Ira Rice was born in Massachusetts in 1793.  His great great grandfather may have changed the name from “Royce” to “Roys,” and his grandfather may have changed it to “Rice.”  Ira Rice’s father served in the Revolutionary War, and Ira served in the War of 1812 under Captain Joseph Hart’s company of Colonel Peter Allen’s regiment.  Ira had a close call with the British when they pushed him back to the river below Niagara Falls, and he had to swim to escape.  Shortly after the war he married Minerva Saxton, but she died a few years later.  He then went to Michigan to settle in wild country made available to veterans, where he lived with his new wife Sarah Ann Harrington.  Missionaries found them there, and they converted and moved to Nauvoo.  Ira and his family acquired property and some fine horses, and had a nice house by the temple, but after the martyrdom of Joseph Smith their home was burned down by a mob.  They fled during the winter, and during the trek west got as far as Mount Pisgah before Brigham Young sent Ira back for supplies.  Ira helped Orson Pratt’s and Lorenzo Snow’s families go west.  From Winter Quarters, Brigham Young sent Ira back again, to get grain in Nauvoo.  Eventually Ira made it into the Valley with Captain Edward Hunter’s 100 in September of 1847, wintered at “Old Fort,” and built a log cabin in what is now Farmington.  He had come forward alone, but the next year his children came out.  Sarah was not with them; she may have died along the trail.  The family lived in Ogden and then in Cache Valley, which was wild enough that the area made for, on one occasion, a dramatic, multi-day grizzly hunt for a marauding bear that took its toll on the hunters before it was killed.  By now, Ira had married a third time, to Elizabeth Ann Morris Butler, who had crossed the plains by handcart, had been a housekeeper for the Rices, and then married Ira.  At 73, Ira volunteered to help colonize Utah’s Dixie, and headed south for the “Muddy” on a cotton mission.  Brigham Young saw him and told him he didn’t need to go, but they were already on the way so they continued.  A flood near Beaver Dam in southwest Utah washed away their belongings, sickness set in, and they were released to go back to Cache Valley.  Ira died on the way back in 1868, in St. George.

This information is taken from “Pioneers, Patriots, and Saints: Ancestors of Edgar Odell Wake and Siblings.”  Additional genealogical information is available at the FamilySearch web site.

In 1800, William Orville Smith was born in Connecticut.  He married Emily Jane Spinnings, and was one of the first settlers in Farmington, Deseret, where he died in 1849.  Through one of his other wives he was the father of Lot Smith, who was a friend of Orrin Porter Rockwell and leader of the raiders who turned back the Army during the Utah War and forced them to winter in Wyoming.

Born in 1814 in New York, Emily Jane Spinnings married William Orville Smith, and was one of the first settlers in Farmington, Deseret.  She died there in 1891.

Born in Rhode Island in 1801, Sarah Ann Harrington married Ira Rice and found herself in the wilds of the Michigan, raising a family of twelve children (Ira had children from his first wife, who had died).  The family moved to Nauvoo after joining the Church, and she received her endowments in the Nauvoo temple, and was blessed by patriarch Hyrum Smith.  The family prospered in Nauvoo, but they were eventually driven out by mobs.  Sarah may have died on the trek west while her husband was further ahead establishing a home in northern Utah.

Francillo Durfee was born in Vermont in 1812.  The surname has been spelled “Durfey,” “Durffy,” “Durphee,” and “Durphy.”  In 1816 there were freezes all year round, so the crops died, and the family had to cut and burn trees to make potash to sell.  Sisson Chase, an LDS missionary, found the family and baptized them, and led them to Nauvoo.  There, Francillo received a patriarchal blessing from Hyrum Smith.  In 1844 the family went to the Mansion House to view the martyred prophet Joseph Smith.  In the fall, while Francillo was away getting supplies, a mob turned his family out of their home and burned it, and stole their cattle.  His wife Miriam died of pneumonia, and the rest of the family fled to the Camp of Israel on the west bank of the Mississippi, and endured a cold winter before heading west in the spring.  After many problems with mud, they set on staying in Council Bluffs for a time.  Francillo’s father had fought in the Revolutionary War to free Americans, but the Saints had to flee America because of religious persecution.  Meanwhile,Thomas Kane’s discussions with President Polk led to the recruitment of the Mormon Battalion, and Francillo joined Company C under Captain James Brown, with young Jarvis Johnson going along with his great uncle Frank.  Francillo and Jarvis scouted and hunted for the company, shooting a grizzly with a single shot in one instance.  Some of the battalion became sick (which was not helped by a doctor giving the men a mixture of calomel and arsenic), and as the main group headed toward Santa Fe, Francillo went with the sick detachment to Pueblo.  The next summer he headed for Fort Laramie, and en route was surrounded by a party of Sioux.  Francillo rode out and spoke to them in tongues, shook hands, and travelled onward.  They found Brigham Young on the trail west, and entered the Salt Lake Valley in July of 1847.  Francillo opened with prayer the first meeting in the Old Bowery.  The next year, Brigham Young sent Francillo and other Mormon Battalion members east to help other emigrants, and the year after that Francillo brought his family into the Valley.  Brigham Young later called from the pulpit for Francillo and others to go on the Salmon River Mission, proselyting among the Indians in the northern Rockies in Idaho; Francillo served as captain of that mission, under the mission president Thomas Smith.  That mission had to be rescued when Shoshones attacked it at the start of the Utah War.  Francillo died in Providence, Deseret in 1871.

