Like a Cat With Nine Lives -- and God's Providence (First of Eight Survival Stories)

The open-pit copper mine up Bingham Canyon started operations in 1906.

When I look back at my life experiences, I seem to remember more vividly the more traumatic ones.

Why that is, I’m not sure.

Is it normal? I don’t know, but those memories illustrate God’s providence in my life.

Copperton Park in the tree-lined town.

Grandpa Butt and
little Lee Hunt

In fact, there have been seven episodes that were especially frightening, painful and memorable, and which could have resulted in the end of my sojourn here on earth. The earliest one occurred at my grandparents’ home up in Copperton, Utah, when I was between five and seven years old.

In my pre-teen years, I especially loved going to see Grandpa and Grandma Butt at their home in the mouth of Bingham Canyon. Grandpa was a train engineer at that time for Kennecott Copper Mine. He had worked at the mine all his adult life, eventually becoming one of the numerous conductors of  the ore trains at the mine. That’s back when the mine used trains instead of the giant trucks that are used today.

Bingham Canyon ore train Nov. 1942.
Photographer: Andreas Feiningerhttp://www.loc.gov/pictures/
item/owi2001038400/PP/ 

Grandma was a housewife, typical for those years. I remember on many of my weekend visits seeing her making doll lamps in her studio and kitchen, which she sold to a couple of outlets in Salt Lake City.

Leona Cooley Butt in front of her
home in Copperton.

During these prized visits I would often hang around grandpa as he played solitary, which he taught me how to play. Sometimes when there were four willing players, we would play canasta. I really enjoyed the game, though I can’t remember the rules now. Also, I would spend a lot of hours building towers out of the small rectangular blocks that grandpa made for the grandchildren to play with on their visits. I remember I could get mine at least two-feet tall from the circular base of about a foot and a half.

One of Grandma Butt's doll lamps.

One of the highlights in my early school years was grandpa teaching me some math skills. Eventually I could add short columns of numbers in my head. He was the one who helped me get proficient in multiplication and especially division.

On many of my visits, I would watch Vivian, David and Clifford play basketball in the driveway shared by my grandparents and the neighbors next door. The garage was also shared, with a one car garage on each half of the building and a basketball backboard and hoop fixed at the upper center of the garage building.

All three Butt boys were stars on the Bingham High School basketball team.

Ray, Vivian and Clifford Butt at
their ancestral home in Copperton.

I was too little to join the games, so I was mostly content to watch and learn. When they weren’t around, I would take out one of the old basketballs and dribble and dribble and dribble. For quite a while, I couldn’t throw the ball high enough to even reach the basketball hoop.

David Butt in his
Bingham High School
basketball uniform.

When my three uncles weren’t playing basketball in the driveway, they usually were off with their friends somewhere else.

But there was this one time when Clifford, who was about seven years older than me, was home and actually with me – or technically I was with him – as he conducted an aviation experiment on the old rotating clothesline in the backyard. However, the experiment turned out to be an introduction to the laws of centrifugal force and gravity.

At first, I was happy just being with Clifford as he worked on his experiment, tying a shallow cardboard box with four small ropes to two adjacent clotheslines that fanned from the 4-inch round center metal post. I don’t remember the conversation, but I’m sure he asked if I wanted to take a ride on the merry-go-round or something like that. Once this little squirt was seated inside the shallow box and holding on to the sides of the box, Clifford started rotating the clothesline.

Grandma's clothesline had a 4" center pole with several wood
two-by-four branches at right angle from center pole with
metal clothesline wires wrapping around the wood branches. 

Wow! This is fun! Can we go faster?

Clifford started to increase the velocity of the spin – faster and faster I spun around the backyard. I’m sure I was getting dizzy – but then it happened: the small ropes ripped through the cardboard and I flew out of the box at an almost parallel level from the clothesline. I crashed into the metal tin garbage cans next to the back of the house. If I had landed just two feet to the right, I would have hit the concrete steps leading into my grandparents’ home. If I had landed two feet to the left, I may have hit the concrete foundation.

