What We Learned From Dave and Bea, by Joy, Ted, Gloria, Wayne and Vella Evans 2008

How Well Do You Know David W and Beatrice C Evans? Selections by WCE, Written by DWE

Funeral Service of David Wooley Evans

David Wooley Evans' History of his Ancestors

A Family of Faith and Works, by David W Evans

Memories of Bea and Dave, by Rose Hutchison

Rose Hutchison’s memories of Bea and Dave

Personal intro........

My grandfather Evans once said, "One's story is...what

one thinks and believes and writes..." I hope you can

know my grandparents better through me....

Beatrice Cannon Evans

Born: May 18, 1894

Died: August, 1985

Grandma Evans was the 1st of 11 children and

reared (not "raised" she always said that one

raised crops not children) in a well to do

family. Her father was a successful attorney

and her mother was a wonderful homemaker

who was widely read and loved and knew the

scriptures well. Her father died in 1917 and the

family lost everything except their home on 7th

East in Salt Lake City. She knew hard times in

her young womanhood and again during the

Great Depression while rearing her own family.

My father Ted remembers, "we were pretty poor but

Mother never dwelled on that.”

Grandma was a good student and completed

her education through high school but became

ill with thyroid disease and was too sick to

continue on to college. This did not stop her

love for learning and literature. She continued

reading and broadening her mind well into her

later years. An eye condition inhibited her

reading, but she didn't let that stop her, as she

would listen to books on tape to satiate her

literary appetite. As mentioned in today's

program, Grandma was an historian and was

the family genealogist and historian for both the

Cannon and Bennion lines.

As a youth, Grandmother won prizes for her equestrian

skills and continued riding as long as she could. When I

was a child, I remember her riding horses at the cabin

on the Weber River. She was in her 70's.

Grandma became very active in the Republican

Party and was President of the Utah Women's

Republican Group. She was a member of the

Daughters of the Utah Pioneers and, as the avid

historian that she was, had many pioneer

stories to tell. She also loved music and theatre

and did a lot of traveling.

Her greatest accomplishment was in rearing

their 5 boys. Much of which was done alone due

to Grandpa's 17 years of service in an LDS

Bishopric and his running his advertising

agency. My father remembered her mothering

as "fair with a good sense of humor, (she)

laughed but kept us in line (and) liked (our)

curiosity and ingenuity. (She was) positive,

encouraging and (told us we were) good and

could succeed." Most of all she instilled in her

sons faith in God and in good works.

Examples:(Wayne breaking his dinner plate

over Ted's head and of natural consequence

and financial necessity was destined to eat out

of a pie tin. Having inquisitive and active boys,

she put up with dismantled clocks and biology

experiments using a pressure cooker and a cat

that was on its ninth life.)

Since Grandpa had a slogan given him I felt it only

fitting that Grandma be given one too. I drew on the

remembrance of the feeling I always had when I was

with her..."Be at ease with Beatrice".

My fond memories of her are mostly from my

early years...playing in her kitchen with the

toys she had in drawers especially put there for

the grandchildren. The smell of her special

green onion salad dressing, little talks in her

laundry room just outside the kitchen. Knocking on

her door to get the key to their enclosed patio that so

my brothers, cousins, and I could play on the wonderful

wicker birdcage shaped swing that was there.

I have memories of Grandma in her cabin kitchen and

always visiting her to get a treat. And the grandest of

all treats...being invited to sleep in their cabin loft (with

the reminder that Peter fell over the edge so be

careful!)

In my teen years I remember going to her home

after Grandpa died and as her health failed to

stay with her a while so my cousin Lark, who so

lovingly cared for her, could have a little time

to herself and young family. Grandma was

upstairs in her bed asleep and I was down in the

living room playing her piano hoping it would give her

comfort and enjoyment. I was always at ease with her.

A gift she had that balanced Grandpa's energy.