Also “Mariam,” “Marion,” or “Marian,” depending on the record; she was born in 1809 in New Hampshire.  Her father was a clockmaker, who learned his trade from his father.  She received her patriarchal blessing from Hyrum Smith.  She and Francillo Durfee had a cabin in Nauvoo, but while he was away for supplies a mob forced her into the snows and burned her home, and she died of pneumonia.  Miriam was buried in Nauvoo in 1845.

“Parker” in some English records, Frederick Barker was born in England in 1800, and came to America with his wife Ann Bligh on the ship “New Brunswick,” seeking a better life.  Smallpox struck many on the voyage, and killed the wife of Frederick’s brother George.  In New York they joined the Church, and in 1846 headed to Illinois in a horse drawn wagon after the main body of Saints had already evacuated the city.  They stopped briefly at the Nauvoo temple to climb to the roof before crossing the Mississippi to Iowa.  Then they built a cabin and put in crops, and in 1849 went on to Council Bluffs, joining Captain Allen Taylor’s company of 100 to go to Zion.  Frederick initially took his family to Sessions Settlement (now Layton) and then to Broom’s Fort (now Ogden).  There, the murder of Chief Terekee by a settler, and Chief Walker’s Ute uprising, made things interesting, as did cricket infestations of the crops.  Frederick lived the Principle, and his wife Ann either took exception to that or to something else, since it seems she divorced him and married his brother.  There isn’t a lot of family information on that turn of events.  He died in 1866 in North Ogden.

Alternatively “Blye,” “Blygh,” or “Blyghe,” she was born in England in 1802.  She married Frederick Barker and came to New York on the “New Brunswick” seeking a better life; the ship suffered a smallpox breakout on the crossing.  In New York she and her husband joined the Church and headed west.  However, either she took exception to Frederick’s practice of plural marriage or to some other thing, because she divorced him and married his brother George. She had a number of dramatic encounters with Indians.  In one instance a Ute killed a Bannock, ran off his wife, and took his little sister.  He was dragging her through the settlements while begging, and cutting on her as he went.  Ann hid the girl under a bed, and then in a haystack when the Utes came to look for her.  Little Soldier threatened Ann, and Uncle George—who the Indians called Look-a-here because he always said “look here”—chased them off.  Later, more of the tribe came, and President Farr said they had best give the girl up.  When the Indians took her they began cutting on her, and one of Ann’s daughters , Harriet (Frederick’s daughter), and Harriet’s friend Louvisa Bronson, ran out and pulled her back.  The Indians were so impressed by their bravery that they let the Indian girl go.  However, when the girl’s brother later came to get her and she left with him, they ran into Little Soldier and the brother traded her to him.  She fled, and Ann hid her again.  When Little Soldier showed up, Uncle George went out to talk to him and his group.  He spoke in their language for a long time.  They said it was the voice of the Great Spirit, and left.  On a different occasion Uncle George teased an Indian that he would sell Harriet for buffalo horses, and when the Indian actually brought some horses, Uncle George had to hide her and get himself out of that situation.  Yet another time Ann was ironing, and Indians came in and demanded bread and threatened to burn the baby if they did not get any.  Uncle George limped out and they made fun of him and his cane, but he commanded them to leave in the name of Jesus Christ, and they left immediately.  Years later, Little Soldier came by Ann’s home feeling dejected about the treatment of his tribe, the loss of their weapons, and their growing poverty.  She spoke to him in Shoshone, told him about the Book of Mormon and its promises to his ancestors, and he left feeling better; Little Soldier eventually became a Latter-day Saint.  Ann died in 1870 at Mount Fort, Deseret.

Hyrum Smith Rice, born in 1844 in Nauvoo, also went by William Hyrum Rice.  In Deseret he tended sheep, boiled salt from the Great Salt Lake, raised livestock, and freighted.  He married Olive Emily Smith and ranched in Idaho territory, at Round Mountain in Cassia County, a way station for freighters.  When the completion of the railroad cut down on stage and mail traffic near Round Mountain, he moved to The Cove in Almo.  Hy didn’t much care for the “Smith” in his name.  He had a drinking problem, and was kindest when sober.  In 1906, he died in Malta, Idaho.

Born in 1845 in Iowa, Olive Emily Smith was a religious woman whose brother, Lot Smith, was a Mormon raider during the Utah War.  She wound up marrying Hyrum Smith Rice, who wasn’t so religious.  In 1886 she was in a wagon when her husband was trying to get a colt used to being harnessed with other horses, and the team spooked when a dog chased a chicken by the wagon; Olive pitched out of the wagon and broke her arm.  A few weeks later she died of infection from the break, was buried on the family ranch, and was later reburied in Farmington.

