Bigham Relief Society

Elizabeth Susan Burnett Brunt was born in London 30 April 1854, to William and Mary Ann Denham Burnett. When she was age five she went with her family to live in New Zealand, where she grew up in Kaiapoi, in the beauty of the country near Christchurch, Canterbury. There she was baptized into the Mormon faith, which her father had espoused. Although her mother never was favorable to that faith, Elizabeth and two of her three siblings showed their faith by later emigrating with their families to join the Mormons in Utah.

On 9 October 1869 Elizabeth was married to George Brunt, also an English immigrant, at Christchurch, New Zealand. With their four children she emigrated to Utah in about 1879. Her husband followed the next year. For several years they lived in various Utah locations where two more children were born in Salt Lake and Davis counties.

George, Elizabeth and children, pioneered to Eagle Rock area in the fall of 1885. First they settled at Sandcreek (present Lincoln), where their seventh child, a daughter Violet, was born in 1886. The following year 1886 she received word that George had died in Butte, Montana, and so she had the responsibility to rear their family without him. It was a difficult task with no income, but she managed and the children learned to work. Her grandson Delbert V. Groberg has built Elizabeth Court, a condominium complex in her honor, at the site of their home near the river. No doubt the many years of Relief Society service brought her joy and satisfaction, for she served about 35 years as secretary or counselor in the Bingham Stake Relief Society Board.

Her daughter Maude Elizabeth Groberg died in childbirth in May 1908. The new baby, also named Maud, born 30 April on her grandma’s birthday, became as Elizabeth’s daughter after she was orphaned the next year. Elizabeth took little Maudie and Violet back to visit her former home in New Zealand and receive new vitality after the heartbreak of the loss.

Elizabeth Brunt died 14 February 1929 at the home of her daughter Violet B. Steele, at Iona. She was buried in Idaho Falls.

Emma Bennett [Emma Jane Holman] was born 14 May 1850 to James Sawyer and Naomi Roxina LeBaron Holman, early Mormon converts from New England and New York, who had crossed the plains to Utah.

She was married 17 September 1869 at Holden, Millard County, Utah, to Benjamin Bennett. Benjamin, born in 1846 in Flintshire, North Wales, had emigrated to Utah in 1863 as a teenager. As a young man he had driven teams to Missouri River, then to Laramie, Wyoming, to pick up emigrants and bring them to Utah. While living in Holden they had entered into the United Order, and he had managed the Holden Cooperative Mercantile Institution. Then he had been called to manage a general merchandise store in the mining town of Fresno, where he served as the first bishop. In 1882 he had served a mission to Europe, returning in 1884, where he was in charge of Beaver City Coop, elected a county commissioner, then mayor. The family moved to Provo to educate their nine (living) children at Brigham Young Academy. In Provo he managed the Eastside Co-op.

In 1893 Benjamin was named manager for Idaho Falls’ ZCMI, so the family moved to Idaho Falls, where they remained for nine years. Two more sons were born during that period, one here, and one while they were visiting in Salt Lake City. That unique birth happened while they were attending the Salt Lake Temple dedication in Salt Lake City. Joseph Temple Bennett was born 7 April 1893 at the temple. In 1903 they returned to Provo.

Emma Jane Bennett died 29 September 1927 at Salt Lake City, Utah, where Benjamin had died in 1917, and both were buried there.

Elvira Crompton Steele was born 15 Nov. 1856 at Big Cottonwood, Salt Lake County, Utah, the daughter of John and Hannah Hardy Eckersley Crompton, who had come across the plains in 1853. She grew up in American Fork, Utah, where she received good schooling, and helped teach. She attended summer school at Brigham Young College in salt Lake City under Karl G. Maeser, Wilson Dusenberry and John R. Park, prominent Utah educators. She taught school at American Fork, where she met James E. Steele, whose Scottish father had died crossing the plains with the Martin Handcart company in 1856, when James E. was a small boy.

Elvira and James E. Steele were married 23 December 1880 in the Endowment House, Salt Lake City. They built a home in American Fork, where two sons were born to them. Her husband was a prominent young citizen, serving on the city council and as justice of the peace, as well as in Church affairs.

James E. Steele became interested in the Snake River Valley in Idaho, but at first Elvira was against leaving their comfortable home and living. James and his brother-in-law William Rushton decided to come, and Elvira discussed the matter with her sister, who was in favor of giving her family opportunity for growth and development in a new country. James E. Steele came to Iona in March 1885, took up 160 acres, built a home, and returned for his family. The valley was beautiful in the spring, but when they returned in August the water had gone, and there was nothing but sage brush waste. But James had a dream of the flourishing future, which he helped to bring about. They lived in a big log room, to which they summoned the midwife for the birth of a girl two months after their arrival. James plowed ditches to pay for the services. Five more children were born here. Elvira became first president of the Iona Relief Society and James became first bishop of the ward in 1886. He served as counselor to Pres. Thomas E. Ricks of Bannock Stake, and then as first stake president of Bingham Stake. He served in the legislature, in organizing canal systems, in the railroad, then in establishing Ricks College and the Lincoln sugar factory. Among his business activities he was a vice president and president of Anderson Bros. Bank Through all these events, Elvira was his helpmeet and partner. She was also busy rearing their nine children.