I’m sure I made the garbage cans clang, but more likely it was my screaming and wailing that brought grandma running out the back door. The next thing I remember was lying on the couch in the front room as grandma chewed Clifford out for – well, let’s just say his “failed experiment.”

I didn’t break any bones, but my back was in a lot of pain. My near-death flight into orbit wasn’t too long before the first time I had hurt my back.

I had been playing with Merrill on some bales of straw at our home on Redwood Road in West Jordan when I jumped from the height of two bales of straw and landed on my butt on the straw-covered ground. That’s when I felt a shock of pain rip up through by back. I wailed and screamed and Mom and Dad came running. Merrill, I’m sure, was just puzzled. Why did I get hurt in such a small fall? Well, first of all, the small layer of straw covered a layer of bricks, which meant I landed basically on a bunch of bricks.

By Greg Olsen
https://gregolsen.com/blog

But when Mom and Dad later took me to the doctors and X-rays were taken, the doctor said my backbones looked thin or not complete. He said to keep an eye on the situation and hopefully the bones would fill out and get thicker.

Looking back at the numerous times when I had similar falls and back pain, I wonder if that first X-ray actually showed the presence of the Osteogenesis Imperfecta that we never realized I have until after Evie Wentz was born almost a half-century later.

But lucky for me that my first flight into orbit wasn’t my last flight. I must have had a guardian angel guiding me into those garbage cans and not the concreate steps in the backyard of my grandparents’ home in beautiful tree-lined Copperton, Utah.    

Recovered Wedding Memories

I was going through a box in my storage closet for missionary pictures and find these pictures from our wedding, April 9, 1976! The originals weren't very good but, now with new technology, I was able to improve them a little.
See if you recognize anyone! Here are some hints:
Chris Smith, Anne Isabel, Don Roundy, Orin Bawden, Merrill Hunt, Stacy Hunt, Rhonda Hunt, Lorraine Hunt, Rhea Westwood, Bruce Westwood, JoAnn Westwood, Jim Westwood, Rendall Hunt, Jay Westwood, Trena Hunt (Trena didn't even realize it was her after picking out a bunch of the other people), Kathy Westwood and Phil Sarborough. Troyleen was pregant at the time and was seated at the host desk, greeting everyone.
Of course, the biggest disappointment is we don't have any pictures of my dad there, which created a lot of regret and conflict!!!



Pretty Bride!
Yes, that's me without a beard and balancing
on that

I'm wondering what she's telling me?
Maybe it's about her missing gravy bowl!

Wedding reception held at the Granger 4th Wardhouse
in West Valley, Utah.

Cutting the cake! Look at them cooperate!

Mothers Rhea and Lorraine.

What a good-looking group of guys!
Left to right, startint in back: Rendall Hunt, Jay Westwood,
Bruce Westwood, Phil Scarbrough, Merrill Hunt, Lee,
Jim Westwood, Orin Bawden, and Don Roundy.

Fun picture of family members and family members to be!
Left to right, starting in back, Jim, JoAnn, Nancy,
Lee, Merrill, Lorraine, Rhea, Bruce, Trena Hunt, Kathy
Westwood (Jim and Kathy got married just months before
us), Stacy and Rhonda Hunt, Anne Isabel (who married
Chris Smith's brother, and Chris, of course, married Bruce. 

I wonder if Nancy's again asking about her gravy bowl!

OK, all eyes on the photographer!

Rendall Albert Hunt: My Little Brother

My little brother, Rendall, is 12 years younger than me -- he just celebrated his 50th birthday.
Karen, his wife, asked me to get some pictures of him when he was young. These are the ones that I've found in my scrapebook. All of these were taken while the family was living in Pennsylvania during the summer of 1966. Rendall was 4 years old and Trena was 8 years old. Merrill had just graduated from Granger High School. I had just completed 10th grade.

Rendall Albert Hunt outside the trailer that the family lived in for the first few weeks. Merrill and I arrived a few weeks after the rest of the family because Merrill stayed for his graduation. Grandma
Butt and Merrill drove us all the way back to Pennsylvania. After staying witht he family
for a couple of days, Grandma drove home by herself.

