The Brief History of

Jane Geneva Robinson Bybee

                                 

Jane Geneva Robinson was born 14 July, 1848 at Beaver Creek Nebraska. She was the first of eight children born to Joseph Lee Robinson and Laurinda Maria Atwood. Laurinda was the third of five wives in a polygamous marriage. 

                     

  

                 Joseph Lee Robinson                                  Laurinda Maria Atwood Robinson

Jane’s father, Joseph Lee Robinson was a very religious and spiritual man.  He was a close friend of the Prophet Joseph Smith. He had several visions. One of his visions was concerning polygamy. I quote from his journal a few words recorded by Joseph Lee Robinson, “Polygamy is an institution of heaven…any man that enters into this Holy Order  of matrimony or any other principle, but with an eye single to the Glory of God is DAMNED.” Because of his vision, Joseph knew that is was as pure a principle as was ever emanated from God and to the truth and certainty of this doctrine he never could doubt again.

                                 

   Jane Geneva’s parents, Joseph Lee Robinson and Laurinda Maria, and sibling

Jane Geneva Robinson Bybee in standing on the right in-between her two brothers, behind her father. 

In 1847, Joseph Lee Robinson and wives, Maria and Susan were living in Winter Quarters, having left Nauvoo with the exodus of the Saints. Joseph became interested in the welfare of the many lonely women in the camp, and through his assistance to these women, he became acquainted with Laurinda Maria Atwood. Laurinda had been married and had with her a three year old son. Joseph felt the need to protect and provide for Laurinda and her little boy. Brigham Young told Joseph to take Laurinda for his wife and she would bring him much joy and happiness.

            Joseph was not a poor man, but with three wives and several children to care for it would be a financial strain. Nevertheless he approached Maria and Susan and told them of his desire to make Laurinda his wife, and related to the the council given him by Brigham Young. With the permission of Maria and Susan, Joseph and Laurinda were married, and sealed by Brigham Young at the home of E.T. Benson, in Winter Quarters on the 20^th of March, 1847.

 

https://www.lds.org/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-and-church-history-student-study-guide/the-church-moves-west/the-trek-west-1845-47-what-can-we-learn-from-the-early-pioneers?lang=eng

There must have been much adjusting in the Robinson household but after a short time, the three wives became as sisters, loving one another and accepting their responsibilities in this household, with love.

            Joseph Lee Robinson with his family began their travels westward in the spring of 1848. They were assigned to the Lyman Company. Very early in the morning of 14 July, 1848 while the wagon train was camped by side of Beaver Creek in Nebraska, Laurinda gave birth to a baby girl, Jane Geneva. So their wagons would not delay the company, all wagons rolled out that day, shortly after Jane’s birth.

Beaver Creek Nebraska

Laurinda suffered a great deal because of the conditions of the trails but her husband had given both mother and daughter a blessing before they left camp, and with the Lord’s blessing also they survived the hardships. (Please see the excerpt from Joseph Lee Robinson’s journal about her birth, found at the end of this history.)  On 9^th October 1848, the Lyman Company arrived in Salt Lake City. Jane Geneva was a plump smiling baby of three months.

            Brigham Young sent the Robinson family to Farmington to live and upon their arrival, Joseph immediately began to provide shelter for his family. After living in Farmington for a few years, Joseph took Laurinda and their children to settle Mountain Green in Morgan County, in Weber Canyon. There he built a home and the family raised sheep. They would shear the sheep, wash the wool in Gordon’s Creek, card the bats and quilt the quilts. It was not a very fun occupation.

            Jane grew up with other pioneer children knowing the hardships of Pioneer life. There were usually long sieges of illnesses and the remedies were nearly as bad as the illness itself; heavy doses of laxatives, mustard plaster and the likes. The children all had to help their parents. The girls helped the father with the outside work as well as their mother in the home. They worked many hours and there was little time for recreation. However Jane was fortunate that her family owned a horse and she spent every hour she could riding the horse over the Indian trails in Horseshoe Bend in Weber Canyon.

