Contributed by Miss Anne Clark 

It was the year 1875, that my Great-grandma, Jane Hale Hall, and Grandpa David Hall started from Council Bluffs, Iowa, for Salt Lake. They left in February, equipped with only a team of horses and a covered wagon. They had a family of six children, the youngest being my Grandmother Zundel (Julia B.), who was only three months old at the time. 

Grandmother Hall walked and carried her baby most of the way across the plains. She told many times of being hungry because supplies were low and often all they had to eat was a cup of cornmeal. 

In one part of the country in which they were traveling, small wild tomatoes grew on the hillside. They were small and looked good, but the children were warned not to eat them as they might be poisonous. My great-grandmother thought that if the tomatoes were edible the family could keep from starving, so she told her husband that she would risk poisoning to taste even the fruit. Following supper and the family prayers that evening, Great-grandmother Hall sent the children to bed and went out and gathered some of the little tomatoes. She washed them and ate them. The next morning she still felt fine and from then on they had plenty of tomatoes to alleviate their hunger. Many more hardships were suffered. When they arrived at Salt Lake, they decided to settle further up the valley, so they went on to East Portage and settled in a log house. Later they moved to West Portage.  

My great-grandmother was left a widow in 1903 and it was necessary for her to work very hard to rear her family. Because there were so few doctors in those days, she went from house to house helping mothers bring their families into the world. Despite the hard times and very little money, she never neglected her church duties and always paid her tithing. She was kind to everyone and always willing to help whenever or wherever she was needed.  

She died in 1919 at the age of 89.