My grandpa rode tall in the saddle. Actually, he was not a very tall man, but in the eyes of a small child, Wilford Woodruff Clark aboard his black stallion was indeed a very tall man.
Wilford Woodruff Clark was born in Farmington in 1863. He was seven generations removed from the Clarks who came from England to Connecticut in 1638, and two generations removed from Timothy Baldwin Clark who joined the Church in Illinois in 1835. The ancestry of Wilford contained farmers and soldiers, builders and merchants, and represented the best of American frontiersmen. The Clarks had gone through Indian raids, suppression by the Missouri army of Governor Boggs and the Illinois rrobs covertly backed by Governor Ford, and the threats of Johnston's Army in Utah.
Life on the Mormon frontier revolved around the Patriarchal order, and Ezra T. Clark's dominion of farms and businesses and families of his children was considered exemplary of this communal living.
Young Wilford grew up in Farmington and Georgetown, Idaho in the company of his parents and his brothers' families and in the home and family of his Aunt Susan. Fortunately, Ezra recognized the value of schooling, and none of his 21 children was deprived of schoolhouse education if such was available. Yet all the boys learned farming, and all the girls learned homemaking, as the basic tools for their future endeavors.
Wilford Woodruff Clark, named for the apostle who had been so close to the Father Ezra in the Nauvoo days, received schooling at the Deseret University in Salt lake City, and at the Brigham Young Academy in Provo, His journal of class notes, meticulously inscribed in beautiful penmanship, remains a prize memento of the education offered in the 1880s.
Pamelia Dunn was very elegant, intelligent, and industrious daughter of John Barker and Julia Meguire Dunn who had recently moved to Three-Mile, Idaho (between Georgetown and Bennington) from Plain City, Utah. Wilford and Pamelia were sealed together on 22 July 1885 in theLogan Temple.
The new marriage was blessed by three children (W.W. Jr. , Vera and William) before a mission call came from President John Taylor in Salt lake City. Shortly after his return from two years in the Southern States Mission, Elder Clark was ordained Bishop Clark and sent to Montpelier to preside for the next 19 years. The home and farm in Georgetown continued to provide sustenance for the Montpelier home during the years as bishop. The Montpelier years provided Bishop Clark with experienced in community action and politics which were to be a part of his interests in the remaining years.
As bishop of the Montpelier Ward,W. W. Clark was an important favor in maintaining harmony between the farming Latter-day Saints and the rail roading non-Mormons. The sons and daughters of Wilford and Pamelia became the models on whom other couples patterned their children. With one son a storekeeper, another a farmer, another a dairyman and soon down the line, the patriarchal order of Ezra T. was now passed on to another generation.
Even young Howard, the family barber, asserted his independence in his trade when he took it upon himself (with the coaxing of LeOra) to shave off the beard of W.W.C. one Sunday Morning! Noting the absence after thirty plus years of beard, Father Clark calmly said, "Shucks, son, how did you cane to shave it all off?"
While Bishop, Father Clark campaigned for office and was elected to one term in the Idaho State legislature and then one term in the Idaho State Senate. Prior to his departure to the State Capitol in Boise, the new Representative from Bear Lake County got into the protocol of his new office by practicing on the farm animals as "The Gentlemen from Ada County" or "Mister xxx from Bannock County." Thus did he know the names of all his fellow senators and where they were from before he even met them (--Walter Clark, 1962--).
I visited your Father twice in 1921 at his desk in the Senate Chamber. One of these visits was on his birthday, February 2. I also met several of his fellow senators and heard their cheerful comments about his example and strength, for he wielded a powerful influence for good. One of these comments was of his humble and earnest prayer in that body one morning when the regular Chaplain was absent. One of these men was Ralph Harding of Malad, Idaho. (Heber D. Clark, 1962)
As the new Bishop-Representative, the House was deadlocked on the decision of appointing a U.S. Congressman and had been struggling for weeks without an appointment. Finally Wilford, a Republican, proposed that it is better to send a man from the opposing party than not send one from Idaho at all. A Demoocrat was named to represent the state, and the idea was commended for its diplomacy by people from in and out of the State. (Amasa L. Clark, 1962)
Wilford lost his final bid for the Idaho Senate in 1928 for several reasons, one of them being his opposition to the fifty-car maximum for a freight train. A significant number of railroading families in his district did not take kindly to his economy.
By modern standards Wilford Clark would have been known as a political conservative, interested in local control of civic responsibilities, aiming at a balanced budget, opposed to state programs if local or voluntary programs would suffice, etc. His name is on nearly every page of the Legislative minutes as having something to say germane to the matters at hand.
He loved America and its Constitution. He had an enviable knowledge of our government, its operation, and the institutions following therefrom.· Few were ever more interested in our elections and the candidates. He knew the pulse of the electorate on domestic and foreign issues. (Judge G. Larsen, 1956)
The declining years for Father Clark began with the death in 1933 of his beloved Pamelia. Aunt Millie, as she was known to so many, was a nost significant lady: Mother of eleven, near-mother of dozens, midwife to many, Relief Society visitor to hundreds, and devoted companion to his husband in many callings; hers would be a biography of significance equal to that of Wilford's.
The years to follow are well-known to most of us: the many missions of Father Clark, his calling to be the Patriarch of the Montpelier Stake, his visits to his children and their families, his love of travel and of reading, his vigor to ride a bullrake in stacking hay, his identity with his black, stallion, Diamond.
I last saw Grandpa Clark after he had moved to Salt Lake City to be closer to medical care in his fading years. His large number of grandchildren came to know Grandpa Clark in many contexts: deep concentration while reading or writing letters (Betty Clark McEwan, 1960), enjoyment in playing checkers (Stanford Larsen, 1961), puttering with repairing and sharpening tools in the barn (Don C. Clark, 1958), saying the alphabet backwards faster than most can do forwards (Beverly Clark Johnson, 1961), and preparing to die: When I last saw Grandpa he was deathly sick. He did not complain, but said that he did not know why the lord did not let him pass away. But he had an answer: he had never known what suffering was and this probably was part of the things he ought to experience in this state of existence. (Chad W. Clark, 1961)
When Wilford W. Clark died in Salt Lake City on 8 October 1956, the year prior to the Russian launching of a satellite, his span of 93 1/2 years bridged five wars, incredible developments in technology and great expansions in the Church population and geography. In his own way he was very much a part of that development. Wilford W. Clark should be imprinted in our Clark heritage as one with the vision of turning difficult situations into opportunities for the spread of the gospel. He should be recalled for being a man ready to step into leadership when such was needed. He shall be remembered for his patience, his counsel, and his love for his children.
This Patriarch of the Springdale Farm in Georgetown, Idaho shall be inscribed in our memories as a man of God.
