Wanted to check out (uhuh) Uh , maybe you could just start ...



(Craig): …that I wanted to check out. (Jennie: "uhuh") Maybe you could just start out by telling where, when he was born. You said November 22nd. So what year was that? 1923?-

(Jennie): '22, I think it was. Ross was born in Delta. And I remember we went over to our Grandmother [Lamara's] house while he was being born. And we were so excited about this darling baby, because he was always a precious darling person. We moved to Provo when he was just a few months old. And in fact, he was born in November, and we moved to Provo the next June, early spring, just as soon as school was out []. He was, as you can see (showing a picture), just a baby on mother's lap, then. He always went every place, with everybody. I mean, mother was so busy in Primary; she was in the Primary presidency. And she was so busy, and she always took Ross with her. So he had lots of experiences when he was just small. I'll never forget when she was in the presidency and they had a Halloween party, and she dressed the baby and Ralph up like black cats. And she had to push them in the baby buggy.

But he had a real interesting life, and it started young, with the things that he did. He was always full of ambition. And as I remember him, he always stood so straight. Even when he was sick, he just stood so straight. And he liked to wear a hat. And he always had his hair combed. And if he had a shirt on with a coat, he had a tie. Now Ralph was so different; he didn't like to wear a tie, where Ross always head a tie on. And he liked to wear a dress coat. He liked to look nice and he always did.

I can remember as a child he was really mischievous, you know. When the bigger kids would think they could do something and were doing something, but before you know it, here Ross was. Like: we were trying to get a [bug] car started, and the big kids were pushing it, and driving it, and we were on our way, and we looked around and there Ross was hanging on the back of it. He was there. (laugh) He was just a little boy, but he was always in on things.

And in school he was just an A1 student. I called one of his friends, and talked to her, that was at school with him, you know. And she said, "Ross was the most loved boy in all his class." (begins to cry a little) She said, "Other kids could have gotten sick, and people wouldn't have done a thing or cared a thing about it." But she said, "I remember [leading] over about six kids that every week we used to go up there, to play a game with him, or to see him, because he was so loved." He always had A's in school; he was a real good student. He was always the leader. She said, "He was always so nice to everybody," she said, "It wasn't just the kids that were popular, but he was nice to everybody. And everybody loved him." And she said, "And when he got sick, that whole class just mourned for [him ]."

I know that it was never a problem to get him to go to church or to Sunday school or anything like that. And he was a baby for quite a while in our family, because we were pretty fairly close together. I mean, there is only maybe 16 months between Ralph and Ross. But after [Ross], before we had another baby, it was four years, because mother had a still born baby []. And we all just babied him and loved him. And who reminds me a lot of his build, of Ross, and that's even how he looks: and that's Matthew, except Ross didn't have any freckles and Ross [didn't] have dark hair. Well of course Ross was about Matthew's age too when he got sick and died. But so many times, I said to [Mathew, "Oh, that] looks just like Ross!" Have you seen that picture when Ross was- I have a couple of pictures here. ("Don't believe so.") (holding up picture) You see, this is Ross. Doesn't he look like Matthew there? ("Ya.") And there's when he was racing. ("Which one is him?") He's the one on this side, here. [] ("[Ya, he] does look like Matthew.")

(Craig): Now what kind of interest did he have at school? Did he have any kind of class that he liked best? Or did he have any goals as far as occupation is concerned?

(Jennie): Oh, well, he always wanted to go to college, and I know that. And we just expected the very best from him because he was just that type of kid. [] He would have just been a great leader. And I'm sure he's a great leader where he is. ("Oh I'm sure.")

(Craig): Well did he have any, I don't know, any interest like- well I know he was interested in sports a lot []-

(Jennie): Well he played in the band too. He played a horn in the band. It's just hard to tell, [], he was just a sophomore; he was a sophomore when he got sick. And I just know that he always planned to go to college.

(Break- 6:37)

(Craig): Maybe you could tell something about his physical characteristics. His build, or how he looked like- Well you said he looked like Matthew a lot.

(Jennie): Well he was starting to put on growth, and I imagine he would have ended up quite tall. And he was always slender, never fat. He moved too fast and he was always on the go, to be fat. As I say, he always kept his hair trimmed and combed, and he was a clean person; clean, neat person. He liked to race. All of our boys did a lot of racing. And play basketball. He was on the teams that they had at school. Mother was always walking down to school to see him play or something, and that was a long ways for her walk. But she was right there to support her kids.

(Craig): What color eyes did he have?

(Jennie): He had blue eyes. Quite a pretty blue eye.

(Craig): Now you were telling about after he got sick and the fire and things like that. I wondered if you'd explain a little bit about his attitude as he found out that he was sick and that he was going to die.

(Jennie): Well, he was never told he was going to die. And he always had such hope and courage. This friend that I talked to said, "You know were just amazed at his spirit." She said, "If we had gone [to] visit him, and he had just been down in the dumps and low," she said, "Kids won't go back to that. But his spirit was so happy and friendly and on the light side, that it was fun to got there." He felt like this cancer was going to get so big and then it was going to come out, you see, and then he'd be alright. And right at the very last, he said to mother, "Is this gonna get me, or am I gonna get it?" You know, he was kind of giving up a little, because he had been so sick for so long. But the first year- Do you know he kept up on his geometry and his studies? He was studying just like crazy so he wouldn't miss out, so he could graduate with his group. And even when he got so sick that he could hardly think, he was trying to keep up with his class. And it's like [Oren] said, he just never complained about it. When the doctor told him he had to use his crutch, at first it used to just scare me to death, because sometimes he wouldn't use it. He'd come in the house and then he'd take a step or too without it, you know. And it used to frighten me to death, because I was afraid his leg was going to break right off because there was such a little bit of bone left there supporting.

[After he got] sick, he took a trip to California. And Uncle Ed took him to the race track, and had him bet on some horses, and he enjoyed it very much. And I found a letter that he had written to Aunt Gladys, in mother's things- I don't know where it is right now- thanking them for the nice time that he had. But everyone knew, of course, that his time was short. The doctor, when he first found it, said, "Don't ask me to cut off that boy's leg. Don't. It's gone too far. It'll be just be nothing but misery for him, and the cancer will still be there, and then where we cut off his leg there will be a big stub of cancer." He said, "Don't ask me, please, because it will do no good." And he lasted longer than they really thought he would, because of the type of cancer he had was a real fast growing cancer. And he lasted longer than they thought. And he never complained []. He was just [great].

(Craig): I wonder how the cancer started. Did he have some kind of accident on his leg?

(Jennie): Well they wondered if he hurt it. When he first discovered it, he had been playing football. And then the doctor thought it was just a torn ligament or something, and he was just having him put hot packs on it. And I can remember seeing Ross hold that knee down in a pan of hot water. [And I thought, Ew! ugh, that'd hurt so bad]. Then they wondered if maybe he had hit his knee peddling on the bicycle someway, you know, on the bicycle handlebars because he rode all the time. And no one really ever knew how it started. [When] it started, it was just [] right up here (pointing).

(Craig): On his right leg?

(Jennie): I think so. And it grew to be a great big thing like that. (motioning with hands) And it pulled his leg up, [the cords], you know; up and back. Oh it was bad. [And yet he was good through it].

(Craig): Well, let's see. We've covered most of this pretty well…

(Jennie): Let me tell you the kind of guy he was. He was the kind of fellow that would hold a chair out for a girl and open the door. A real man. He kind of prided himself on that.

(Craig): Kind of the guy that didn't have to be asked to do things.

(Jennie): Yes. And when Janeen was born, he was just going into his teens, []. And he was just so sweet with her; he just loved her and he would [pamper] her around, you know. He was just so cute; that's the way he was with this little lady, his little girl [..]. He was alive till she was about two, I guess, or something like that.

(Craig): What time of year was it when he died? []

(Jennie): It was just in the spring; just before graduation. He died on the 19th.

(Craig): Of May?

(Jennie): [No June.]

(Craig): Now he was 16 when he died, wasn't he?

(Jennie): Mmhm. Here it says he was president of the sophomore class of the school year at Jordan High School, and was president of the FFA class at the Sandy Junior High School. And he was also head boy at the Sandy Junior High School. Have you read this obituary of his?

(Craig): No.

(Jennie): Well maybe that might help you.

(Break- 14:19)

(Ralph): This is Ralph Bishop talking, answering some questions that Allen Craig Bishop is asking regarding my brother, Ross.

Ross was about 16 months younger than me. So he and I were very close. In fact, I believe we were just as close as the twin boys in our family, Dean and Darrell. With this exception: that Ross looked up to me to be the bigger brother and make many of the decisions, which I did. Let me show you the closeness: in the first grade one day, our teacher gave us all a big stick of candy as a treat. I think it was Valentine's Day; it was the first grade. And everyone started eating theirs except me. And Ms. [Sanders], the teacher, came and said, "Ralph, why don't you eat your candy like everyone else?" And I said, "Well, I want to wait until I get home, so I can share it with my brother Ross." And she seemed quite touched by this, and she said, "Well I'll tell you what, you eat yours now, and I'll give you another one to take home to Ross." So I got another big stick of candy to take home to Ross, and I was proud as punch; I ate mine. And I went home and he wanted to share his with me, but I said, "No," that I had mine. So he ate his. We often shared things like that. It brought us very close together, and I was always trying to protect him, and he was my little brother.

Well I guess one thing that I remember most about Ross, was that he was a very sharp kid; he caught on quickly. And he loved fun. Well through his early teen years he became a real teaser. He and I used to tease our older brothers and sisters by going up to them and making a funny sound (Ralph makes a sound). And we'd say that in the face and they'd get so tired that they would get exasperated with us and lose their temper, and then we'd run for mother. And then I saw that this was creating disharmony in the family, so I stopped it, and I tried to get him to stop it. And he tried, but he still had a little devil in him, and every once in a while these bigger brothers and sisters would be talking, and he'd walk up and go (sound). [He'd look them] right in the face (sound). And pretty soon they were so angry that they'd chase him and he'd run behind mother's skirts. And mother laughed herself almost sick over this. He was such a little tease, and it really tickled mama because he'd run to her for protection. And then pretty soon they'd all be laughing, although they were mad at it first. It was just a silly thing.

