The Westra siblings knew her as Great-Grandma-Bohne. I must admit, I thought it was "Bonnie" for a long time. Hannah Lucinda Hurst Howell Bohne was Grandma Zada's mother. She lived in Fairview and we visited there several times. I remember hearing a story about how when she was two years old, her mother had given her a peach and sat her outside, when a big pig came and tried to take the peach, and ended up biting and dragging little Hannah through the yard. She had a scar from that and would tell us how it happened. She was the third of 11 children, and her youngest sister Leola was born shortly after her own daughter Reola (and yes, the rhyming names were on purpose). Great-Grandma became interested in family history, and wrote up a full auto-biography of her life. She also wrote a biography for her father and grandfather. Click on the link to see the PDF of the 30 pages she wrote. It's interesting stuff! There is a condensed history included below.
I was born in Colonia Dublan, Chihuahua, Mexico on February 10, 1892. My father, Walter F. Hurst, and my mother, Hannah Alzadia Anderson, were both born and reared in Fairview, Utah. My grandfather Hurst was a polygamist and things were very uncomfortable for polygamists around this time. He moved to Mexico with many in the extended family. My parents joined them, and moved to Old Mexico the spring before I was born.
Most of the time until after I was eight years old, we lived in the mountains. My father’s oldest brother was in charge of a large sawmill that was owned by the Church. My father and others of his brothers worked there. I have many happy memories of my early childhood. We children played in the sawdust. We made play houses in the square and triangular stacks of lumber as they were put in drying piles, and also under the huge oak trees where the branches reached the ground and closed us in on all sides. My parents realized we should be in school and so they quit the sawmill work and moved into the valley. My school days were happy days. Our schools were church schools and theology was a requirement. I graduated from the Dublan Seminary and attended the Juarez Stake Academy for two years before leaving Mexico.
By 1912 conditions with the Mexican government were serious. The Mexicans were jealous of the accomplishments of the Mormon people. The revolutionary war was on and the government was terribly unsettled. American people were in grave danger so the Church and the American government evacuated the American citizens into the United States. It is a long, sad story, but we just walked out and left all the property and accumulations my parents had spent the best twenty-one years of their life working for. A month later we arrived in Fairview. Our relatives were very kind and considerate to help us get located.
June 4, 2013, I married Sylvanus Howell in the Manti Temple. He had served twenty-seven months in the Colorado Mission. He had lived and boarded with his mother until he was 33 years old. The difference in our ages was 13 years. We moved “up the creek” into a two-roomed house on a nine- acre fruit farm. Our family came along very fast, and we had four beautiful little girls before we realized it. Reola (1914), Neva (1915), Zadia (1918) and Bertha (1920). On October 6, 1921, I gave birth to our first son. He was premature and in a serious condition. We had a hard time pulling him through, but by the time he was a year old he was a normal child. We named him Berthell. When Berthell was six years old our second boy, Demont was born. He was a beautiful baby and has been very educationally minded. Kenneth was born last (1929).
Sylvanus was a wonderful gardener and we kept bees. It was a lot of work but it didn't bring in enough cash to make ends meet. Reola married in 1932, Neva in 1935 and Zadia in 1938. Sylvanus’s health failed, and he died of cancer May 20, 1939. After Sylvanus died, I served as president of the Y.W.M.I.A.[Young Women ], and the next summer as President of the Relief Society. I had already served as president of the Primary. I was a widow for fourteen years. During that time all three boys enlisted in the service, with time overseas in actual duty.
I worked for eight years on the school lunch program. I would ride the school bus to work and back. With the help of the children, I kept up the place and the bee yard, but it was difficult to do alone.
In December 1952, Arthur Bohne came to see me. His wife had died almost two years before. He had been a construction worker, and the last few years he had been a farmer. He had three sons, but they were grown and on their own. After he made a few trips to see me, we decided that we both needed each other. We were married December 30, 1952, in Salt Lake City. My children gave us a wedding supper in Berthell’s new home. A week later we moved to Las Vegas where we spent two years. Arthur had a good job working for Reynolds construction Company. Reynolds were working for the Atomic Energy Commission and the wages were very attractive. We lived in a trailer in the Atomic Energy Trailer Court.
This was indeed a new experience for me. I believe this was the first time in my life I had ever had leisure time. It took me a little while to adjust to my new condition. Arthur would leave at 7:30 in the morning, and I would be alone all day. I did a lot of reading and writing. After two years, we returned and purchased a new home. We were very content and happy in it. After we came back from Nevada, I became interested in D.U.P. work. I served five years as secretary for the local camp and two years as registrar. I also served five years in the county organization. I have become very interested in genealogy and history writing. I have done quite a lot of history writing and am in hopes some of my children will continue what I have started.
