see through. Mobs often in that day came and looted Nauvoo and when he saw them on the street he would run and hide. He saw the people driven from Nauvoo and he shared in the exodus. The trip across the frontier was slow and full of tribulation. A youth of but 8 years, he walked the entire distance to Utah. First to Council Bluff for winter quarters. Here he received his first schooling of two months. Then on to Salt Lake. With three other small boys and a negro girl, he drove cattle from Nauvoo, Ill., to Salt Lake, Utah. The plains were then covered with the buffalo and he saw many thousand of them. Again in 1851, he went with his mother to California and he was put behind the cows with an Indian pony his mother had bought for him. This pony carried him the most of the way but was too poor to ride all the time. At one time on this journey they were five days and nights on the desert without water for the stock and very little for themselves. When at length he reached a small, bitter seepage, he drank three cans of water and was reaching for the fourth, when a man caught him and took the can from him. He wasn’t too strong and he was then allowed to eat, after which he was allowed to have more water. This no doubt saved his life. His first stop was in Cahoon Pass, near San Bernardino, where he was able to get another month of schooling.

While driving cows up the Mojave River, one got away out in the brush and as he went out to drive her back into the herd, an arrow whizzed by him and hit the cow, a trick of the Indians to kill the cow and have a feast. His youthful days were busy ones in assisting and helping his widowed mother. He did quite a bit of freighting, helped to build a home, worked on the roads and did manual work of all character. An orphan at fifteen, he felt he was almost alone in the world. For nearly fifty years he never heard of any of his relatives, although he inquired of hundreds of people from all parts of the country, he was never able to hear of any one by the name of Flake, until the writer happened to meet John J. Flake from DeKalp, Kemper County, Miss. This was in Dec., 1897, on a train near Meridian, Miss.

While bathing in 1856, he dived from a stump about eight feet high and struck the ground in shallow water. He was dragged out for dead but finally was able to breathe. His head was knocked back so he could only look upwards, not being able to see the ground without getting down on his hands and knees. The physician informed him that he would never be able to get it down again. He said he would get it down or break his neck trying. He also found that he was quite numb on one side. Later one day he was asked why one leg was shorter than the other one and found that he had but one shoe on. For months he worked with his neck, rubbing it, using liniment and would lie with the head on the chair and weight of the body suspended on the back of his head in this way for hours. At length it yielded and in time he got it so corrected that no one could tell that anything was ever the matter with it. It now does not bother him unless he undertakes to do some writing or work that requires the head to be held down. The numbness has never left him, but while he uses that side as well as the other, he has little feeling in it.

In 1857, when Johnson’s army was sent to Utah to "bring the Mormons into subjection" and it was reported that the Mormons were all to be killed, William Jordan Flake returned to Utah, to live or die with his people. He knew they were honest, honorable people, that their loyalty was second to no other people who lived. Evil-disposed men had gained the ear of the United States authorities and the army had been sent. When things were represented by honorable men, the army was recalled. He however now decided to remain in Utah. His first job was following some Indians who had stolen a bunch of horses which they took with them. He was ten days on the trail and most of that time without food. He took the horses he brought from California to Salt Lake and traded them for five yoke of oxen and two big wagons. While returning to his home a snow storm came one night and he lost his oxen. For ten days in eighteen inches of snow he hunted for them, and finally found them in a small cove up in the mountains. A little further on he got his oxen into Salt Creek, had to drag them out, got wet and nearly froze before he got a fire to warm by. Two deserting soldiers came up, warmed by his fire but dared not stop for fear of being captured. They both froze to death before morning. He reached home without further trouble except the freezing of his feet. This kept him in for a short time and while not being able to do work, he made use of his time in courting Lucy White of Cedar City, Utah. Later he married her. Later in the winter, while on the Sevier River, an officer tried to take from him a Government overcoat. He refused to give it up, saying that it would mean death by freezing and he would rather die fighting. Finding that he well knew the roads and the officer having a detachment of soldiers on their way to California, they obtained from him all the information they could as to the roads and went on their journey, leaving him the coat.