In junior high school, they had a lunch program; they started a lunch program during the Depression. And we ate down in the shop; there was no lunchroom in our junior high school, so they fixed the lunch in the home ec room. It was generally a bowl of soup and a sandwich. And then we'd line up and buy this, or it was given to us, I guess. At that time I think nearly everyone got some; this was free government food. At any rate, we'd go into the shop and eat it. And the shop teacher was a man named Royal D. Madison, and we used to say his initials really meant Right Down Mad. Because he got right down mad at people when they got out of line. But Ross and I would imitate radio stars down there. We were very good at imitating Popeye the Sailorman, and Wimpy, [], and the others on the radio at that time. And Mad used to sit there and laugh and laugh his head off whenever we would put on a little show for him over his little loud speaker system, and he thought that that was great.

We set a goal to be great Olympic athletes, and it seemed like we were going to accomplish that goal when we were young because I was the fastest runner in my room, and Ross was the fastest runner in his room. And when I got in junior high, I was the fastest runner in junior high, and Ross was the fastest runner in his room next to me. He never could beat me, and he was a year and four months younger than I was. And he couldn't jump as high. He wasn't as big. We were bother rather small as we started through, [..]. He did very well for his size. In fact I guess he did better for his size than I did for mine. But we loved track and field and we would practice and practice. We would high jump and pull vault, and in our backyard we were pull vaulting 10 and 11 feet high using a three quarter inch plumbing pipe for a pole. And we had to stand on a milk can, and hold a two foot board in our hand to put the board up; that's how high it was. And we were in the seventh and eighth grades. Well the future looked good for us. Then I got scarlet fever in junior high school, and that sort of cut me down. I never was really as good after that. I got [] anemia, and so my athletic career went clear out the window. But that was after high school; I could see I could go no farther than that. But Ross, I thought I would coach him and get him coming along.

When I was senior in high school, he was a sophomore, […]. [] [when] he was a ninth grader, the 10th graders went to Jordan. When I went to Jordan, it was just 12th, 11th grades. But the year Ross came they put the 10th grade there. Any rate, he was a sophomore, I was a senior, and I was playing on the football team. He was playing on the sophomore football team. He was elected president of the sophomore class, and was quarterback on the sophomore football team. I was fullback and I was calling signals from fullback position on the main team.

[And] school started. And Ross complained about a sore leg; his right knee hurt. And we took him to the doctor, and the doctor said he had a little bump on his knee and it'd get alright. But it kept hurting worse and worse. It was funny, it hurt so bad, that he couldn't punt the ball with his right foot. So [] he was punting the ball with his left foot, and kicking it about as far as he was with his right. And the coach said, "Turn your suit in and go see the doctor and fight out what's wrong and get that cleared it up." So they took an x-ray of his leg, and the doctor said, "Oh I see a little abscess on the bone." And he said, "It's no problem, we'll just cut into that and we'll drain that little puss pocket there." So he made a little incision into Ross's leg and put a drain in to clean the puss out of this little pocket on the bone where he said he'd been bruised. Well what he thought was a pocket of puss was cancer, commonly called a rose cancer. And after a week of having this drain in, no puss had come out, and he saw it didn't heal it off. In fact it started looking puffy and bad. And then the doctor got frightened, and he took a specimen out of the source, and sent it to a hospital. And back came the word: he had a very violent cancer. And his leg started to swell where the incision had been made, and finally a cancer grew right out of that cut just like a big rose. It was about, oh, six inches across, and it stuck up about three inches above his leg. Well, of course, then the doctor said, "Well…" told my mother and father. They didn't tell Ross what he had. They told him it was a tumor; eventually would reach its course, and then it would recede and his leg would get well, and the tumor would probably just fall off his leg. They told mother and father that it would kill him if it got into his body and the only hope he had was to immediately cut his leg off up at the hip. But prior to this, Ross of had been complaining of shooting pains up his leg and into his groin, and the doctor said, "Well if he's complaining of that, there's no sense of cutting his leg off. It will just be much more painful and he'll die a lot sooner, 'cause that leg will never heal where we cut it; it will turn into a big cancerous mess."

So we all had to make our minds up of when he was going to die. And this was a real time of trial of fire in our life because we tried to keep him from the knowledge that he was going to die. And we had to shield him from people who tried to quiz him about his problems. But he got so he had to go on crutches; he couldn't walk. And then he dropped out of school; he was going to loose a year, and he said he'd come back another year when it was healed, and go back and get back on the teams. And then he got so weak that he couldn't get out very much. So mother and dad took him to California; he always wanted to go to California. And they took him to California for two or three weeks. And then they came home, and they brought him home to die. I was on the basketball team by this time, and I had a recurrence of my anemia. And the doctor said, "Well, it's alright if you want to play basketball. But if I were you, I wouldn't care what the coach or team thought; I'd quit and save my health." Well I got thinking I'd much rather be with my brother for the last few months than I would be with the basketball team. So I quit the basketball team, just before the league started, so I could get home every night early and be with my brother.

