Paul Harvey, where are you?

I envy Paul Harvey, the famous radio broadcaster who always knew “the rest of the story”. Old photographs and daguerreotypes, beautiful and descriptive as they are, still leave the viewer to his or her imagination to complete the narrative. Such is the case in this instance.

William Hyrum Standley is my Great, Great Uncle, a brother to Mary Jane Standley, my Grandmother Lucille Chase's grandmother.

Born in 1871 in Warwickshire, England, William immigrated by 1888, the year he married Elvira Jane Mooney in Spanish Fork, Utah. Isn’t this portrait of William with one of his infant children charming?

 

This daguerreotype is of the growing family only eleven years after their marriage with their children Mary Ann, Emma Jane, Charles Henry, William James, Joseph Hyrum and Nephi. Their Mormon connection is quite evident in the names chosen for their offspring.

Shortly after this picture was taken, the young mother, Elvira, not quite thirty-one years old, was killed in a buggy rollover, leaving William with the huge responsibility of caring for his young family alone, the oldest just having turned ten and the youngest only fifteen months old.

Mary Elizabeth and William

Three and one half years went by of untold challenges before William married Mary Elizabeth Hull to care for his children in 1903. She certainly looks capable of taking charge of William and his family in this photo .

A son, George Leroy, was born to this union.

Sadly, the marriage was short lived; as William passed away only five years later in 1908, at age forty-seven. He was buried in Darby, Idaho.

It is difficult to understand how Mary could have left William’s children, orphaned, taking her son George and returning to Utah, but this is the path she chose. 

Mary Elizabeth and her son George

The young widow was only thirty years old and had already experienced much toil and heartache.


By this time, the oldest daughter, Mary Ann, had married; the youngest, Nephi, was only eight years old. Emma, the second daughter married the following year, leaving four brothers to fare for themselves. The Moss family in Ririe took in at least one of the sons, Joseph Hyrum, and reared him.

Paul Harvey, where are you when I need you? I’d really like to know the rest of the story. How did the buggy roll over? Tell me about the courtships of these young couples. How did the orphaned children survive? I'd love to know more.