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
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