My father’s name was Franklin Demarcus Haymore. He was the son of Daniel Haymore Jr. and Martha Hall. My father was born at Mt. Airy, North Carolina 12 August 1849.

He could have been a drunkard. His father had a distillery, but father said when he saw how the men acted that drank liquor, he got so disgusted that he decided he did not want any. In fact father did not form any bad habits. He did not drink or use tobacco or use bad language.

When father was a young boy he played the violin by ear. About the time father was old enough to sing, all the singing schools stopped because of the Civil War. Father was a little too young to be drafted into service. I have heard father tell how they got a great number of the boys to volunteer for service. He said the people gathered at the park and the young ladies would march around and call the young men to come and march with them, and all the young men that marched with them were listed as volunteers for service.

When father was a young man he heard the Elders preach the gospel and he believed it. When father went to work he carried the "Voice of Warning" in his pocket and would often read it. Father said it was reading the "Voice of Warning" that converted him to the gospel. He said he believed the gospel was true for two years before he joined the church, but he waited because he wanted to be sure. Father fell in love with a young lady by the name of Adaline Taylor. She and her father and mother were converted to the church also, and when a company of converts decided to go to Utah to make their home with the Saints there, they were among that number. Father decided to go with them. Father said that his father did not want him to go, as he was the only living son grandfather had at that time. Grandfather offered to give father everything he had if father would stay home and not go to Utah. Grandfather was not very wealthy, about all he had was his home and a few acres of land, but he offered to give it all to father if father would just stay home with him. But father joined the church and emigrated to Utah, and he never regretted this move. Father and Adaline were married and had a number of children.

A few years later father married my mother Elizabeth Ann Lant on 22 March 1888. Father filled a mission to the Southern States. Father and Mother had four children, David Franklin, myself (Mildred), Alvino Antonio and John Lester. Our mother died when we were small children. Father was then living in Old Mexico in a little town called Colonia Oaxaca. In the meantime father's first wife Adaline had died and father had married Pearl (Wilson Brown). Pearl had one small daughter named Pearl Melissa Brown. Pearl was also taking care of Adaline's children, Arthur, Adrum, Millard, Walter, Eva and Veda. It was to Pearl that father took my Mother's three children also. Alvino Antonio had died in infancy. Later Pearl had two daughters Emma Julia and Centenna by her marriage to father. These two girls lived to maturity. Pearl lost two or three babies in infancy. Pearl was one of the most just women that I have ever known. She treated all us children exactly alike. She never showed any partiality toward her own children, but loved us all just like we were all her own children. Pearl took pains in teaching us the gospel too. She would give us a few pennies for helping her do something and then have us pay tithing on them. She so instilled the paying of tithing in us when we were little that the desire to pay tithing has always remained with me.

When I was about sixteen years old Pearl died. That left father with four girls to look after with no mother. This worried father, but father was kind to us children and he believed that religious training had a great influence on a person’s conduct, so he sent to Salt Lake and got four books of "Jake's Cattism" (catechism) and gave one to each of us girls. We were required to study one chapter a week and father had the family all gathered around the table in the evening while he asked the questions to see how many of them we could answer. The boys also took part in the discussion. We learned a great deal from it. I was the oldest girl at home after Pearl died. So I took care of the family as best I could until father later married a sister of Pearl's named Mazie (Wilson) Cluff. Mazie had a son named Orson LeRoy Cluff at the time she married father. By her marriage to father she had a son named Demarcus. He died when very young. Aunt Mazie was a good woman. But we girls did not always see eye to eye with Aunt Mazie and had our little disagreements now and then. But as we girls grew older we could look back and see where we had made mistakes, but we all respected and loved Aunt Mazie. I think a great deal of Aunt Mazie’s children too. Her oldest son LeRoy Cluff was always just like a brother to me, and I do not think that father has a son as much like him as Aunt Mazie's son Franklin. Every time we see him he is always so friendly and sociable. We are always glad to see each other. I just love Aunt Mazie's daughter Ellen Bradshaw, and my girls just love her too. My daughter Ella and Ellen lived as close neighbors for a while in Mesa and when Ellen had an important date to go on Ella would take care of Ellen's children and then Ellen would care for Ella's children when Ella needed to go somewhere. After Ella started to work Ellen took care of Ella's children in the day while Ella was at work for about a year, and was just as good to Ella's children as she was to her own. When Ellen got sick and could no longer care for her children, Ella got my second daughter Emma Merkley to care for her Children. Emma has had them now for about two years and still is caring for them at the present time. Ella has told me many times that Emma is just as good to Linda and Sherrie as she is to her own children.

When the war broke out in Mexico, and the Authorities of the church advised the people to come to the United States where life and property were safe, father hated to hear this counsel because he did not like the idea of leaving all his property and every thing that he had accumulated in a lifetime, and still father was afraid that he would make a mistake if he did not obey the counsel of the Authorities of the Church. I remember father saying "I have watched the advice of the authorities of this church for twenty years and I have never known it to fail yet. So I think I had better take their advice even though it is against my own desire."

Father soon left Mexico and settled with his family in Douglas, Arizona. About two years later father built a large nice brick house and just after we moved in father said "If I had of stayed in Mexico and not got out when the authorities of the church advised us to, I would not have had money enough to build this house with, because nearly everything that I left in Mexico I lost". A few years later a lump began to grow on his nose and it worried father so he went to see Doctor Wright about it and Dr. Wright said "It is a cancer, come down and we will cut it out for you". Father let it go for a while and the lump continued to grow larger so father went to see Dr. Lund about it and Dr. Lund said "It is a cancer and I would advise you to have it cut out right away." but father hated to have his face all disfigured by cutting the lump off so he let it go and soon after that father went to Morelos, Mexico. One morning father walked down to the river bank and father knelt down and prayed earnestly to the Lord to heal him of the cancer so he would not have to have it cut out and disfigure his face. Later father came back to Douglas, Arizona. Aunt Mazie was ill and Dr. Wright was called into the home for her. As Dr. Wright was leaving father asked him if he remembered father consulting him about a cancer on his nose and Dr. Wright said "Yes, what did you do about it?" Father said "It disappeared". Dr. Wright said you are a lucky man." A short time before Dr. Wright came to see Aunt Mazie, the family was in the front room and father came in and asked if we had noticed that the lump on his nose had gone away, but we had not noticed it had gone away until father called our attention to it. Then father told us how it happened to be gone and about the prayer that he had offered.

Note: Franklin Demarcus Haymore died in Douglas, Arizona on July 8, 1931.