Fleeting Memories

November 2019 Carl Stubbs As a young man, I wanted to follow in my father’s footsteps as far as the Church was concerned. He had a strong testimony of the gospel, and he instilled that belief into me by his example. There were many people in my life that helped me along the way. I soon learned that the Church was true, but that all of the people who were members were not always so, including myself. Some of the men that were influential in my life besides my father were Frosty Traasdahl, Karl Snow, Glenn Snow, Jake Williams, Bert Whitney, M J Christensen and Bishop Cheeseman. I’m sure there were others, but these are the ones that come quickly to memory. One that I met prior to my mission was Alma Sonne who was the one that called me on a mission. I have always believed that the Church was true and have known that all of us are not exempt from the temptations of the world. I believe that we are all attempting to do our very best with the abilities that we have been given. As I went...

When I returned from my mission, I applied for a job for 7-11. It was owned by Southland Food Corporation at the time, and that in turn was owned by Lady Bird Johnson, the wife of President Johnson. I was hired as an assistant manager of one of the stores on Boulder Highway near Las Vegas. After a little time, there was an opening in Las Vegas for a manager. I took the job. I really liked it. They sent an older man to the store to be trained as an assistant manager. He was a friendly man and was doing pretty well.   The company had a contest for all of the stores, and my store won. What I won was a keg of beer. I was not really interested in it, and so I gave it to the assistant manager. He had been looking for a car for transportation. I wanted to sell my 1958 Cadillac and he wanted to buy it, so after work one day he took the keg and drove the car home for his wife to look at it. I didn’t see him for a few days after that. He just didn’t show up for work. I think that the keg w...

Our scoutmaster Bert Whitney took us on many different activities. One was to the Potosi Mine. We drove from Boulder City, Nevada to the edge of where Las Vegas is now. There we left the main road that went to California and headed up into the mountains near there.  I’m pretty sure I could not find the road now, but the scoutmaster knew where it was. I think that he spent a great deal of time out in the desert looking around. He lived near there with his family when he was fairly young. We drove through the desert for a ways and came to the backside of a mountain. The car was parked, and we started up a trail to the opening of the mine. It was quite a hike for me and for some of the other Scouts, but it seemed easy for our scoutmaster. We finally all arrived partway up the mountain to the front of a large opening into the mine. The hike up had been hot and somewhat hard, but as soon as we arrived in front of the mine, there was nice cool air coming out. We went back into the mi...

Written on October 12, 2020 As a young man between eighth and ninth grade, I had the opportunity to go from Boulder City to Kansas to work on my uncle’s farm. I say given the opportunity, but I was really just shipped out. His farm was in the southwest corner of Kansas. Looking back after sixty-two years I realize that my parents, my dad, in particular, wanted me out of town. I’m not sure why, but I guess I was not all that enjoyable to have around. I can’t even remember the name of the little towns they lived by, but I remember the farm. I suspect that my uncle Harry and his wife Inez were not that excited to have me there, but they treated me ok. I was there for about three months. They had two sons who were older than me. Duane was eighteen and Manley was about twenty. An old wheat truck like the one on my uncle's farm I got to work on the family farm driving a tractor, a large wheat truck, and a 1947 Kaiser-Frazer car. After work and on the weekends, I was allowed to driv...