Life of Lauretta Hepworth Astle Written by her daughter, Arstanie Astle Nye

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It was a big day at the time when chokecherries and service berries were ripe. The horses would be hooked to the wagon, lunch packed and we would all climb in and head for the hills to fill our buckets with the dark red berries. Mother made jellies and the most delicious service berry preserves or sweet pickles.

Each Sunday morning all would be up early to get the work done and to be ready to go to Sunday School. Father always kept a nice team of horses, they would be hooked to the white topped buggy and we would drive the three miles from the ranch - often being the first ones to the meeting house. Mother was President of the Primary for awhile, so we would pick up the children on the way to Primary during the week.

One day in May 1916, Mother and some of the girls were out raking and burning rubbish, while the others were doing their work in the usual way, when someone noticed smoke coming from the roof of the house. The house, just being a lumber shell construction, was all in flames. The fire burnt everything except the clothes we were wearing. The members of the Ward and the surrounding neighbors brought bedding, food and supplies, helping with what they could. A stove was put in a tent and we made out for the rest of the summer. It was during World War I, that a beautiful new house was built on the ranch. It had hot and cold water and a bathroom. Mother was so proud and happy it being the second new home built for them and by them, in her few years of married life. Mother did not live too long to really enjoy the new home. In the winter of 1918, influenza spread over the Valley which was a treacherous disease. There were not enough well people to care for the sick. It brought great sorrow in the home. Father, mother and most of the children were so ill they did not leave their beds. On December 23, 1918, Vernon the twenty-year-old son past away and the next day, Christmas Eve, Mother died too.

There was so much sickness and so much snow that no funerals were held. A beautiful white casket was brought to the house. Mother was dressed in a white dress and her temple clothes, she looked beautiful. We all stood looking from the window as she was taken away and laid in her final resting place. She was still a young woman in years, just forty-four, but yet old with life's experiences, of laughter, love, sorrow and joys. Our Mother, Lauretta Hepworth Astle, had certainly lived a life of all lives.

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