 Almost every Friday and Saturday, the family would head out on another sightseeing trip. This is Rendall posed in front of the Washington Monument in D.C.

This is Troyleen, back, Rendall and Trena next to the Sasquehanaa River, across from the LDS Ward Meetinghouse in Harrisburg, PA., during that summer in 1966.

Rendall, wearing a Union Civil War hat, finds the perfect spot atop a Civil War monument.

What a happy-looking little boy: Rendall in the green wilderness of Pennsylvania.

Three Kings Grandpa: Albert Edward Rufus Butt

Albert Edward Rufus Butt,
before meeting Leona Cooley.

(The next several blogs will include pictures I found in a box I inherited from my mother, Beatrice Lorraine Butt Hunt Magee.)

Albert with Idella on knee
Sylvan (David West)
between his legs in 1927.

Around Thanksgiving of 2009, I wrote a letter to my family titled: "True Meaning of a Hunt Thanksgiving." In that letter, I mentioned several things for which I was grateful to my Grandfather Butt. I quote: "I’m thankful for my Grandfather Butt. He was so humble and loving – though he was quiet in showing it. He showed it by the time he gave me. He worked hard as a train conductor at Kennecott but got home by about 3 or 4 in the afternoon. So when I was there, especially on Saturdays, he would entertain me. Grandma just wanted me to entertain myself. I did that a lot with building blocks that Grandpa made. They were about three inches long and ¾ inch square. I could build incredible castles and towers. I built the tower of Babel many times. When I was a little older, I would take one of their tennis balls and bounce it off the seven stairs in front of their porch and try to catch it. If it hit an edge, it would take a crazy bounce. I envisioned myself as a pitcher and tried to hit the third stair right in the middle. I got pretty good. I also would bounce it off the garage in back. I played a lot of basketball back there, too. That’s where Clifford, Vivian and David got their start in basketball – the hoop on the double garage.

  Leona Cooley Butt and Albert at summer
cabin in 1945.

Grandpa Butt loved playing cards and played a lot of solitaire. He taught me how to play – his way. He also taught me how to play canasta. We had to have four play that – I think it was Merrill, me, Grandpa and Grandma. I think Clifford played some times, too. Grandma liked playing canasta, too.Grandpa did something special for me – that I will always be grateful for. He worked with me many times on my math. He taught me tricks
 in addition that I still use. It’s because of what he taught me that I ended up winning the prize for being the best in math in my class in fourth grade at Monroe

Leona Cooley Butt and Albert at summercabin in 1945.

Elementary. The girl that I was battling during the last month of school was Lena Newbold. We had to do all the sets at the back of the book without any errors. I was the first to do it. And it was because of what Grandpa Butt taught me – addition, subtraction, division, multiplication. Unfortunately, no one in the family was much good at spelling."

Bert (Albert) in front of
Hotel Bingham in late '20s.

I found a letter that Troyleen, my sister had written to Grandpa Butt, asking him to tell us about himself.I quote: "Dear Grandfather,
I love you a great deal, and I am concerned for you. I would like to keep a record of my grandparents especially yours.
This all my idea, I would like it for my book of Remembrance.
Please tell me about your life even from the first day you were born.
I want you to get well and get out of the hospital, I'll be glad to have you stay with us here.
I do love you, grandfather.
Love, your grandaughter,
Troyleen Hunt (July 6th)

Albert Edward Rufus Butt in the woods outside his mountain cabin in 1945.

Mark replied to my blog and I quote:

"I don't remember seeing any pictures of Grandpa when he was a younger man.

It is great to see them. I see many of Grandpa's features in my son Ryan.
I remember Grandpa teaching my Sister's the Alphabit backwords. I never cared to learn them backwards, because I didn't see any benefit from it.
My sisters loved it. I also remember the blocks. My sisters and I would play with them while Mom, Dad, Grandma and Grandpa would play cards. I think he also liked to play cribbage.
I remember getting to go with him to the Copperton Cafe. I don't remember the name of it. But he liked to go there to eat lunch and chat with his friends. I also remember he would save his coins (change) and give them to us when we came to visit from California. That was a big deal to us kids. I loved spending time with him. He would also come to our home in Taylorsville on a weekly basis to check on us when Dad was gone. Dad had gone to California to work."
Mark McGovern
As I was reading Mark's comments, I then recalled going to Grandpa a couple of times to the store/cafe and also the coins he gave to us kids, too. Thanks, Mark!

