My mother was born in Devonport, Devonshire, England. When she was a year old her parents, who were recent converts to the L.D.S. Church, came across the sea and, with my mother as a baby crossed the plains. Joseph Barker, the father, driving an ox team for a man, and his wife and child coming three weeks later. Mary Ann (Doidge Barker), the mother, did washing for the captain and his family for the opportunity to let the baby ride, and Mary Ann walked most all of the way.

My father was a farmer and had cattle, both range and milk cows, most of the time. He also contracted building fences and tie cutting. We moved from one place to another frequently. Before I was six years old we lived in several places in the Mancos Valley. and at Cortez in Montezuma Valley, and a short time at Telluride, Colorado.

My parents taught us to pray and to attend regularly to Sunday worship. They were rather strict in trying to keep our conduct as a Latter-day Saint’s should be. They were anxious that we children should be active and take any office in the Church that we were called to.

I had five sisters and one brother. My oldest sister died at the age of seven when I was three years old, but I have little memories of her. Another sister, the next younger than I, died at the age of 16 and left us all to mourn her loss. The next to the youngest child, a tiny baby girl, died at 5 months. So there were three sisters and one brother left. The loss of these children greatly saddened my parents.

I had a happy childhood. We had plenty to eat and, by my mother’s skill in sewing for her girls, we were well and comfortably dressed, though money was never very plentiful, and I am sure my parents made great sacrifices to make us happy.

We rode in lumber wagons and buggies, and often rode horseback. We had a sidesaddle for the girls, but I would rather ride a man’s saddle. We girls helped our father on the farm, as our brother was the youngest child of the family. We walked at least a mile to get to our school, but we always rode to Sunday School and Church as it was several miles away.

From the time I was six to about eleven, we lived at what we called the lake house. It was really a reservoir but a large one and it was within a few yards of our house. Here we swam and skated and most all of the Webber children were baptized there. Many times the thick ice was cut to baptize some of them.

I was baptized by John H. Hammond, November 5,1898, in John Hammond’s pond. My friend, Lydia Hammond, was baptized the same day by her father. I was confirmed the next Sunday, November 6th, by Bishop George Halls in the old log meeting house.

I started to school a few days before I was six years old. My first teacher was Anna Halls. She was a fine teacher and was also my first Sunday School teacher. My next teacher was Ida Thurber. In the fifth grade I started to Robert Thurber, then to Francis Busch, Miss Ray Provest and Miss Kerr all in elementary school. In high school my first principal was Mr. Sexton where I went to Mancos town to school. I walked in early fall, but in bad weather I rode in a spring buggy with Lydia and Effie Hammond and Lella Halls, and Francis Halls was our driver. I played two years on the basketball girls’ team. I thought I was a pretty good player. I always liked sports and games more than girls’ play at dolls and dishes even when I was younger.

Red Mesa, Colorado

When I was 17 we moved to Redmesa, Colorado, which was new sagebrush land open to farming. My father bought 40 acres. Our first year, we rented a farm, and the second year a larger one. This year my sister, Dora, died. It was February and the snow was three feet deep and roads almost impassable. She was the first grave in the Redmesa Cemetery.

The next year we built a brick house with six large rooms and a hall. We even had a doorbell, which was very unusual for our country town. We all worked very hard to clear land and plant crops and milk cows. My days were very happy here as there were quite a number of fine young girls and boys who had good times at dances and parties and playing basketball and baseball.

We also had plenty of opportunity for church work here. I was a Sunday School teacher and Primary teacher when quite young. In 1912, I became President of the Young Ladies M.I.A. from which I was released in 1914. I taught a class in the religion class organization. Later in 1921 and 1922 I was again made Y.W.M.I.A. President for several years. In later years I taught older classes in Mutual and Sunday School. I was Counselor to Lura Ball in the Primary, Counselor to Agnes Slade in the Relief Society, and Counselor to Florence R. Dean in Primary at different times in Redmesa Ward.

In 1911 the San Juan Academy was started in Kirtland, New Mexico. My sister, Bertha, and I lived in a little house and batched and went that year to school, which we enjoyed very much.

My first boyfriend was the man I married much later, for he was very young then. We kept company off and on for four or five years. We walked to dances and rode in the family buggy on occasion. We had lots of parties and many home talent plays we both took parts in. (Note by Myrtle's daughter Marie: Daddy told us children that the first time he ever saw mother, she was running up through the field to play basketball at Greer’s.)

