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FORGET ME NOT:   AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF  
BETTY BURTON STOHL     

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 Clark & Betty at their Wedding Line, with Jane, Maxine Tate, Mary Boden, and Kathryn. February 13, 1940.  Click photo for large image 

 

While working at KOB I met Clark Stohl, my future husband. David Ellison and I were in David’s office, actually a desk in the back room where dresses and coats were received, working on an ad. Clark had just arrived from Washington, D.C., where he was working for the Bureau of the Mint, and had come to visit his college chum. David introduced us and we talked a moment about the Marriotts and about some of the people I knew in Washington.
    David must have sold Clark a so-called bill-of-goods because that evening he called and asked me to go to a movie with him the next night. We went to see Pygmalion with Leslie Howard, the famous British film star. During the evening we had a good time, but I couldn’t remember Clark’s first name. It was easy to remember his last name because he had several girl cousins who had been very popular at the U of U. From then on, during the two weeks he was here in Salt Lake, we saw a lot of each other.
    It was February of 1939 when we first met. We wrote all summer and both dated other people. Clark would send a registered letter every Sunday Morning. Jane and Kathryn would be angry with me because I would never answer the door for the mailman.  
    Clark came out from Washington D.C. again in September, and at the old parking spot for dates at the mouth of Parley’s Canyon overlooking the city, he asked me to marry him. We decided on February 13th, 1940, in the Salt Lake Temple. Until that time I had his Sigma Chi pin but didn’t wear it because he was 27 years old and was over the college stuff and did not want me to show it.
    Our marriage was performed by Elder John A. Widtsoe of the Council of the Twelve Apostles. Our wedding reception was at the Delta Gamma House, the first wedding to be held in the new house. Bridesmaids were Jane and Kathryn, Mary Boden Durham and Maxine Tate Grimm. Lloyd Stohl, Clark’s brother, served as Best Man. We were entertained at many parties, the details of which were written up in the papers with pictures, as was often done by the society writer in those days. Both the Sigs and the Delta Gammas sang to us at our reception, much to our embarrassment because Clark felt so much older than those in the chapter.

  The S-4. Betty, Margaret, Ruth, and Mary. 1963.
Click photo for large image. 

 

While at Irving Junior High, I was in a fashion show and was so proud to be wearing mother’s aqua blue satin formal and her crystal necklace. Mary Brown, later Firmage, and after Edwin’s death, married to Dr. Ralph Woodward, former head of the Music Department at BYU, Ruthie, now Mrs. Curtis McMullin, and Margaret, now Mrs. Phillip Badger, wore pajamas they made in sewing class. The S4 had to be in everything together.

  Jennis Elizabeth Stohl, age 1. Click photo for large image 

Jennis Elizabeth was born on June 15, l949. This was on Martha’s second birthday and just minutes before my birthday on June 16th. I was in the hospital for Jenny three times in six weeks before she decided to arrive. Perhaps she just had to make an appearance to gain her body, because we only had her for two brief years before she was hit by a car while Clark and I, with Katie, Burton, and Aunt Jess Rigby were in Fort Wayne, Indiana, visiting Mother and Daddy who were presiding over the Great Lakes Mission.
    A missionary, who took the call in the mission home, drove to find us visiting the city while we were sightseeing and brought this terrible news to us. I think it is the only time in my life I ever fainted.
    Jenny was a very bright little girl who began to wave and say bye-bye at six months. She never had a bottle after six months. She drank with a straw in a cup and slept in a big bed with Martha after a year. Our home teachers were amazed that she would kneel at our big round coffee table with the rest of us and take her turn praying at two years old. She would ride her little tricycle down Beverly Street just like the big kids.
    Jennis Elizabeth died on August 15th, 1951, when she was hit by a car driven by an elderly neighbor. She had gotten out of the house and wandered into the street just at dusk, before the sitter missed her.
    Her funeral was held in Stratford Ward on August 18th, and was a very large one for such a tiny child. Mother had come out from the mission field with us on the plane, and Daddy drove out with the children, Aunt Jess, and the mission Secretary. Her viewing was right in our own living room in the morning before the funeral. She was in a little pink dress, pink socks and white slippers from Kenny Stoker, who was loving and kind, as were all our friends. As I kissed her goodbye, I put her pink "gobee" in the casket. She was seldom without her fuzzy pink blanket. It was strange that I had had a dream awhile before in which I saw the identical scene, a small casket in our living room with a child in it. I couldn’t get that dream out of my mind.

  Betty, Marilyn, Katie, Sara, Martha, Amy, and Laura at a family reunion, 1972. Click photo for large image 

One of my sweetest memories is of all the children lying on the bed of the baby’s room while I would sing lots of old nursery songs, and even some my Grandmother Christopherson taught me, while I rocked the baby to sleep. Even Burton would join us until he became too old. I finally wore out the old rocking chair, which gave up and collapsed. Sadly, Amy and Laura missed this because the others were now too old as well.

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