Judd & Elva Thompson

This is the most beautiful couple, just look at them! Although I never knew Grandpa Judd, I love and respect him so much. I feel like he was one of my guardian angels on my mission and I feel a great familiarity when I hear his stories.

Grandma on the other hand, I did grow up with. She has to be one of the sweetest and most spiritual women that have ever lived. Her life is a testimony that miracles do happen and she was a blessing to all who knew her. I love them both so much and I know that even now, they are aware of my life, my faith, and the decisions I face each day.

Judd Walter & Elvira Hopkins Thompson

Kids: Dallas, Bonnie

Today I want to share a story from Grandma's life:

It was while I was eight years-old that I had diphtheria, and that experience had quite an impact on my family.  The little Bennett boy, who lived in the south west part of town near the black hill, came down with diphtheria, and the entire town panicked. They sent for vaccine to be brought in for everyone in town, but before the kids in my school got inoculations, I went to play with a friend from school. We were playing jump rope and all of the sudden I felt as if my head was on fire and my throat hurt something awful. The mile and a half home was a mighty long walk.

My mother put me to bed and started doctoring me, but I kept getting worse. I doubt that anyone suspected what was wrong with me at first, but since Loey and Lisa both had perfect attendance records at school, they didn’t want to take a chance on catching anything that might cause them to miss school. They moved over to live with Aunt Libbie and Uncle Will next door. Both of them were so smart they sipped several grades and they were in high school at a very young age. We didn’t have a telephone, but Dad went across the street to Kemp’s place, and he tried several times to call Dr. Woodbury to try to get him to come to our house, but he was staying at the Bennett’s home around the clock in an effort to save their five year-old boy who had diphtheria. He was the only doctor in town at the time as far as we knew.

One afternoon a neighbor told Dad that there was someone sick at the Squires’ home, which joined our place on the west about half a block away, and they were sure a doctor was coming out there. Dad walked down there and stayed on the sidewalk near the Squires house and waited to catch the doctor. He did get him to come on up to our place, but it wasn’t the old Dr. Woodbury. It was Clair Woodbury, the son of the old doctor. He had just finished his internship back east and was on his way to Las Vegas to begin his practice of medicine. He stopped in St. George to visit his parents. When he found his father so overworked and tied down at just one place, he decided to stay and try to help out.

He diagnosed my problem as diphtheria and said that he knew of a new kind of antitoxin, which had been tried at the hospital where he interned. He believed it might save me, and he also had shots to give to the rest of my family to prevent them from catching it. Mother had already had diphtheria when she was a child so she was safe, but I got a big shot in my hip and he gave shots to all the rest of the kids in the family. Then he put up a quarantine sign and no one could leave our yard or enter it.

The shot he gave me took awhile to work and I was only half conscious for a few days. I could hear people talking but I didn’t pay any attention to them. One day I did hear Mark ask someone if I was dead yet. I heard my Dad say, “For goodness sake, don’t talk like that. Can’t you see how upset your Mother is?” I could hear Mother crying and I guess she must have been completely exhausted. Right after that Grandma Homer gave up her apartment down by the temple and she moved to our place to take care of me. I don’t know where Grandma slept or if she ever had a chance to sleep for I was in a coma for quite awhile. I wasn’t dead, but I wasn’t really alive.

Finally one day I woke up and looked around and the first thing that I said was to ask where all the people went. Mother asked me what people I was talking about and I told her it was the ones dressed in white who were singing that beautiful song. I remember that the people were sitting in choir seats which were arranged like were in the St. George tabernacle and the Salt Lake tabernacle. They were all in white, but I don’t think it was robes. I got the impression that they were dressed like people are in the temple. I only remember actually seeing women’s faces, but I’m sure I heard men’s voices. They were singing the song, “The Holy City.” Now, that is not a song that an eight year-old would have learned in Sunday school or primary, and as far as I knew I had never heard it before. I listened to that choir sing it over and over until I had memorized every word of every verse and I was able to repeat it to my mother and Grandma Homer. I still remember every word of it.