Well he got weaker and weaker, and the [cancer] got higher and higher. And Darrell was going to the University of Utah, and he laid out a year so that he could help take care of Ross, and help to take care of the money. And as Ross got weaker it got so that we couldn't even put him into bed; he had to stay on the couch in the living room.

I remember one night, we all talked to mother and dad about going to a show to get away from the tension. And I said, "I'll take care of Ross." And he and I were alone in the house; the whole rest of the family went to the show. And you walk into the house the stench from that decaying cancer was overpowering. And our Bishop, Bishop [Radisson], it almost made him vomit every time he came to the house. But we had become used to it; to us it just smelled sweetish, almost sick and sweet. But Ross and I were lying on this couch, and I was lying alongside him. And he started to weep. And he said, "Ralph, I'm gonna die." And I said, "Oh no your not. This thing is gonna eat your bottom and then it'll get better, and you'll recover." And he said, "No, I'm gonna die." And he wept; he put his head on my shoulder and wept and cried, and tears rolled down on my arm. And he said, "I know I'm gonna die, but I'm not going to let mother know it because she thinks she's so brave. She's keeping my courage up all the time; she's so sweet. So I won't tell her I'm gonna die. Don't you tell her that I know I'm gonna die." And I said, "I won't." And so we wept together there; and we could see all of our dreams that we [laid] so often as little brothers, coming for naught, and he was gonna die. And he knew it and I knew it; and he knew I knew it, and I knew he knew it. So we had a cry out there, and then we dried our tears, and he feel asleep with his head on my arm. I never did tell mother that I knew he was going to die until after he'd passed away.

He gradually got worse, and as he got worse, the cancer affected him elsewhere, and he begin to see things. You'd come in the room and he'd say, "Oh Ralph, there's a big bear over there behind the stove, and I'm afraid of the big bear; it's come to hurt me." And then I'd open the kitchen door and I'd chase the bear out. I had to kick him in the seat and shew him and chase him and knock him around, and knock him out, and then shut the door and say, "Now the bears gone." [And he would be so relieved]. Another time he said, "There's a snake, a great big snake." So I'd have to fight the snake and kick the snake out of our house, and he'd be relieved. The pain became so great that we had to start to give him shots to kill the pain.

Well spring came around. One morning just before lunch time, a bunch of the athletes- [who] all ate their lunch together [with ] talks for two years together every noon, [] we just ate our lunch together. So we went out on the bleachers where the sun was shining beautifully and we saw our house burning. And I said, "Oh poor Pollock's house is burning." From where we sat it looked like Pollock's house to me. The bell rang; we went back to our next class. And just as it started, the teacher came through the door, and said, "Is Ralph here?" And I jumped right up and said, "Ya." And he said, "You come with me quickly. Your house is burning down." And he said, "I'll take you home." So we jumped in the car and went on home, and sure enough the house had burned down; caught on fire. And Ross had had a hemorrhage on his leg, and it bled. And they caught the blood; they spread newspapers all around on the floor, so that it caught the blood. And after they stopped the hemorrhage, they stuffed the newspapers into the stove that heated the room. And apparently some of these papers burned up through the chimney, and came out on the roof and caught the roof on fire. But Ross had been giving a shot, and he was lying right in the sun, with his eyes open under the influence of drugs, while the house burned down. He was lying on a mattress that they had dragged out there. I and my sister grabbed the mattress and pulled it over under the tree so he'd have some shade. And they took Ross to the hospital.

Well that night, we were going to the hospital to visit him, and mother and father were up there with him. And I was going with uncle Mark, and uncle Mark [was] a little slow at picking us up. So we went along State Street. He was up at the LDS Hospital. We got up to the city and county building, and I looked at the clock, and I don't even remember what time it was; it was about quarter to nine or quarter after nine or something, quarter after seven. And all of a sudden the truth came to me: I said, "He's dead. Ross is dead." And I started to weep. He said, "No he's not. We're going to see him" And then I said, "No, I just know he's dead." I just received that notice right there: that my brother had died. We got to the hospital and walked in and met mother and father coming down the hall, and they were both weeping, and they said, "Ross just died [fifteen] minutes ago." Which had just corresponded to the time it [had taken] to get up there and get to the hospital. And they said, "Ralph, you should always remember that the last words that your brother Ross said was, 'Where's Ralph? I want Ralph. I need Ralph.'" And I did cry because I hadn't been there when he needed me the most. I had been sort of his, well I guess his hero. And he wanted me when he passed away, and I wasn't there to hold his hand.

Well so, he died- I mean, first the garage burned down, to get things back in order. The day before the house burned down, the garage burned down completely, right to the ground; burned completely down. And the next day, the house burned down. The next day, Ross died. The next day, I graduated from high school. And I was supposed to give a talk in church the following day on Sunday, but I couldn't; I was too spiritually exhausted.

