March 1962
This is the life story of Alberta Jeppsen, who was born 12 June 1931 in Hill Spring, Alberta, Canada to Samuel Leland Jeppson, father; and Mary Thomas Jeppson, mother. I, her mother , am writing this story of Alberta’s short, but abundant life, with the hope in my heart, that her brothers and sisters will enjoy the precious memories they all have of their sister, the tenth in number of our family of thirteen, and hoping that the grandchildren ( her nieces and nephews) will enjoy getting acquainted with this precious aunt, whom they will never know only through this source.
Alberta’s life was an eventful one. It commenced with her very unusual birth, I shall give a brief account of this event in order to prove my point of this first statement. At the time I am writing about, we, her parents and the family, were living on a farm in a sparsely settled town in the Province of Alberta, Canada. We were living in the little settlement of Hill Spring, which is about 25 miles west of Cardston, our nearest town. There were no electric lights, no telephones, except for one which was in the one and only little store, no night service–day service began at 7 a.m. and closed at 7 p.m. There was no train service and mail service only three times a week. Our mode of transportation was by team of horses hitched to a white topped buggy ( Canadian name for the buggy was Democrat). Many people along with ourselves did not own a Democrat, but travelled in a wagon. Our nearest medical help was in Cardston. There were no villages or towns between Hill Spring and Cardston, just prairies and the Blood Indian Reservation’ and because of my expectant condition we needed to be on the alert for the slightest sign, so that we could have sufficient time to make the trip safely. Well, early in the week I had this warning and my husband and I rode the rough road to Cardston, reluctantly leaving our children at home. The older ones were trained to take over the responsibility of the home and chores, but the oldest one was just 14 years. By the time we arrived at Cardston and visited the Doctor, I had changed my mind it seemed, and my Doctor said that he thought I could wait another two weeks in safety; and therefore we returned to our home in Hill Spring, tired but glad to have a reprieve. Next day I tried to turn the place upside down to get my washing done, clean the house, get a quantity of food prepared, and do everything which a person in my condition should not do, but they always will.
I went to bed rather late, but happy that I had accomplished something and would be up early to iron and hang the clean window curtains. I was awakened very early in a great deal of pain but I did not want to waken my husband, he too was so tired and had a big day’s work facing him. I thought “ this is just another false alarm” similar to the few days previous but no, it was getting worse and I knew that my unborn child was knocking on the Door of Life. I reluctantly called my sleeping husband and told him the news, but he too remembered what the Doctor had told me, and tried to tell me that I was just nervous and worried, but after he awakened enough to see me, he knew that this was the hour. He had thoughtfully rented a car for a few days, in order to be ready for a quick trip, and while I was getting ready with the help of my oldest daughter Ellen, we went out to get the car started, but, alas! It wouldn’t start, he cranked and cranked, but no response. He was panicky and I was sick. I started out to tell him not to try longer, but to get help for me, but when I was halfway out to the car, I turned back to the house. I knew I must hasten, but I could not make it back. I went down on my knees, my baby was ready to be born, My husband called for help and he was heard all around the townsite and half clothed neighbors came running from every direction to find out what was happening in their quiet neighborhood.
I was close to the back door of our house and Alberta was born in the rocks just at the rising of the early Canadian sun. Brother Bert Wood, the store keeper, also a counsellor of the Bishopric came and wanted her named Dawn’ another name suggested by others was Roxie. But the cold Canadian wind was blowing and the early morning was very chilly; we felt that it was a typical Alberta setting and we gave her the name of Alberta. We were really thankful that the car wouldn’t start, otherwise she would have been born on the Blood Indian Reservation.
Alberta was a beautiful baby, large brown eyes, dark hair and a pink and white complexion. The ladies who came to my rescue believed her weight to be around 8 lbs. Several hours later when the doctor arrived, he pronounced her perfect, strong and healthy, but I had not done so well, as I had an infection which cleared up later.
Our little daughter was born on the 12th day of June 1931 in Hill Spring, Alberta, Canada. She was blessed by her father, S. Leland Jeppson on 2 Aug 1931. She was a happy, lovable child and everyone loved her.
We moved from Canada to Caldwell, Canyon County, Idaho in June 1934 when Alberta was 3 years old. We traveled in a truck with our furniture and all belongings we could take along, and eleven passengers. This was anything but comfortable, but to Alberta everything was wonderful. Although she was very young, everything in life was a wonderful experience. We were three days enroute. Caldwell Idaho is a beautiful place, climate wonderful, fruit and vegetables in abundance., but only a small Branch of the Church, but we immediately got in touch with the leaders and became active in the organizations. Alberta commenced her schooling here in the Washington School in Sept. 1937. She loved everything about it, and gained many devoted little friends. She managed to pick up all the childhood diseases very readily – mumps, measles, chicken pox, whooping cough, etc. But she took it in her stride and she never allowed it to slow her down too much.
