This continues the story of William Stradling and his family from last week, and covers the trip to St. John's Arizona to help settle. There is some material on the hard life there.  Rose's death  is mentioned, and the taking in of the children (including my grandfather, Paulos Byron) by George and Mary (Stradling) Cook.

  They traveled to Arizona by way of Kanab, entering the Territory of Fredonia, traveling over the Kaibab Mountains to House Rock Valley, on the north side of the Colorado River. Here their horses strayed away from their camp one night and were lost for two or three days. When finally the horses were found and brought to camp, Dan Vincent decided to return to Utah. He had seen all of Arizona that interested him. 

Their next obstacle was the Colorado River. They went into the canyon at Lee's Ferry. The wagons and people were taken across on a raft, but the horses had to swim the deep, swift water to the opposite side. Then came the hard climb out of the canyon and over the rugged Buckskin Mountains. There was one particularly rough, hazardous ridge of almost solid rock called "Lee's Backbone" that everybody dreaded.

After that there were long days of slow travel over the almost water-less Navajo reservation to the settlements on the Little Colorado River, east of the present city of Winslow. The old St. Johns road followed on the north of the Rio Puerco (dirty river) until its' junction with the Little Colorado, about twenty-five miles from St. Johns. They then had to cross the Little Colorado, but compared to the dangerous, difficult crossing of the Colorado at Lee's Ferry, this wasn't much of an obstacle to the hardy travelers. The main hazard was that an animal might step off into an unseen chuck-hole and get down, or a wheel fall in and tip the wagon over, and there was danger of becoming stuck in the shifting quick-sand if for any reason the outfit didn't keep moving. 

It was December 21 when William arrived at St. Johns with his family. They camped temporarily on the Public Square, where the Old Bowery stood and where a school-church was in process of being built. The man working on the roof climbed down and introduced himself as Brother Kemp, the first person William met in St. Johns. Later Bishop Udall visited them and made arrangements for them to buy land. They purchased 100 acres across the river east of town and in a day or two moved into a couple of small adobe houses, with dirt roofs and floors, which had been built by an early Mexican. Thus they celebrated their first Christmas in Arizona.

Life was hard, the land which they had purchased for $10 an acre was very poor soil and most of it was only used as pasture land in later years. Their work animals, after the long trek from Utah, were in poor condition and feed was scarce. The men had to go into the hills with their wagons and hoe dry bunch grass to keep the animals alive. They could not be turned out to graze because of the poisonous "loco" weed which looked a lot like alfalfa and was often fatal to cattle and horses if they ate it. There was plenty of work on the ranch; hauling wood, cutting and hauling posts from the hills, making fences and ditches, and planting crops. For the women there were endless household chores and no conveniences. Sometimes the men got cash paying jobs outside the farm. William and his son Joseph, worked for Bishop Udall, driving mail from St. Johns to Navajo. 

Richard (Dick) Vincent died in 1883. He went after the calves one winter evening and didn't come back. A storm came up. After a two day search, he was found at the Garcia ranch on the Carizzo, 20 miles from home. Chimio Garcia found him wandering among the cedars (said he had been eating cedar berries). Garcia sent word to the folks. He died a couple of days later and is buried in the Stradling plot in St. Johns. 

The Stradling family built a house and stock buildings, made corrals and planted an orchard. They constructed a dam about one-forth mile above the house, which formed a storage reservoir to hold run-off rains. They could also turn water into it from the river when it was their turn to irrigate. In this way they could keep the irrigation water shut up in the reservoir until it was convenient for them to use it. The dam formed a lake of several acres and contained many fish. 

They also built a small pond between the house and the corral for watering their stock. It was filled by a ditch leading from the reservoir so there were fish in it also. Sophia used to feed the fish regularly - in fact they were like pets, surfacing when they saw her coming with the feed. The family had all the fish they needed to eat. 

St. Johns was cattle country and many wild cattle roamed the range. Often they broke through the fences and ate the crops. One day William was trying to drive a bunch of wild cattle out. He had his two dogs helping him herd them. A wild rabbit distracted the dogs and they chased after it, leaving him alone with the cattle. A wild bull then turned back and mauled and gored him, almost killing him before the dogs returned and chased the bull off. He was badly crippled from this unfortunate accident and was not able to do much work from then on.He used a cane for the rest of his life.

William and Sophia lived at their old homestead in St. Johns for about ten more years. It was a long distance for their children to visit and care for them, and in 1895 they moved in with, their son, Joseph and his family. A room was added on to their house especially for them and because William's happiness depended upon having a fireplace, a man was hired to come in and build one in his room. In July of 1902 their daughter, Rose died and her five children were taken to Joseph's home where their grandparents, William and Sophia Stradling, were living. Nettie was the oldest of Rose's children being almost 10 and the baby, Franklin was only one day old.Sophia cared for the little fellow night and day until he died in her arms in December. 

The children's father died in February of 1903. George and Mary Ann Stradling Cook had returned to Provo from St. Johns and having no children of their own, they decided to bring Rose's children to live with them in Utah. At the time of April Conference in 1903, the four surviving children went by train to Provo with Sophia going along to look after them. Although she intended to return to St. Johns, the family in Utah persuaded her to stay in Provo. That summer, William also returned by train to Provo. William and Sophia had left their home in Provo in 1881. They lived in Arizona for about 22 years. During this period they endured many hardships and deprivations of the comforts of life to which they were accustomed. They had been called, and had willingly gone to help settle the St. Johns, Arizona area to conquer the wilderness and establish a colony of the Church. In 1903 they returned in their old age, to their beloved city of Provo to finish their days her upon the earth. William died August 17, 1912 in Provo, Utah at the age of 88 years.