I think that Ross- [] was an outstanding scholar. He got A's and everything, and a very quick mind. I don't think he'd be as big as I am, but he was a beautiful runner. When he was in ninth grade, you'd watch him run, and he had a great big stride for as short as he was. He was a close friend to Reed Grant who came from a prominent athletic family. And he and Reed [] had what they used to call a quintathlon- not a quintathlon. Any rate they did a number of events together. I guess it was a Deseret News' quintathlon…-Decathlon. Any rate they did ten events. And Reed always beat Ross, but just by a few points. Each boy was judged on his own weight, age, height. And Reed was much taller than Ross. And Ross could outrun Reed, but Reed could out jump Ross, when it came to high jumping, not broad jumping. But Ross could outrun him. And it was tied both ways, and Reed just a little ahead of Ross on the total points. And [Reuelen] Rasmussen was Ross's other close friend; the three of them were really close buddies. I don't know what Reed is doing now. Reed went on to star in college in track, and Reuelen went on to star in, [I'm sure] somewhere. He's in Arizona now. And both Reed and Reuelen are quite wealthy. Ross was very friendly with people. Sometimes he joked a little too much, like [when he] teased his brothers and sisters. One day in junior high school, we had to catch a bus home, and I was up in the English room talking with my teacher, Ms. Fraser, and Ross came in crying. And I said, "What's a matter?" you know. And he said [(someone's name)]- who later on became a Bishop in the LDS church- had put his arm around his neck and squeezed him so hard that it chocked him, and he had almost passed out, and his neck was still hurting. And this guy was in my class, but he was a year older than I was; he had been held back in first grade. He and I were friends. So I immediately went right down there and confronted this guy down, and told him if he ever touched my brother again or I'd take care of him. I don't know if I could've or not; but he was bigger than I was, and a year stronger, but I was more determined.

Any rate, we had this close relationship; I looked after him, and he'd look after me. We used to irrigate together, and we had a small ten acre farm, and when we irrigated at night, Ross and I would take the water turns. We were in our early teens; fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. And we hated to lose all our sleep, so [we'd ] turn the water in sections down the rows of corn and wheat, and we didn't want to walk through the wheat because that would trample it down. So one would stay at the top, and one would go down at the bottom, and [ we could] holler and hear each other. [It was warm nights], and we'd just lie down in the ditch. When he went to the bottom, he'd put his feet in the row, [and then he could identify] when the cold water came in: it'd touch his feet, and he knew the water was through. And then he'd holler, "Turn it to the next one." So [I'd] open [ a gate], and go to the next section. And he'd go down to the next section, and set his feet in the ditch again. And we didn't have to have a light. Batteries were expensive, [and we could tell] when the water got there. We didn't have to see it; we could tell by our feet [].

And we used to herd cows. We herded our cows, and [the neighbor kids] would herd theirs. And once in awhile we would herd other neighbors' cows, and we charged 25 cents a week to herd a cow. We'd take them up on what's [now] the flats, in the morning, and keep them up there until they were all full, and we'd bring them back home early afternoon. And this way they could get the [feed] up []. Well when we herded cows, we were always doing athletic things; always standing broad jumping, and running broad jumping. And we'd stick sticks in the ground to make a high jump. And we were always trying to do something to increase our agility. Now on the farm, the task sort of fell that I did the cows and the pigs and the rabbits, and Ross did the chickens. Well we'd go out and start on our choirs together, and see who could get through first. And he had two or three cows to milk, and it'd take about 15, 20 minutes a cow. So we'd hurry just like crazy to see which one could get through their choirs first. So even there we had competition. And [it] made fun of it; we had a lot of fun.

(Craig): []

(Ralph): [] Alright, he was full of leadership, and every group that he was in, he was one of the leaders. And if they voted, he was generally the president. Or if it was a scout troop, he was the patrol leader. And one of the things we did together that was real great was: Grant Crump was our scout leader, and I was Senior Patrol Leader, and Ross was Junior Assistant Patrol Leader. And we ran the troop; the three of us. And Grant Crump, the scout master, and two young guys. Crump worked for the state road, or county road, one of the two, on snowplows, and when it snowed, he [couldn't] come get you; he'd be out plowing the roads. Then Ross and I would take charge of the scout troop. And many, many weeks of the winter, we ran the scout troop, and the scout master [] he told our folks, "I've never seen two young men like this, they can just take over that troop, and just conduct it just as though I were there. They get so much accomplished. They make me feel sometimes like I'm not needed." Of course he was, but we just knew how to run a scout troop. So there at the age of 14 and 15 and 16 [] we were getting a great experience. And while I was a leader of the scout troop and Ross was the Junior Assistant Patrol Leader, we had a trip to Yellowstone park; and this was the real highlight of our scouting experience. We invited the older boys to come, with the troop. We invited my older brothers and sisters and the older boys in the Ward. We had to get 50 scouts- 50 people to go. So we had to invite the older groups, and even up to the [young ] who wanted to go. And we put everyone in groups, and we made a leader of each group of five, we put all our rations up for groups, [..]. We spent evenings taking care of this. Even figured out lunches; What would we have for lunch? So we all rode [in the] back [of] a big truck; Bill Hansen had a big truck that he hauled [oil] in, and we put seats down the middle and down the sides. And when it was time to stop for lunch, well the food was put under the seats, [..]. But we'd just pull a box out, and here's lunch for group A, and here's lunch for group B, and here's lunch for group C, and it was all outlined. And ['Kay] give the lunch to the captains and they gathered their fives and they'd eat their lunch. And when it came time for supper, [they were handed] their rations, and there'd be a menu they were supposed to cook, and here's the stuff to cook, and there was enough for everybody. It just worked out beautifully; I mean, I've seen armies that couldn't do it as well. But that week was just a great time; we went to Yellowstone park, and lived in tents. We just a real fun time.