 

Albert E.R. Butt, left, in new pair of overalls and

holding a white vadora hat with two or more of his

children on the side of the road.

If you would like to help me, I have some questions to help you just to get the idea of what I would like."

Bert (Albert) and Leona at their cabin
in 1945.

Folded with this letter to Grandpa, was a response written, I think, by him. I quote:
"My Father named me after the kings of England: King Albert, Edward and Rufus.
I came to America in August 1913 with my mother, two brothers, sister and half-brother Jack Smale, who was two (2) years older than I.
We came over on the Steam Ship Laurantic of White Starline. My Father had preceded us over to Upper Galena, a small mining town about 5 miles west of Bingham Canyon, Utah, in May of 1913.

Bert (Albert) and Leona on a trip
with Lorraine & Warren Hunt in 1949.

Went to work as a miner for the U.S. Mining Co. He moved up to a shift forman in 1916 and applied for and recieved (sic) natural ization papers for all the family. He worked for this one company only and retired at age 66.King George the 5th and Queen Mary were the Rulers of England when we came to America.

Leona, Lorraine and Bert at a cabin on trip.

We came by way of Canada. We left the ship at Montreal, took train to Chicago. I can't remember the different cities on route to Bingham Canyon on train called "Bingham Bill." We took horses and buggy up to Galena. Parts of my life as I member (sic) in England. We started to school at the age of 4 years. I was an above average student. I still have awards for good attendance which you may have. I also had a Goldedge Bible as award from the Methodist Sunday School for good Bible student. Church in England was compulsary the same as grade school.

Albert Butt and Lorraine Hunt
at Copperton home.

I remember my first day. We were all taught to thread a needle with colored silk thread then we were given cards with letters and numbers which we were to trace with needle and thread I completed. I progressed well in all my schooling in England also grade school in Copperfield High School at Bingham Canyon. Did not complete Uniior Year.I was only an average boy. I had my ups and downs, good lickings at school and at home for missbehavour (sic) and sluffing.
Miss Annie Simmons was wonderfull (sic) 3rd and 4th grade teacher. Mrs. Sherman 7th and 8th stern and dominant. She pounded the subject into your head made me tops in spelling, aritmetic (sic), reading.
(Next part is written by someone else in long hand.)
Writing or penmanship and English. Best Teachers. My Best school chum 

was a boy named Byson Thomas, We went all the way from the 3rd grade to the 3rd year high school. We always done our home work together. We also went to all the school programs and dances together. He was killed in the Lark Mine fire. He was one of the boys that came to see us when we arrived at our first home in America. In the early days there were no cars. We used to make our own wagons also skis and bobsleds. We built a cabin high in the mountains. We used to go up and camp during the summer holidays. We got odd jobs at about 12 years old. I had a job milking cows for $2.00 a week. 5 cows morning and night.

At 14 years I was driving a delivery wagon for a store at $90.00 a month and at 16 I went to work for Utah Copper Co. as a track man."

Grandpa Butt with Warren
Lee Hunt at his home
in Copperton in 1954.

Albert Edward Rufus Butt, born Feb. 12, 1904,
died May 25, 1973, at the age of 69.  

A salute to my Uncle David

On Jan. 31, 2012, I added the pictures in this post, which came from a stash of photos I inherited from my mother, Lorraine, who is David's older sister.

David played for Bingham High
School. I was young but remember
going to a couple of his games.

