Edith Richards Ash was born October 7, 1871, the third child of Joseph William and Eliza Richards Ash. Her parents were English converts, coming to Utah in 1868. They lived in Salt Lake City until sometime in 1870, when they moved to Pleasant Grove, Utah. Their first home in this pioneer settlement was a dug out, or cellar in the southeast part of the town. In the early spring of 1871 they moved to the "Basin", later called Lindon.

Their home here was just a shelter from the sun, that first summer, made by piling the sagebrush they pulled from the land, placing it so it formed the north and west walls. Their covered wagon box was the east wall, and here in this wagon their baby Edith was born.

The next summer, when the baby Edith was eight months old, her mother died. Brother Joseph Wadley and wife Emily, took the motherless baby into their home and hearts and cared for her as though she were their own. So to those of us who were privileged to know Brother and Sister Wadley, they were always grandpa and grandma Wadley.

Mother's early childhood was filled with much work and sorrow, for after grandfather's second wife, Emma Gardner died, leaving two small children, their home was again broken up for several years. Emma's brother John and wife Harriet took the three little ones into their home until mother was 8 years old, then they returned home and mother took over the task of caring for her little brother and sister, as well as the home. Without the help of Sister Wadley, Sister Eliza Banks and Sophia Culmer, the closest neighbors, it would have been an impossible job. These good sisters, especially Grandma Wadley did all they could to teach her and to lighten the burdens she had to assume.

Because of her many duties at home her schooling was very limited, but she was an ardent reader, and spent every moment possible reading everything that she could get to read. This ability to read and to assimilate what she read, gave her a wonderful store of knowledge of many things, other than the household tasks she was forced to assume so young. Because of these early hardships, her years were filled with compassion for all those with whom she came in contact, especially the poor, sick or unfortunate.

High among the happy memories of my childhood days are the hours we spent in the long winter evenings, sitting close around mother's low rocking chair, as she sat and read to us. Mother taught all her daughters the fundamentals of good housekeeping as she had learned them through years of experience - how to cook, can fruit, wash and iron and do plain sewing, mending and darning and was anxious for us to get all we could from our classes at school, so we would be better fitted to assume the duties of wifehood and motherhood than she had been.

Soon after Father's death and his estate was settled, Mother, Joe and Hazel moved to American Fork, where they bought a small, but very nice little home with a large lot and chicken coops on it. Father's financial reverses and his sickness left mother with very little except some life insurance so she tried to augment her means by caring for a large flock of laying hens.

In August 1935, after Hazel had graduated from American Fork High School, and wanted to attend B.Y.U., mother came to live with us. She was afflicted with arthritis so badly she couldn't be left alone, and Hazel wanted to stay in Provo. Joe had gone to California to work, so she sold her little home to George Scott, and moved back into her old home.

Though she was unable to get about much because of the arthritis in her knees, she kept her mind and hands busy, reading every book, magazine or paper that came her way. Our girls brought her every book they could get from the Grade, High School and Public Library. When she wasn't reading she spent her hours crocheting, sewing quilt blocks, or making braided rugs and each week she would see that all our stockings were neatly darned.

God was very good to our wonderful mother in her last hours, for she passed to the "Great Beyond" peacefully, quietly, in her sleep, as she had always hoped she would, so she would never be a burden to others. Her sudden passing was very hard to take at the time, but as we look back to that time now. We are happy she was granted this great blessing and her last desire.