Family Tree
Jeff Westover

Hearts, Souls and Bones

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I was recently released from my calling as a Temple and Family History Consultant. I’m sad to lose the responsibility because I have enjoyed it a great deal. I’ve served in that capacity for more than six years and even though it is the type of calling that gets people running the other way from you in the halls of the church it’s been a lot of fun to see people grow when they begin their family history.

The journey of discovery is a fun one, I don’t care who you are. It’s great to see someone go from the frustrated beginnings of not knowing where to start or being overwhelmed by the technology to actually learning their family and where they come from.

It does take a while to capture the vision. But once you’re hooked, you never quite get over the excitement of what family history really is.

I’m an opinionated person. Nobody really appreciates that much and in the calling of being a family history consultant there is a lot of needed restraint when it comes to opinions.

But now that I’ve been relieved of that responsibility I’m going to give you some opinions based upon my experience in trying to help others.

~ The Main Thing ~

The first rule of Family History is one that I use for a lot of things: The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.

What’s the main thing?

You.

You are the main thing. And for many people that’s an absurd idea. After all, family history is the exploration of others, right?

But that exploration is really about you, at the end of the day. Like many things, losing yourself in family history is just another method of finding yourself. Most are really surprised by that after they have invested the time and work of family history.

But why is it such a singular thing when it involves thousands of people, at least in theory?

Because your family history is unique. You might share heritage with a sibling or a parent but your total family history is entirely unique.

When you marry you adopt a whole new line of family thanks to your spouse – one that will belong to your children. But theirs will one day be unique from yours.

In that respect, the family history of one is not the same of another. It’s like fingerprints. Nobody has the same family history.

That singular definition and pursuit of the same individualizes family history. And there are times when you will swear the lessons you continue to learn from it are individual as well.

You are the main thing. Nobody can do it for you. You have to tackle it alone. You have to make the effort alone. You have to leave it for others to discover somehow.

That makes it all a very daunting thing. It is work. It is time consuming. It can be expensive. It can feel like an insurmountable task, which it really is, and it will never be truly done.

So why do it?

We do it because of the heart, the souls and the bones. That’s the stuff that family history is made of. It’s a very personal thing.

~ The Bones ~

The bones of family history are found in cemeteries and in pedigree charts. They are the dry data of names, birth dates, places and relatives. They are what everyone thinks of when they think of family history.

Oh sure, family history is much more than the bones. But it’s where nearly all of us begin.

It’s necessary to get down to the details at this level. Frankly, it’s not my favorite thing, to be honest. Standing over a grave and getting a name and a date really does not tell me much beyond the fact that existence is proven.

But the bones are heartless and soulless. Meaningless, otherwise. If that’s family history to you it has to be the blandest of meals.

Real family history has more flavor. That’s the stuff of the heart.

~ The Heart ~

The heart of family history is found in the stories, the personalities, and the experiences of the person attached to the bones. It’s the fun stuff of family history.

Unfortunately, it is the hardest part to find, especially the further back you go.

YOU have the potential of being a heartless entity of family history if you don’t do something about the record you leave behind. That too is family history.

I have a grandfather who modestly wrote a one-page autobiography. He was a modest individual. But really if I had my way I’d like to lecture him about how it wasn’t enough. I’ve learned a lot more about him through the stories and experiences of others with him. It sure would be nice to get to know him through his own words and recollections.

That is worthy of your thought and consideration.

The heart, you see, is what we really all get the thrills from when it comes to family history. The heart is found in tragedies, tears and triumphs. It is born through the unchangeable stuff of gender, identity, roles and even in what some call “social constructs”.

You see, it doesn’t matter if they were famous. It does not matter even what they did for a living. Where they went, the houses they lived in and they stuff they did on a daily basis pales in importance to what they thought, how they treated others, and what their opinions were when they faced the stuff of life we all face.

That’s the heart.

That is what makes us appreciate the folks of the past that we have never met. And that is where the real work and the real payoff is in family history.

The heart is what leads us to the real blessing of the work: the soul.