In the Spring of 1940 we moved our family and belongings to Utah. We settled in Harper Ward about 4 miles north of Brigham City. There was quite a difference here from our home in Idaho. It seemed so much more like home to us, I’m sure it was because the majority of the people were L.D. S. and we were all like one big family. In the schools in Caldwell, Idaho the L.D. S. children were sort of frowned on because they were in such a minority compared to the many denominations there. In the Fall of 1941 Alberta was bitten by a dog, the wound was in the fleshy part of her leg, it was very painful and she was laid up with it for weeks, during this time she had to remain home from school.
Alberta loved everybody and everything, always had a smile and was active in school functions as well as church activities, belonged to singing groups and was very good on the piano. She had quite a flare in composing poetry. There are many little verses mixed up with the school work. She loved parties and dances; hikes, especially Easter hikes. She and her girl friends would plan Easter for weeks. They started on their hikes ( weather permitting) very early in the morning, taking food for breakfast and lunch, and later in the day they usually wound up in the movies. She had a great admiration for Movie Stars, and had their pictures pasted all over her bedroom wall–Mickey Rooney, and Van Johnson seemed to be two of her favorites
She was so concerned about World War II– how she wanted to help. She, with several singing groups, would go as often as possible to entertain injured soldiers in the Bushnell Hospital whenever they were permitted to do so.
In October 1944 she had an appendix operation which was quite serious because about two weeks later infection set in and it was a long time clearing up. Her fourteenth birthday June 12, 1945 was a happy one. She wrote in her diary that it was the “funnist” birthday she had ever experienced but it was her last birthday also. Three days after this birthday, June 15th, she came from her bedroom and said she had a Charlie Horse in her knee, and at the time no one worried about it, thinking it would be alright soon; but a few days later she began to limp. There was no visible mark, swelling, or anything that could be seen or explained. We took her to the Doctor and after his examination he said that it must be a strained ligament, but it still continued to be painful and by now it was quite swollen. In Aug. 1945 our Doctor decided to take an x-ray of it. Upon examination of the x-ray our Doctor (Merrell) became very upset, but he did not make any explanation of the x-ray but sent the picture to Ogden to an x-ray specialist. Three days later the findings came back as Carcinoma or cancer of the bone. On Aug. 13, 1945 a biopsy was done. This meant that a section (a small piece of flesh and a specimen of the blood) was taken from her knee. This specimen was taken to Bushnell Hospital, then a Military Hospital ( now it is the Intermountain Indian School). This was the largest and best hospital in the West. The test was made and returned to the Cooley Hospital in less than an hour. It confirmed the diagnosis of the x-ray. This information was strictly kept from her and yet she sensed it right from the first, I am sure, but always tried to make us believe otherwise. While she was still in the Hospital recovering from this test, on Aug 15, 1945 the great World War II came to an end, and she would watch from her window at the hospital the celebration which was going on, and how she wished she could join with and participate in it. She walked with crutches and enrolled in school in Sept. 1945. She had been elected Vice President of the Junior High School the spring before. She was so enthused about it, but the pain in her leg grew worse and worse and she had to withdraw before the month of Sept ended. We took her to specialists and tried every kind of treatment which was recommended for this kind of disease. Nothing that was tried did her any good. The trips to Ogden and Salt Lake became unbearable, her knee was now huge and draining, the flesh was dark and terrible, the knee bones had severed connections and the pain was excruciating. She could not stand nor sit, nor lie down with any degree of comfort and on Nov. 19, 1945 her leg was amputated several inches above the knee, quite close to the hip. The flesh in the remainder of her leg looked perfectly healthy. The Doctor told us that if he didn’t know better, he would say that she would be perfectly all right. But due to the fact that this was in her blood stream he knew that it would attack some other organ of her body. This amputation was a terrible shock to her system; the nerve ending, the knowledge of having lost her leg and all things summed up, her long illness and suffering, weakness and pride, she had lost all desire to live; but due to her wonderful doctor, Dr. M. R. Merrell, who not only gave her tender medical and psychiatric care as well, who showed her a fatherly love and understanding, she soon became her adorable self and found new hope and happiness in her loved ones and friends. She was retained in the hospital for three weeks. The wound healed nicely and now she could move and be moved from one place to another with much more comfort and freedom from pain than she had experienced for a long time. But two days before she was taken from the hospital she had a sharp pain in her stomach, causing a severe nausea. The vicious disease had already attacked her in a different part of her body.