(I was 18 when she died)

David Woolley Evans

Born: March 5, 1894

Died: August 1982

Grandpa Evans was the 4th of 9 children born

into a faithful and hardworking family. His

father started working for the Deseret News

(which was owned by the LDS Church) as an

errand boy and worked his way up the ladder to

become the general manager during a very

difficult time in LDS history. Much of the time

his father was not paid for his work, but

Grandpa said of him "... Father was the kind of

person who would have given his all to the

church if he had been asked to do so." And

such was the family of faith in which he was

reared. Grandpa's mother was loved by all who

met her and was a retainer of friends. Many of

her friendships lasted her whole lifetime and on

into the remembrance of the next generation.

It was said, "Friendship was (her) special talent

and gift." A gift my Grandfather also possessed. His

father was killed in 1906 in a streetcar accident, which

sent the children off to work to support the household.

Grandpa was able to work and go to college

and even graduate in 3 years with a bank

account of $700.00. He served a 2 1/2 year

mission in the Northwestern States Mission and

also served in the Military before he married

Grandma. He was a great lover of literature,

music, theatre, and history, hence this gathering today

to award prizes for biography, which he loved.

Of course, Grandpa is best known for founding

the Evans Advertising Agency, which did much

public relations work, and the many successes

of his career. I had opportunity to read a thesis

written by John C. Speer about Grandpa and

his career and gravitated to the topics that

interested me... Turkey, Water, Symphony and the

popular "Slave with Dave" slogan affixed to Grandpa

from the Agency.

Turkey story--post W.W.II slump..."Eat More Turkey"

1945-1955 increased consumption 400%. It would be

safe to say that Evans Advertising and Grandpa are the

reason this country eats turkey daily rather than just at

Thanksgiving and Christmas.

The Upper Colorado River Storage Project-grass roots

system, congressional support, and Navajo tribal

involvement.

Saving the Utah Symphony-- "pack the house" by giving

away tickets, Mr. Abravanel gave free workshops--

people began buying tickets

"Slave With Dave" -- a colleague Robert Ruff said of

Grandpa he, "would never ask anyone to do what he

was not willing to do himself." It takes an

extraordinary man to elicit such loyalty and hard work

from employees and posterity.

My memories of Grandpa are all attached to

working in one way or another. I don't know

that he ever retired totally from Evans

Advertising. All my memories of him are

performing some kind of work, gardening,

fixing fences, digging irrigation ditches,

building ponds, etc.

My only recollections of him not working are

the annual family Christmas party where I

remember the highlight of the night was

Grandpa passing out Christmas envelopes with

crisp never been used paper money inside. I

don't even remember the denomination of the

gift just Grandpa saying "HO HO HO" as he

passed them out. The next is of him at the cabin

on the Weber headed out around 4 or 5 in the

afternoon to go fishing. And finally, of he and

Grandma out walking their evening

constitutional and the visits to our home along

their route.

(I was 15 when he died)

Memories of Beatrice C. and David W. Evans, by Edmund C. Evans

Some Memories of Beatrice C. and David W. Evans

By Edmund C. Evans

Presented at the Evans Biography Award dinner

                There is a certain degree of risk in asking a fond son to make public statements about his parents.   Remember, you wordsmiths, that fond not only means, “loving; affectionate and tender” but it also may mean, “foolish, silly, simple and weak.”   There certainly is nothing to prevent a person from being both simultaneously. 

                I am grateful to be asked to share some of my memories and feelings about the two people whose enthusiasm for history, appreciation for excellence in writing, and love for their Western American heritage and Mormon religion made this award possible.   I might also note that they represent the economic extremes of writing.  Mother’s books were entirely a labor of love from which she never earned a farthing and Father wrote for money for nearly 70 years. 

                Mother was the oldest of 11 children.  Her father John M. Cannon was one of the small group of Mormon youth who were sent “back East” to get educated.  He received a Law degree from the University of Michigan, returned to Utah and had a very lucrative law practice, put a great deal of his wealth into the sheep business with his brothers-in-law, the Bennion boys.  He died at 52 and his family lost almost everything in the post World War I crash of the livestock market.  Her mother Zina Bennion (sister of Milton Bennion, noted educator and teacher of teachers) read and studied as voraciously as a widowed mother of 11 could do.  Her habits of using her free time to read no doubt influenced my mother’s habits of reading and preserving history. 

