Horace Edgar Hammond was born April 22, 1876, in Providence, Utah in a little log cabin just south of the Providence Elementary School House.
The first recollection I have of my childhood was riding on a little red wagon with small wheels. I rode from one room to another, one room being a step lower than the other room, which made an interesting bump.
When I was about three years old, I remember my father buying me a pair of black leather boots with a red piece across the front and the word “Decker” on it. I was very proud of them. About this time my mother took me to Farmington and when we returned my father had all the rafters up on a new home where the old home used to be.
I started to school when I was seven, my first teacher being Miss Clara Rice. She was my cousin, and I did not get along very well with her. For that reason, I ran away from school nearly every day.
I was baptized by Godfrew Fuhriman on June 1st, 1884, when I was 8 years old, and confirmed by William Fife on the same date.
My mother died when I was only eight years old. My father, Milton Datus Hammond, had four wives. My mother was his first wife, LoVisa Miller. His second wife, Freelove Miller, my mother’s cousin, died a few years before mother in 1879. Freelove’s children, 6 boys and 1 girl, lived with us until mother died. Then we all lived with father’s third wife, Chesty Transtrom. There were 18 boys and girls in one house – imagine the congestion! Chesty was the mother of 4 girls and 3 boys.
When I was 10 years old, I lived with my oldest brother, Melvin. I had lived with him for about one year when his wife, Sarah, became ill. Then I had to go live with Chesty again.
Father owned a large horse ranch near the Snake River, and he also owned a large pasture just across the state road from the Logan Sugar Factory. We boys drove the cows to the pasture and went fishing and swimming nearly every day. We had three dogs, Charley, a large Saint Bernard; Ring, a red and white; and Shep, a black dog. When all three dogs went after the cows at the same time they often killed a calf before we could stop them. Charley had to be shot to prevent this trouble. Ring got poisoned, and Shep probably died of old age.
In April, 1886, father and the older boys left Providence with 40 teams to work on the railroad in Wyoming. About 3 years later, in 1889, I went to Telco, Washington, to work on the railroad, where my father and some of my older brothers were working on a railroad.
Four of my brothers and I, all about the same age, were supposed to carry water for the men who were driving teams, but the foreman had some time keeping us busy. We would take turns, each carrying the water for one-fourth of the day. We would go boat riding and every other thing but carry water. The men would threaten to beat us but we were not much afraid.
In October, 1889, we came back to Providence. Occasionally the railroad company would sidetrack the car in which we were riding and leave us for a day or two; thus, we were about a week coming home, whereas we could have come home in one or two days. For three years we went to school in the winter and in the summer five of us, nearly the same age, went fishing every day. In 1892 we went to Bozeman, Montana, where father was building a canal. I was 16 years old that summer. I night-herded the horses until September, when we went to Sheridan, Wyoming. There we worked on the Burlington and Missouri Railroad doing grading about 30 miles northeast of Sheridan. Our last work that fall was on the Tongue River, 15 miles northeast of Sheridan.
It was very cold in December. One time late at night, about 15 miles west of Sheridan, we came upon an old barn. We lay down there and went to sleep. It was near Christmas and very cold and when we awoke our boots were frozen hard. We had to go to the nearest farmhouse to thaw them out before we could put them on. A few days before Christmas we went to spend the winter at a farm on Wolf Creek owned by a man named Garrett. We had no money but we got supplies from Mr. Garrett.
In the spring of 1893 we did one mile of grading on the Tongue River where Wolf Creek empties into it. In July of that year we went into the Big Horn Mountains and got out railroad ties for the B. and M. Railroad Company. The logs were brought to the saw mill owned by Mr. Hall. He had a flume a few miles long, 3 or 4 feet wide and 3 or 4 feet deep, filled with water that carried the logs to the mill. The flume emptied the logs into a large pond. At the mill the logs were floated into the mill, sawed into ties, and dropped into another flume. This took them 7 miles and dropped them into the Tongue River that floated them a few miles to the railroad.
About Christmas time we went to the same farm, that of Mr. William Garrett, to spend the winter. We then had enough money to pay him for our supplies for both winters.
In the spring of 1894 we did our first grading on the Little Horn River on the Crow Reservation in Montana. In July of that year I left father and went up in the Big Horn Mountains and worked getting ties for a company by the name of Don’ll AbShane. They had a big herd of mules and a lot of poor teamsters and they would tip loads over every day. When they had some stubborn mules that refused to go for the other drivers, the foreman always gave them to me to drive for a few days because I was the only one who could make them work.
