My mother, Karen Jensen Christensen, was born in Silkaborg, Denmark, on January 12, 1850. She was the second daughter in a family of four girls of Jens Jensen and Anna Christina Jensen. She was a woman of medium height, large blue eyes, and an abundance of brown hair. She possessed deep wisdom and a magnetic personality. Although she had very little schooling, she was able to converse on almost any subject, as she was a great reader.

Mother was very tolerant in her views, yet very decided if a real principle of right and wrong was involved. She was a woman of strong character, and never wavered in doing what she thought was right. I have seen mother go Relief Society teaching all afternoon, carrying a big basket, gathering articles of clothing and food for the poor.

Mother and her family accepted the gospel in Denmark. The family always invited the Elders to stay at their home, and offered them food and a bed when they didn't have enough food for themselves Her mother would take her children from their beds and put them on the floor, so the Elders could be comfortable. She would also wash their clothes and mend them.

When mother was twelve years old, she got a job in a paper factory. At this job she held a very responsible position, being head of a checking department, managing the cutting and counting and boxing of all the writing paper and stationery. She could count the leaves in a book or paper bundle in a few minutes. She worked at this position for six years. When she was eighteen, she took a position for a better wage with a wealthy family on a large estate. She worked hard, and did not get enough to eat. When grandmother found out that Karen was almost starving, she had her come home.

AMERICA

On the third of June, 1873, Mother and her sister Boletta immigrated to Utah, arriving in Ogden on July 23, 1873. Their immigration was made possible by friends who loaned them the money which was to be paid back as soon as possible. My father finished paying this debt at the time mother and father were married in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City.

When they came to Utah by train, landing in Ogden and going directly to Weston, Idaho, where they had friends in the family of Rastus Nelson. He was the missionary in Denmark who converted the family to the Latter Day Saint Church. Mr. Nelson was instrumental in obtaining work for mother in the Ferdinand Fredrickson home.

This was Uncle Fred's grandfather Here she worked for one and one-half years on the farm, following the reaper in the wheat fields, tying the cut grain into bundles with greater efficiency than the men working with her. After spending two seasons at this hard work, she took up sewing and did the sewing for the Fredrickson family and others until l874.

Uncle Soren Jensen (Aunt Boletta's husband) and father were friends in Denmark. When father immigrated to Utah in 1864 with his first wife, Marie Christiansen Christensen, he had Mr. Jensen dispose of his business in Denmark. This business was a store with all kinds of wooden articles. They brought some mixing bowls and other articles to Utah.

MARRIAGE

Father and Aunt Stena, his second wife, then living in Newton, Utah, journeyed to Weston to visit. As mother was working for the Fredricksons at the time, she met my father. In those days there were no long courtships. Mr. Fredrickson encouraged mother to marry Mr. Christensen. He said "He will make you a good husband and a good father for your little girl."

Mother had a little girl named Signe, whose father had refused to join the Church, and mother had such a strong testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel that she felt she could not stay in Denmark. Since she had the opportunity of coming to Utah, she left Signe's father and came with her sister Boletta.

By hard work and careful planning, mother was able to help bring the rest of the family to Utah. These included by grandparents, Aunt Hannah, who later married John Barker, and Aunt Christina, who married Henry Jensen.

When she married, Mother's home was not completed, so she lived with Aunt Stena for eighteen months. Mother often said that they never had a disagreement. Aunt Stena had a family of boys:

James, Charles, Joseph, Henry, Nephi, and Moses. Father had two children by his first wife. They were Mary Christensen Ayling, and Chris Christensen. Mary was born in Denmark in 1863, and Christian was born in Laramie, Wyoming, August 26, 1864 on the way to Utah.

OUR HOME

Mother moved into her new home in 1878. It was a two room rock house, with a rag carpet on the floor with a lot of clean straw under it to make it soft. A bed mattress filled with straw was nice to sleep on when a thick feather bed covered the straw. White curtains around the bed and at the windows were made of flour sacks. The washing was done by hand. The clothes were scrubbed on a washboard. The starch was made by grating potatoes on a fine grater in a tub of water. The tub had a screen or mosquito bar stretched over it, so the grated potato would be caught in the screen, and allow the starch to settle in the bottom of the tub. All of the water had to be drawn from a well by a bucket at the end of a rope. Lye was made from ashes from hardwood. Water was poured on them. Then, after standing over night the water was poured off and used.

