My Great-Grandfather died doing temple and family history work. John B. Cannon was the oldest son of 11 kids whose father died at age 51 when he was only 19 years old. During his life, John always felt a strong need to care for and be with family.
In the spring of 1983, the Cannon family, including my grandma and her siblings, helped type up and distribute the personal journal of our ancestor, Jens Christian Nielsen. Jens was the first convert in that family line, having been baptized in 1852.
On April 13th, my great grandparents, Alice and John Cannon, left on a road trip to personally give copies of this family treasure to relatives in southern Utah and to take family names to the St. George temple. Before leaving, John left a note with his son explaining that they were going to “visit relatives, living and passed away.”
The next day, they decided to visit the Pine Valley Cemeteries looking for ancestors’ graves on their way between Cedar City and St. George. On Thursday, their car got stuck in the wet spring mud of 1983. This was the same day that the famous mudslide in Spanish Fork Canyon engulfed the town of Thistle, Utah. They left their car and began walking to where they perceived there was help. They walked all night and into the next day before finding shelter in the cleft of some rocks. Fatigue from 7 miles on two artificial hips allowed them to sleep there Friday night.
Saturday, John discovered a ranch house and returned to tell Alice. He told her about the house, but said he was unable to take her there as his legs wouldn’t work anymore. He told her of a dream he had the night before, where he had been told this was the place he was to die. They stayed in the rocks all day Sunday. They chatted in the cleft of the rock with sleep coming in the early morning hours. At dawn Monday, my great grandpa was gone.
Alone now, great grandmother searched for the ranch house following the road and power lines through a snow-covered field. At 4 foot 11 inches, Alice struggled for each step for over 9 hours to traverse the 1/2 mile to the ranch house. Late Monday afternoon, Alice found the ranch house that John had told her about. With the cabin locked up for the winter, she had to break a window to climb inside. She ravenously ate a jar of jam she found left in the refrigerator and then immediately found some paper and penned a note to her unknown hosts. “I’m so sorry I had to break into your home. It prolonged my life.” She went on to ask whoever found her to notify her children, whom she named with phone numbers, to cover the cost of the broken window. Exhausted, she then lay down to sleep.
During her 3 days alone in the cabin, she melted snow for drinking water and wished she could die, but as she said, “No one would take me.” When they did not return home from their trip, as expected, a large search party was organized by foot, car and plane. As the days passed, the hope of finding them alive started to fade. The Sheriff’s Deputy who found Alice wept when he entered the cabin and saw her sitting in a chair alive. She was a survivor who had lost her mother at age 6 and overcame both scarlet fever and diphtheria before suffering a ruptured appendix. As a teenager, she contracted the deadly strain of influenza during the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918. As a young mother, she needed a blood transfusion and was accidently given unmatched blood that should have killed her. At age 81, six days lost in the mountains was no match for Alice.
She would later say how she always wanted to die together with her husband, but she just couldn’t seem to. She was driven to live, her mission not yet complete. She lived another 13 years as a widow after having a surgery to remove her left leg below the knee and most of her right foot, both from frostbite. I was 18 months old when this event took place and I was blessed to know and love this wonderful woman for 14 years. I will never forget her contagious optimism. I witnessed it during one of our family nights she attended. We were singing “do as I’m doing, follow, follow me” and taking turns leading the family around the room. When it was Grandma Cannon’s turn, she began dancing around the room when her artificial leg fell off! Without missing a beat, she looked at us and said, “I bet you can’t ‘do’ that!” Her legacy of joy, faith and family is part of who I am.
Many of us have heard the call of our ancestors, turning our hearts to our fathers. Did John know that on this trip he really would visit both “the living and the dead?” He literally gave his life serving his family on both sides of the veil and taught his posterity the importance of family and redeeming the dead.
-Jon Schmidt, Granite View Stake