Ruth Estelle Bailey

My Mom talked to me a lot...and as much as we "butted-heads" I loved to hear her stories. Mom said that she was told that she was such a tiny baby that she slept in a shoebox as an infant. I know that her family came to Utah in 1937, first settling in Park City. She told me that they rode in the back of a truck and only had mayonnaise and bread to eat...and she couldn't eat mayonnaise ever since. She said that they stayed in the back of a store their first winter in Utah, and she remembered that she could not get warm. Next they lived in the part of the Salt Lake Valley where the Cottonwood Mall was/is in Holliday, and then her family settled Murray on 2nd West. Her family were sharecroppers in Alabama and they moved to Utah with encouragement and assistance of the LDS Church. Most of Mom's family moved back to the South in the late 1950's and early 1960's after my Grandma Betty's death....I'm sure that is was for many reasons...the culture, the climate...Mom said that "the mountains always scared Goldie and Ruby."

I loved to hear Mom's stories about growing up in Murray, Utah. Her stories were mostly about common day-to-day stuff...the people, places, and pets in her neighborhood: earning money by picking fruit in the orchards with her family in Holliday and Murray, Utah; her brother Willard's chickens; the neighbor's dog Star; making dolls from cloth and corn husks; playing in the empty homes on Box Elder Street; watching the trains filled with soldiers going off to serve the country during World War II; going roller skating at the Murray Skating Rink; and...my favorite stories...the time she and some friends were j-walking across State Street and a police officer made them go back and forth across the street at the crosswalk numerous times....and the time she and some friends took apples from a market and a police officer made them shine all of the remaining apples as their punishment! My Mom openly admitted, proudly, that she was a "juvenile delinquent!" Mom went to Murray High School and she dropped out when she was 16 to marry my Dad. She met my Dad through her friend Joyce (Kropf) Bailey who was dating Jerry Bailey, my Dad's brother.

I'm not sure if Mom liked to cook or not...I was an incredibly picky eater as a child, which I know drove my Mom crazy...so I am not the person that should pass down information about my Mom's cooking...I think Mom made great desserts, tuna casserole, and fried chicken. The "dressing" (turkey stuffing) that she maid for thanksgiving was probably the most delicious food I have ever eaten - ever. She would set aside stale bread and we would break it into cubes until it became a huge mound, and Mom would blend in all kinds of tasty stuff (you can tell I don't cook - and I never got the recipe so don't ask!)...and she would cook it in with the turkey...and seriously, I could have just eaten that for Thanksgiving dinner! How wonderful it is to discover that through Mom's family that we are Mayflower Descendants! I wish she would have known her family history.

Mom had an incredible amount of awareness, 'mothers intuition,' and common sense. Like most people born in her era, the Great Depression, my Mom was extremely thrifty. In 1969, my Dad's workplace, Kennecott Copper, was on a nine month labor strike and the story is that she did Christmas for 7 people with only $25. She also had a knack for picking out quality merchandise and I know that she loved it when my Grandmother Wilma gave us towels for Christmas.

My Mom was a strong woman - she became a widow when she was 48 years old with two teenagers. We used to go for drives around Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. we would drive up to Evanston, Wyoming and bring beer back to Utah - usually driving down Monty Cristo Canyon, because it is too narrow to pull anyone over in a "car check"...I guess the Statute of Limitations is up on that...she also stole a beautiful carnival-glass beer picture from a local bar.... I have it know...possession is 9/10ths of the law! Mom liked to go gambling in Wendover, Nevada; liked to go to hockey games; liked Sandalwood and Chantilly Perfume; had a great collection of lipstick, and costume jewelry; liked the songs "Heartache Tonight" by The Eagles and "Walk of Life" by Dire Straits; the television show "Roseann"; liked the Book The Boston Strangler by Gerold Frank;and loved the movie The Sound of Music. Mom loved nature; going to the Uinta Mountains, American Fork Canyon, and Cannon Beach, Oregon; going to the Senior Center; going to yard sales with her friend Mayree Myers; going out to eat; and she enjoyed sitting out under the patio in our back yard, listening to Two Way Radio, drinking ice tea, (she made delicious "sun-tea" -especially the peppermint kind) and watching the hummingbirds with our dog Sam I also think that she had wanted to take in the cat that would eventually be my cat, Princess Ralph, but she was not able to do so because of her asthma.

Mom had a group of lady friends that she met through Church that she called "the Club" and they would get together once a month once a month to go to dinner. The families would get together at the end of summer for a backyard barbeque, and they would have a Christmas party just for the adults. Each September, the day after we went back to school for the year after three months of summer break, Mom and her friend Marry Russon, who was in "the Club," would "run-away" for the day...usually they would drive to Wanship, Utah to eat at Spring Chicken Inn...why the needed to "run-away" will always be the biggest mystery to me in all of our family history...but when my Dad was alive it was one of the times that he would make his special hamburgers! Mom and Dad also liked to get all dressed up and go out to nice restaurant for dinner and go to plays at Theater 138. We also got to go to a lot of live theater and to the ballet.

My Mom suffered with a lot of health issues in her last years which were extremely frustrating to her. I know that she wanted to be more active - to be out and about, traveling with her friends. On Christmas Eve 1995 she passed away in her sleep at home in Murray, Utah. When I moved back to Murray after I earned my Masters Degree, I lived in her home until it was sold and I felt her presence a lot and I continue to feel her around me. I hope that she is in a place of love, light, and peace, and I hope that our ancestors are proud of her. If anyone wants to share their memories of my Mom please let me know.