            Joseph Lee Robinson was very concerned about education and one of the first things he would do was provide facilities for school. It may be one of the rooms in their home, or perhaps he would construct a one room school, so the Robinson children did not lack for schooling as many of the Pioneer children did.

            While the Robinson family lived in Mountain Green, the Byram Lee Bybee family from Uintah also moved to Mountain Green. Jane and one of the Bybee children, Byram Levi became friends.

            The Bybee family only lived a short time in Mountain Green and then they moved back down to the Canyon to Uintah. Shortly after their return to Uintah, Brigham Young sent them to Dixie in Southern Utah to grow cotton. About one year after Byram Bybee and family moved to Grafton, Byram Levi told his parents that he wanted Jane for his wife and requested they allow him to return to Uintah so that he could court her. Byram lived with a brother in Uintah while he courted Jane, and would ride a horse up to Mountain Green over the same Indian trails that Jane rode her horse. Their courting was short and simple. Many of their dates were spent with Byram playing the fiddle for dances. He would fiddle, call the dance and attempt to dance with Jane all at the same time. They spent as much time as possible riding their horses as this was a hobby they both loved.

            On 14 July, 1865, on Jane’s seventeenth birthday, she and Byram Levi Bybee were married at her mother’s home in Mountain Green. They were later sealed in the Salt Lake Endowment house on 2^nd February 1867.

 Salt Lake Endowment House

http://www.ldschurchtemples.com/endowment/

Jane and Byram made their home in Uintah. They built a home by the side of a hill near a spring. It was a two story adobe home. It was small at first but later they built onto the home and had several bedrooms upstairs, a large kitchen and a large living room down stairs. The house had two doors that opened to the outside, one on the west and one on the south. They also had a large porch, or balcony on the south that was several feet high so they could dry their fruit. The water for the household use was carried from the spring. The stove used for heating and cooking was a four hold wood stove. They cut branches and limbs from surrounding trees for their firewood. They always kept a gallon capacity teakettle on the stove and there was always a fire burning to keep the water hot. Jane would catch rainwater for washing clothes on a scrub board. The water was heated in a large tub on top of the stove. Later they bought a stove with a reservoir that held five gallons of water and finally they purchased a stove with both a reservoir and a warming oven.

     They did not have the water piped to the house until after Byram’s death. The spring was about 900 feet from their home. The irons used for ironing were heavy and heated, several at a time on the stove making summertime ironing a chore indeed. Jane had a sewing machine and was an expert seamstress. They used candles for light and Jane made her own candles. They had no refrigeration so the meat was kept in a salt solution called brine which cured the meat. After the meat was cured by the brine method it was hung in the basement for summer use. During the cold months they would kill a beef or hog and hang it in the grainary to cut as needed.

            Byram was a good hunter and provided them with wild meat. Also to supplement their meager income from the farm, he would kill wild game and sell it to hotels and restaurants in the Odgen area. Jane made butter and would sell it for fifteen to twenty cents per pound. Building butter was not an easy task and after a few years they were able to purchase a cream separator and thus Jane’s job was made a little easier. 

http://explorepahistory.com/displayimage.php?imgId=1-2-62

This photo is from the late 1800's and shows the three phases of butter making: turning the churn, stamping the completed butter, and working the buttermilk out of the butter in a tub. 
Courtesy of Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center. Pennsburg. PA.

This photo does not include any family members, just an example.

     The family did not have many luxuries but they did have an organ and all of the girls learned to play and became church organists. The family spent many a long winter evening entertainment with music; their father playing the fiddle and the girls taking turns playing the organ, and all joining in with song. They also had candy pulls. The candy was made from honey or molasses. The family holidays were celebrated lightly. They never had a Christmas tree, but all of the children had stockings hung on Christmas Eve and Christmas morning they would find candy, nuts, raisins and occasionally an orange in their stockings. Their Thanksgiving was always a large dinner with chicken and all the trimmings, mince pies and plum pudding.

