This week brought to fruition something Ken has been thinking about for over 25 years, and working to make happen for at least two years. It's far, far away from Durban, but it is a piece of our greater mission in life to be part of eternal families.
Mary Ann Morris Allen was the first wife of Ken's great-great grandfather, Daniel Allen (1804-1892). They joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Ohio in June 1834, being baptized by Joel H. Johnson. It's a long story, but they suffered through the persecution of the early Saints in Ohio, in Missouri, and in Illinois, then began their trek west, out of the USA to the Great Basin (Utah territory) in early1846. Mary Ann gave birth to a baby boy (on Ken's birthday!) just before they left Nauvoo, Illinois. She became ill along the Iowa trail and died about 80 miles west of Nauvoo on 10 May 1846. She was buried in an unmarked grave without even a coffin.
Fast forward to 1994. Ken and Sue went on a bus-trek along the Iowa Mormon trail with some of Sue's extended family. One purpose of the trip was to dedicate a marker in a cemetery near Iowaville, where ancestors were buried -- although we don't know where the specific graves are. Visiting Nauvoo, Ken started thinking about a marker for Mary Ann Morris Allen.
In 1996 Ken and Sue and family returned to Nauvoo and participated in the historic Nauvoo Pageant, portraying the Daniel Allen family. (Ken made a couple of cast videos, which are posted on his website, kenallen.tv)
Fast forward to 2019. Ken and Sue went back for another trip to Nauvoo and Iowa. We visited with members of the Iowa Mormon Trails Association (IMTA) and found an old pioneer-era cemetery along one of the obscure traces of the trail which Daniel Allen had reported they followed. The cemetery is on the trail about 80 miles west of Nauvoo, and Daniel reported she was buried 80 miles west of Nauvoo. Ken thought this would be the perfect spot for a memorial marker for Mary Ann Morris Allen. Ken then worked with IMTA to have a plaque made and placed there.
There were several miracles that happened with the day.
First, the weather was perfect. No summer rainstorms, which are common in Iowa.
Second, the cemetery is out in the middle of nowhere, and they weren't sure if there would even be a cell connection at all. They made arrangements to video the meeting, but were not sure it could Zoom. There was no cell service until just before the meeting started, and then data came through and the whole thing was perfect. Most of us watching mostly turned off our audio and video to keep the bandwidth requirements down and we could see and hear every word.
Third, Ken was sad he was not there, as a descendent, to participate in the memorial dedication. Susan Sims was the Public Relations person working to advertise this. She had sent information about it to all the LDS stakes in central Iowa, and even across into Illinois.
It turns out that the Stake President in Peoria, J. Scott Johnson, is a direct descendent of Joel H. Johnson, who baptized Mary Ann and Daniel Allen. But even better, and totally unknown to Ken, his First Counselor, Rick Jeffs, is a direct descendent of Mary Ann and Daniel Allen through their daughter, Eliza! His teen-aged son is Daniel Allen Jeffs (shown here).
All in all it was a great day, and a reminder of how much we owe our pioneer ancestors and how important families are.
A couple of video recordings will be made available in the next several weeks, probably here, on Family Search and YouTube. Check on Facebook--Iowa Mormon Trails Association.
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The rest of the week was pretty quiet. We did have four Elders go home on Thursday, but no one new arrived, except the two who finished their MTC training with us. The original list had 16 coming this week! Now they are mostly bumped to 15 September. But there are also 15 others due to arrive that day. However, we know that many of them won't have their visas in time, so some will get bumped down the road anyway.
For dessert the Elders and President like to order "Death by Chocolate." It's a milk shake in a mug shaped like a skull. It has whipped cream and fudge sauce on top, and Oreos and a KitKat bar stuck into that. Elder Tom and President Lines are trying to pretend these are terrible. Elders Van Orden and Bascom enjoyed theirs.