~ The Soul ~

The soul is the spiritual side of family history. If you are a person of faith this is a concept that builds faith. If you are not a person of faith it is something you discover and may have trouble explaining.

Years ago, I met a man at Roots Tech who was not a person of faith. He was elderly and suffering from physical challenges that made attending Roots Tech problematic and that saw his decades-long hobby of family history one that pushed him in ever-more difficult directions. He openly asked my why he kept doing it, given all that he was dealing with.

I tried my best to explain that his ancestors, though long dead, were still alive. I tried to explain they were pushing him as much as he was pushing himself. I tried to explain that the work he had engaged in for years was one they appreciated and that someday when he crossed over to the other side he would recognize them and they him.

I did my best to explain the doctrine of “we without them cannot be made perfect and they without us cannot be made perfect”.

With tears in his eyes and a nodding head he agreed. He could not articulate what he was feeling. He did say that was the most profound and loving doctrine he had ever heard. But it helped to explain the power of the work and the influence upon his life for good.

Though unschooled in things spiritual he was not inexperienced. His family history work had exposed him to the souls of those he researched. He discovered that he loved them. How do you define love? Would you call it a thing of the soul?

The soul of the work of family history comes from connecting with those ancestors you research. Many reject that thought as crazy. Yet so many who might shy away from spiritual or “churchy” things cannot deny this is what happens to them the deeper they wade into the waters of family history. Love is the ultimate and unavoidable outcome.

If family history teaches things of the soul what does it teach us about the Divine within us?

What more can personalize the work than that?

When you discover the soul of others you discover the soul of yourself. The worth of souls is great in the sight of God. YOU – the main thing – are great in the sight of God. Your ancestors teach you this about yourself.

~ Bringing the Bones and the Heart to Discover the Soul ~

As I wrote when I first began this little website many years ago my goal was to leave my children and grandchildren a better record than I received.

I’m still working on that. I realize that not everything I share here applies to everyone. My family history is not exactly the same as anyone else’s, as noted above.

But the effort of sharing what I can find is put out there to help others help themselves. I’ve discovered a lot about myself in my efforts here to just share. I would not have discovered what has been so important to me if others had not done their best to share what they had.

So we will continue to evolve. I’ve shared in other parts of the website many times that we don’t really do the family tree thing here.

I have tried to steer as many people as I can to the efforts of the one-world family tree located at FamilySearch.

That’s still true.

I believe FamilySearch is one of the the most important projects in the world.

We all contribute to it. In my 20 years or so of working with FamilySearch it is amazing to see what it has become.

Yes, it’s frustrating that anyone can edit, add to and take away from the tree. That will never change.

But that capability is also it’s magic. The record only gets stronger and stronger as we move along.

So we don’t want to discourage its use. We will continue to link to it relentlessly and work to get you logged in there and using it.

But I also know there are many who are still so challenged with even the technology of a password that they will never go to FamilySearch and pay the price for learning how to use it.

I know there are people who need the visual of a tree or pedigree chart to understand the connections between people and generations.

So we’re soon to post up a family tree – free and available to all – right here on WFH. No login required either. Just click and it will be there.

Naturally, it will not be as complete as a family tree that any competent individual can build on their own. It certainly cannot have all the dynamics of what can be found on FamilySearch.

But it will be enough for those who cannot get to that level.

To it will be tied pictures, documents, histories, links, maps and the stuff of the heart and soul.

Oh, and the bones.

Utah War
Jeff Westover

The Chaotic 1850s in Utah

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Our 19th century timeline series continues with Part 2 – Pioneering Utah.

The chronological perspective is the only way to really absorb all that the Westovers were dealing with in the 1850s. It was nothing short of chaotic from start to finish.

The decade began in somewhat of a scattered fashion. Edwin and family were in the Fort Union area, trying to make the farm go. They were endlessly challenged by grasshoppers and drought. Edwin’s work was supplemented by mandatory militia service, which in time would take him to dangerous new assignments.

Electa’s status is interesting. She shows up, without explanation, in the 1852 census in Sacramento, California. She’s back in Utah a few years later. So what happened? Why was she there? Following the path of her youngest son Oscar F. Westover is really the only way to unravel this mystery.

