Jacob Foutz Family Association

Lois Ann's Conversion

2010-09-19T22:09:00.000-07:00

From the Life History of Lois Ann Claney Foutz, page 16:

Elmer was concerned about the war and wanted to get into the military service. I had started going to church with him in Sheridan at the little branch. After writing out ten questions and sending them to Leaone, Elmer's sister, we got an answer from the Presiding Bishop of the Church, Joseph B. Wirthlin. He answered the questions to my satisfaction and I agreed to join the Church.

Elmer wrote to his Bishop in Pleasant Grove and told him that he was planning to go into the military service and if it were possible we would like to go to the temple to be sealed for time and eternity before he did so. The Bishop asked for us to come down and we could talk about it.

Elmer had a meeting with the Bishopric one Saturday night and they gave him the third degree but agreed to give us a recommend to go to the temple if we could get the Stake President to sign it. I was baptized Sunday afternoon about 4:30pm, and Monday we went to see the Stake President. He was the man who married us, and after a pleasant discussion in which he gave us some good advice, he signed our recommends.

On Wednesday morning at 6:00am, Leaone and Charlie, Elmer's sister and her husband, accompanied us to the temple. Although I had been a member of the Church for less than 72 hours, we were sealed for time and eternity and had our two little ones sealed to us. I certainly didn't realize the significance of what I was doing at the time; but I have been grateful ever since that the Church authorities were willing to take a chance and let us do what we did. My only regret is that I didn't become a member earlier.

Selling Soda Pop

2010-09-10T13:43:00.000-07:00

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From the Life and Times of F Elmer Foutz, page 5:

At the rodeo, they always had pop and ice cream stands for the spectators and they hired boys (no girls in those days) to carry soda pop into the grandstands and around where cars were parked with people sitting in them watching the rodeo. I managed to get a job selling soda pop and as I remember it, we were paid one cent per bottle commission for what we sold. The pop cost five cents a bottle. We also got into the rodeo free.

One year, the man in charge of the pop selling gave each of us $1.00 in change in case someone happened to have a silver dollar or a 50 cent piece for us to change. There were no big bills as this was depression time. We had a 24 bottle case of pop with a carrying strap and we would go through the crowd selling pop, hopefully before it got warm. If it was a hot day, and it usually was, we were able to sell quite a bit and the manager had promised to give the salesman who sold the most a dollar bonus.

My friend and I were running neck in neck, but as the rodeo ended he was a half a case ahead of me. While the other boys were turning in their money and checking out, I picked up another case of pop and headed over to the rodeo chutes where the tired cowboys who had competed and the stock handlers were still busy taking care of the rodeo animals. They were hot and thirsty and some of them even drank two bottles and I soon sold my whole case and went back to check in, but no before the man in charge was wondering who it was that hadn't checked in.

Actually, there had been boys who took the dollar change, the full case of pop and carrying strap and headed out to sell and when the pop was sold, they abandoned the empty case and disappeared with the dollar change and $1.20 for the pop. It was a profit of $2.20 and you had to sell nine cases to make that much. The man had my name and was inquiring as to which Foutz family I was from and someone said I was Fred Foutz's boy. He replied if I was Fred's son, I was honest and I would be back and soon I showed up and collected the dollar bonus money in addition to a cent per bottle for 19 cases if I remember right, over 550 bottles; not too bad for an afternoon. We also got to eat some of the frozen ice cream bars that melted and other fringe benefits.

When I compared that half day with two long days thinning sugar beets for $4.00, it was a really good deal. I have always been proud of the reputation my Dad had as an honest man and I remember when he died, how I went all over town to the places where he sometimes ran up a little charge account to see if he owed anyone any money and not a single place admitted Dad owed them anything. Some of them said he used to charge things, but in later years he hadn't done it, etc.

Billy Butter

2010-09-10T13:23:00.000-07:00

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From the Life and Times of F Elmer Foutz, page 6:

While I was living in Pleasant Grove, an incident regarding the value of an honest name happened in the neighboring town of American Fork...The creamery in American Fork made butter and other products. One of the employees, a Mr. William Stewart, was bald-headed and always wore a little black derby hat even in the plant. One evening as William was leaving the creamery, the manager stepped out of his office and asked William to come into his office, that he wanted to talk with him. The manager told William to have a seat, that he would be with him in a minute but he had some mail to get out and he very busily shuffled papers on his desk, etc.

