I was born on December 21, 1899 to William P. Paskett and Annie Louise Mecham Paskett at Grouse Creek, Box Elder County, Utah. I weighed seven pounds and was blessed in February 1900 by my father.

We lived in a five-roomed log house. I had scarlet fever when only a few months old. The folks didn’t expect me to live. I started to school in September when five years old. My first teacher was Miss Brown. I had to walk a mile to school, unless the neighbors picked us up as they went by in a sleigh. The snow was so deep some winters that we just walked on top the fence on the snow drifts. I had whooping cough when in the second grade. Everyone in the school had whooping cough so we didn’t bother staying home.

I was baptized when eight years old, thought I was drowned and have always been afraid of water since. Oh, let’s go back. When two years old, I fell in a tub of water and mother thought I was drowned.

In 1912 we moved into a seven-room frame house that Dad built. (Dad was a carpenter, a farmer, a blacksmith, a school teacher, a little bit of everything. He always said he was a “Jack of all Trades.”  He also was a very good organist.)

The winter of 1913 was very bad for Grouse Creek. Seventy cases of smallpox, no school or church, no doctors and what seemed to be a miracle, no deaths. School was started again in March and everyone had red measles. Of course, I had to have measles harder than was necessary. Again my mother didn’t expect me to live.

For recreation we went horse back riding. The dances were all under the direction of the Mutual. In the winter time they had a dance every week.

When I was fifteen, I went to Oakley with a group to learn some new dances. (Grouse Creek at the time belonged to Cassia Stake.)  Oscar A. Kirkham was the director. We learned several dances, then taught them to the Grouse Creek people. I sang in the church choir for several years. I was mutual secretary for three years, 1916-18. The winter of 1916-17 I lived in Ogden for three months. I worked for Mrs. C.J. Humphrey for a few weeks, then at the Wisteria Ice Cream Parlor.

Of course, I had boy friends. Being one of ten children we always had crowds of boys and girls at our house. Always on Sundays we fed from twelve to twenty people. One time my sister, Hattie, slipped away with a boy after eating, before the dishes were washed. The boy took his brothers one horse buggy. They went to see my grandmother. Because Hattie left without asking if she could go, mother for once told me to leave the dishes for her to do. Hattie and the boy were washing dishes at 11:00 at night. I later married that guy.

Edward Lee & Rhoda Paskett Lee

I married Edward Lee on November 18, 1919. We went to Phoenix, Arizona for our honeymoon. We stayed there for eighteen months. Our first child, Ivan Edward, was born at Phoenix. In March 1921 we moved back to Grouse Creek. In July we moved to Malta, Idaho. Our second child, Cleon, was born on February 1, 1922 at Malta. In the summer of 1922 we went to Black Pine Mountainto work at a saw mill with Edward’s brother, Joseph. I moved back to Grouse Creek for the winter of 1922-23. We moved to Montello in April 1923 to work on the railroad. Third and fourth babies, Edith and Rulon, were born in Montello. Moved to Etna (about five miles from Grouse Creek) in June 1925. Curtis was born at Etna. We proved up on a homestead while living at Grouse Creek in 1927. We came to Oakley in October 1928. Five children were born in Oakley:  Louise, Thurman, Joseph Wayne and Mary Jane (twins) and Helen. Louise was killed in a car accident in May 1932.

Front Row – Cleon, Helen, Rhoda, Jane, Ivan Back Row -Thurman, Rulon, Curtis, & Wayne Lee

For eight years I was on the Primary Stake Board with Rosetta B. Robinson as President. I was President of the Oakley 4th ward primary for two years, 1935-37, two years with Sister Don Matthew on as the Stake President. I was Stake Officer, Ward President and a Seagull teacher all at the same time. Three daughters graduated from the Seagull class with me as their teacher. I worked in the Primary for twenty-five years altogether.

Rhoda died on June 14, 1989 at Monticello, Utah at the age of eighty-nine and she is buried in the Oakley, Idaho cemetery.