History

If this is your first time here, go to the very first post and read in order to get the whole story.

An oral history of Leland Coles was recorded on tape and transcribed by Dianne and Laura.  There's lots of great stories in here, but it's much too long to put it all, so I'll pick a few interesting stories to share.  If you could sum up a persons life in a few short sentences, Leland would be this:  Grew up as a hard working farmer in Utah.  Lived a tough life growing up and had to work hard to earn meager wages but didn't complain about a lack of riches or niceties.  Met his future wife at a dance and later married.  Together they had one child (Laura's grandmother) and adopted a son.  They lived in many houses, apartments, trailer houses, in Utah, Arizona, and for a short time in Hawaii.  He spent alot of time keeping nice gardens and volunteered with the Eagles club.  Later in life they became active in the LDS church and volunteered much of their time serving in the temple and as missionaries at the Ogden Temple Visitors Center.

Here's some excepts from his life story.

Irrigating sugar beets, June 13, 1952. Mack Hansen, Elwood, Utah

 "We lived on the edge of a canal, so to be able to learn to survive around the canal we had to learn to swim.  When you became the age around three years old you'd start wondering and being inquisitive.  They'd all get out and go swimming and we were always swimming in the canal and there was seldom anyone drowning who lived near the canal because they warned about it and were always given instructions and they knew how to swim so they weren't afraid of the water and they'd never play in it unless they were going swimming.  And if they did play in it or fell in they knew how to get out.  When I was about six years old my sister Lois was with me we pulled a little two year old girl out of the canal that was from Brigham City and was visiting some people about two or three miles north of us.  At the time we had been herding cows on the ditch bank and we had a whip with us and I reached out and got the body to come in to the bank"

Street scene of Tremonton, Utah showing businesses including, People's Market, Y Not Eat, Parco Gas, hotels and drug stores. c 1920

"Dad in the summer would always contract beet thinning and hoeing the potatoes or helping in the hay.  This was our regular summer work.  We'd go around and take care of other people's beets, we'd thinned several acres of beets.  This was the way we'd earn money to send the boys through school."

"When I was five years old I had to herd cows in the hills.  Again, my dad contracted to take two or three families cows with them and /I had the privilege of taking them and I'd have to stay with them all day.  I had a horse and a dog with me at all times, and the horse, it didn't make a difference if I fell off, it would always see that I'd get back on.  And if I did get off, it's always go to a fence or something to help me back on.  The dog could kill a snake in two whips of his head.  It would grab rattlesnakes or ant type of snake it didn't matter.  I'd always take a whip and I could kill a snake with a whip if I needed to."

"...when I was about six or seven years old I had the experience of driving a team of horses on a harrow, walking behind the harrow.  I did this all day for about three and a half days, harrowing out 160 acres of ground."

Train load of beets for shipment to sugar factory near Tremonton, Box Elder Co., Ut., c.1910.

"In 1925 we moved to Ogden... We didn't have very much work.  Roy and Otto (his brothers) went to work as a salesman in a clothing store in Salt Lake for a while.  (around 1928-1929)...I just started high school and worked around for farmers.  I remember working fro our neighbor.  I watered his hayfield and beet crop and whatever he would had and then help him put up his hay.

"When we were in high school, we used to walk from Harrisville to Five Points to catch the bus and go to town on Wednesday and Saturday nights.  We would dance at the White City, which is now a bowling alley and a recreational center.  If you went before 9:00 on Wednesday nights you could get in for nothing and on Saturday nights if you went before 9:00 you could get in for a dime.  This was mostly our recreation besides going to shows once in a while and we didn't go to shows very much because they were 10 to 15 cents...  We always had a pretty good crowd there and this was the biggest way that most of all the city and county kids started going to dances and having fun for their own selves.  I sure used to have good times at these dances...

I remember one night I got on my bicycle and rode down to one of my friends towards Five Points, it was Clyde Yearsley.  I got there and he was all dressed up and he said he was going to a dance and meet a gal there and I said well you don't want me along and he said sure come on anyway and he talked me into going.  So I dashed back home, changed my clothes, and told my mother where I was going.  I got back to Clyde's place in time to catch the trolley car and get to the dance.  After we got there I said there usually wasn't a good crowd on Wednesday nights, but this was the only time this gal could get off and I wanted to go with her and she had a car.  ..(we) picked up a girl and when she got on Clyde kind of grinned at her and spoke to her and he she had known him.  He said, "Well, there's one you can dance with."  I said, "There'd be two with her and your girl so it won't be a lost night."  We went to the dance and there's always someone you know and I knew quite a few and we introduced them back and forth so Clyde got Laura to dance with him and brought her over and introduced me.  Her name was Laura Urry...  We saw each other at dances later and I took her out a few times..."

White City dance hall

"After I went with Laura for a little while I finally got crazy and got a job.  We got married.  To get the job you had to be married.  I got the job and then we got married after I had the job and was secure.  During the summers of 1931 and '32 my brother Otto and Tom Harris, a fellow who lived out in Harrisville with us, and myself had a trio and we'd go around to different places and sing, especially ward reunions.  We got quite a kick out of doing it.  Tom Harris and I really enjoyed it, we were always together singing.  Of course I played the musical saw too and we used to go around and entertain quite a bit this way."

"One day when I was thinning beets, it was May 13, 1936 Claudia was born and that was a great day for me.  I was really pleased with it and we decided to name her Claudia which was the favorite players on the radio program that I had seen and we would listen to all the time usually come on at night."

"(Claudia) gave us some problems one of her greatest favorites was to get my house slippers and run around the house and she'd trip over things and trip over the shoes.  Once she drove her teeth through her lip and toungue and we took her up to the doctor one night and he looked at her and told us "You've got to keep that kid out of those shoes.""

"We had one time after the bakery job I worked nights...  It got so that Laura didn't like that part of the work, being away at night all the time.  I finally got another job and decided to work them both.  I went to work at 8:00 in the morning and got off at 5:00 and then I didn't have to go to work until 11:00 at night.  So I worked two of them for about three months and when I decided I was going to get a little better job during the day, I didn't see any reason why I shouldn't keep it, but if finally didn't work out.  It was a really good job for us, but when I came home at nights, Laura had had it with the baby so I'd take her for a walk and sing to her.  We had quite a few talks together.  She'd just look at me and really enjoy it.  And I think all in all we enjoyed bringing her up."

He went on to work many different jobs from farm jobs, to delivery jobs, washer repair, and finally got a job at a hospital as a mechanic.  He worked there for 35 years.