William sat on a chair in front of a radiator with the sun shining in through the window and was obviously uncomfortable, but the manager kept busy and didn't stop to talk to William for a few minutes. All at once a trickle of melted butter slithered down the side of William's face out from under his hat. The manager told William that they had suspected for sometime that he was stealing butter and now he was caught red-handed and that they couldn't have dishonest people working for them and he fired him.

A few days later the manager reinstated William because he was a good worker and he had to start at the bottom of the pay scale and work himself up again. From then on, he was no longer known as William Stewart, but was called Billy Butter by all who knew him. His wife was known as Billy Butter's wife. His son was known as Billy Butter's boy. This was a lesson to all of us that crime didn't pay. For the value of a 35 cent pound of butter, the man and his family were disgraced.

Little Red Riding Hood

2010-08-09T21:08:00.000-07:00

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From the Military History of Elmer Foutz, page 7:

"As I was walking to the PX to get some stuff for the guys in the poker game one night, I heard a little timid voice sing out, "Who goes there?" and in a very loud clear voice I replied, "It is I, little Red Riding Hood, be not afraid" and since no more was said I proceeded on my way only to step out of the shadows into the bright moonlight and there immediately in front of me was the gold braid of an officer's hat shining in the moonlight and a very nervous enlisted man by his side. I saluted as smartly as I knew how, the officer returned it, and I went hurriedly on my way. I have wondered many times since what that officer of the guard really thought that night."

Crime Doesn't Pay

2010-08-09T20:46:00.000-07:00

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From the Life and Times of F Elmer Foutz, pages 44-45:

"I had an uncle, George T. Foutz, who was a post office clerk in Salt Lake City. He always had a good automobile and often took Mother and Dad with him to the canyon or other places. He had been a bishop and president of the Postal Clerks Union in Salt Lake and had attended national meetings in Pennsylvania and other places. All went well for him and his family.

One time when I came to Utah to visit the folks, I stopped by the post office in Salt Lake and asked to see Uncle George but the man at the window said he didn't work there anymore. When I inquired as to what happened he told me that Uncle George had been caught rifling the mail. I didn't know what that meant, but the man explained that he had been caught stealing money from the mail.

For some time they were aware that money was being taken from envelopes that were sent to a fund-raising organization and they had checked on everyone but four people at the post office. One time after Uncle George went to the rest room, he came out and the assistant postmaster met him at the door and told him the postmaster wanted to see him in his office. They went to the postmaster's office and after a little small talk, the postmaster asked Uncle George to let him examine his billfold and when he did he removed a dollar bill and wrote the numbers on it on a piece of paper. Then he explained that those were the same numbers he had copied from a dollar bill before putting it in an envelope addressed to the fund-raising organization and then routing the letter through the ones George was sorting. He asked George where he got the dollar and of course he had no idea, he had gotten it as change at the grocery store or somewhere, but on further questioning, the postmaster explained that a postal inspector was watching Uncle George sort the mail from an observation point above where he was working and when the letter came to him, he put it in his pocket and a little later he went to the men's room. Now the letter was gone and the bill was in his billfold and no other dollar bills would have the same numbers. Uncle George finally admitted that he had taken the money out of the envelope and torn it up and flushed it down the toilet and put the money in his billfold, but it was the first time he had ever done it and he couldn't explain what caused him to take such a chance.

Uncle George was immediately tried in federal court and was found guilty. Because the offense was a federal charge, the judge explained that it would be unfair for the people of Utah to have to stand the expense of his incarceration, so he sentenced him to a year and a day in prison, to forfeit all pay and allowances due or to become due, and to be confined at hard labor at a federal prison.

Uncle George served seven months at McNeil Island near Stilacoom, Washington, where he was a model prisoner and was released. He couldn't get a job and sold his home in Salt Lake City and moved to Ogden where he bought a small dairy and tried to make a living, but it didn't work well. After a short time, Uncle George had a brain hemorrhage and died. It was a sad ending to what had been an enjoyable life before he stole the one dollar. Another good example that crime doesn't pay."