In 1904 the Steeles went to the St. Louis Exposition (fair), and on their return trip also visited Independence, Missouri, once headquarters of the Church.

After James died in 1930, Elvira lived at the home of her daughter Hannah Kelley in Idaho Falls, where she died 13 Jan. 1945. She is buried in Rose Hill Cemetery.

Alice Boomer [Mary Alice Bybee] was born 6 November 1867 at Smithfield, Utah, to early Mormon convert pioneers Robert Lee and Jane Miller Bybee. Her father had been a boy when he had met the prophet Joseph Smith. He had crossed the plains with his parents. Her mother, born in Scotland, also had emigrated as a child. Alice’s parents were married in Utah, but her mother died while Alice was a small child. Alice’s father remarried Harriet Raymond, who became her mother. In her youth Alice witnessed the building of temples in Manti, Logan, and Salt Lake City, Utah. While growing up in Manti, she had the misfortune of falling from a board, that injured her left eye. As a result she eventually lost her vision.

Robert Lee Bybee and Harriet and children settled in Menan area, then called Poole’s Island, in about 1883. Alice remained a year longer in Utah, then at about age 17, joined her family in Idaho. In 1887, when she was blossoming into a beautiful young woman, she began working as a clerk in ZCMI store in Rexburg, then in Eagle Rock. She described Eagle Rock downtown as consisting of two hotels, Anderson Brothers store and bank, Sam Taylor’s livery stable, the old wooden bridge across the Snake River and several saloons.

She was married 25 Nov.1890 at her parents’ home in Willow Creek, near Idaho Falls, to Anthony H. (“Dick”) Boomer, who had come to Idaho from Nova Scotia, worked for the railroad, and later operated a transfer business. They lived in Idaho Falls, and reared an orphaned niece of Alice’s. Alice gave birth to two daughters; the first died in infancy, but the second grew to be a joy and comfort to her mother. In 1916 Alice was widowed. Although Dick had not been LDS, she continued a faithful member of the Church and active participant in the community.

Alice Boomer knew how to make friends and influence people. She loved to sing and cheered others as she sang in choirs and other singing groups. She taught Sunday School, Primary, was a good neighbor, and served as an officer of the Village Improvement Society. In her blindness she learned to do many useful tasks–writing, knitting, making bread, washing dishes. She wrote: “We received a clock for a wedding gift and it has been running all these years. When Dick was alive he wound it every Sunday. It has ticked through all the births, death and marriages, all the parties, and the good and bad tidings with only one small repair job. It is the joy of my life now. The only way I can tell the time of day is by the strike on the hour and the half.”

Alice had become blind, and lived in her old age with her daughter and family in Salmon. She died 23 July 1957 at Salmon, and was buried in Idaho Falls.

Emma Rushton [Margaret Emma Crompton] was born 21 July 1853 in Nebraska near the Platte River. Her parents, John and Hannah Hardy Compton were on their way west and Emma was born in a covered wagon. The wind and lightning were so bad the wagon had to be chained to a tree to hold it down. They arrived in Salt Lake in September and settled in Cottonwood, then moved to American Fork, where Emma grew up experiencing the hardships of pioneer life. Sometimes being without bread, she learned economy and thrift. She spun her own yarn and knit her own stockings at age 13. She had a beautiful singing voice, and enjoyed youth activities.

She was married to William James Rushton at American Fork, 2 March 1872. He too had been born on the pioneer trail at Sugar Creek, Iowa.. They had eight children; two died in childhood. When Emma’s brother-in-law James E. Steele James E. Steele had visited Iona, Idaho, he persuaded William also to settle in this unclaimed territory. William came to Iona and built a cabin on 160 acres. In 1885 Emma and their four sons started their pioneering life in Idaho. The first few nights they stayed in the Steele’s little cabin which sheltered seventeen. Then the Rushtons started living in their own one-room log cabin. Sagebrush and wilderness stretched as far as they could see. William worked on the first canal to bring water into Iona. He helped start and build Eagle Rock and Willow Creek canal near Heise. He hauled cedar wood for fuel. He was fond of horses and a good provider, yet in the early days Emma had to fix a good meal with very little, serving jack rabbit or fish for Sunday dinners. She beautified the home with flowers and dressed fashionably. As counselor in Bingham Stake Relief Society Emma and others traveled an estimated 700 miles making their visits. She regularly went to general conference and the Salt Lake Temple. She was divorced from William Rushton.

Emma died 15 May 1940 at Iona, and was buried in American Fork, Utah, as Emma C. Smith.