Marriage to Charles E. Dean

Charles Edwin Dean and I were married 3rd October 1913, in the Salt Lake Temple. We traveled the most of three days on the train to reach Salt Lake. We went on an excursion rate train and many of our Stake people were on our train. We had to lay over at hotels first night at Telluride and the second night sat in station at Grand Junction, Colorado until 1:00 A.M. then on to our destination by noon the third day. We went to Uncle William Dean’s home to stay the first night before we were married. It was Friday when we were married and Stella Dean and Clara Taylor went through the Temple with me, and Leo Taylor with Charles. Charles mother came from Shelley, Idaho a day or so later. We visited with the grandparents, Joseph Ridges and Agatha Ridges, and some of Charley’s aunts, sisters of his mother. Jasper, Charles oldest brother, was living in Salt Lake working at the time and he showed us around the city and was kind to us. We stayed at the Raymond Hotel for almost a week, then went to Huntsville where my aunt, Ella Halls, lived. She was very good to us and Will Halls asked Charley to stay and work on the farm for a while so we were there two weeks. I gained 10 pounds those two weeks. I needed much more than that as I weighed only 101 pounds before I was married and stayed about that for many years.

After leaving Huntsville, we went back to Salt Lake for a few days, then on back to Redmesa on the train. We were gone just a month. The night we got home, we went to a party at the Willdens’ and people seemed glad to see us.

(Note by daughter Marie: Mother used to tell us kids about having put her ring that daddy gave her for their wedding in a small paper sack. When she unpacked her suitcase when they got home, she threw the sack in the stove, thinking was an empty sack It was latter that she realized she had thrown her ring away.  Money was practically nonexistent for much of their marriage, and it was when they were quite old in Provo [I don't remember how old] that daddy bought her a gold wedding band)

For a few days we stayed with my family then moved to Charles’ family home. Strange as it may seem, I had never worried until then where we were going to live, just so we could be together. At his home were two brothers just older than he. The Dean family had moved to Shelley, Idaho just a year before. Lawrence was filing claim on a dry farm at the Mesa and Wilford was in the Redmesa Bishopric, so they had remained.

I had also filed on dry farm land, 160 acres, and Charles built the cabin and did the cultivation. We had to live on this place six months out of the year for three years to prove our title. So it was move back and forth to the Redmesa Dean farm and our dry side one. But we were young and it was mostly fun. The snow was very deep some winters. We had a homemade sleigh which we went back and forth in to church gatherings. Charles made some skis and he went about to do errands on them.

Family Life

Our first child was born 5 September 1914. I had a serious childbirth as it was a breach birth and the baby did not breathe for at least 20 minutes. The doctor said, “Perhaps it is best if she does not live as she will surely have dislocated hip joints if she does on account of the difficult time and the pulling on her little legs.” Finally after working vigorously with her, the doctor asked if Sister Taylor, who was a good midwife, had a suggestion. She said, rub alcohol over her heart. Our little baby then began to gasp and soon started to breathe. Even then, the doctor suggested that she be given a name, as he was doubtful that she would survive. Brother Hiram Taylor and my father, William Devenport, blessed her and prayed for her life to be spared. They gave her the name of Mildred. She was again blessed at church a few weeks later. She was a beautiful and perfectly healthy baby and we were indeed grateful that she was spared and is now the mother of seven children of her own.

Soon after we were married, my husband was made Superintendent of the Sunday School. Then a little later he was also an alternate High Councilor in the Young Stake (1917). In 1923 he was made Bishop of Redmesa Ward, which position he held for almost nine years. He was then made a High Councilor in the Stake. And in 1935 was made a missionary bishop to an adjoining ward, which was six miles north of us, the Kline Ward. At this time my health was very poor and Apostle Ballard told my husband to bring me to conference the next day at Mancos and he would give me a blessing and that he was sure I would gain my health again. He gave me a wonderful blessing and I was greatly blessed through it as he promised.

After almost three years, my husband was released from the Kline Ward as Bishop, and the same day in the afternoon was put back as Bishop of Redmesa Ward. He held that office until we moved to Provo in 1939.

Through Charles being Bishop so long, we had many opportunities to meet many of the Church Authorities. Several of them stayed at our home when they came out to Stake Conferences, as they held the conferences in different wards of the stake and there was no hotel in our town to take them, the family must entertain them. This we tried to do the best we could, but embarrassed at our not too fitting accommodations.

Before our second child was born, Charles and his brother Lawrence went to a saw mill camp and cut trees and hauled in the logs and had lumber made for each of their families a house. Ours was a small two-roomed, not much more than a cabin. We also bought 40 acres of his mother’s land to farm besides renting her farm and farming our dry farm across the La Plata River. Most years were very dry and we had many near failures of our crops. Some way we seemed to keep happy and lived without wanting for necessary things.

Winifred, our second daughter was born 19 January 1917 in our little cabin home. Our regular old doctor was away in the East, so we had to get another for her birth. Charles was away at the sawmill and didn’t arrive until 12 minutes after the baby was born. She was our healthiest and best natured baby we ever had and was a joy to take care of. She now has two boys and two girls of her own. She married Earl Banks of Lehi on the 25th of September, 1942. They live in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he is a meteorologist with the Weather Bureau of the Government. They were married in the Salt Lake Temple and are very active in the Church organizations.

[Photo right shows in front row children Mildred, Edwin, and Winifred Dean. Back row Myrtle, Charles, and "Aunt Sally" -- Sarah Arnold Dean, plural wife of Joseph H. Dean.]