Elder Van Orden went home this week, and it was hard to see him go. He has been the Assistant to President Lines since mid-January. That meant he lived upstairs in our apartment building, and was in and out of our office a lot. We got to know him well, and appreciate what a fine young man and missionary he is. But, thanks to Zoom, we were able to hear his homecoming talk today in tiny Loa, Utah. (That is way down south in the boonies of nowhere, not far from where Daniel Allen's family settled! The town is eight blocks N-S and six blocks E-W)--and 8000 feet high.
Watching him in Loa felt so strange. He was there on the screen, but we expect him to come into the office tomorrow just like he usually does. Elder Bascom and Elder Mokhoanatsi, the new Assistants, came down to watch at the Hubrichs with us.
Ken spent a bunch of time on Saturday trying to get a Renault Duster diesel car to start. It was washed in the upper parking lot at the office on Friday afternoon. Evidently lights got left on, or some such. When he went to move it to the storage parking lot downstairs it simply would not start. We tried to jump-start it, but couldn't, so gave up and went to dinner.
We tried a new place for dinner: O & O, for Olives and Oil. It's an Italian restaurant on the grounds of the Westville Country Club. Good food and good company with President and Sister Lines.
Not the best photo of any of us!
Saturday morning Ken went over and plugged the Duster into a battery charger for a couple of hours with the battery still in the car. It still would not start. Then he finally pulled out the battery and took it upstairs to the office. Getting the battery out was not an easy task! We'll see if the car will start on Monday morning. Otherwise we'll have to buy a new battery.
Sue spent Saturday being lazy at home and making cookies for a party on Sunday afternoon--see below. It was good to have a lazy day at home.
Sunday morning we talked with Hubrichs about going for a walk around the university that we can all see out our big windows from both home and the office. We drove over there, but the guard said it is closed except to students and staff because of COVID.
The entrance has a pond with lots of baby ducks.
We sat in the butterfly garden.
We watched the ducks in the big pond.
There were a few water lilies, but the large lotus flowers we saw when we were there six months ago were all gone. They must be seasonal. It's now the middle of winter. We'll take Hubrichs back in January and see all the summer blooms.
There is a huge banyan tree.
Ken liked the light & shadows along this path.
Ken called this The Tree of Life because it is so light.
The Sunken Garden area reminded us of the gardens at Filoli near our home in Palo Alto.
Sunday afternoon we were going to have a little going-away party for Elizabeth and Jano. They live just downstairs from us. In March 2020 they had recently retired and sold their home here in preparation to move back to their native Hungary. Jano moved to South Africa as a child with his parents. On a trip back to Hungary many years later he met and married Elizabeth. They worked in South Africa and raised their two sons here, but the sons have both moved back to Hungary and Germany.
Just before--literally--they were ready to leave, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, South Africa went on total lockdown, and all flights were canceled. They rented the small furnished flat in our building "for a month or two" until they could get home. That was 16 months ago. They are now vaccinated and have tickets to fly to Budapest on Wednesday this week.
Sister Hubrich thought it would be fun to have all the neighbors for a fruit/cookies/juice little party in the yard of our building on Sunday afternoon at 3 pm. Everyone was invited. Various people made food to contribute--that's why Sue made two kinds of cookies on Saturday.
Then about 1:30 pm, Sue saw a cute little girl who lives on the top floor and asked if she was coming for the party. She said, no, because she was going to see her Dad. I talked to the mom, who said her husband had tested positive for COVID on Friday and was elsewhere in isolation. We talked to Elizabeth and decided to cancel the party. That's just too close to home! The COVID rates are rising again in Durban and we don't want to tempt fate.
So then, we all ran around the building and shared the food we'd made. At least that didn't go to waste. (Just to Sue's waist!) We had chicken biryani from Sylvie (curried chicken, rice, potatoes, lentils--yummy). Elder Hubrich made a beautiful fruit plate with berries, pineapple, oranges, papaya, apples, etc. Elizabeth gave us wonderful cheese rolls and apple cake. Trona made chocolate muffins.
We all agreed that when this COVID thing is finally over, we will still have a party for the building, just for fun!
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