In September I went to work for father again. We did our last mile of railroad work father did. Then he with the rest of his family came home to Providence, using a free railroad pass from Huntley to Logan. When we arrived in Logan after about a weeks travel, it was about nine o’clock and Andrew, my half-brother, and I walked to Providence. It was very dark and we were scared. I was 18 years old at the time.
Uncle Elijah Jones took father’s outfit and went to Redlodge, but he lost so much money that he lost the outfit (about fifteen teams and 7 or 8 wagons, but the horses were all old and some of them had worked on the grading 14 or 15 years).
When I was 20 years old I went to the B.Y.C. for about a year. On December 19, 1900, I married Salina Eliza Tibbitts in the Logan Temple. In the summer of 1901 the Logan Sugar Factory was built. I hauled rock and brick. We got the rock from Dry Canyon.
In October I went to Billings, Montana, for one year. Our first child, Horace Larue, was born on the 8th of July, 1902. I was at Billings at the time and Salina was at her mothers.
During the following winter we moved to John Ransenberger’s house. In the spring of 1903 we bought our first home from my sister, Alzina Brown. It was bought for $1,000.00 and included a three-room house, one city lot and 17 acres of bench land. On October 11, 1904, our second baby, a girl, LoVisa, was born and named after my mother, LoVisa Miller Hammond.
In the spring of 1906 we moved to Honeyville and rented a farm but we stayed there only one year and then, because we did not do very well, were pleased to move back to Providence.
On January 9, 1907, our third child, a boy, Darvel Tibbitts Hammond, was born in the same home as LoVisa. When Darvel was only six months old all three of our children contracted whooping cough. I was working at the time and Salina took care of them most of the time.
In the spring of 1908 we sold our home to Albert Crowl for $700.00, built a little shanty on our land and moved into it. We lived here for one and a half years. Then we built what we thought was a very nice house and moved into it during the fall (1910) before Datus was born. At that time I was working for the Pacific Land and Water Company in Park Valley. We got out cedar posts and were supposed to get out 80 posts each day, which we did. I worked one year at this job furnishing my own team and I got $78.00 per month. I came home in the spring and on May 20, 1911, Datus Miller was born. I went back to work in Park Valley and returned home in September. I then worked on the Smart Gymnasium at the Utah State Agriculture College in Logan, Utah.
In 1913 we spent the summer on my brother Estus’ farm in Benson Ward and harvested a crop of oats and wheat. After returning home I worked on the header with Charlie Clawon all fall.
In July 1914, we traded our place on the hill to Julius Kraus. That summer Charlie and I went up to Blacksmith Fork Canyon to work for Ezra McCombs. On April 21, 1917, Owen Holt was born.
The next few years I spent hauling rock and working on our little 10 acre farm two blocks directly west of our home. I bought this piece of land from Louis Fife.
In 1931 we remodeled our home. We dug a 2-room basement under the house, built a large back porch and finished two rooms upstairs. I worked on our little farm, hauled rock, and did some temple work and was active in genealogical work.
Having been denied the privilege of a college education, I have made every effort to see that my children had the benefit of an education.
In September 1936, I was operated on for goiter and got along exceptionally well. One year later I was operated on for prostate trouble in the Dee Hospital in Ogden, but never fully recovered from this last operation and was never able to do hard, manual labor.
On June 7th 1940 Horace Hammond was taken to the William Budge Memorial Hospital in Logan and died June 9, 1940
Horace and Salina
Father Horace E. Hammond had one of the sweetest and most peaceful spirits I have ever know. I married his son Datus December 23, 1937, two and a half years before his death.
At this time he was unable to work and was confined to a chair much of the time. Yet he never complained and was so glad to see us when we visited. He was quiet, unassuming, and modest, yet he had something of real worth to say whenever he spoke. He could always see the good in other people and spoke only the good. He had a sense of humor, too, and was quick to size up humorous situations.
His most outstanding characteristic to me was the peace in his soul. He radiated this quality. Whenever Datus and I visited the family home, I always sensed his serenity and peaceful heart. It was a privilege to have known him.
He was upright, deeply honest, fair, quiet, and kind. Datus had profound respect for his father, and so did I.
His kindness and love for animals was a legend in Cache Valley. People from everywhere would bring their horses to him to train. He could calm and train animals when no one else could. He trained many wild horses whom no one else could handle. His daughter LoVisa remembered many times sitting on a fence with her brothers to watch their father calm and soothe a bucking horse. This was a favorite hobby for him.
Horace Hammond was highly intelligent, diligent, hard-working, and versatile. His keen intellect and peaceful spirit will always be remembered by his loving family and friends. He was truly beloved.