50 Years in Polygamy: Big Secrets and Little White Lies Read online

Despite similar trials among other families living plural marriage, the Allred commune was thriving and expanding. Large homes were built on Uncle Rulon’s property, or older homes refurbished for more close relatives. Over the next few months, Dad, Mom, Eleanor, and their children painted their house, planted a garden, installed appliances, and added an indoor bathroom.

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  In the spring of 1944, my grandmother Evelyn moved into Uncle Rulon’s big house to be closer to her sons and grandchildren. Uncle Marvin’s, Uncle Rulon’s, and Dad’s families were enjoying each other’s company with a sense of peace, good fortune, and unity, with no idea their little dream world would soon be turned upside down.

  On March 7, 1944, there was a widespread raid on polygamists’ homes across the Salt Lake Valley and in Short Creek, Arizona. (These days, I call them “attempted rescues” as government officials knew there were underage marriages, abuses, and other crimes taking place.) Around 8:30 in the morning, one of my uncle’s wives rushed over to Dad’s house to tell him the police had broken into Rulon’s home and confiscated everything: personal property, books, papers, diaries, records, and anything else they wanted.

  The first day, Uncle Rulon and two of his wives were arrested. The following day, officers returned to arrest three more of his wives. Fifteen men from across town, one of whom would become my father-in-law, were also jailed. In early May, the men were indicted and sent to prison for unlawful cohabitation; the women were sent home to raise their children. Much of the correspondence between family members was in code, with changed names, dates, and addresses, to cover information that would surely implicate them further.

  Articles expounding on constitutional rights and religious freedom hit a few major magazines. Several happy, contented-looking polygamous families appeared in full-page photos, along with stories and testimonies of Fundamentalist believers. According to my parents and relatives, stinging criticism came primarily from outside of Utah by non-Mormons who felt LDS Church leaders and members had turned their backs on the very people who were faithfully living the laws their prophet Joseph Smith had originated.

  On April 7, 1944, the cover of International Events magazine—“The World’s News in Pictures”—highlighted my future father-in-law with his five wives gathered around a piano. The photo caption read, “Mate and Five Wives in Close Harmony.” Little did the world know of the real events and unrest in that “united” family.

  Uncle Rulon described his prison experiences in his journal:

  The warden told Joseph Musser that Church leaders and authorities were anxious to make concessions that would end this national and state issue. As parole dates were to be set, Musser counseled his brethren to comply with the state’s request, asking them to sign a document renouncing their beliefs and pledge to refrain from living with their plural wives. Joseph asked them to do and say whatever was necessary to get them back with their wives and children again.

  With their fervent beliefs God’s laws were foremost and above the laws of the land, most of the men refused to follow Joseph’s advised concessions and sign a decree that seemed contradictory to their beliefs. They did not want to make an agreement “with death and hell,” as they considered this “new” Manifesto to be.

  Uncle Rulon told us that Joseph Musser instructed his brethren to fast and pray about their misgivings. That evening he and Joseph Musser said they had similar dreams in which the Lord instructed them to sign the document. They believed God would not hold them accountable for this kind of deceit; rather, He had opened the way for them to return to their wives, children, and religion. They were certain that to sign a document that required them to lie about their beliefs and future intentions was no more binding to them than the Manifesto had been. It would be “nothing more than a political agreement with the world.”

  My future father-in-law and five other men refused to sign the agreement and chose to carry out their prison terms. It was later rumored that these men accused Uncle Rulon, and the other eight men who accepted early releases, of making as damnable of a choice as Wilford Woodruff had done in signing the Manifesto. After that ordeal, many things would never again be the same among the Council of Friends.

  Neighbors, merchants, LDS Church leaders, and government officials in Utah hoped polygamous activity would eventually dissolve and go away. But it was not that simple. The arrests of the fifteen men led Fundamentalists to become even more tenacious in their convictions, beliefs, and secrecy. Then and now, hardships and trials are viewed as God’s test of His choice people, to see if they will remain faithful and endure to the end. Whenever polygamy was publicized, Allred Fundamentalists noted an influx of converts—proof, they felt, God was in fact upholding His cause. Those cases served to encourage Fundamentalist Mormons to “shoulder up” to their responsibility to keep building the kingdom of God, no matter the tribulations.