                My mother was an excellent student who received awards and scholarship in her early education but was denied collegiate studies by a period of severe health problems in her late teens and early twenties.  She loved to read and teach and at a very young age was a member of the General Board of the LDS Primary Association which allowed her to travel throughout the state in the company of LDS Church leaders giving speeches and instruction to women many years her senior. 

                She mothered her five sons, taught us to love learning, and filled us with stories of the history of our own families, our country and of the Manx, Welsh, English and Scottish ancestry she loved so much. 

                I can never remember when mother was not passionately involved in family history.  She was the family historian for both the Cannon and Bennion families and wrote, edited or contributed to several books of family history and wrote countless historical sketches for the family news letters that she generated for at least 50 years. 

                She had an unusual and poorly understood eye condition that made reading very difficult.  (Her eyes created unequal sized images whose conflict gave her severe headaches and painful eye strain.)   She learned to write with her eyes shut using a ribbed backing behind the paper so she could conserve her limited eye strength for reading.  She was considered visually impaired enough to be eligible for the Federally funded “Talking Books for the Blind” and she read the classics while many other women were listening to the original radio “soap operas” …Ma Perkins, Portia Faces Life, and Our Gal Sunday.” 

                How often she t old me, as I was frittering away my time reading “trash”, that story of Guttenberg’s terrible anxiety that his invention of moveable type would release a scourge of wicked, wasteful writing on the world.  He and she were both correct in their concern. 

                Father was in the middle of a family of 9 children whose ancestors included musicians, poets, diarists, and whose father, until his untimely death in a streetcar accident, was manager of the Deseret News.  None of these progenitors ever attended college.  Father was the first.  He worked and studies his way through a four year course at the University of Utah in three years, spent some time as a newspaper writer but quickly gravitated into the advertising and public relations world where he worked for others until he was nearly a50.  He then started his own advertising and public relations firm “on a shoestring”.  This has grown into one of the nation’s large firms with offices in many cities.

                How many pages of writing he did in his life is unknowable.  His goal in writing was to change other people’s behavior.  This was sometimes direct advertising telling the housewife why she should use beet sugar or turkeys.  Sometimes it was telling politicians and the general public why the waters of the Colorado River should be used carefully…and why the Upper Basin States  must band together to preserve their rights under the Colorado River Compact.  Sometimes it was to further the political causes that he championed…never as a candidate but frequently as a “King Maker.”  Sometimes it was as a devout believer in his religion in preparing a series of cards for the young people of his church entreating them to “Be Honest with Yourselves”….He gave them sound, attractive reasons for good behavior, illustrated professionally by his staff artists.  Sometimes it was as a grateful, believing advocate of higher education.  He could easily write glowingly of his Alma Mater, the U. of U, serve enthusiastically on the board at USU, and teach courses in public relations at BYU.  I don’t think he ever could cheer for any other team than Utah in athletics. 

                Father saved thousands of letters, clippings, articles and quotes about the things that had touched his life.  For the last two decades until his accidental death at 88 he hurried home from his work at the office and went to his room where he joyed in writing hundreds of pages of his own life history using the documents he had saved.  It is my guess that it was t his experience that focused him on the idea that there was so much history and biography that needed to be saved.  The idea that some of his resources could be given to stimulate others to work at biography gave him great joy.  He wanted to give real recognition to the most excellent writers.   However it was as important to him that the less polished writers would be stimulated to tell the stories that they knew.  He was just as happy about the poorly organized, badly constructed, ungrammatical efforts of the novice as he was about the polished work of the pro.  His dream, which he shared with mother and the rest of us, was that many many people would be stimulated to preserve the stories of work, faith, drama and humor that fill our lives and enrich others in the telling.