The Ross Solon McGee story: Installment 2

(in the words of Myrna McGee Smith)

Ross McGee and Elsie Gifford had been acquainted for a long time but Elsie had left Springdale and was living with her brother Nathan and her mother in Delta, Utah. So they wrote letters to each other and then on May 23, 1922 they were married in the St George Temple. On this same day Russell was baptized at the St George Temple.

Henry and LaRetta and their family lived by the D at the black hills in St. George. It was while they were living there that Russell and their boys were playing and found an old bullet shell when Arden picked it up and it exploded and blew off the fingers of one hand. They had to rush him to the hospital, but he had to spend the rest of his life with no fingers on one hand.

At one time when Ross and Elsie were living at the Gregson home in Washington Fields in St George an Eagle kept flying around near Elise and Gladys was real worried about her for fear the Eagle would hurt her.

On Elise's birthday on Dec 4, 1923 Martina took her to the St George Temple to be baptized.  After her baptism Martina took her back home and Gladys told Elise to go get a comb so she could fix her hair.  At this same time a bunch of kids were hiding in another room and surprised her with a surprise birthday party.

In 1924 Ross and Elsie were living out in the Washington Fields where Ross worked a farm for Seegmillers. One day when he was coming home with the wagon and the team of horses, he began crossing over a bridge at the canal when the horses were spooked, they reared backwards breaking the spring tooth.  Ross was on the round seat when the horses came backwards on to him, and he knew he had to squeeze out before they started struggling. He was certain his back was broken because his legs were numb but he knew he had to get out from under those horses. He crawled on his stomach up and out of the canal and was crawling on his stomach when Mr. Seegmiller came along and seen him there.  Mr. Seegmiller got the horses and wagon and then lifted Ross into the wagon and took him to the house. 

Golda ran a mile to a drug store to get medicine for the pain he was having.  There was a Dr. Nelson, who was a Chiropractor. He came to the house to help Ross get better and hopefully be able to walk again.  Dr. Nelson was a very large heavy set man, and also blind  When he would come to the house to help Ross, He would feel his way along the hedges until he could find the door to the house.

Ross learned to walk again by pushing a chair in front of him. It took him a year of doing this to learn to walk again. 

Elsie was expecting her first child before this accident happened and on Feb. 20, 1925 Irene was born. Then the following year on Oct. 18, 1926 their second child Lloyd was born, but at a different house because they had moved again.

When Golda was sixteen years old in 1927 she was given a job at the Hotel in Cedar City so Ross drove her there. He was very worried leaving her there and kept telling her to make sure the door to her room was securely locked.

On Jan. 24, 1928 LaRaine was the third child born to Ross and Elsie. They had moved again so he also was born in a different home.

Jim and Sally and their children left St George in 1924 and moved to Draper along with Grandpa Solon Huff McGee. Beverly and Bruce were born in Draper.  They first lived in a house that looked like a chicken coop and later built their home where each one helped and they moved in during the year of 1934.

Henry and LaRetta left St George and it is thought that they settled near Bluff or Riverton and lived there for awhile and later moved into Salt Lake City.

In September 1928 Ross and Elsie and their family loaded their Model T Ford with as much of their belongings that they could and had someone move the rest of their furniture in a big cattle truck when they moved up north. They moved into a home in Crescent which was between Sandy and Draper on State Street in  a house that was behind a store and service station. 

In about Dec of 1928 when the family was living in Crescent Russell and Elise with some friends were playing Cops and Robbers in the barn where there was a granary and Elise had ran onto a cellar when Russell was chasing her and it caved in with her.

Another time Elise and Russell and another neighbor girl were playing in a building they played by when Elise went up a ladder and fell through the door out into the driveway and scraped up her face rather badly. Gladys was in bed after having surgery for mastitis and had her tonsils out and Leo had just come over to see her.  They were going together at this time and he got there just as Elise fell and got hurt.

While they were living in Crescent Elise needed to go and get the milk down the road at Atwoods and Irene wanted to go with her but Elise told her she couldn't go because she wasn't cleaned up and it’s a good thing because when she and Lloyd were out playing he wandered out by a sheep or a goat that was tied up by the irrigation ditch and he fell in, so Irene ran and told Russell that Lloyd had fallen into the ditch and he ran as fast as he could go and pulled him out just before he went through the culvert.  Elise said when they got him back to the house and was getting him dry they asked him how he was and he said just "shine".  He was only a little past two years old.  They were very lucky that he didn't drown.

to be contniued: