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Our mother made the big flag for this celebration, that is how I came to make one. We children played down in the willows, Uncle Hyrum's boys would climb the bushes & get the birds eggs to show us. We always put them back, we felt so sorry for the poor mother bird.
I believe children are often shown things as I was the Airplane or airship
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July 1878 celebration at Snyderville, with long tables spread for the town people & others who came as we did from nearby ranches or farms. There were Indians who sat down at table & stayed all day at the celebration, On the mountains west could be seen smoke rolling up from a forest fire, the first I had ever seen. When we lived at this beautiful ranch or farm on Silver creek we had a lovely Newfoundland dog that was our companion in our roaming around & at play. I was a sober child & often got by myself & thot of many things. One day while sitting alone behind the house thinking of going to Salt Lake City & our home there, of friends & relatives, I looked over toward the city which was a long day's drive from our ranch, & in the sky I saw what I called a boat sailing through the sky. It was more like the Blimp than aeroplane for there was no wings. The Christmas we were there I got my first reader & a doll. Our father made a dancing doll that he made of twigs with a wire in the back. By taking hold of the wire, he moved it up & down very slightly & it danced, its joints were so loose. Our stepmother had dressed it in bright red. We always laughed as it danced.
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When we left Silver Creek, in moving there was not room for my playthings, had named my doll Aggie, we were to get these things some time & for years I hoped we would get them but the last minute there was not room to take them, so I always tried to take my children's playthings.
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When we moved back to S. L. City in 1878 to the house our stepmother owned, I went to my first school. We were in hard circumstances, father was out of work & not well. Mother took in sewing, she was not strong either, he would run the sewing machine. He was very kind & loving to her & us children & she was so very good to us so loving & kind, yet I always mourned for my own mother. I know motherless children have a lonely cast off feeling. I cannot remember anyone treating me unkind but I always appreciated every kindness shown to me. I & sister Lizzie felt very near to each other. We often went to our grandfather's, she to Aunt Catherine's, I to Aunt Ann's, who we were with so much when they took care of us after mother died. We would see Grandmother Chapman & Grandfather but these Aunts who took care of us had children our age & younger. Aunt Ann named her youngest girl Mamie, that is what they called me, but my father always called me Mary for I was named for my mother. It was at Silver Creek at our ranch that I learned the first songs that I can remember. It was our father's half brother, Uncle Lyde we called him, who taught me the Sailors Grave.
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