  Of the fifteen men who were arrested, sent to prison, and released; all eventually returned to their wives to live in polygamy. With high birthrates among polygamists, the population continued to swell at an astounding rate. And the kettle was still boiling.

  CHAPTER 3

  Like a Piece of Dirty Garbage

  1947–1952

  Eleanor’s second child and Mom’s sixth were born in July 1947 as Uncle Rulon’s family quietly disappeared. Everyone knew better than to ask questions. One rule of thumb was “If you don’t know the answers, you won’t have to lie when you’re asked.”

  Some weeks later, Dad informed his families he planned to move them to Dayer LeBaron’s ranch in Los Porcelas, Mexico. The LeBaron brothers had offered a place of refuge to polygamists on the run, and that’s where Uncle Rulon had moved most of his wives and children. My dad felt certain the ranch would be a haven for his family, and Mexico would be a warm and welcome retreat from his painful bouts with rheumatic fever and rheumatoid arthritis.

  In anticipation of the long trip, Dad borrowed an old milk truck from Eleanor’s father and fashioned a makeshift bed behind the driver’s seat. He installed two wooden seats that ran the length of the truck on each side, and a popover canvas to cover the whole bed of the truck.

  On August 8, Dad departed Salt Lake City with Mom, Aunt Eleanor, their eight children, and one of Uncle Rulon’s wives with her five little ones. For six long, hot days they were packed in the truck “like sardines in a can.” Arriving in Old Mexico, they found there were only two types of weather: torrential rains and blistering winds.

  Uncle Rulon had already begun building adobe homes for his families. Tents were set up for Aunt Eleanor and Mom. Their babies were allowed to sleep in Maude LeBaron’s home to protect them from thousands of nagging flies.

  Within weeks, several more families arrived in the barren, dusty parcel of desert that quickly became known as Tent City, a refuge from perceived persecution.

  By November, Mom, Eleanor, and their children once again shared a home—this one made of adobe. The best part of their house, Mom once told me with a smirk, was the crisscross broom-straw designs they swept across the hard earth floors. “You can imagine how long those entertaining designs lasted,” she jeered. On each side of the tiny family room, which also served as a kitchen, was an eight-by-eight-foot bedroom. In each of these was a two-by-two-foot window that couldn’t be opened, but let in a few rays of light. The rest of the family’s scanty belongings stole every inch of their meager space. Food was prepared in the tiny kitchen and served outside in the dusty, fly-infested yard.

  As more and more refugees arrived, food and other commodities became scarce. When Mom could no longer breastfeed Shane, Annie LeBaron, who lived a mile or so up the road, offered Mom some of their cow’s milk for his bottle. Over time Mom and Annie became close friends. At that time, neither of them imagined Annie’s young daughter, Maryann would become my father’s third wife.

  One hot and arid day, Dad and several other men on the Dayer Ranch cleared a tract of land, overgrown with mesquite. After heaping the wood into three hug
e piles, Dad lit a match and watched the timber go up in flames. Others who had wandered over to see the bonfire soon found themselves in a festive mood. Before long, food seemed to appear from nowhere. Families offered whatever they could spare. And throughout the night, members of Tent City and the Dayer community sang and danced on the hard-crusted earth until the wee hours of the morning. By then, the reflection of the glowing embers glistened on the brightly colored ponchos covering the children who’d fallen asleep on a huge tarp a safe distance from the fire.

  Thanksgiving and Christmas Day celebrations were much like the bonfire day and night—full of joy, laughter, and praise.

  To earn a living, my father set to work building furniture. He volunteered to build new benches for the students at the Galeana schoolhouse, which was packed to the rafters with polygamous children. He also pitched in to help teach some of the classes; which didn’t pan out very well. Even with his good intentions and his fourth-grade education, his obvious lack of training in the teaching profession and his inappropriate sense of humor got him ousted.