He was a good looking young man. The whole family loved him, of course, the whole family loved each other. I don't think they loved Ross anymore than they loved each other, but the fact that Ross became our first death sorta made them look on Ross the fondest, as the years have gone by; as being the first one in the family to pass away, and to pass away under such trying circumstances. So they all loved him. There were times when Dean and Darrell could have rung his neck and Lewis could have killed him gladly because he teased them so much. He was the kind of guy who told things the way it was; he liked the truth. I don't really know what he planned to be in life, and all those years have taken that away from me. As we grew up, I made up my mind; at this time, I was thinking of being a writer. I want to be a writer, and the last thing in the world I want to be is a school teacher. And here I am a school teacher and I haven't done much writing.

Ross had some funny friends. We were raised in a real neighborhood up there. One day, Ross, who was about ten or eleven, [] came running into the house, he said, "Ralph, come quick, come quick!" And I ran with him down the road, and his friends- there was sort of two factions, two sections [down there]: the Harris boys and the Pollock boys. The Pollock boys were more my age; there was one boy Ross's age. But the Harris boys and the Pollock boys always fought. And the Pollok boys had caught a Harris boy out on the road, and they tied him to a telephone pole and built a fire under him, and they were going to burn him to the pole; burn him to the stake. When I got there they had started the fire, and they might have killed that kid; that's just how smart they were. Of course I stamped the fire out and set things straight. But had a lot of fun in that neighborhood with Ross and those friends. They still remember him with fondness; he was part of our group.

He was very active in church. He and I, I guess, one time, were the only ones in our age groups that were active in the Aaronic Priesthood. No, the Harris boys were active; I shouldn't say they weren't. But most of my friends flubbed out and fell along the wayside. Some of them came back. But I remember many, many times, Ross and I were the only kids there to bless the sacrament. And he believed we should support good things and do good things, and he was all for it. He liked to take part in plays in school and anything. He played a cornett in the band, and I'd play the bass horn in junior high school. And we enjoyed that.

(Craig): [ ?]

(Ralph): It was a sousaphone. ("sousaphone") Ya. Oh I think he was very fun loving. He did enjoy a good joke. I had a buck sheep that I taught to bull fight. And how Ross loved to see that thing bull fight, and how he loved to bull fight it. We'd get a bunch of kids around there, and then I'd turn the sheep loose, and the kids would run like quail; the sheep would chase 'em. He never hurt them. Oh once in a while he'd knock one down, but if he knocked one down, he'd just stand back and wait for them to get up, to see what the next part of the game was; it was just a game to him. And Ross loved to bull fight with the sheep. And we did crazy things like going around chicken coups and squeezing eggs out of chickens to see if we could do it. We'd get a chicken that was on a nest, and then we'd get a hold of her and put it on our arm and squeeze her abdomen with our hands, and we could milk the egg out. And we thought that was a pretty good trick too. If you milked a cow, you egged a chicken, we said, and we did that. We had a lot of rabbits, and we turned a lot of rabbits loose into the community. I guess it was really my project, but Ross got involved in it. One time he counted 85 baby rabbits running around in this little pen, and that didn't count the mothers and daddies. And every other day it seemed like there was a new batch of rabbits coming up out of the burrows. We ate rabbits until we were sick of them. And then finally, we just finally opened the gate and turned them loose. The dogs were chasing rabbits all over the county for a week or two.

He didn't like to kill things. When it came to killing rabbits, killing chickens, this fell to me. He didn’t want to do it; he didn't like to do it, and I always took care of it. And he was no different from my other brothers and sisters. I killed the rabbits and I milked the cows, and when [we] had to shoot a pig, I shot the pig, and things like this. He just sort of didn't like to do it, and I could see it had to be done and someone had to do it, so I'd do it. Well…

(Craig): []

(Ralph): Well let me just summarize. To summarize, Ross had brownish hair, straight, not much curl to it. It was quite straight; he parted it on the side. I think the other side for me; he parted his on the left side, and I parted mine on the right side. He was a leader in everything he did: scholastic wise, athletics, church. He was just a leader. He was the kind of a boy all parents wish to have. And he had a tremendous sense of humor, even though sometimes he'd tease too much. He had a great depth of feeling. He was constant; he didn't shift this way or that. He knew what he wanted and he went towards that goal. He was intelligent. He was just an all around fine boy. And I loved him very much. And I sorrowed. At one time, I prayed to our Father in heaven that he would take the pain and the cancer out of Ross's leg and put it in mine, and let Ross survive. And I'd be willing to take the death. You know for a week, his leg quit hurting and mine ached intensely. And then I thought, "Well, I guess the Lord has heard my prayer." But then his started growing again and it got worse, and mine quit hurting. So I guess maybe it was my mind that was making mine hurt. The Lord didn't want any sort of silly bargain like that.