In 1883 Henry Dennison Durfee was born in New York.  As an adult he was an express rider for Brigham Young, and was also sent out repeatedly to help pioneers come across the plains.  He also went to California during the gold rush.  In addition, he went on the handcart rescue, and he went on the Salmon River Mission rescue where he helped save his father from Indians.  When the Army invaded Deseret he evacuated south to Sugar Creek near Payson, and eventually returned to settle in Providence, where he was the first constable of the town.  He lived in Beaver Dam in northern Utah, then in remote Connor Springs, where they had to shop in Corinne (once of the territory’s wildest towns).  Next they went to Idaho to live in Almo.  He married Jane Isobelle Barker, and endeavored to always have family prayers, to read the Bible to his children, and to rest on Sunday.  He lived to be 82, dying in Almo in 1916.

Born in New York in 1839, Jane Isobelle Barker was brought west to Nauvoo after the Saints had already begun to evacuate, and she sat on the steps of the empty temple and cried.  Then the family ferried across the Mississippi.  Three years later they went on to the Salt Lake Valley.  Along the way she gathered buffalo chips for fuel, played, and danced.  Once Indians came into camp demanding meat, and across the camp saw a pan with buffalo chips in it that Jane had put out.  They thought it might be meat, and that night they snuck back and stole the pan.  When the family got to Zion there was not a lot of civilization.  They got sugar from beets, but didn’t have much flour.  The Barkers went north to the Weber County area, where Jane married Henry Dennison Durfee.  She was shy, but spoke frequently in tongues, and on one occasion Eliza Snow interpreted for her, saying she had spoken in Hebrew.  In 1927 she died in Almo.

In 1869, Nathaniel Able Rice was born in Providence, Deseret, although he would grow up in Almo, Idaho.  When his mother died there the children scattered.  Nathaniel worked in Idaho, Utah, and Nevada with cattle, and returned to Almo to marry his sweetheart Alice Jane Durfee.  With Lorenzo Durfee he bought some land but also worked at roadbuilding, haying, dairying, and building the Vipont mine.  Nathaniel came from rough stock, but his wife guided him toward church, and together they built a prayerful family.  He brought his extended family back together at the ranch.  Nathaniel was known for having a word that was better than a bond.  If he had men working under him and a contractor didn’t pay, be paid his men himself.  Nathaniel loved spirited horses, and one of his favorites kicked him, causing a series of strokes.  He died at St. Mark’s hospital in Salt Lake City in 1904, and was buried in Almo.

Alice Jane Durfee was born in Box Elder County in Deseret, in 1872.  Her parents moved to the remote area of Connor Springs, where there were only three other families nearby.  She liked to dig Sego lilies, play in a cave, and explore, but lost some of her curiosity when she fell into a deep spring covered with watercress; her brother saw her fall in, and saved her from drowning.  The family went back to Beaver Dam (the one in northern Utah territory), and then to Almo, Idaho, to a leaky, dirt roofed, dirt floored cabin.  She got through eighth grade in Almo, sometimes going to school on horseback, sometimes by sleigh.  Settlers were at time afraid of the Indians, who had supposedly ambushed a wagon train in City of Rocks a few years earlier (that story is now disputed by some historians).  Once when she got lost, an Indian found her and took her home.  When her husband Nathaniel Able Rice died, she became impoverished.  The county had begun giving out some widow pensions, but when she heard a woman speak critically about a widow in Elba who had a pension, Alice did not want to suffer similar criticism and so did not seek one.  She got a weaving loom to make rugs, and her children worked, so they survived, and through it all she maintained her faith in the priesthood and its ability to help her family.  Alice lived to be over one hundred years old, dying in 1873, and is buried with many other family members at Sunny Cedar Rest in Almo.

Janie Isabelle Rice was born in Almo in 1894, and grew up with cold winters and cougars prowling around the home.  She ran free, trying to catch lynx kittens, climbing at City of Rocks, and at age eight walking to a log cabin school.  Her appendix burst when she was small, and the doctor wanted to operate right there at the Rice home, but her mother chose to rely on a priesthood blessing instead, and Janie lived.  As a young woman there were dramatic programs, sleigh rides, rabbit drives, and dances above Tracy’s store.  Her father died when she was ten, and not long into her own marriage to Charles Francis Wake he died, leaving her a widow for most of her life.  Janie was patient and hardworking, making soap, cooking to feed a threshing crew, and doing all the rest that comes with ranch life.  At one point she had a gas powered washer, and in the 1940’s her son Edgar bought her a refrigerator, which was an amazing appliance.  When Janie’s mother died, Edgar packed Janie off to California to live with him and his family, and she was astonished and delighted by the airplane ride.  However, she got homesick and soon went back to the ranch.  For her grandchildren the ranch was a fun place to visit, to sit eating green apples with a salt shaker, or to ride a horse Uncle Wes saddled up.  Janie spent her final years in a rest home in Burley, where she occasionally entertained the facility by singing “Born in the U.S.A.” over the intercom.