The floors were made of wide rough boards. These were scrubbed clean after each washday. In 1878 father added a summer kitchen. Mother helped him finish it later so that it could be used as a bedroom In this home mother's first three children were born. They were Karen Elizabeth, James William, and Anna Christina. At this time mother moved to a farm in the summers and into Newton in the winters.

On the farm she endured the natural hard ships of pioneer life. She would milk the cows, feed the pigs, churn the butter, and walk to town, a distance of three miles, carrying a bucket of eggs and several pounds of butter. Butter was ten cents a pound, and eggs as low as six cents a dozen. She would buy a little sugar and other groceries, and a few yards of calico at ten cents a yard, making dresses from this for herself and the girls. She would knit stockings for the family and make suits for father and the boys.

Father was a good provider. We always had plenty of meat, honey, cheese, molasses, fruit and vegetables. The vegetables were put into a pit in the winter.

After moving to the ranch, two more children were born: Ada Boletta and David Wilford. At this time the U.S. Marshals began persecuting the polygamists. When father came to the ranch, we children would lie out on the shed and watch for the Marshals. One day they slipped up on us by lying down on their horses. Father went through a trap door and hid in the cellar. Although I was very young, I shall never forget seeing the Marshals open the trap door and holding two six shooters on father, order him to come out. He served six months in the penetentiary, but he had many polygamous friends there.

When Will was nineteen years old he was injured very seriously while getting firewood in the canyon. The load tipped on him and his back was broken. A friend named Albert Ledingham was with him. He had to ride a horse many miles. for help. Dr. Ormsby and son came to the canyon and brought Will to town. They set his back the only way they knew then, by two strong men pulling on his arms and two on his legs, while the doctor pressed on his back with his knee on a small board. He lay in bed for over a year, paralyzed from his hips down. We didn't think he would ever walk again, but by massaging and good nursing after two years he walked, first with crutches and then with a cane. He married and was the father of six children.

We had a wonderful friend and neighbor in the person of Mrs. Amelia Jensen, a trained nurse and midwife. She was such a comfort and help to us in sickness, and especially in Will's illness. When there was sickness and death, she was always there. She and mother were very close friends, and our families had many good times together. We loved her dearly and appreciated her many kindnesses.

LIFE IN OUR TIME

We lived on the ranch at the time they built the Oregon Short Railroad through Cache Junction and Bear River Canyon. Almost every day transits would come and ask for food, as our farm was near and mother was almost always alone. One day toward evening, a man came and asked to stay all night. He said he was very tired. Mother made believe father was coming, and kept looking down the road. She gave the man food, but he could see how frightened she was. He made his bed out in front of the bouse, and gave mother his two guns. Mother said she sat by the window all night and watched the man. In the morning she gave him breakfast and he departed.

Mother did the sewing for both of father's families. In those days there were no tailor-made suits. Mother would shear the sheep, card the wool, spin it, weave it and make suits for all the boys.

In her young married life, mother loved to dance. She would fix her beautiful hair, (which she could sit on at the time of her death at seventy years of age) wear a pretty calico dress, and walk to town and back to attend a dance. She said there was no class distinction then. Everyone wore calico dresses.

It was while living on the ranch that a cow attacked my sister Lizzie, and tore off her ear. Mother and her sister Hannah cleaned it and sewed it back on. It was hanging by the skin, but they kept ice on it and it grew back on, although a little deformed.

They also had grasshoppers to contend with. They often took most of the crop. Mother told us of how hard it was to keep the cattle alive in the winter as very little hay was put up at that time; and if any was it was usually bunch grass. One winter when she lived on the ranch and my father was laid up with rheumatism in town, most of the feed the milk cows had was grain which mother cooked and fed them. My brother Charles helped her.

At that time the Indians were hostile. Several times in the summer mother and Charles put the children on the horses and went to town when large bands of Indians would camp near.

I remember once after my father died, mother was taken seriously ill. We sent for sister Jensen. She packed her with cloths wrung out of hot turpentine water. Mother said she felt she could just have closed her eyes and died, but when she saw her band of little children weeping around her bed, she knew she must live. It surely was a struggle for mother for years to get the farming done and educate her children, especially after Will's injury.

Our sturdy pioneers had to live their lives the hard way. They had none of the conveniences that we enjoy today--yet they enjoyed live and were happy. The gospel meant so much to them. They didn't rely on doctors in time of sickness. They put their trust in the Lord. I remember running for the Elders many times in the time of sickness. Just through the block was Brother Clark, who would leave his work, call for another Elder, and administer to the sick.

Because of this faith the pioneers grew in strength and character. What a rich heritage they have left to us.

Mother passed away on May 2, 1920, at the age of 70.