(Break- 46:13)

(Craig): Oh, I don't know. Tell of some of experiences that you might have had with him while he was [dying].

(Beth): Okay. Ross was five years older than I, and one of the things that I can remember that made me feel really proud, is when I was in first grade, he was head boy of the Sandy Elementary School. And he planned this big Christmas program. Ralph was a representative from the junior high school, so the two got together and planned this program where the auditorium had different games situated around. And then the children from the grade school would come in, and the junior high school kids would take charge of each game, and they would travel from game to game, and I was proud because my brothers were doing it. He was always in leadership positions. When he got in junior high school, he was the either head boy or editor of the paper or something; I can't quite remember exactly what he did. But I knew he was very active in athletics. And he and my brother were always practicing after school, and they made high jumps, and hurtle things. And out in the field they'd set up these hurtles, and I used to try and practice along with them. But he seemed to be very well liked at school because he obviously he got in all these leadership positions.

The first memory I have of him getting ill was that this lump of [his] started to appear on his leg, [where] he had been kicked at some sporting event. The folks took him to the doctor, and they started treating it, and soon the lump started to grow and he became weaker and thinner and started losing weight. But as a little girl, I wasn't aware that there was anything serious about this going on. And then he began to get worse and he had to go on crutches. And I can remember when he started high school, he was elected Sophomore Class President. But he could only go to about a month or so of school and then he became too ill. (begins crying) [This is a hard time bringing back all these memories. Turn it off and turn it back on].

(Break- 48:45)

(Beth): Ross got progressively worse and the sore became very large. The doctors had cut into him and I guess that's the time they discovered it was cancer. And of course I was in the third grade at the time and I really wasn't aware. I just always thought he would be getting better. Now we had a large family, and my father was a carpenter. And I noticed that Ross got weaker, and the folks were bringing special things for him to eat; like he would have sweet Danish rolls and sausage, and these things that the rest of the family couldn't afford. And I was down in the cellar casing eggs- we had a chicken farm- with my mother one night, and I said, "Mother how come Ross gets to eat all the good things and the rest of us don't?" And it was at that night that she broke down and cried. But she says, "Well because your brother's going to die, and we want to let him enjoy everything that he possibly wants, and we just can't afford to give it to all the children," because daddy [hadn't had] too much work that winter. And as I say, there were still six boys home and two girls, so this came as a great shock to me because I had no idea he that would die until she told me that night. And so from that night on I felt so sorry for my mother because I would catch her crying when she was all alone and when no one could see her. And so I decided that I felt very guilty for all the mean thoughts I had about Ross being spoiled, and I tried to repent and be as nice to him as I could because I knew that he wouldn't be with us much longer. And then as I look back on it now, I can realize how difficult it was for him because he could see his self getting worse and worse all the time and he was in a lot of pain. And I knew that this must have been a very difficult thing for a boy his age to go through. And sometimes he'd get in so much pain, and his temper would get a little short. I felt very sad because he had to go through that suffering. And I just remember he'd always come home with A-cards, and I was just always very proud of him. I remember a lot of young people were so good to him his age; they'd come up and see him. And my brother Ralph spent all the time with him; he wouldn't go to games or anything, (weepy) so he could be with him.

And I can remember one day at school, my sister taught first grade at Sandy Elementary School, and I was in third grade, and she went home for noon, and I kept waiting for her car to come back. And when we went in at the noon bell, I was really worried because her car hadn't come back. And about an hour later, the principal called me out of the classroom, and her hand was shaking as she put it on my shoulder, and she says, "I have some bad news to tell you." And I said, "My brother died." And she says, "No, your house burned down." (laugh) And she got me in the car and took me home, and of course there was no roof on our house, and all these people standing around, strangers that I didn't know, and our furniture was out of the lawn. And my mother wasn't there because she was at the hospital with Ross. And I can remember, I walked through the house and I started to cry so hard. (weepy) And my dad came up and took hold of me, and he says, "Now you just stop this right now. You can cry all the tears in the world and it won't change anything one bit," and he says, "We need your help. We have a tough situation. You got to stop this crying and you got to take hold of our self and help us out," and he says, "You can be a help your older brother." And my dad so stern, that was the sternest my dad had ever talked to me in his life, in my life, 'cause I usually got everything that I wanted from my father. And I decided right then that I'd better stop crying. But it was a very sad situation because I just felt like the world was just sort of crumbling in around me as a little girl in the third grade.

But we spent the night at my sister's house. And the next day, my brother Ross passed away, and it was very sad. And yet I knew that he was in so much pain that he just couldn't keep on enduring it like he was. And so cushioned it. It was the first time I had been around anyone who was going to die. That was my first experience with death. And that's just a quick [nutshell] of my memories of Ross.

