Introduction to Palmer Neighbors in Park Valley & Rosette

Recorded here are brief life sketches and photos of the pioneer families in Park Valley and Rosette beginning in the 1860's before the railroad was finished.   They came from foreign lands and various areas of the United States.  Most were Mormon converts.  Some gathered first to Kirtland, Ohio, others to Far West, Missouri, and many to Nauvoo, Illinois where they knew the Prophet Joseph Smith. After his death, they crossed Iowa to Winter Quarters and some of the men left their families to join the Mormon Battalion.  They moved west along the Mormon Trail to settle in Utah with the saints. 
    They were a strong, faithful and hearty people as they settled in various pioneering Mormon communities.  They built log or dugout homes and raised their families with faith, love of the gospel and of the land. The women, standing beside their husbands, were living in very sparse conditions, having their babies on the frontier with the help of a neighbor midwife, fighting off illness, facing death and Indians who roamed about.  Homesteading the land was a hard and arduous life.  
    Many of the first small group of settlers who came to the Park Valley and Rosette area beginning in the mid 1860's, were members of the extended Campbell family. They came to the area from North Ogden and are listed with a few families in Kelton area in the 1st US Census taken in the area in June of 1870. More families arrived from North Ogden and other communities. Included among those early settlers in the valley were members from the early prominent convert families of the LDS Church.
     Two of those pioneer wives included: 
        Thomas Dunn’s wife Harriet Amelia Carter Dunn, niece of Simeon Carter, an early convert landowner, who hosted Joseph Smith and other leaders at his home in Ohio.  His two  brothers gave their lives during the Far West era, including Harriet’s father, John Carter. They were mentioned in the D & C. Harriet died in Park Valley on the 11 of May 1870 and was buried in an unmarked grave.
        William Godfrey’s wife, Lucy Ellen Williams Godfrey, the granddaughter of Fredrick G. Williams, a medical doctor who served as a counselor to Joseph Smith and also donated a large plot of  land in Kirtland for the building of the Kirtland Temple. He served on through the Nauvoo years and died before the saints left Nauvoo to move west Winter Quarters.  Lucy was a daughter of his only child, a son Ezra Granger Williams, an early doctor in Utah.  Lucy served as a counselor in the 1st Park Valley Ward Relief Society Presidency.

    When James W. and Elizabeth Miller Palmer arrived with their family in Park Valley in early June of 1893, and settled on the Rohwer/Parkinson place, they met their new neighbors and settled in to served and lived out their lives among them.  My parents, Rud and Letitia Palmer, were newlyweds in 1933 when they purchased the Yates/Seely ranch and it was there that we were raised among a new generation of those same early families.

    The family names of those early settlers of the broad valley are listed in alphabetical order for ease of organization.  The information was researched in Ancestry.com, from internet family sites, US Census Records and Park Valley Cemetery Records.  I have made them as accurate and I could, but have had to depend on family records recorded from various people. At least twelve of those original families still have direct descendants in the valley today.  Their stories have given me a great appreciation for their lives and sacrifices in settling the valley where I grew up.
                                - Junelle Palmer Lind -

Introduction

The PALMER PRESS began in 1986 and included a few small vignettes of the stories our Dad (Rud Palmer) told us of his childhood. It was written for the Palmer Reunion we were hosting at the old Palmer Ranch in Park Valley, Utah. It was a little newsletter we passed out to the family to read during the Chuck Wagon Breakfast.

Many asked that I write more, including cousin Lane Palmer who attended from Philadelphia, PA, where he had just retired as the editor of the FARM JOURNAL MAGAZINE. Through the years I have requested help and the cousins have shared stories of our grandparents, James and Elizabeth Palmer as well as their parents, uncles and aunts. Digital copies of the Palmer Press can be found at the right side of this page.

With the help of our children, we have produced a video, OUR PALMER LEGACY (1995) and a DVD, REFLECTIONS OF OUR ENGLISH HERITAGE (2008) which have been dispensed to family members.

Junelle P. Lind, Editor

New information coming

I have set up this blog to make updated, verified copies of the "Palmer Press" available with the most recent research. I would like to thank cousin Judy for her research work. Please check back for new additions.

Thanks,
Junelle Palmer Lind