My Paternal Grandmother Willmia Brown Robinson was born clear back in 1877. She was always very old to me. She lived in Arizona with an aunt of mine. By the time I was old enough to remember her, she was only coming to our house in California once or twice a year.  

She and my Mother did not have a close relationship, so in the days leading up to one of her visits we children heard a lot of complaining. I remember sitting next to her on the couch in our living room and looking up at her wrinkled face. Her skin seemed so loose, I was afraid of kissing those wrinkly cheeks. She wore black “mother goose” shoes with “supphose” that were held up just below her knees with a visible garter band. I never saw her in pants, always a dress. When she came to visit us, I had to share my bed with her. She coated herself with Mentholatum every night before bedtime (for those of you who are too young to know what that is, think Vicks Vapo rub). I remember waking up out of a sound sleep to what I thought was a herd of turkeys gobbling through my bedroom. She was snoring. I thought of her as old and “funny”.

The church had been the focal point Grandmother’s life. After Alzheimers set in, everywhere we took her she thought she was at church. I remember being about 13 and sitting in a parking lot at the grocery store. As she watched the ladies in casual clothes exit their cars and go into the store. She was appalled that they would go to church that way. When I was about 15 she died.

In 1970, when I was first married, we lived in West Jordan. I became acquainted with an elderly lady down the street named Bessie Spencer Bateman. Bessie happened to be my grandmother’s niece. She was just about 10 years younger than my grandmother. Since all of my family was in California, I was a lonely young mother with a baby. I would put my little son in his stroller and walk over to Aunt Bessie’s house. Bessie had grown up in Kanab with my grandmother. She told me the most wonderful stories about my grandmother. She told me how beautiful she was and how she had the most excellent singing voice. One day she gave me a copy of a little journal that my grandmother had kept.

On that day I came to meet and know my blessed grandmother. She had such living faith. She was the 2nd wife in a polygamist marriage. She had 8 children and her husband never actually lived with her. She lived through many difficult things alone. Always alone except for the comfort she got from her faith in the Savior. She wrote about her youngest son dying in WWII. He was a stretcher bearer and on his first day in the field he was killed. When she got the news, she was by herself. She tells about the Holy Ghost enveloping her and staying with her for 2 weeks. She said that it felt like a gentle sun lamp on her. She related many other experiences to me through her journal, and I came to really love her, for the first time in my life.

I have often wondered what my grandchildren will remember about me. I want them to know about me when I was young and pretty and not just old and “funny”.  I want them to know how much I loved the Lord. I want them to know how important family and family history are to me. In this day and age of everything electronic I feel a need to put pen to paper. I know that I can save things on Family Search but I think that some things are too personal. So for some experiences I keep a few little paper journals. I want my grandchildren to know my heart and If I don’t write it down, we will all forget to remember

–Karen Stoddard, Temple and Family History Consultant, Hegessy Ward