  Laundry days proved to be a nightmare. Thirty-seven women had to share the only well on the property during the six laundry days before the Sabbath. Water was boiled in huge tubs over bonfires. Using homemade lye soap, the women scrubbed each piece of clothing up and down on rippled sheets of metal in wooden frames. Finally, the clothes were rinsed in vats of cold water and hung over long ropes tied between trees. On rare occasions—really lucky days—the women’s laundry dried and was retrieved before it became caked with mud from the dust and rainstorms.

  As February neared, Dad decided to return to Utah to find work. Just before he had to leave, Shane came down with a serious case of pneumonia. Mother told Dad, she desperately wanted to return with him. Most importantly, she could get Shane to a hospital. She also hoped to spend some time feeling like his only wife and his only love, at least for a while. But Dad betrayed my mother again. To avoid his guilt for giving in to El’s pleadings and demands, and to avoid Mom’s tears of anger and desperation, he waited until Mom was nearly packed and ready to go before he gave her the devastating news.

  Mom thought she’d never speak to Eleanor again. It was bad enough she felt Eleanor had already stolen her husband and her soul, as well as most of her time; now she wouldn’t even consider Shane’s need for quality medical attention in the States. None of that mattered to El! She’d already made arrangements for herself, my dad, and her children to stay in Murray, Utah, in a comfortable apartment above her father’s garage.

  Things were getting crazy between some of the LeBaron men and those who had fled to Mexico. Joel LeBaron began to demand praise and adoration, claiming to be “The One Mighty and Strong”—and everyone’s new priesthood leader.

  In Utah, Joseph Musser decided, although Fundamentalists were still not safe in the States, moving back would be better than the poverty in Mexico and the conflicts there between the LeBarons and other brethren. Joseph directed my parents and other families to return home and count on the Lord for protection.

  Mom and her children had been in Mexico for nine months before Dad brought them back to the States in May 1948. He settled them in his sister’s basement in Farmington, Utah, while they waited for a house two miles down the street to become available. Mom thanked God every night their primitive standard of living had been short lived. Yet even during the most difficult experiences in Mexico, she was grateful she’d had time to read her scriptures and form a few lasting friendships.

  In the fall, Dad moved Eleanor and her children into the top floor of Mom’s rental home in Farmington. While they waited for a furnace to be installed in the new home my father was building for Eleanor in Murray, the LDS visiting teachers became suspicious of the living arrangements. My parents were quickly summoned to visit with the local stake’s high council. The council questioned them about their beliefs in plural marriage and asked them to deny any affiliation with anyone living polygamy. Mom and Dad had no choice. They passionately defended their convictions and were subsequently excommunicated from their much-loved Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

  Mom told me, “I cried off and on for months after that day. From the time I was a little girl, the LDS Church was an integral part of my life. When they excommunicated us, I felt like they’d punctured my heart and discarded me like a piece of dirty garbage!”

  *****

  In the spring of 1950, Dad rented an old farmhouse in Draper, Utah, about eighteen miles south of Salt Lake City. Mom, Dad, and their kids loved it there.

  Being typical boys, my brothers Luke and Darryl managed to burn the chicken coop down with some matches they found. A short time later, Luke and his new buddies got in trouble for chasing the neighbor’s chickens and breaking their eggs. It was there in Draper, my older siblings got to know Mom’s mother, Myrtle Cooke a little more. Whenever possible, she left her FLDS community in Short Creek, Arizona, to visit and give Mom a hand.

  My mother’s life-long friends, Cleveland and Annie LeBaron and their children, also moved back from Old Mexico. On one of their visits, shortly after Cleveland brought his daughter, Maryann, to Utah from Mexico, she’d run away and married an abusive man. Now she was left with a four-year-old son to look after. Cleveland told my parents, when they lived in Los Porcelas, Maryann “thought the world” of Dad’s family. The bottom line: he wanted Dad to consider taking twenty-one-year-old Maryann as his third wife.

  In general, Fundamentalists deem it a priesthood bearer’s duty to prayerfully consider marrying his brother’s widow or any other woman who asked for his hand in marriage. My dad once told me, “If the prospective husband says no, he’d better have a darn good reason.”