Today, Feb. 1, 2010, has been a shocking, sad day for my extended family on my Mom's side. Our Uncle David, brother to my mother, Lorraine, was found dead today after going missing following church Sunday. He was last seen by Elaine, his wife, when she decided to walk the two blocks home from church and Dave was to drive home in the car. Police found his car this morning after a missing person bulletin was posted overnight.
I'll miss Uncle David a lot! Some of the best memories were of playing basketball with David. He had a great hock shot, and he was a very good dribbler. When I was little, he loved teasing me by dribbling the basketball while I would try to get the ball. He would dribble it around his back, between his legs, over my head (I was really short) and I seldom could get the ball away from him. He played on the Bingham High School basketball team when the school was in Copperton. Bingham was a powerhouse in basketball back then. Vivian, David's older brother, was a senior when Dave was a sophomore, and I believe Clifford was a sophomore on the team when Dave was a senior. Everyone knew about the Butt basketball players. I remember mostly watching them play basketball in the driveway at their home in Copperton. I mostly watched because I was too little to play -- and they played a very aggressive game. Sometimes I would get to shoot around with them.

David, Elaine & Ronald lived down the street in Granger
for several years when I was a teenager.

 When Merrill and I were young and living in Granger, Mom and Dad would take up to my Grandma and Grandpa Butts on Halloween. It was a great place to do trick or treating because the homes Copperton is very compact with the homes close together and the residence pretty well to-do -- at least back then. Most of them worked at Kennecott, and the mine was doing was doing quite well back then. Many times we would get regular-size candy bars. One of the highlights of Halloween at Grandmas was when Dave, Vivian and Clifford went all out and did a spook alley through their home. Guests would come in the front door and would be greeted by a Dave as a Monster, then Vivian would pop out of a florescent-painted coffin looking like a skeleton (Grandma used an old pair of flannel underwear and dyed them black and then painted the bones of the skeleton with florescent paint. Vivian did a mask over his head that was painted like a skull. Then Clifford came out of the hallway as Frankenstein and scared the visitors as they were looking at Vivian. Then they had to go through the kitchen and down the back stairs and out the back door. The whole living room, kitchen and back stairs were all decorated for the spook alley. This would have been back around 1958-1960. Probably just before Vivian went to college.

David's Missionary picture, 1961.

Dave went on a mission, setting the example for many of us younger guys in the extended family. Soon after he returned home, he was working at ZCMI. The workers used a freight elevator that had a light bulb that had gone out and hadn't been replaced yet. The workers got used to still using it. One day, Dave stepped into the elevator, but the elevator wasn't there. He fell to the bottom and landed on the top of the elevator, shattering his leg. I can't remember what else was broken, but I remember that the leg was what put Dave down in the hospital bed hooked up to a weight pulley on his leg for months and months. Elaine, his wife of more than 40 years, was one of the nurses that took care of him in the hospital. After he was released, he came to our hospital -- put was still in his hospital bed with the weight pulley for several more months. It was "fun" for us kids having him there, but I do remember needing to do a lot of fetching for him.
I remember a couple of teaching moments for us kids: Dave taught us the proper way to eat with a fork and a knife. "In your left hand, you take the fork and hold it with your index finger pressing against the back of the fork just at the bottom of the handle. Keep your elbow as low and you can and use the knife in your right hand, holding similarly. Then after making three small mouth-size cuts of the meat, you set the knife down and put the fork in your right hand and continue eating the different items on the plate until you need to slice more meat. Repeat as needed."

Front cover of David's
Mission Farewell.

I'm telling you, it made a good impression on the girls at school when they saw the proper way I ate. (Well, I thought so, anyway.)
Also, he taught Merrill and me an important lesson in the nuances of girl and boy relations: "When you pass the bath of a good-looking girl, don't make any weird comments or whistle at her or them. Just give them a smile and continue on -- and especially don't look back. That's a no-no. Even if they turn and look at you, still continue on. If by chance you might up with them again, they may show more interest." I know I tried to follow his advice, but I doubt it helped me any.
After being stuck in a hospital bed for months and months, several of those at our house, Dave finally was able to get out of bed and get around. What was one of the first things he did? I'm pretty sure it was dating Elaine.
He still lived with us for several weeks after he started getting around, but even when he moved home, he would often come by on the weekends after a late date and come into the boys room and crawl into bed.
One night, I was awaken by the squeaky floor boards in the hallway. I was sure it was a monster coming down the hall to get me. When I heard the bedroom door handle and the door squeaking, I was positive I was a goner. When I felt the breath of the "monster" on my neck -- I was shaking with dread! Then I heard the words: "Hey, Lee, where should I sleep tonight?"

Left two inside pages of David's Farewell program.

Oh, it's just David! I'm safe! No monster! Just David!
It didn't seem like too much longer after that that Dave and Elaine married.
Dave walked with a limp most of his live -- and had at least two knee replacements (or was it hip replacements?). He also battled diabetes for many years. Diabetes had claimed his sister, Idella, two brothers, Clayton and Sylvan, and was a factor in my mother's suffering, too, though she died of an aneurysm.
When I returned home from my mission and had to have my left leg amputated because of bone cancer, Dave served as an inspiration to me. He had suffered so much because of the elevator accident -- which changed his life forever. But he was happily married and had a great family. That became my goal: I would go on despite having just one leg, go to college, get a job and most importantly find a sweetheart like Dave had found, get married and have a family.

One of the highlights during my recovery was going to the movies with Dave, Elaine, Vivian, Doris and my Mom. Our favorite theater back then was the doomed Century Theater off State Street and 3300 South. I remember going to Towering Inferno with them. At that time, all of us lived in the same ward in Granger (now West Valley City).

In October of 1971, while I was still recovering from the amputation of my left leg, I decided that we should replicate the spook alley that Dave, Vivian and Clifford had done up in Copperton. Dave and Elaine lived just down the road from us at this time, and he, Merrill and I re-created the spook alley -- with a few twists. Merrill became the monster with a bloody machete, Dave was Frankenstein and I was a poor victim of a machete attack. We stuffed one of Mom's nylon stockings and placed it below my stump as I laid on a bench in the kitchen near the back door. I had painted the end of my leg stump like blood and bones -- very ghastly. Dad was outside and directed the visitors through the back door. He had piped load Halloween music outside from his stereo system in the living room. As they stepped into the kitchen, Merrill would step from the side of the fridge and swing the machete at my leg, the leg would fall off onto the ground, and I would shake my stump and scream like I had had my leg chopped off! It was pretty "bad." Then Dave would step out from the hallway in the living room and would complete the fright as the kids and parents left through the front door. It was pretty cool! Dad had to stop a lot of the little kids and give them candy out in the driveway because our spook alley was too scary for little kids -- and really too much for a lot of the older kids. They said the machete attack was too real! They wondered how we were able to make it look so real! Dave was the link between the first spook alley and our spook alley.

David outside home in Copperton.

Over the years, I had the chance to listen to Dave talk in church many times. I loved listening to his talks and enjoyed talking church with him.
After I went off to college, I didn't have as much to do with them as I would have liked, but while Mom was still alive, we always seemed to get together on holidays or near holidays, for Christmas. But after Mom passed away and I got tied up with Hunt Mysteries, we didn't get together near enough!

Elaine & David at "Godfather of the Bride."

Elaine, Vicki Voss as Carla Beckenstein and Dave at performance of "Godfather of the Bride" at Gray Cliff Lodge in Ogden Canyon.
Dave and Elaine came to several of our shows -- many of them were close to where they lived when they were living in Liberty in Ogden Valley.
The last time we got together with them was at the funeral for Margaret, Clifford's wife, who passed away just a few months ago after her battle with cancer.

I'll miss David, but he and Mom can now catch up on things up there. And maybe he'll find another mission.

Dave was 70 years old. I'll be 60 years old this month. He was only 10 years older! That's not a big difference when you get our age! My dad, Warren, just turned 86 years old. Dad was shocked and saddened, too, over the news. Dad always seemed to enjoy being around Dave. There was a lot of connections -- Dave's missionary years, the times he lived with us and the time when we all were in the same ward. Those were good times.
I'll miss Dave, but I'll be seeing him pretty soon I suppose. (Oh, Heather, my daughter, says I'm not supposed to say that last part! Sorry!)

Ronald was Dave's firstborn.

Ronald Sherilynn. I'm not sure who the others are!

This was a special Valentine's that Mom kept of David.

A grown-up Ronald with his bride.

Dining with the extended family: Lorraine, left, Elaine, David,
Lee (across from David) and Nancy Hunt.