Charles was now married and raising a family but began the decade still in the employ of Erastus Snow. That would change mid-decade as he would take up his own place near Edwin.

In fact, there was a convergence of sorts with the Westovers, the Shumways, and the Findleys in Big Cottonwood just as the handcart companies arrived during the Mormon Reformation in 1856.

The handcart pioneers brought us new family members. In fact, the introduction of plural marriage brought forward new realities to pioneering and different aspects to family history for us to contemplate. The “lone and dreary world” has a lot of salacious thoughts about plural marriage but the records left behind paint an entirely different picture that needs to be pondered. The women of the Westover families were strong in ways most cannot imagine and what was accomplished during these years by them is nothing short of miraculous.

The efforts to be faithful, to embrace new levels of faith and to grow farms and families was all interrupted by the Utah War – an event that gets passed over in most family histories because, well, nobody died.

But it was a hugely disruptive event that displaced nearly everyone in drought-stricken Utah Territory – including the Westovers.

Once again, the destitute and poor – which was just about everyone – had all that they had worked for placed on the altar of faith.

Families were separated from their husbands and fathers. It was a tense and uncertain time that would lead to significant changes for the family ahead.

While the post of this decade is a long one it is rich in new details, records, and photos. It needs to be absorbed and held up against written histories of the larger events of the Mormon Reformation, plural marriage, the handcart companies, the famine of 1855-1856, the 10th anniversary celebration of the 1847 pioneers, and the Utah War.

We also need to acknowledge the written histories compiled by earlier generations of our families. Within them is the general story – and a lot of errors. Many of the new records we have now and showcase in this post correct those errors. Family records and memories are always going to contain errors and conflicts in information – but they remain necessary because they contain that which mere data of records can never tell: the story of the family. We need them and we appreciate them, imperfect as they may be. We know that in posts ahead we will rely on the stories of individuals passed down to give nuance and definition to our ancestors who sacrificed more than what the data of genealogy can provide.

In all, the 1850s show that nothing was really settled at all with our pioneering ancestors.

They kept moving, they kept adapting and they kept faithful in fighting the demons of the past while forging a future for the family. While taking nothing away from their experiences in just getting to Utah we cannot help but be humbled by all they passed through just to stay there.

Our next installment on the 1860s shows how all this continued.

Independence Rock
Jeff Westover

New 19th Century Timeline

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Hannah Beal Sceva Headstone
Jeff Westover

Hannah and Her Sisters

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As a father of six daughters who have all now grown to adulthood I can speak to the special society that sisters enjoy. I’ve seen it with my Grandma and her sisters, and with my own sisters, and with my wife and her sisters.

The stories from our family history below showcase this as well.

~ The Beals and the Westovers ~

Obediah and Rebecca Beal were married at the end of the American Revolution. They would go on to have a family of six children – five girls and a boy.

While Obediah and Rebecca were both born and raised in small communities near Massachusetts Bay their married life would take them towards a frontier in Vermont where all of their children were born.

Polly, Hannah, Sally and Daniel were all born in Bethel, Vermont.

In 1802, when Electa Beal was born, the family was further north in a village called Bristol.

Four years later a final daughter, named Laura, was born in Berkshire, Vermont – a tiny village on the U.S.-Canadian border.

This travelogue of the Beal family is significant because it puts them in very close proximity to the traveling Amos Westover family.

Amos and Ruth Westover, of Sheffield, Massachusetts, found themselves in Canada just beyond the border after the American Revolution.

Amos was looking for land and had followed a few of his older brothers in seeking a land grant from the King in Canada.

Between the years 1790 and 1811, Amos and Ruth moved their family several times – and had several children along the way – all within about 50 miles or so of the Beal family.

While there is no proof the families knew each other while in Vermont it is a fact that both the Beals and the Westovers ended up very close to each other in Ohio years later.

Electa Beal, daughter of Obediah and Rebecca, married Alexander Westover, son of Amos and Ruth, in Ohio in 1823. Daniel Beal, son of Obediah and Rebecca, married Olive Westover, Alexander’s little sister also in 1823, in Ohio.