After returning home, though she was in a great deal of pain, she took up her music at the piano. She learned to get around on crutches and went to a few movies, and on New Years Eve she went to the home of one of her many friends for a sleeping party. This had been planned by her friends especially for her. When she received the invitation to this party she at first declined, she felt that the girls would have to deny themselves of a lot of activities which they would ordinarily have if she were not there; but they all insisted that she go, and she reluctantly went. I called her a few times during the late evening to ask her if she wanted to come home but she stayed the entire night and had breakfast in the morning. She had been given the couch to sleep on which the rest of the girls slept on the floor. She had taken some pain pills with her so that she could take them when she needed them. Mr. Rasmussen, father of her hostess, brought her home at 9 a.m. He carried her into the house from his car. She had had a delightful time and was real happy but it was the last time she ever felt well enough to visit anyone. She had been especially blessed at this time it seemed, to have had the strength and courage to have this last frolic with her dear companions. From this time on the vicious disease took over and no matter what she ate or drank, she regurgitated. The pain was excruciating, the process of ejecting the contents of her stomach through her mouth was continuous, her liver came up in bits, the flesh dropped off her body, her hip bone came through her skin. Medication came through the hypo for now the only thing we could do for her was to inject shots of morphine. But whenever she awakened she had a smile and hoped we were not getting too tired of helping her.
One afternoon just three days before she left us, Brother John P, Lillywhite came to see her, he had been a constant visitor from the time she took ill. He was with her when her leg was amputated and on many occasions gave her a blessing before he left our home. On this particular day she was asleep when he came into the room and when he spoke to her, and without opening her eyes she said “ Hello Brother Lillywhite”, he asked her how she felt and she answered as always, “Just fine.” Then turning to me she asked me if I had her wedding dress finished, I didn’t know hoe to answer her, but when she asked the same question again, I told her “Yes”. She asked me to show it to her, but I put her off by talking to Brother Lillywhite. She smiled and seemed happy, then she asked Brother Lillywhite “ When I go to the Temple do you think there will be a place where I can lie down and rest for a little while, I feel so very tired.” His answer was, “ Yes, Alberta, you can rest as long as you want in the Temple.”
She seemed satisfied and happy and went back to sleep, but I could not understand what this meant, and asked Brother Lillywhite what it was all about. He told me that during her long illness she had gone a long way in her thinking and studying and learning. She was prepared to have her Temple work done, and this was the way she had of making it known to us.
The Red Cross had helped us in getting her two older brothers here, who were overseas during the second World War, in time to see her alive. At this time her oldest brother Lowell was a patient in a hospital in Paris, France. When the news reached him there, he was flown to New York on a hospital plane. He called home from New York to find out if she still lived. Receiving the word that she was, he was flown to Palm Springs, California. Then he came by train from California to home, arriving a few days before she left us. She was thrilled to see him. Paul, her second brother, was flown from the Pacific but he was a few hours late to see her alive.
During the last night she lived, her sister Louise, who was a registered nurse in the L.D.S. Hospital, Salt Lake City, came up to sit with her. At 2 a.m. on Friday, March 1 1946, I took over so that Louise could get some rest because she was to be on duty at the hospital at 7 a.m. that morning. When she went to lie down, she told me that Alberta was slipping away. I could not recognize any change, but Louise’s training made her aware and when she arose from her bed at 5 a.m. to get ready to go to Salt Lake City to work, she checked on Alberta and then called the doctor to come. She also called the L.D.S. Hospital and asked if she could change her morning hours for afternoon hours, so that she could stay home at this time. Her request was granted.
Doctor Rasmussen came and confirmed what Louise had told us–that she had very little time left. He asked when she had been given her last shot. I told him that it had been at 2:00 a.m. He seemed surprised because she showed no signs of pain. I asked him if we could delay giving the shot to her now as she didn’t seem to need it. He said, “Yes, but have it ready. Don’t let her suffer anymore.” But she never needed it any more, pain seemed to have left her completely in her last few hours.
If there is such a thing as a beautiful death, Alberta’s was beautiful. She seemed to be free of pain. She had Heavenly Visitors with her; she would converse with them, and then turn to usa and talk. She told them that she did not want to go, but would rather stay with us. Then she would tell us how much she loved us, and asked us not to cry. She said, “You see, I’m not crying.” Then she asked me to sing a song to her, saying, “ I would like to sing, but I can’t seem to make it come out.” I sang one verse of “ The Lord is My Shepherd. She seemed satisfied, then smiling to us, she raised her eyes to her Heavenly guests, smiled as if she were saying, “ I’m ready.” Her beautiful spirit departed from her emaciated body, but her sweet influence will remain with us always. She died on Friday, March 1, 1946, and she was buried Monday, March 4, 1946 in the Brigham City Cemetery.
On March 20, 1947, one year after her death, we, her parents, went to the Salt Lake Temple and had her endowment work done for her. We both felt her nearness to us all the day through.