War Bond Allotment

2010-08-02T13:59:00.000-07:00

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During WWII, F Elmer Foutz was assigned to the air base at Biggs Field, Texas working as a surgical technician. He recounts the following experience in the Life and Times of F Elmer Foutz, page 49:

"When we were asked to sign an allotment form to buy war bonds, I refused to sign. Soon I was ordered to the commanding officer's office and told to sign the papers. I was told that I was the only man in the company that hadn't signed up for war bonds and anyone could afford a minimum deduction for bonds. I told the captain that if he would let me show him what my financial situation was, I believed he would agree with me that I couldn't afford to buy bonds.

I proceeded to list my expenses and the first thing I listed was my tithing. He asked what that was and I told him it was a donation to my church. He told me I could eliminate that, that I would have the rest of my life to contribute to the church and while I was in the service others could support the church. I told him one of the reasons I was in the military was to protect my right to religious freedom, that I had been paying tithing all my life and neither he nor anyone else had a right to deny me that right. I told him it didn't cost to pay tithes, it paid.

I listed my expenses (which amounted to more than the $91.85 I got per month) and explained that the only way we were able to make it was to borrow on insurance or from relatives, but we weren't complaining. We were making it O.K. He told me he didn't see how we lived and told me to return to duty. Two weeks later when a promotion roster came out, I was the only man in the company to be promoted to Corporal. After signing up for a war bond allotment, I still had more money than I had before."

A more detailed account of this story was printed in the June 1977 issue of the Ensign. Click HERE and scroll down to "I Couldn't Afford Not to Pay Tithing" to read it.

Margaret Mann on the Hauns Mill Massacre

2010-07-18T21:42:00.000-07:00

The following is an excerpt from the biography of Jacob Foutz by Grace Foutz Boulter and Mary Foutz Corrigan with additional material compiled by Lael S. Larsen. His wife, Margaret Mann recounted the story of the Hauns Mill Massacre as she remembered it years later:

Sister Foutz said the Saints had thought all was amicably adjusted after the meeting they had with the mobbers the day before, and Brother Evans had gone to inform the brethren, her husband among them, that all was well. It was about the middle of the afternoon of that day when all of a sudden, without any warning whatever, sixty or seventy men with blackened faces, came riding up, their horses at full speed. The brethren ran for protection into the old log blacksmith's shop. Being without arms they were helpless when the mob rode up to the shop and without any explanation or apparent cause, began a whole-sale butchery by firing round after round through the cracks in the log wall of the shop.

Sister Margaret Foutz goes on to tell, "I was at home with my little family of five children and could hear the firing of guns. In a moment I knew that the mob was upon us. Soon a runner came telling the women and children to hasten into the woods and secret ourselves. This we did in all haste without taking anything to keep us warm; and had we been fleeing from the scalping knife of the Indian we would not have made greater haste. As we ran from house to house, gathering as we went, we finally numbered about forty or fifty women and children.

"We ran about three miles into the woods and there huddled together, spreading what few blankets and shawls we chanced to have upon the ground for the children. There we remained until two o'clock the next morning before we heard anything of the result of the firing at the mill. Who can imagine our feelings during this dreadful suspense? When the news did come oh what terrible news! Fathers, brothers, husbands, inhumanly butchered.

"We now took up the line of march for home, but alas what a home! Who would we find there? Now with our minds full of the most fearful forebodings, we retraced those three long dreary miles. As we were returning I saw Brother Myers who had been shot through the body. In that dreadful state he had crawled on his hands and knees about two miles to his home.

"After I arrived at my house with my children I hastily made a fire to warm them, and then started for the mill, about two miles distant. My children would not remain at home as they said 'if father and mother are going to be killed we want to be with them'.

"On the way to the mill, in the first house I came to there were three dead men. One a Brother McBride, was a terrible sight to behold, having been cut and chopped and mangled with a corn cutter. I was told that he was a survivor of the Revolutionary war.