Byram and Jane were the parents of eleven children:

         Name                               Birthdate                                                   Deathdate

1. Laurinda Geneva                 Oct. 30, 1866                                              May 16, 1951

2. Alice Elnora                          Dec. 1, 1868                                               June 29, 1879

3. Annabell                                April 3, 1871                                              July 10, 1879

4. Byram Lee                              June 17, 1873                                              May 14, 1963

5. Emma Lucine                         May 20, 1876                                             August 30, 1961

6. Laron Lafayette                     Nov. 4, 1879                                                May 15, 1880

7. Maud Luan                             March 30, 1881                                           May 9, 1882 

8. Joseph Orin                            March 26, 1883                                           August 16, 1966

9. Laura May                              Oct. 14,  1885                                              Dec. 16, 1972

10. Zina Pearl                             March 30, 1889                                          Oct. 2, 1964

11. Silva Josephine                   March 25, 1893                                           Feb. 26, 1894

                  

Jane Geneva is seated on the far right holding Zina Pearl and Laura May is standing next to her mother.

 The Jane Geneva and Byram Levi Family  Taken in September 1893

Front Row L-R  Laura May, Silva Josephine (baby), Jane Geneva, Joseph Orin, Byram Levi, Zina Pearl.      Back Row L-R Emma Lucine, Byram Lee, Laurinda Geneva

          In 1879 there was a diphtheria epidemic and Byram and Jane’s family were afflicted. They were advised to give their children whiskey but they refused. However, two of their children died with the disease, Alice Elnore, and ten days later Annabell. Alice had planted a white rose by the west side of their house and realizing she was going to die, requested roses from this bush be placed on her grave. When Annabelle was sick, she also knew she was going to die and asked for wild flowers from the hillside be placed on her grave.  After the death of these two little girls the rest of the children were given the whiskey and they all got well. The next year their son Laron died at six months. They also lost two other girls Maud and fourteen months and Silva at eleven months. The family felt the loss of these children deeply. They would just begin to adjust to the loss of one child and would lose another one.

            Most of the bybee family went barefoot around the yard and house. They had to wear shoes on special occasions in their home and when going away, but they all preferred the bare feet. Jane was a very good cook and fed her family well. She made bread about twice weekly. The flour was purchased from the John Taylor Mill in Riverdale and the yeast start was given to her by a Danish lady. 

Taylor’s Mill in Riverdale Utah

          Each year the threshing crew seemed to increase at Bybee time and decrease shortly after. There were lots of workers when it meant eating at Jane’s. In later years Jane also cooked dinners for young people after community dances. Jane had a strong testimony of the gospel. She kept the commandments to the best of her ability. She was prayerful, honest, faithful and true. She was a loving, kind and compassionate mother and a good housekeeper. She was slow to anger but when riled watch out! She would not tolerate her children to bicker or find fault with one another. She taught her children to be honest to themselves and to all others. They were also taught to honor the leaders of the church. Family prayer was a daily activity in their home and the administering to the sick was essential to their getting well.

            Jane would not listen to gossip, nor did she participate in gossiping. She would say “If you can’t find something good to say about someone, don’t say anything!”  Jane was a stout person, with eyes of blue and hair dark brown, worn parted in the middle and pulled back severely, as was the custom.

            Byram had been ill for several years and at the time of his death, 7 July, 1905, Jane was ill and hospitalized. The doctor would not release her to go home nor would he permit anyone to acquaint her with Byram’s death. When she left for the hospital she kissed Byram goodbye, not realizing that this was indeed goodbye. It was several days after his death and burial before Jane was notified of his passing. After his death of Byram, Jane cared for her family by again selling butter, eggs and other commodities from their farm. She also boarded school teachers for the Uintah school district.

            In 1911, the Union Pacific Railroad bought a right away through the Bybee property and it was necessary for the old home to be torn down and in 1912 a new home was built. This house was of yellow brick and was built on their property south of the old homestead. Jane lived in this house with her son Joseph Orin and his new bride May Grix.  Jane loved her new home, but insisted that no plumbing facilities be put in the home. Her daughter-in-law was from the city and it seemed and odd thing to build a new house and not have water piped into it. But Jane was insistent and so… no water and no bathroom facilities in the new home. The water was piped all the way from the old spring to the outside of the house but not into the house. Jane still worked hard and with her new daughter-in-law they continued to be busy canning fruit, sewing, darning, baking and cooking and cleaning and it never seemed to reach the end. 

