Adelia was born on March 1st 1882 in Plain City, Utah to Andrew and Hilda Peterson. Andrew had immigrated from Sweden quite a few years back but for Hilda it was all new. She had only arrived in the United States 17 months prior at the end of 1880. Hilda was just learning the new language and learning how to take care of an adorable daughter without any family to help her out.
Adelia grew and as she did so did the family and her responsibilities around the house. She was the oldest with five brother’s and a much younger sister at home and Hilda relied upon her to help out, taking care of her younger siblings and working around the house to cook, clean and sew. Adelia’s father, Andrew was a farmer and worked hard to provide for the family. She grew up with Swedish roots and learning about the Swedish culture.
Delia met Neils who was living in Riverton, Utah and fell in love with this much older man. It was glamorous thinking about moving away from the six younger siblings and marrying Neils. Soon after on Nov, 18, 1896, they both married at the very young age of 14 to Neils Rasmussen who was at the time 28 yrs. old. She moved from rural Plain City, Utah to a small farm in South Jordan, Utah to begin their new life together. Neils was a farmer and his younger brother Hans lived with them working during the day hiring out to other farmers.
She had three children, at the time and one of them dying as an infant. Married life with all the work of raising a family, living on a farm was to much for Adelia. She was constantly doing chores, washing laundry, cooking the meals, cleaning up and watching the children. Life was hard with so much more to do and going to bed every night exhausted isn’t everything that she thought married life would be. It looked as if from someone looking in, that the world came crashing all around and she didn’t know what to do. The responsibilities of motherhood bearing down on her like a heavy weight.
Adelia doesn't love Niels packs up her belongings leaving the children behind
She didn’t love Neils any longer and life being married to him was suffocating. She felt trapped and had a hard time growing up so fast when she was just a child herself. She walked out the door and left young Marion, age 6 and Carl, age 5 with their father and went back to her family’s home with her Mom and Dad in East Garland not knowing that yet again, she was pregnant with another child, Warren Edward whom she would leave with her mother, Hilda to raise. In November of 1904 Niels filed for a divorce alleging cruelty and desertion. Adelia’s testimony before Judge Armstrong in January 1905 claims, “Adelia told Neils on multiple occasions that the relationship was over and she no longer loved him, packing up her belongings and leaving her young, innocent children without ever looking back.” Later that year as the divorce was finalized, she gave birth to her fourth child Warren at her Mother’s home in East Garland in April of 1905 just a few short months after her divorce.
Neils remarried less than a month later to a Miss Emma Roth who he met in divorce court. She left her husband because he ran away with her little sister leaving her with a toddler, Albert. After marrying Neils in February of 1905 she got pregnant with Leona. Emma’s daughter Leona was the same age basically as Warren and there was no way she could take care of two babies so Warren grew up with his Grandmother Peterson. Neils and Emma had six children and raised Marion and Carl as if they were their own. Later in life Marion sought out her mother, Delia and formed a relationship with her but Carl wouldn’t have anything to do with his mother or the Lundeen family. (Later in life Howard reached out to his family and was rejected from any communication with them)
Shortly after Adelia had Warren she left and moved in with David Charles Lundeen in 1906, when Warren was not yet a year old. David lived in West Jordan and for a period of time when Delia was married to Neils, she lived in South Jordan. It’s not clear how Adelia met David but possibly they would have met while Delia lived in South Jordan with Nels. East Garland where Delia was living with her parents was 86 miles North of West Jordan. So how they met and when they decided to have a relationship isn’t clear. They were twelve years apart, Adelia just 25 yrs. old and David was 37 yrs. old. David had never previously married, his mines and working with his brother, Joseph were his life. She fell in love with the idea and enthusiasm David had for mining and the prospect of getting rich. He came from a good Swedish family. She was young and beautiful with long dark hair and striking eyes. He had fallen for her charm and beauty. She felt like living with David a miner would be a welcome change to the hard work of farm life. Just the previous year in 1905 David’s father passed away and was buried in the West Jordan Cemetery.
He dressed extremely nice in suits when he was home and when he was at work he was gone for long periods of time mining coming home when he could. Under these conditions David Russell was born in March 1907 just 19 short months after her last baby, Warren Edward whom she left in East Garland with her mother. The mines seemed to be producing and they had money to spend Life seemed to be moving in a positive direction. On April 9, 1907 the Salt Lake Herald Reported, “David Lundeen leaves soon for Dugway to visit his mining interests there.” She had another beautiful daughter, Lucille a little over two years later. Soon after times were tough, mining didn’t bring in a lot of money and David Charles wasn’t home much of the time to help out with the children, or just have an adult to talk with in the evenings. They seemed to be barely scraping by to put food on the table and clothe the children let alone buy nice things for her or their home. In January of 1912 Howard Kenneth was born in Midvale, Utah. It was a hard time for the family. Some of the mining shares that David Charles sunk his life saving in were delinquent and fines were levied upon some of the remaining shares. David was made President of the Bonanza Mining Company in Dugway. When Howard was almost a year old in January of 1913, David reports that he found some gold and silver in one of the mines in Dugway.
This picture was taken in 1907 around the same time that Adelia and David were raising their family in that area. Early West Jordan relied primarily on agriculture, mills, and mining activity to form the base of its economy. The Census in 1910 reports a population of 1,760 residents.
