Introduction

Childhood

Courtship and Marriage

Education

Teaching

Touring

Scouting

Theater

History and Politics

Farming

Church Service

Mission President

Temple Presidency

Ashcroft Observatory

Family

Funeral

Photo Gallery

Touring

“Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all of one’s lifetime.”

― Mark Twain

The College was always looking for ways to keep the faculty busy during the summers.  This led to Theron’s touring ventures.  Theron was too busy teaching, farming, surveying, and serving in the church to have hobbies, but he did love to read books – especially history books.  About the only time he ever relaxed was in the evenings when he would sit by the fireplace and read.  He knew so many stories about Church History, about the history of our country, and he especially loved local history and geology.  He would read everything he could find about a place or an event such as the Mountain Meadows Massacre, the Hole in the Rock expedition, the Zion Narrows, Cable Mountain, Jacob Hamblin (friend to the Indian), Silver Reef, Hurricane Mesa.  He loved the National Parks and the beautiful scenery of Southern Utah.  He knew where to find geodes, petrified wood, arrowheads, and fossils.  He had cousins living among the Native American Indians in New Mexico and became interested in all things Indian.  He made many trips to the Three Mesas area in Northern Arizona.  He became a welcome figure on Walpi Mesa and was personal friends with many of their artisans – potters, basket weavers, jewelry makers, and dancers.  They invited him into their homes and shared their freshly baked piki bread.  He bought their crafts and praised them.  They even invited him into their kivas for their religious ceremonials.  Daddy was a teacher, and he wanted to share all these things with others.  He took his family, then he took his friends, and then he wanted to extend the opportunity to the community and beyond.

As a drawing card for summer students, the college offered a series of tours for college credit.  They tried to offer a short educational or historical tour every weekend and then one long tour at the conclusion of the summer session.   Their shorter tours were to the Indians, Jacob Hamblin's Home, Brigham Young's Winter Home, Hole-in-the-Rock, Dead Horse Point, Mountain Meadows and Arches National Monument.  Lucretia agreed to provide a home-cooked meal on each of the tours – potatoes and fried chicken in the dutch oven, set jellos, crisp tossed salads, home baked pies, and ice cold drinks.  It is hard to believe she could lug all the equipment, cook over an open fire, and provide such a banquet in the most remote locations imaginable.  While she cooked, Theron would give amazing lectures, share history, tell stories, and inspire gratitude and pride.  They were quite a pair, and countless students, community members, and tourists throughout Utah and neighboring states have fond memories of wonderful food and fellowship with Theron and Lucretia.

The following paragraph was clipped from a Christmas card from H. Reese Anderson, Director of Pupil Personnel for the Uintah School District following a 1963 trip with Theron to the Indians, in connection with a College of Southern Utah conference on interpersonal relationships.

“I’ll probably remember the week-end in the middle of the conference even longer than the conference itself. Eight of us, under the stimulating leadership of two Mormons (Theron and Gail Lindstrom) who had had long and close friendships with the Indians of the Southwest, drove to the new Glen Canyon Dam now under construction, and on to Navajo and Hopi reservation areas. We saw authentic tribal dancing – for the benefit of the Indians, not the tourists – and visited homes of Indian families well known to our leaders. We saw and heard things that would have been impossible except in the company of true friends of the Indians. Then back through Jacob’s Lake and Zion National Park. The running commentary of our guides opened my eyes to the meaning of much which I had on other trips merely driven through passively, and gave me a much greater appreciation of this part of our country.”

Another letter dated August 21 (year not included):

“Dear Professor A.,

The tour of the Indian homes, mesas, and territory along with your interesting explanations was the high point of many a summer vacation which our family has been privileged to take.

This has been a rare experience for the John Moore family and we are only sorry that our 18-year-old was not along to take advantage of it.  You may be sure that much of the Hopi and Navajo folk-lore and customs will be expressed from the Methodist pulpit deep within the inner-city parish of San Francisco.  They are a truly noble people and our appreciation for them has surely been deepened this summer with your generous help.

May you have a fine year this coming summer at CSU.  Sincerely, Barbara C. Moore.”

While Pat Rogers was head of Utah Parks, Theron made arrangements with him to have a Park's Tour.  They used a college bus, but they had meals and lodging at Zion, Bryce, and Grand Canyons, and the total cost was $5 per person.  They called these 'photography tours'.

For several years, Theron was hired as a consulting engineer on Project Smart on the Hurricane Mesa.  Two winters he had twelve students working on calculators, figuring the path of the trajectory.  The students were paid a dollar an hour, which seemed fabulous to them at the time.  The college paid for the calculators and paid the students and then kept the rest of the money that the government paid for this service.  The contracts were for $10,000 at a time.  They could contract for this much without congressional approval and so they would do that much and then renew.  Through this association, Theron started taking tours to the Mesa, where they would watch a shot and then have dinner.

Another favorite touring spot was Cable Mountain, where Theron would tell the story of lumbering from the top of that mountain into Zion Canyon.  His son-in-law, Harl Judd, recorded the following in his journal:

“Theron was always thinking of something and proposing an outing or activity on the spur of the moment.  One morning he said, “Let’s go to Cable Mountain.”  He wanted to check it out and see if he could take a tour group out there sometime.  So we went.  We got in the old red pick-up with the pipe racks, and headed up Cedar Canyon, behind Navajo Lake and down the road to find the turnoff to Cable Mountain.  Those of you who have been there know that once you leave the main dirt road, the road going out to the edge is pretty rough.  Just before you reach the edge where the cable was attached and the wood was cabled up and down, the road drops off and goes over some sandstone.  In other words, at this point the road is very rough.  I was driving and so I asked Theron if we should continue.  You know what he would have said, and so down we went.  When the dugway came into view we both knew that we were in trouble.  The road had been washed out and the sand was deep on both sides.  We saw just one place where we thought we might be able to turn around and make it.  Theron’s instructions were, “Go, Go, Go!” and so we did.  We were very nearly stuck at the bottom of the dugway.  It was very rough with lots of rocks.  With some luck we made it almost to the top when we slid off one rock and high-centered on another.  We were in real trouble as we had no shovel or tools except for one single-blade ax.  With no other options available, Theron crawled under the truck to chop away at the rock.  Eventually we got off the rock and back up to the main road.

“Heading home we went via the East entrance to Zion.  We were very hungry as we hadn’t eaten all day.  We didn’t have any water.  We were very ill-prepared We stopped at a little cafe in Virgin, but we didn’t have any money.  Theron didn’t have any and neither did I.  So we looked on the floor of the truck and in the glove compartment, and we found enough money to buy one malt.  We went in, bought one malt to share on the way home.  When we got out of the cafe and into the truck, it wouldn’t start.  We waited a while and then tried it again.  Lucky for us, it finally started.  That was long, long ago, and it was a fun trip not to be soon forgotten.”

This experience is so typical of Theron.  He loved to explore, to hike, to check things out.  Sometimes he would take a friend, but often he took his family, so they had the privilege growing up of going to unusual places -- the Indian dances in Gallup, NM, Goblin Valley State Park, Arches National Monument, Dead Horse Point, gathering pine nuts in Western Utah, caving, the Zion Narrows, Cable Mountain, Mountain Meadows Massacre site, gathering geodes, trilobites, arrowheads and other fossils.

The longer trips at the end of summer school started by offering American History credit for students to go “East” for three weeks of fun and learning.  It was difficult to completely fill a bus with students, and so they started letting a few townspeople join them.  A Salt Lake City tour director filed a complaint with the Interstate Commerce Commission and they came to investigate.  They said that the college would have to be licensed to continue the program.  The college wasn't interested in securing a license and so Theron decided to get one personally.  Trailway Buses objected, saying that they offered touring service out of Cedar City, and so Theron had to go to court and pay a lawyer to secure his license.  As a result, he determined to continue using his license until it had at least paid for itself, which amounted to over $500.

Some of the longer trips included those to the Northwest, (Yellowstone, Glacier, Banff, Lake Louise, Mr. Rainier, Crater Lake, Yosemite, etc.), the Eastern Tour, (Chicago, Detroit, Boston, New York, Williamsburg, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, Nauvoo, Niagara Falls, Hill Cumorah Pageant, etc.), and Mexico, (Mexico City, Taxco, Pueblo, Yucatán, Palenque, etc.).  Twice the Eastern Tour included the World's Fair in New York and once the World's Fair in Montreal.

Their first trip to Mexico was taken in an old college bus. Theron told the people that the cost would be $100 for nineteen days and that would include all transportation and lodging. The college said that they couldn't do that without bankrupting the college and so he made arrangements to pay them mileage for the bus, buy all the gas, and pay Gene Hardy's expenses as driver. He paid for all of that and the lodging for nineteen days and refunded each tour member $15 when they arrived home. Their total trip had cost them $85 plus meals. The last trip he took to Mexico cost $558 per person and was for only eight days, but the travel was by plane.

On the second trip to Mexico, they made arrangements to go with Greyhound.  When they got to the border, they discovered that Greyhound was not authorized to travel across the border and so they were transferred to a Mexican bus line.  The driver was negligent and when they came to a narrow bridge, he honked and crossed.  A truck coming in the opposite direction also honked and crossed.  (The rule in Mexico was the first one honking had the right of way.)  Their bus hit an abutment that tore out the front section of the bus.  A girl from California was sitting in the front seat and her leg was nearly cut off at the ankle.  They grabbed a pillow case and wrapped it as best they could and tried to find help.  The bus driver had fled and was never seen again.  Eventually they found a tourist who agreed to take Theron and the injured girl into Mexico City to the hospital.  Lucretia continued with the tour.  At the American-British Calgary Hospital they got some excellent care, but it was not known that first night if they would have to amputate her leg or not.  In the morning they could see pink color in her toes and knew she would keep her foot.  After three or four days, Theron took the girl back to her home in California.  Her leg was in a cast to her hip and so he had to carry her on the plane.  The plane had trouble and had to return to the hanger for repair work.  With the delay, it was such a long flight, that it became necessary for the girl to go to the bathroom.  The stewardess couldn't lift her and so Theron had to carry her to the restroom.  She had to keep her leg elevated at all times, so Dad had to stand and hold her leg.  Of course they couldn't close the door and so it was quite an experience for her, as well as for him.

Several of the Mexican tours were taken by train.  On one such tour, they were scheduled to arrive in Mexico City at 9 a.m.  They had all retired to their berths for the night.  Suddenly there was a terrific jolt.  Theron’s impression was that they had been bombed.  There was lots of noise and dust.  The lights all went out and suitcases were sliding down the aisles.  Then there was bump following bump and they could hear moaning and groaning.  When the movement stopped, Theron got down from his berth and checked on Lucretia.  She had blood gushing and spurting from her head and said she couldn't move as her back was hurt.  Theron checked all the rest of his tour members and they were all fine.  Theron got out and looked around.  He could see immediately what had happened.  They had derailed and the cars had jackknifed.  The tour members had been in the last car, and as he walked up the train, he could see dead all along the way.  The only light he could see was a farm house several miles away and he didn't know whether to walk there for help, or what to do, when he noticed car lights coming down the track.  It was an old, broken-down ambulance.  They loaded the nine most badly hurt people in the ambulance on carriers with only slats, (no canvas) and headed to town, just bumping down the railroad and hitting every tie.  Theron hopped onto the back bumper and rode to town with them.  It was a small town, but it did have a First-Aid Station.  It was dirty, with flies everywhere, and there were bandages even on the floor.  A little Mexican boy shaved Lucretia’s head with a safety razor blade held in his fingers and then the doctor sewed it up.  He just piled the rest of Lucretia’s  badly matted-with-blood hair on top of her head and wrapped it with a bandage and said she was finished.  Theron had no idea how they would get to Mexico City.  They said there wouldn't be another train for days because of the wreck.  There were no buses in that town and the two or three taxis refused to leave town.  He didn't know what to do.  He did know that before he did much else, he must find some clothes for Lucretia.  She was still in her nightgown and robe.  He started for town, when he saw a car with New Mexico license plates.  It wasn't going and he was quite anxious to reach it, but just as he got up to it, it started, and he expected it to drive off.  It didn't however, and the people yelled at him and asked him how he had got their car to start.  They had spent the night at a little motel expecting to get up early and drive to Mexico City, but they had only gone a little ways when their car had stopped and nothing they did would make it start.  Then when Theron walked up to it, it had started.  They asked him where they could take him and he explained that he needed some clothes.  They took him to town to buy them and took him back and waited for Lucretia to get dressed and took them into Mexico City with them.  They took them to a hospital there in Mexico City for further checking and then to their hotel.  They gave them their address and said if they could help again to please contact them.  That night Theron contacted the Mission Home and had two missionaries come to administer to Lucretia, and the next day she continued the tour with them. Incidentally, buses had gone to the wreck and picked up the rest of the passengers and brought them to Mexico City.  They reached their hotel by mid-afternoon.Lucretia  found a little shop and bought some yarn and crocheted a hat and went right on as if nothing had happened.  It wasn't until after she got home that she knew she had several broken ribs.

One of the things the Ashcrofts are  proud of, is the great number of people who have traveled that never would have had the opportunity had it not been for Theron and Lucretia.  They organized tours that people could afford and were never concerned about what they could make.  Consequently, many of the good, humble people of our area have been places and seen things that they never would have done otherwise.