Lucinda Geneva Bybee Jones, Geneva Lavon Jones Allen, Lucille Allen, Jane Geneva

This appears to be a 4 generation photo with Jane Geneva seated on the far right.

               

 Jane Geneva Robinson Bybee on the far right in the dark colored dress

           Jane had many relatives and with them and her own children and grandchildren, it seemed like someone was always visiting. She was never happier than the times when she could cook for large crowds. Everyone was welcome at the Bybee home and no one ever went away hungry. In the last years of Jane’s life, she wasn’t as active as in her earlier years, she seemed to be content to have her children “fetch” and care for her.

          Jane Geneva Robinson Bybee died the 7^th of June, 1922 at the age of 74 years at her home in Uintah and was buried in the Uintah Cemetery beside her husband Byram Levi Bybee. 

Sources of Information:         

Excerpts from the journal of Joseph Lee Robinson, compiled by Rena Robinson Cutler

History of Jane Geneva Robinson Bybee DUP Library, by Lavern Jaques Poll

Written accounts from Histories of three of the Bybee children

Verbal recollection from living grandchildren

*This is a wonderful website that describes the Lyman Company and their adventures, the Joseph Lee Robinson family is listed under “View a list of individuals known to have traveled in this Company.”

https://history.lds.org/overlandtravels/companyDetail?companyId=2

*Here is a “Trail Excerpt” from Grandpa Joseph Lee Robinson’s journal!  In paragraph 3 he mentions the birth of his daughter with his wife Laurinda at Beaver Creek!

Robinson, Joseph Lee, Autobiography and journals 1883-1892, [manuscript:] vol. 1, 60, 66-67.

Trail Excerpt

·         RELATED COMPANIES

·         Willard Richards Company (1848)

·         RELATED PERSONS

·         Joseph Lee Robinson

·         Jane Geneva Robinson

·         Laurinda Marie Atwood Robinson

·         Susan McCord Robinson

·         Amasa Mason Lyman

·         SOURCE LOCATIONS

·         Church History Library, Salt Lake City, Utah

And it came to pass that we prepared for a start with best fit out we could gather with the means, we could muster with provisions and clothing and seeds to go to the valley of the Great Salt Lake Valley away in the rocky mountains where the Lord said, Stop ye my Saints and till the soil and in my name build to me a City and to yourselves habitations to dwell in and serve me the Lord your God and I the Lord will bless you and multiply you abundantly.

The Prophet Brigham said "we have found a land that will do for the Mormons". and it came to pass that after loosing so many cattle and some horses that I only could muster up teams enough to start three waggons by hitching up or yoking cows, one waggon for each wife and family

1848 in this Spring we again left our homes in the city of winter quarters, were organized in Amacy Simans [Amasa Lyman] Company[.] we set out and traveld west upon the Mormon trale, we were divinely Inspired to go ahead in the name of the lord, we had Faith in God and Great love for his Cause and People, we hade an asurence[,] yea we knew that God was with his People therefore we had great joy, and much rejoicing, with all our sorrows and tribulations, for surely our tribulations were Great and many, but nothing daunted nor discouriged us[.] we never looked back, nor repented that we had taken upon us the name of Jesus Christ which the world calld Mormon