"I hurried on, looking for my husband and finally found him in an old house covered with some rubbish. He had been shot in the thigh. I there rendered him all the aid that I could, but it was evening before I could get him home.

"I saw thirteen more dead bodies at the shop and witnessed the beginning of the burial which consisted in throwing the bodies into an old dry well. So great was the fear of the men that the mob would return and kill what few men that was left, that they threw the bodies in head first or feet first as the case might be. When they had thrown in three, my heart sickened and I could not stand it more. I turned away to keep from fainting.

"My husband and another Brother had drawn dead bodies over themselves and pretended to be dead. By so doing they saved their own lives and heard what some of the mob said. After the firing was over two little boys that were in the shop begged for their lives, but one of the mob said 'they will make Mormons' and put the muzzle of his gun to the boys' heads and blew their brains out.

"Oh what a change one short day had brought! Here were our friends dead and dying, one in particular asked me to take a hammer and give him relief by knocking his brains out, so great was his agony. And in all this we knew not what moment our enemies would be upon us again. All this suffering, not because we had broken any law - on the contrary, it was part of our religion to keep the laws of the land - but because the evil spirit was at work among the children of men.

"In the evening Brother Evans got a team and wagon and conveyed my husband to our home. He carried him in and placed him on the bed. I then had to attend him alone, without a doctor or anyone to tell me what to do for him. Six days later my husband, himself, helped me to extract the bullet which was buried deep in the thick part of his thigh and was flattened like a knife. We did this with a kitchen knife.

"During the first ten days the mob came every day with blackened faces (more like demons from the infernal pit than like human beings) cursing and swearing that they would kill the old Mormon preacher, who was my husband. At times like these when human nature would quail, I have felt the power of God upon me to that degree that I have stood before the mob fearless and although a woman and alone, those demons in human shape had to succumb to the power which they knew not of. During these days of danger I sometimes hid my husband out in the woods behind our home and covered him with leaves. When he was able to sit up he was dressed as a woman and put at the spinning wheel. In this way his life was protected. Thus during my husbands illness was I harassed by mobocratic violence."

The story is told that on one occasion when the mob came to Sister Foutz's looking for her husband, she felt the power of God upon her to such an extent that she was totally unafraid. She commanded the mobbers, inasmuch as they had killed and injured the men of the community, to kill and dress a pig for her and her little ones to eat. These men trembled before this little woman and did as she had told them to do. Sister Foutz often told how she surprised herself on such occasions, but she was humble and gave credit and thanks to her God for this extra courage and strength.

*If you'd like a pdf file of the full biography of Jacob Foutz, Sr. emailed to you, please CONTACT US*

Jacob Foutz

2010-07-18T21:02:00.000-07:00

From the biography of Jacob Foutz by Grace Foutz Boulter and Mary Foutz Corrigan with additional material compiled by Lael S. Larsen, page 57:

Jacob grew up in his father's family, still speaking the German language. He married Margaret July 22, 1822, at Green Castle, Pennsylvania. Their children spoke only German. They joined the Church (of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) in 1834. Margaret was President of Ward Relief Society on its organization at Nauvoo.

Jacob was a member of the Nauvoo Legion. He was among a group of 85 men aboard "Main of Iowa," a steamboat sent from Nauvoo to patrol the Mississippi River to prevent the Prophet being taken to Missouri by water for trial. The boat loaded 24 June 1842.

April 7, 1845, Jacob sanctioned Bishop of 8th Ward, Nauvoo. Left Nauvoo. Harvested a crop the summer and fall of 1846 at Garden Grove, Iowa.

Captain A.O. Smoot Company. 21 June 1847 left Winter Quarters for Salt Lake (one month after Brigham Young)...two wagons for belongings - individuals walked...arrived in Salt Lake Valley 25 September 1847. November 7, 1847, made Bishop, east half of new Fourth Ward. Located west side of town, near Pioneer Park.

Jacob died 14 February 1848. Probably from a heart attack while shoveling gravel. Death first to occur in valley. Spring, 1852, Margaret moved her family to Pleasant Grove. Three of the Foutz sisters and their husbands were already settled there.