Our friend and neighbor for 15 years, Rowland Smart, was a legend in his own time, and we loved him dearly. “Rowly” (or “Rowley”) was the only living early-settler “pioneer” I’ve known. A great area in which to raise our five children in the 1980’s, East Mill Creek (three words, according to early inhabitants Kay and I knew) still had pockets of rural pioneer life, look and feel. The most obvious was the Smart property on 39th South (SLC), where the owner, Rowland Smart, lived in the old white frame house he was raised in. Kay and I were privileged to enjoy Rowly’s friendship, and to feel welcome in his home. Entering it was like time travel back to the late 1800’s.
Rowly was nearly 90 years old, a WWII (Europe) and Korean War veteran, good Christian, never married, had no children, but frequently shared his sage advice on marriage and parenting. This down-to-earth farmer was also generous with his garden produce and other gifts delivered in his old repainted blue pickup truck.
A regular gift was Brother Smart’s monthly written message, often in his unique cursive writing (on backs of used paper) for me to type up (correcting numerous misspellings while preserving his special “voice”). Many were already typed by other helpers, and photocopied for friends. As I recall, most were personal experiences – true (we believed) stories from his amazing life. I still have them in Grandfather’s file cabinet (my OCH) and on floppy disks (right) for possible publication.
I have a feeling Rowly would approve of my sharing excerpts from his monthly “blog”.
