Princely Pioneer

 

This is my maternal grandfather William Frank Smith.  

I am proud of my pioneer heritage on my maternal granmother's (Anna Sorenson) side of the family as well as on my father's side of the family but my mother's father was a pioneer of unique destiny and, in my opionion, epic proportion.  The bare bones of the story is that he rode into Wendover in a boxcar where he went to work for a man trying to establish a gas station in the middle of nowhere.  It was a great idea and Grandpa ran with it.  He bought it and built on it establishing a restaurant, hotel, and casino.  All of this information is in the article above.  I would be happy to provide copies to anyone who wants to read the whole thing.  I suspect most of us have a copy of our own.  My mom, Marian Barnwell, passed out many copies for which I am grateful. 

I never knew my grandfather.  According to familysearch.org he was born 31 Dec 1886 in

Leola, South Dakota and died on the 24th of December 1958 and I was born in 1959 but I have heard many, many stories about the man W.F. Smith was.  He was the kind of man who brought home extra people to Thanksgiving dinner because they needed the meal.  He found jobs for people who needed them and liked to buy things for his wife.  There is an old story that my mom once told me that Grandpa once said to her "your mother thinks I should tell her I love her more but I told her once and until I say different it stands!"  Now, I know we like to hear we are loved but I can't help thinking that this is an adorable story.  For one thing, what a sweetly hysterical thing to say to your child.  The message is, "I love her and that won't change".  Another story my mother shared about her father was about the time he gave her a case of strawberries and told her he really likes strawberry jam and could she please make him some.  Then he went away and left her to figure it out!  According to mom she did.  I'd love to know the whole of that story - I think, but ultimately what it says about my grandfather is that he had a way of subtly expressing confidence in a person and giving them the space to make mistakes without those mistakes being a crisis.

I would be very grateful to hear any other stories about my grandfather.