For several years he herded stock most of the time, generally to protect them from the Indians and sometimes from the white outlaws. He joined the Minute men, an organization whose members were always to have, in easy reach, a good horse and saddle, to be ever ready on the trail of the outlaw at once day or night. He often went on these missions. In 1859, he moved to Beaver, Utah. In 1860, while the mountain road was covered with snow, with a load of logs he was hauling with which to build a house, he was coming down the mountain when the wagon slid from the dug-way, his feet were caught in the logs and he fell under the load. The snow was ten feet deep and this saved his life. His brother, Charles, dug in the snow from the lower side and got him out unhurt. He shortly afterwards traded two horses for two houses and lots, and of a generous nature, he gave one of them to his boyhood chum, Marion Lyman, and with his young wife, lived in the other one.
The house furnishings were more crude than the younger generation can well imagine; a tin plate or two, one case knife that he found without a handle and for which he whittled a handle, a wooden spoon, the work of his hands, a bedstead made with an axe, a couple of log stools, and yet he lived in the fashion, as nothing more could be bought within a thousand miles. He must wait until he could make a trip to the "store" for something better and that trip meant a summer’s journey.

That same year he took up a farm and fenced it. He has been owning farms ever since that time but has done little farming as you cannot farm well while in the saddle and riding a horse. The following year he took a herd of sheep to keep on the share and kept them for several years under this arrangement. He employed men to look after them in the summer time while he went off freighting, one summer on the Pony Express and two summers he went to California.

In 1854 at the call of his Church, he took a six horse team and went to the Missouri River to bring out immigrants who were then constantly coming to Utah. He was to bring 2000 pounds for the Church, and any additional matter he chose to bring, he could bring for himself. He brought things most needed, of which were two stoves.

Most of the year of 1866 was spent in the Indian War, known as the Black Hawk War.
In 1868, he married Prudence Kartchner. He now spent his time working with cattle, taking all the cattle of the community to look after and was helping to open up new places on the frontier. In 1875-76 he was employed by the United Order, at $1000.00 per year, to look after their cattle and also opened up a farm in Escalante, southeastern Utah. In 1873, having been sent with a few others to look up the prospects for settlements in Arizona, he was called by the Church authorities in 1877 to take all he had and go to Arizona to help develop that country. To him the call was a command; a duty that could not be shirked. He sold his home, his lands and everything he could not move and on Nov. 19, 1877, started for a new home 500 miles distant, in an unsettled and wild country. He had six wagons loaded with provisions. Nine yoke of oxen and seven span of horses pulled them. With him he carried 200 head of loose cattle and some 30 or 40 horses. A cold winter, snow in places on the road from 12 to 15 inches deep, they did not reach the valley of the Little Colorado until about the middle of January, 1878. Here they settled, the whole of the winter being spent in wagon boxes for homes. Because of numerous floods which took out the dams needed for irrigation purposes, this location proved very unsatisfactory and in June he started to look for another home.

There were few settlers in that country, some small towns, and a few ranchers. Those in the towns were principally Mexicans. We were compelled to get along on what we brought with us as the nearest trading post was 250 miles away. After a two week trip, during which he went as far East as new Mexico, he returned having found only one place that suited him and as the owner wanted $12,000.00 for it, he did not buy it as that was more than he then was worth. His family wished to move so badly that he went back and purchased it, and got three years in which to pay for it. It was necessary to go back to his friends in Utah to get stock on credit. He went and traded sheep for cattle, telling them that he had no sheep but that the Mexicans did and he could trade for them. He promised them that he would deliver them twice the number he sold them, the delivery to be made in three years. They knew him and did not hesitate to trust him. The following year he did the same thing again and got more cattle.

The first winter at this new home, some fifteen families from the South who had been West about a year, came to him for help. They had neither food nor clothing and begged him to provide for them, saying they would work early and late for just enough to keep them until they could get something to do for themselves. There was no work to be had and they were destitute. They were taken in, every room in the ranch house sheltered a family, and the adobe stables were pressed into service. He thus furnished shelter of some kind for all. His wife Lucy cut up the seamless sacks for pants for the boys. I have worn them myself, and the wagon covers were used to make dresses for the women and girls. We ate anything we could get to eat. When the flour was gone, all ate Graham bread, and the Graham had been ground in a coffee mill. We had barley bread.

This benefactor bought grain from ranchers for seventy-five miles distant and then went to Utah and purchased $500.00 of cloth with which to clothe them.
The most of those who came were poor. He purchased farms or ranches and turned them over to the people to pay for when able to do so, reselling to them without a profit. He never collected one cent of interest from any man, although some did not pay him for years. His home was the camping place for travelers passing through and for fifteen years, he fed more to the travelers passing through than it took to keep his large family. He fed their horses for days sometimes, never turned any man from his door empty handed nor did he charge a cent for the accommodation he gave. Twenty and as many as thirty strangers at a time sat at his table in a single day and during these days, it was rare that the family ate a meal with no other one present.

I remember an old miner who came to our home and being sick, asked to be allowed to stop a day or two until he was able to go on to Colorado. Father unpacked his burro, took the man into a room, and placed him in bed where he remained for weeks. Several days later this old miner called mother, and handing her a belt containing several hundred dollars, asked that she take care of it, informing her at the same time that he had not stated the truth when he came and told us he had no money. He said that he had feared the Mormons would kill him, if they learned he had the money, as he had been told they were that kind of people and had never met one before. He said he knew different now for it was her kind nursing that had saved his life. Three months passed, before he was able to go on his journey and when his belt was handed back to him as given to mother, he offered to pay for his keeping and the feeding of his two animals, but father refused to accept anything. Used to roughing it, this old miner cried like a child and said it was not right to refuse to accept pay, and opening his belt, he dropped several pieces of gold upon the table and walked out and went on his journey.

The first year after William Jordan Flake bought the valley, he raised 2100 bushels of grain. There were those who were ready to buy it, but he kept it, used and gave it to the poor for food, as they needed it. More land was now needed for those coming in to settle, he gave forty cows for the Concho ranch and then he gave three hundred cattle for the Nutriose ranch. Then he helped to purchase Springerville, which was a part of the valley purchased from the Mexicans and finally purchased the Nutriose. Most every settlement made in Navajo and Apache Counties, Arizona, by the Latter-Day Saints, after he came into that section was purchased first by him and they are the beneficiaries of his exertion.

His word had ever been his bond. He was never required to give security and has purchased property running up into the thousands without any security other than his oral promise to pay. He was never sued in court nor has he ever entered suit against any one. He was often the instrument of breaking up gangs of thieves, who infested the West in an early day and he has looked down the barrel of a gun of an outlaw on several occasions. He never used a gun in defense of himself or his property, although he always carried it as a protection against the Indians at times.

Two wives have been buried and for twenty-one years he has been without a companion, living with his children, all of whom are now married. Until eighty years old, he rode the range in all kinds of weather, thought nothing of lying out all night on a quilt, or being out in the rain or snow, or having missed a meal or two in order to accomplish a task undertaken. For exercise, he often, yet, goes out for a day’s ride among the cattle he sold some years ago. He has good teeth, reads without glasses, enjoys a good appetite, eats any kind of food and hardly knows what a days sickness is. He has become somewhat deaf and for that reason does not mingle or go out much where he will meet strangers. He has more and truer friends than any man in Arizona and has in his lifetime done more to build up that State than any man ever has or can do. In his dealing with mankind, he has never considered a man’s politics or his religion. He has treated all men as brothers until proven unworthy. Uncompromising with evil, he has ever stood for clean and honest living. No scandal has ever been attached to his name and when he passes from this sphere, it can be well said of him: "There lies an honest man."

--By his son, Osmer D. Flake

 (photo on right) William Flake here appears in prison garb during his six-month sentence at the Yuma Territorial Prison for illegal cohabitation (polygamy).