The Beal and Westover families stayed settled in Ohio for the most part for about 20 years.

Obediah, Amos and Ruth all died and were buried there in 1822. Rebecca would live until 1844 and appears to have stayed near eldest daughter Polly for the rest of her life. Each of the Beal children married but were not far away from each other during these years.

When Electa’s husband Alexander unexpectedly died in 1834 she turned first to her family for help as she struggled with the family farm in Goshen and three young boys – Edwin, Charles and Oscar.

~ Conversion and the Trek West ~

Hannah Beal married a man named George Washington Brown in 1811. The Browns had two children, both daughters – Adeline and Sophia.

There was no small amount of trauma for Hannah during these years of the late 1830s and 1840s. Her daughter Adeline married in 1835 and made Hannah a grandmother in 1837. But within a few years both Hannah and Adeline lost their husbands.

In 1844, Hannah was taught by Mormon elders and converted, along with her daughter Adeline.

Hannah urged the elders to visit her family in neighboring counties. There they found a searching Electa, who at this time was trying to help her eldest son, Edwin, get through the death of his young wife and helping to care for her first grandchild.

When the decision was made to join the Saints in Utah, Hannah ventured west sometime between 1848 and 1850.

Perhaps she came at the insistence of her sister, Electa.

Electa and her boys and grandson were part of the large company that came west with Brigham Young in 1848.

By the early 1850 the records of Electa and Hannah clearly show them as being in Utah – Electa, in Salt Lake City, and Hannah out in Grantsville living with Adeline and her husband Aaron Sceva.

What records we can find confirm that “Aunt Hannah” was the family leader in Utah. Before Edwin and his families were called to the Cotton Mission in Southern Utah it was with Aunt Hannah where they were farming.

~ Living with Plural Marriage ~

We have accounted before how the years of 1856-57 were significant for the family during what is called the Mormon Reformation.

Plural marriage changed the lives not only of the men, but also of the Beal sisters who were grandmothers.

Hannah became the plural wife of Aaron Sceva – that’s right, her own daughter’s husband. This was actually not an unheard of arrangement. Church leaders frequently advised well-established men to marry widowed and unmarried women in order to help support them.

Electa Beal also took to marrying again during these years. Her new husband, like Hannah’s husband, was a prominent figure in their communities and within the Church. In 1849 she married Eleazar Miller, one of the men who had baptized Brigham Young way back in the 1830s.

Brigham, of course, knew all about the Westover family. In letters exchanged between Brigham and Eleazar in 1850 he inquired after “the new Mrs. Miller”. Electa, however, chose to stay close to her sons and never lived with Eleazar Miller. There is some indication as well that later Electa married a man named Chauncey Loveland – but as before, she never lived with him either.

~ Another Sister ~

Within 2 years another sister – the youngest of the Beal sisters, Laura Adaline Beal– would venture to Utah.
Laura’s story is a little unique. In 1844 when Rebecca Beal died she gave all she had to her youngest child, Laura.

When Laura was small child she suffered from an accident that put scissors through one eye, blinding her in that eye. Her history states that soon her other eye “faded in sympathy”, rendering Laura completely blind.

She would end up in a school for the blind from 1837 to 1844.

While there she was given a copy of the Bible published just for the blind, which took up several volumes and had become her prized possession.

Laura Beal's Bible

One of the volumes of Laura Beal’s Bible for the Blind now resides in the Daughters of Utah Pioneers Museum

It was not in Braille, as that had not been invented yet, but it featured large raised letters that could be read by touch.

The skill of reading with her hands was just the beginning of Laura’s many talents. She could sew, knit and create with her hands with legendary speed and dexterity.

Laura was also known for her spiritual sensitivities. Her love for the Bible and her ability to independently study it gave her amazing story-telling skills. Children later in life were reportedly spell bound by Laura’s retelling of Bible stories.

A missionary from Utah visited where Laura was living near Cincinnati in 1850, telling her that he knew her two sisters who had joined the Church and moved to Utah. His efforts to teach her the gospel were enough to get Laura to head west with him and his wife to Utah, even though she was not a member of the Church.

