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Show mu ' ,'1 FOCUS' May '22-Ma- y 281980 Pearl Hortin favorite .teacher Oakley could be heard for miles and served to keep time for the whole town. Pearl attended school in Oakley for eight years after which all the students took "a stiff two day examination in Kamas." Those who passed the exam celebrated their graduation in Park City with other students from all over the county. (This was in the days before Summit County was divided into three school districts.) As Pearl remembers it was very exciting. After graduation. Pearl attended the Summit Stake Academy in Coalville for one year until the high school was built in Kamas. It took one hour for the students from Oakley to ride to school in Kamas and Pearl boasts that she only missed school a few days a year. If the weather was below she explained, we stayed home. In 1916, she finished with honors in the first graduating class of the high school and went on to get a teaching .degree Jfrom the University. ' of Utah.-Peataught School ' in Oakley and Kamas for 23 years. In the interim Pearl Fransen met and married W. Eugene Hortin. Hortin served in the calvary and his 0, rl A family tree served as Pearls place card at last years family reunion. - By Nan Chalat Tulips and daffodils and valley. "My Father and the terraced rock garden giving way later in the summer to asters and pan- industrious people. They cleared the land of its sagebrush, oak and rock and they dug the ditch to bring the water from the river to the thirsty rich soil of the farm. Crops grew fast and when fall came the barn was overflowing with hay, the grainery was full of grain and sies in a continual evolution of flowers. On sunny days closer observation, reveals-bonnet bobbing up and down a among the beds. Pearl Hortin is ruthless with dandelions but a visitor who stops to chat is treated to a warm 'smile and a bouquet. If Pearl isn't gardening she is most likely at the Senior Citiens Center in Kamas, or singing in the Oakley Choir, or attending a meeting of her literaiy club,-oteaching at Relief Society or visiting her 17 grandchild- ren. During the last week of ' stormy weather which kept the cellar was full of vegetable; and potatoes and with shelf after shelf filled with jams, jellies and fresh fruits." There were special tasks for each of the. .children, Pearl gathered eggs, watched the sheep on the mountain and helped to milk the cows. When she was six she started school and r everyone indoors, Pearl got an early start on this year's ' Christmas presents for her growing family. Pearl Hortin was born on Feb. 10, 1897 at the mouth of the Weber Canyon in Oakley. Her memories of riding to school on horseback chumms'-butter-fomom and r piano. Eugene Hortin was a carpenter and farmer, he worked in the mines in Park City and also worked hauling timber. He built the home that is now surrounded by Pearl's flowers in 1930. Eugene passed away in 1960. Pearl is as sunny these days as her flowers. She glows with pride in her sons and their wives and children. She is also by virtue, of Mother were hard working creeping phlox drape over . portrait hangs above the catching gophers for dad bring back an era that seems to have passed away long ago. From Pearl's handwritten notes, we are reminded of the strength of character it must have taken to settle the Across the road from the intersection of Center and Main in Oakley a certain hillside is always the first to burst into bloom each spring. laughs when she explains that the children often rode two to three on a horse. "In 1904 the community built a new brick two room school house with hardwood floors and a big bell on top of the building which rang each morning recess and noon to call the children to class." having taught so many children a sort of grandmother to the whole com- . munity and she. confided, "Fond : . ' memories . pass through my mind of the choice girls and boys who passed through my dasses. I . have always been happy about their successes and felt sorry when they - had troubles." At 83, she drives her own car and as she puts it, "I go when I please and I . come home when I please." . is one of those ladies. She . that most of us look up to and . think to ourselves, I hope Im like Pearl when I am 83.' J i i ncsEn . a Pearls garden Is the toast of downtown Oakley. - ' M rn Evan at 83 years of age, it is' tough to catch Pearl Hortin at home. M f t (I M H I I M . I . i 1 -'i ri i . t ...M i |