Stories of Ancestors, Family Reunion 1998
At the Reunion, Viola Lauper Johnson was asked to share some stories of her ancestors. Her words were recorded and transcribed by Wilma Stocker.
She speaks of her father, Emile Lauper, her mother, Emma Vissing, and her great-grandparents, Else Nielsen and Jens Jacobsen (relating stories told by her mother).
I'll relate one little incident, since you asked for that. It has to do with my father and his faith in one of the precepts, in that he did leave his family in Switzerland, some of them had been baptized, but you realize there was no access to temples there. And he now was in America, he was the only endowed member of his family and during his sleep he was disturbed with almost a voice, at least it was a strong impression, that came to him. Something like this, "Oeuvre le port" [Oeuvre la porte] and this was repeated, his rest was broken repeatedly two or three times after that with the same expression, "Oeuvre le port". I probably say that all wrong, but that's a French expression for "Open the door." You know my father knew immediately what that meant. That he was to set about his business to get the papers and the ordinances ready for having the temple work done for his people and he did it as soon as he possibly could. One display of his faith.
To combine his with my mother, who was this little Danish immigrant. Again I'll refer to how we're connected to the Gospel on our maternal side, in that it's her little grandmother, my great grandmother, and the rest of you can add your second or third to wherever it belongs to make little Else Nielsen Sorensen your grandmother. And it's that brave little valiant person who was responsible for our connection on that side of our family. She was deserted by her husband, left with four children, in her circumstances in Denmark where she once had - was well situated. She was reduced to very poor means, and it changed her whole personality, she was so devastated. And when the missionary people called on her. She was very resistant, because at this time she had become - where she had been a very sociable little lady - she was now withdrawn and sad and mistrusting. But eventually these persistent missionaries, and here I give a loud and honest applause to the missionary system, because those persistent people did come back in a way to approach this little lady and she finally let them in. She was converted and it changed her life again, and from then on she could think of nothing but getting her little band to Zion, which they eventually did. So we owe her this deep gratitude. And it was this little grandmother that raised my mother, in that my mother was relegated to live with her which she did until her maturity and so we think of her in a very special way and the husband that she connected with in this country, who became our favorite grandfather in that we give him a special moniker, he's our grandpa-wooden-leg-Jacobsen. But I can't tell you that story because it wasn't included in my assignment.
Well, a word about little Grandpa. He was a worthy little Latter-day Saint gentlemen that she met in the Danish colony that the saints immigrated to, with the help of the immigration society, and were headed towards the, or were channeled towards Sanpete County because there were many Scandinavian people that were aggregating there and there it was that Grandma Else met this little Grandfather and he, the dear soul, was now a widower, had served well in his family and his wife had passed away. His children were grown and he was wealthy in that he had an acre of land, a horse, a goat and a few chickens, you know ... and moreover, he had served in a couple of wars, the Danish-Prussian and something else and had his leg shot off. They did nothing for him, but give him - he served the rest - He was about twenty-three years old. He served all of his life and he grew to. He lasted for a good many years and he never had anything but a make shift piece of wood. He went thumping along and lived a marvelous life, and served as her parent because she lived and grew up in that fine home, unusual as it was.
Now just a comical report about my parents. I mustn't make this too long, I'm sure others have been asked. A little anecdote: We'll skip down many years and we're grown people now, her children, all of us, my siblings and I, and we're living in Ventura County and my parents were attending the Branch there, as we all were, and they were quite active in a rather large Sunday School class and it was holiday time, Christmas, and the class decided to have a Christmas party and they were going to make it unique in making it a kids party. So they were all urged to dress like children and report in that manner.
But I have to give you a throw back here, in that none of us had ever known my father without a mustache. This was just part of his anatomy, if you can call it that. We never knew him otherwise. He did lose some hair on top as he grew older, but never the mustache.
So now they're getting ready for this party. They sort of did it at the last minute too, in that they said very little about it, but I guess as the day arrived and the moment, they each said, well, we better get ready or something like that. And each went to a room and he went to the bathroom I remember, and Ma went to the bedroom and she had thought more about it than he and she rigged up a pair of his trousers, she didn't cut them off, goodness sakes, couldn't do that but she did blouse them up with some elastic so that they looked like knicker-pants, which some of you don't know about but you might have seen in the movies, and some suspenders and did, oh, and a bow tie and did her best to think up things that would make him look a little childish. And she herself, who had long hair, never had cut it in my lifetime. She always wore a bun on top. She combed it out and parted it and made two braids, put cute red bows on the end of each braid and a shorter skirt and that's the way she looked.
But the payoff was when father came out of the bathroom, he had shaved his mustache. And that was colossal. That just really changed his whole personality. We never got over it and we couldn't because this was a few days before Christmas and unfortunately his demise occurred on New Year's Day following that which was only a short few days. He had a sudden death. So we buried him without half knowing what he looked like because he had no mustache. That enough?