He continued his missionary efforts, drawing on Laura’s love of the Bible. While in route Laura fell ill but had enough faith to ask the elders for a blessing. She ended up requesting baptism while on her way west.

After arriving in Utah she became the plural wife of a man named John Price. It was not a good situation for her, however, and within two years she found herself in an abusive situation that had robbed her of the money given to her by her mother years before. On the advice of her Bishop, she contacted Brigham Young for a bill of divorcement, which was granted.

From there Laura headed to Grantsville to her sister Hannah’s home. It was there she began to build her legendary status as “Aunt Laura”.

From that point forward in her life Laura stayed with family she knew. For a while she was with Hannah, then she joined Electa in Southern Utah for a while. In later years, she lived with a daughter of Edwin’s in Hamblin, Utah where she eventually died and was buried.

Aunt Laura was noted for a couple of peculiarities. She was very independent and insisted on caring for herself and helping around the home. Most children were fascinated by her because of all she could do and how well she would engage them.

Laura’s history concedes to one “bad habit” Laura had picked up years before she came to Utah – she smoked a pipe. She battled for years to conquer the habit in efforts to keep the Word of Wisdom and her history notes she got it down to just a once-an-evening indulgence. Like everything she did this was done according to a well-established pattern. Frequently the children would be pressed into service to help her light the pipe.

Laura’s church activity was forever steady and when the St. George Temple was dedicated she was there, with her sister Electa as a fellow temple worker, and she participated in doing temple work for their family members back in Ohio.

Hannah, Electa, and Laura each had their individual stories of coming to Zion and working out the salvation for their loved ones. Each of them was faithful. Each of them was a powerful example and doggedly devoted to the family. They cared for each other and honored their parents.

Hannah is buried in Grantsville. Electa is in Washington City, near St. George. And Laura rests in the Hamblin cemetery.

Jeff Westover

Hello, Cousin

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One of my favorite parts of Rootstech has been the development of the “Relatives Around Me” feature at FamilySearch.

The physical gathering of 30,000 family history enthusiasts in downtown Salt Lake City was bound to include a few relatives. But how to find and connect with them? Using cell phone technology and an enrollment process via FamilySearch they found a way to do it. Last year, which feels like a million years ago now, a few of us did get together and took the following picture:

Descendents of Edwin R. Westover

Rootstech this year is entirely different. As of this writing, about a half million attendees are enrolled. Given that many people from around the world, how many relatives can be going through the Rootstech experience at the same time?

Well, they’ve adjusted the technology and we can see who is enrolled who we are related to. This year I can see that nearly 40,000 related to me are at Rootstech.

Obviously we cannot meet this year. But can we still connect? Well, I’m trying — one by one — to reach out to as many of my cousins out there as I can.

I’m introducing them first to the Edwin Westover Family Project.

While that is very important to me I feel the overall effort we’re making here on this website and at FamilySearch is more important. Somewhere in the closets of those 40,000 cousins could be a lot of great information. It could be pictures, it could be artifacts, it could be journals or whatever. We’d like to copy it all and archive here. I think among all those cousins is a bigger family story to be shared.

I want to meet you all, too.

The Edwin Project, which is simply a modern gathering of Edwin Ruthvin Westover’s descendents on Edwin’s 200th birthday, is a great way to meet so many of these cousins.

But let’s face it – Edwin is the low hanging fruit. I’d like to find more information about those generations who came before Edwin. We have a branch of the family in Canada, another in Missouri, more in Michigan and New York state. There are histories there from the 18th century we need to learn.

So when I am reaching out to cousins at Rootstech is not only relates to Edwin. I’m interested in all of you.

So don’t be shy. When I sent that message you may have seen at FamilySearch, it’s not just some weirdo you don’t know stalking you at RootsTech. It’s me. Your cousin! And yes, I’m a weirdo but only in the nicest possible terms and I just want to know you.

We have a tremendous shared heritage. I’m anxious to learn more of our story from wherever I can find it.

So if you have information, pictures, journals and family history stuff, please share. And I’ll share with you. That’s what we’re here for.