He’d hoped it would be of considerable value. It was up and down with the mining and whether they had the money they needed to get by remains to be seen. The frustration of not having what they needed and just trying to scrape by was a breaking point for Adelia, and yet again in 1917 she packed up her belongings and left another husband for the second time but this time she took the children with her. And in October of 1917 she married Ross Smith (30 yrs. old) who was this time two years younger then she was at 32 yrs. old., in Logan, Utah. They didn’t remain in Utah very long. Shortly after marrying, by 1920 they moved to 2808 19th Ave. S. Seattle, Washington. The house is still standing today that they lived in.
Ross’s occupation was a Machinist in a Shipyard. Five years after getting married they had a daughter, Cora Margaret in 1922, and they moved to California shortly after in 1925. Ross worked for The Los Angeles Herald Express as a machinist. And during the 30’s he was with Warner Bros. and Twentieth Century Fox Movie Studios, then with the Meier Brewing Co. He went from one job to the next working for the rest of his life as a machinist of sorts.
Little known facts about Ross Smith
Howard Lundeen’s View of Life At Home
Howard Lundeen recalls as a child moving around more times then he cares to recall. Here are a few of his memories.
“Mother married again about this time to help provide a home for us. She married Ross D. Smith whose birth place had been Rochester, New York. He was dark and had features with high cheek bones, and curving pointed nose that would indicate some Indian ancestry. The time, place and condition of this marriage I do not recall. The first residence I do remember was a big two story home located somewhere just south and east of the county court building in Salt Lake City. It was here that Richard Sexton, my sister Marian’s baby contracted small pox and the entire family, with the exception of my step-father became ill with quite serious cases. The doctor first diagnosed it as chicken pox and after a period of quarantine changed his diagnosis to small pox– then considered very contagious and dangerous. Our quarantine ran longer as a result of this and life was dreary–and very boring being shut up day after day. Our only sorties to the outside were from the second story window to a porch roof where we sunned ourselves while trying to construct sun dials on the shingled roof. The most vivd recollection here was making numerous articles out of the small empty wooden cigar boxes that our stepfather used to drop off for our use. We certainly valued them as they could be converted into doll furniture, wagons and carts that we harnessed to the pet cat– and numerous other items carved or nailed together.
When I was about six years old, our little family moved to Seattle, Washington, where we lived during part of World War I. My step-father worked in the Seattle shipyards at this time, 1918-1919. Our residence was a wooden framed house on Beacon Hill. The great Influenza epidemic of 1918-1919 comes vaguely to memory. I recall that when people left their homes, they were required to wear a gauze mask of some sort to try to keep from spreading or receiving germs.
Following World War I– I’m not sure of the year — we returned to Garland, Utah where my stepfather went into business as a garage mechanic. It was mushrooming years in the automotive industry. It was here in Garland that my half sister, Cora Margaret Smith, was born on April 14, 1922.
These were unsettling years 1923-1932... Where to call home?
In the year 1923, my stepfather, who was not doing well in Garland and had a wanderlust, moved us all to California. We located in Whittier. Ross, my stepfather, continued to work as a machinist in a shop in Whittier and later in the adjacent oil fields. As a result we moved to Long Beach, California in about 1925 and lived in a very small house at the base of Signal Hill– one of the great producing oil areas in the country. A little later we moved to Lemon Street in North Long Beach…. We really weren’t there long before moving to Los Angeles where we located first, I believe, on Union Avenue, south of Washington Blvd. Later we moved to a flat on Raymond Avenue near Jefferson; then to an apartment on Adams Blvd; to an address on 37th Place; to an apartment on the corner of Venice Blvd and Grand Avenue; to a basement apartment with my brother David while my folks were in San Francisco; to a house on 14th Street where I attended Magnolia Street School; to a flat on Vermont Avenue at Venice Blvd; to a flat on 5th Avenue, south of Washington Blvd; to a house on 18th Street, one block north of Washington Blvd; to a house at 1119-1/2 Kenmore Avenue; to a house on Sycamore at Delongpre in Hollywood; and then to a house at 7531 Hampton Avenue in Hollywood which was our residence when I entered the service. My folks then moved to a house in Burbank on Griffith Park Ave, where Mother was living when she passed away of uterine cancer.
I merely list the homes I can recall because these were unsettled years. It is difficult to place them in exact order. It was, however, while living in the basement apartment with my brother David on South Flower St., that I was called to San Francisco where my stepfather was temporarily working. I spent approximately three cold, foggy and bleak months in that area residing with my parents in a dingy apartment, typical of hundreds in the city. I did not attend school there. I was about fourteen at that time.
During high school David and Lucille had long since left home and given up their schooling to go to work. There were some poignant and embarrassing memories during this period, though because our family was quite poor. If my stepfather made good money, it never seemed to be available for more than the bare essentials. Therefore, the social activities to which I was invited always found me in clothes which I was ashamed… After high school, college was out of the question due to financial hindrances and the severe depression period. It became most urgent that I find work and help myself and my family.
It was during these years Grandma Peterson used to visit us, particularly during the winter months. We also had my Uncle Eph and Warren come to live with us for various lengths of time. My brother married in 1929 and Lucille married quite young as well. David had two children, but shortly after his marriage in 1932, shortly after I graduated from High School David died after an extended illness.
From our home in Hollywood, I received my notice to report for induction into the service at Fort McArthur. Just before my departure, I was saddened to learn that my mother had cancer and that she was already undergoing treatment.
A surprise visit was made to my mother’s home on Griffith Park Drive in Burbank. She had no idea I was returning and was truly stunned by my sudden appearance on January 22, 1943. This was a memorable visit because it was the last time I saw my dear mother before her death on Sept. 10, 1943, at the age of sixty-one. With her passing, my home ties were severed and the feeling overcame me that there was no place to call home.