(Craig): Could you describe maybe some of his physical characteristics, or personality traits or something-

(Beth): Yes. He was very sharp. I remember when the family used to spend a lot of time in the evenings visiting because we didn't have television in those days. And he was always cracking jokes; he was very, very sharp that way. I remember he would always crack a joke and they'd said, "Put a mark on the wall," and [they'd take their] finger and go like this (making signal) in the air; they used to keep track. There was a lot going between the brothers, [they were] always trying to outdo each other, mentally, you know: who could pull the [quickie]. I can remember sometimes there would be disagreements between the brothers, but never between Ross and Ralph. At least I don't remember any; they were always very close. Sometimes disagreements would come between the twins and Lewis, or Mark and the twins, or, you know. I can remember my mother, if daddy wasn't home, they would just start wrestling, you know; it start out in fun, and then they'd start getting too intense. She'd take the broom after them, and she just [pick up the broom and say to the boys], "Stop right now!"

Ross was a good looking young man. Of course he was thin. I think young men, when they going through adolescence, they sorta [thin] out. He was quite thin [..]. But he always would win races, and always was on the basketball team, and he loved athletics. And he loved to excel scholastically. And he had a great love for his brother Ralph. I was just the little sister who would sometimes get in the way. (laugh) But Ralph, when he was on crutches, would carry him out to the car, you know, and take him on rides []. Ross really appreciated [that]. He was a little different looking than the other boys, I thought. He sort of favored more his mother, his looks, than he did my dad, I think.

(Craig): Now before he got sick, what were his relationship with friends? Did he have any body that was a-

(Beth): He had a girl, that the romance started sort of in ninth grade. In fact he had a couple girls. He had this one girl who moved away; she moved to Montana. Her name was [Glenna Steffenson]. And then there was Benny Jensen, who liked him, who used to come up all the time when he was sick; she'd come up and see him all the time. But [it wasn't] a girl [that] he was sort of fond of; they were just really good friends. I don't think it amounted to [anymore] than that. But he did have a girl he was fond of in ninth grade. And he had some good friends; there was a group of them: there was Reed, Grant, and Reuelen Rasmussen, and, oh, there was about five boys who would come up and visit him all the time. He played in the band in school, he played the cornett. And he seemed to like music.

(Craig): Now these friends that he ran around with: we're they athletic and things like that?

(Beth): Yes. Sandy Junior High School was, you know, Sandy wasn't as large a town as it is now, and everybody knew everyone. But he just didn't have one special friend; it seemed like it was always a group of them. I think his close friend his brother Ralph, [..]. But he had lots of friends. They were certainly nice to him too when he got sick. They used to call me little Bisha's sister, you know, and it used to make me feel quite important, because everyone at noon time used to walk down to the store to buy goodies. And we would pass the junior high kids, and they'd say, "Oh, there's little Bisha's sister," you know. And it made me feel really important because then [in front of] my friends [I] got that recognition from [] the big junior high kids, and I used to feel quite important because they'd always go out of their way to be nice to me because I was "Bisha's little sister".

(Craig): Well is there- gee I don't know- is there any other experiences or something that before he got sick that you might remember?

(Beth): Only the that he was quite a tease, and I used to sometimes go running to mother, and she'd always could explain it away, []. She never got after him too much. She'd just say, "He's just a tease" and "Don't let it worry ya". But he didn't ever do anything bad, but he was a tease, as I remember him [] as I was a little girl. I was born after six boys, and so really in that family I pretty well had my own way because, I can remember, they would all: the boys would get in the front room and they'd toss me from one to the other. I can remember that so plainly, when I was a little tiny girl. And of course they [would] always catch me, you know. (laugh) But they would always do that game with me. And they would always treat me very [well]; my brothers had [always] been very nice to me. But I do remember Ross as being sort of a tease, but not anything bad, just, you know, [] kept the party alive.

(Craig): Well that's fine. I can't think of anything more [].

(Beth): As the years go on, the memories dim too, [] because I was just in the third grade when he died. I can remember another thing that on Saturday morning that was fun: the whole family got in and helped to clean. And they'd mop and wax, and my job would be to: I put clothes on each of my feet and I had to go shine the wax on the floor on the linoleums. And they'd put paste wax on, []. I remember I'd go skating with these two clothes on my feet; that was my job. And I'd sometimes wrap it around my bottom and I'd slide around to polish the floor. And we'd all work together. We'd always be through by noon, and our house would be spick and span. And then we'd to go town, and mother would go with us, and the whole bunch would climb in the car. And we'd go to town quite often. Then we always would walk a lot to the shows. They used to have shows down at the amusement hall on Saturday nights; we'd go as a family. And when coming home I remember I'd get so tired, and so I'd take turns and I'd ride on each of the boys' shoulders, you know, 'til we got home, because we lived about two and a half miles or three miles from the church. But it was fun; the family life was fun, it really was. We'd have a good time. When we got a car, [ we used] it more; usually when we'd do walking, like either when something would happen to the car or when we'd run out of gas, you know. And we used to get the whole neighborhood on the car; we'd stop at every house on 7th East- of course there was only five houses on 7th East too- but we'd pick up everyone. Kids would be standing on the running boards and the car would be packed. And then we'd head off to Sunday school and church. So that's about all I can really remember.

Okay.

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