Let us now return to our traveling camp west of the Misora river[.] as we had set sail from winter quarters we traveled on very slowly but moving west wardly toward the promised land[.] had some hinderment in crosing River and passing throough some Indian towns and loop fork of the Plat[te] river and other streams, and on beaver Creek my third wife Laurinda M[arie Atwood Robinson] was delivered of a child[,] a find daughter we named her Jane Geneve [Geneva.] the mother and child doing well, she was born the 14 day of July 1848 but the mother had to suffer a good deel as the child was born I the morning and the camp moved on the same day but we blessed her and the Lord blessed her and she was strengthend so that the camp was not hindered[.] We very soon got into the Buffalo country when we obtained a plenty of meat which was certainly a great blessing to us, now we are traveling into the wilderness[.] Now the Lord is not feeding us on many from heaven direct as he did the Children of Israel but he is feeding us upon substantial food nevertheless just as good if not better an we can discern his hand in his marvelous powr in protecting and in feeding this people and in leading them to a land of Peace which our god had certainly prepared and was holding it in reserve for his beloved saints where he purposeth to feed and nourish them[,] train and disapline them and bring them under the [-] of the wicked and into the bond of the covenant when forty years expires or soon after the expiration of forty years he shall bring about the redemption of Zion and while that is being acomplished[,] a still greater manifestation of the powr of God will be manifest in the great destruction of the wicked and in the building of a Holy Temple where the concecrated spot in Jackson Co. Mo and then the work of the work of the Father commence among all Nations to gather them to the land of their Fathers & even to Zion and Gerusalem [Jerusalem] and their shall greater miracles be rought[.] yes[,] far greater than was wrought by the prophets in leading the Children of Israel out of Egypt into the promised land[.] by that time the Latterday Saints, will have a large experience and will possess great faith[,] will possess mighty Power[.] then great and mighty miracles shall be performed and God shall Get to himself a Great name and very much honor[.] now the little stone[,] very small at the beginning[,] and the faith of the saint, were weak and many[,] very many have fallen away because of the power of the Devil and the wickedness of the world and the littleness of their faith[.] yet for all that[,] there has been a constant addition to the little stone[.] as all that are born Saints and all that are baptized are joining[,] on which is enlargeing the kingdom and it shall never sease growing untill it shall become a great mountain and fill the whole Earth and it shall become so large that it shall grind every other kingdom to powder and the dust shall be blown away and there shall be nothing left to show where they stood, amen

now we are traveling along[,] all the same singing[,] prophesying and praying and rejoicing be cause God is certainly with his saints, they shall rejoice and it came to pass we pased through larima [Laramie] and the Black hills and on Sweet watter[.] we found the devils Gate and an abundence of saleratus and many of our cattle got Atcalied and died[.] we had to use a great Deal of precaution to save enough to get through to the valley[.] I lost several being alcalied and one by wolves but still we traveld along pass over green river[.] here a few of us stoped and and went up the river on a hunt[,] killd some Elk and antelope[,] saw some of the Lamanite hunting[.] they looked rather sour but did not molest us[.] they might have sised us up[.] they rode all around us and hoped to see and learn our strength but the Lord preserved us, we returned to camp[.] found all wrigh[.] only one of my cows killd by wolves[.] we traveld along very finely[.] crosed sevral fine streams[,] hams Fork[,] Bear river and webber, through Echo[,] a very diverting and curious Canion, and up Canion Creek and up and down and over the mountains[.] surely it was rough and tumble, but through the Blessing of God we reached the height of the last mountain before dropping into the great Salt Lake Valley which was destined to become the Center Stake of Zion[.] in the mist of the rocky mountains, we halted, and gazed with much wonder and admiration and with tears and much joy, there was an emotion of feeling in our bosoms that we cannot desscribe[.] Sufise to say the valley looked very good to us then, we desended and entered the valley the first of Oct 1. 1848. drove into the fort, the Brethren had built a fort that they might protect themselves, the next day I went south 6 or 8 miles to see some corn that John our coulerd man had raised, as he had raised some crop for us so that with what we had brought, we were obliged to make it do us untill we could rais something the next season, the next day took a trip north some 6 or 8 miles to see the country[.] Saw the President, told him where I had ben and what I thought for the present[,] if it should meet with his aprobation, he said all right[,] go ahead

consequently on Saturday we drove up to the mouth of North Canion and camped for the winter, Sunday with a part of my family atended meeting at the fort and on Monday we took our teams[,] went and gatherd our corn to secure it as we discovered there had ben but little raised in the valley and it stood us in hand to save what we had that we might [-] starve to death of [sentence unfinished]

Susan [McCord Robinson] my second wife was delived of her second Daughter, a promising child[.] we hailed the Same with jot [joy,] very glad we had found a resting place[.] the mother and child doing well[.] in this month we got out timber and built one house[.] we enterd into it with some satisfaction.