  One paragraph in Mom’s journal about her sister-wife says:

  January 1951

  Maryann and Owen were married today, after which we stopped at Brother Pollard’s store to buy groceries. Brother Pollard says to Owen, “You look like you just came from a wedding.” Owen didn’t reply with words, only a smile.

  *****

  For nearly two years, turmoil had been brewing among the men of the Council of Friends. It was rumored, ever since Joseph Musser encouraged Uncle Rulon and several others to secure an early release from prison, those who chose to carry out their prison terms became critical of their priesthood leader’s decisions. Some felt Musser had misguided his followers. And over time, Musser suspected, many of his high priest council members had commandeered unrighteous dominion over their cohorts. Musser claimed many of his council members in Colorado City and other places had been trading young daughters and sisters in marriage. Sometimes girls as young as twelve and thirteen were coerced into marrying older men—men they didn’t know or love.

  Mother said, “When Joseph Musser advised these men to stop their abominable behaviors, they responded with criticisms such as, ‘Joseph doesn’t know what he’s doing—he’s just a senile old man.’”

  John Y. Barlow passed away in the latter part of December 1949. Joseph Musser continued to plead with his council members, whom he felt were insubordinate. He begged them to repent and support his decisions, or he would have no choice but to bypass them and call a new council. He eventually did. There was a tremendous amount of opposition when he called Uncle Rulon to be his first counselor. Those who had upheld Barlow until his death began to claim LeRoy S. Johnson as their new prophet.

  My family’s version of what both Fundamentalist groups called “the Split” was told over and over during my years in polygamy. The Allred, Johnson, LeBaron, Kingston, and Independent polygamous clans all had opinions of how, who, where, and why. No matter whom we followed, who we were, or where we stood, everyone claimed to have the real “truth” and the most accurate documents and information as proof.

  Regardless of exactly how it happened, the Split created the Allred (later known as the Apostolic United Brethren, or simply “The Group,” to its members) and the Short Creek Group, still the two largest Fundamentalist polyga
mous factions in the United States. The division brought heartache, torment, and disaffection between families and friends. Some men and women within these groups continued to interact with each other by simply agreeing to disagree, while others became bitter and non-communicative. Many men in the Short Creek Group forbade their wives and children to have any contact with those “dreadful Allredites.” Grieving brothers, sisters, parents, and friends, strove with all their might to persuade their loved ones to change their hearts and minds. “If only you would fast and pray—longer, harder—you will know who the ‘right’ and ‘true’ priesthood leader is,” they would plead.

  It all made more sense to my mother, when she found out several years later why her good friend Alice quit coming around and didn’t marry my father. Mother sadly reminisced, “Her father had lost respect for Owen, Uncle Rulon, and Brother Musser before and after the Split, so he forced Alice to marry another man.”

  Alice told a dear friend, who told the story to Mom. One morning Alice was awakened and told to get into her wedding dress and come downstairs. (Since many young girls didn’t know when they would be called to marry—sometimes at a moment’s notice—they already had a wedding dress in the closet awaiting their wedding day.) Like most Short Creek (FLDS) girls, Alice had no idea who her husband would be until the last minute. She screamed and wept in protest, telling her father she was in love with Owen Allred and still wanted to marry him. Completely disregarding Alice’s desires, her father locked her in her room and told her to fast and pray until she got the “right” testimony. Then she could come out to stay. Ultimately, Alice must have received the testimony her father wanted her to get.

  My thirteen-year-old sister Lucinda wanted to stay in close contact with the friends she’d made in Short Creek before the Split. My parents trusted my mother’s parents, the Cooke family, to keep her safe while she spent a good portion of the summer in Short Creek. During her summer vacation, Lucinda fell for Wayne, a handsome—and already-married—twenty-one-year-old man. When she confided her girlish infatuation to her grandparents and friends in Short Creek, they encouraged her to get married right away, claiming her parents would never give their permission for her to marry into the (then called) Barlow Group; so she must do it now. Wayne, her grandparents and friends all told her she couldn’t let anything or anyone prevent her from carrying out God’s will.