Job, Elizabeth & John Pack Headstone Fundraiser – please help us replace it.

Please Help Us Replace This HeadstonePlease click on the photo for a larger view.

Tombstone Inscriptions…Rahway Cemetery…

“Pack, Job, d. April 13, 1750 (verse), in 60 y.

Elizabeth, wife of Job, d. April 13, 1750, in 56 y.

John, son of Job and Elizabeth, d. April 13, 1750, in 14 y. “

The Job, Elizabeth & John Pack headstone in Rahway, New Jersey is halfway gone.This is our only known ancestral Pack headstone in New Jersey.  Please help us replace thestone by contributing to the John Pack Family Association by June 2012.  Please send your donations to:

The John Pack Family Association 
c/o Ben Pack, goodaya@gmail.com
1097 N 910 E 
Orem, UT 84097

Or you can donate online using PayPal here:

 


 

John Pack photo album

John Pack Reunion Changed to Aug 20, 2011

The John Pack Family Association

2011 Reunion Update

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Dear Family,

For those of you new to our email list, WELCOME! (Please note that we are working to increase  our contacts and your email may have been added by a family member who loves you-unsubscribe at the bottom if desired.)

 

The annual John Pack Family Association reunion will be August 20, 2011 (NOT the 13th). This will be just after the 2011 BYU Education Week so come and enjoy both events!

 

If you are not familiar with the annual reunion, it is a wonderful wholesome recreational activity for singles and families alike. It is held at ‘This is the Place Heritage Park’ in Salt Lake City, UT. There is a replica of John Pack’s home there. There are also a host of fun activities and things to experience at the park itself. From panning for gold in a real flowing stream to riding ponies and trains, the park has a lot to offer. Block out the date now so it will not get crowded out by a busy summer! (See the park website for more info.) (Read one family members experience from last year’s reunion at the end of this email.)

 

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Also, we are looking for a volunteer to design the cover for the upcoming new John Pack book. Please contact our editor, David R. Pack if you are willing to share of your artistic skills in this manner (davidpack@cableone.net, 208-356-4779).

We have recently upgraded our contacts database to include your ancestral line. We hope this will facilitate future smaller family reunions. Please take a few minutes to complete the survey JPFA Contacts Database to enter your information into the new database. Please share this link with anyone else who may like to be on our mailing list.

There is a new entry on our website that is a transcription of a speech a family member recently gave about John Pack.

Have a great summer!

Love,
Ben Pack, JPFA President

 

 

 

P.S. Last year’s reunion experience, by Alison Pack:

 

We attended last year’s John Pack Family reunion at the pioneer village in “This is the Place” State Park, along with our son and daughter-in-law and their five children aged 2 to 12.  We were gratified to find that the trees lining the streets of the main part of the village had matured to give pleasant shade (and, where the trees ended, a novel “misting corner” had been constructed).   Having had a taste of the delights of the reconstructed village before we convened at the Social Hall (even Grandma enjoyed bowling the iron hoop and eyeing the child-size wooden stilts at one of the homes), we were excited to begin our tour, part of which was enjoyed on a train with a street route.  At the many homes and shops and public buildings we found costumed “settlers” eager to share their lives with us, and we were drawn back in time in a most delightful way.  At every home we entered there was a special, authentic activity going on which we could either observe or participate in.  The gentleman at the leather store gave us some fascinating information leading to saddles and to Pony Express riding—which was especially interesting to us as there is an ancestral connection. The knowledgeable craftsman’s wares were on sale at the pioneer store (ask the kids about the array of fascinating toys and other goodies there, too).

Further on, the kids climbed a scale model of the good ship Brooklyn, which in 1846 took a group of Church members fleeing persecution from the east all the way around the Cape and up to San Francisco.  (We were surprised to find some familiar family names on the passenger list.)   While the parents rested on the covered benches there, kids could pan for “gold” at a little stream nearby, and near the same spot one could also board a tiny train and go for a ride around the “lake.”  Shortly thereafter, we found ourselves sitting in the cool shade of an authentic Indian Hogan, hearing a Native American and her son tell how their family lived.  There were even fascinating outbuildings in the woods nearby.  What a fantastic addition to the park.

When it was time for cake and ice cream, it was a short walk to the reconstructed (air-conditioned!) John Pack home—the perfect venue for the family to get together and enjoy each other’s company.  There was much that we did not see, and we’re eager to go back this year and enjoy more of the wonderful pioneer village, while meeting all of you at our grand 2011 Reunion on August 20th!

 

The John Pack Family Association – www.johnpackfamily.com
Ben Pack – 801-225-5996


John Pack: DUP Talk – Phylis Tonks

This is a talk presented by Phylis Tonks (a John Pack Descendant) at a ‘Daughters of Utah Pioneers’ meeting in St. George in the spring of 2011

JOHN PACK

John Pack was my great-great grandfather. He was born to George Pack and Phylotte Green on May 29, 1809 in St. John, New Brunswick, Canada. He was one of twelve children. When John was eleven years old, the family moved to a farm at Hounsfield in New York State. It was close to Watertown, which was an active industrial center, and like many farm families, they visited the town as often as once a week on market day.

In October 1832, John, then twenty-three years old married Julia Ives, my great-great grandmother, in Watertown. John had purchased the farm from his father and as part of the transaction, agreed to care for his parents, who were now in their sixties.

By this time, Joseph Smith had received his revelations, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was officially organized. Missionaries were being sent all over from Kirtland, and John and Julia probably had heard of the “Mormonites,” of the “golden Bible,” and of “Joe Smith.” By 1835, traveling missionaries found John’s parents, George and Phylotte Pack, and they believed, and were baptized. Once in the Church, they could not resist the attraction of gathering with the Saints at Kirtland, Ohio, so John helped them “fit out”–get together the wagon, animals and whatever they could take with them and they left for Kirtland in the fall of 1835.

John and Julia had been married nearly four years now, and were still living on the farm in Hounsfield. They had had several discussions with visiting Elders, including Heber C. Kimball and Joseph Smith, Sr., but because of John’s strong-mindedness, he was not easily converted. Once converted, though, John’s and Julia’s lives would never be the same. They were baptized in March of 1836, and in the early spring of 1837, they sold their farm, packed all their goods and headed for Kirtland to be with John’s parents, George and Phylotte. It was here that they renewed friendships with Heber C. Kimball and other apostles and personally met Joseph Smith.

John Pack’s year in Kirtland – the spring of 1837 to the spring of 1838- was a terrible time for them because of the persecutions. John purchased a farm on the Chagrin River outside of Kirtland, intending to build a sawmill, but it was not to be. The Pack’s attended meetings in the Kirtland Temple, and they were loyal to the prophet and his defenders like Brigham Young.

In April, after selling the farm at a loss, John and Julia headed for Missouri with their two children, four-year old Ward Eaton and baby Lucy, less than a year old, and John’s parents, George and Phylotte. This was a difficult 500 mile trip in a wagon, and it took a month to arrive in Far West. They bought a farm on the Grand River, some thirteen miles away.

It was going to be a long, hot summer with many terrible things going on. Oliver Cowdery, David and John Whitmer, W. W. Phelps, and Lyman Johnson had been excommunicated and were very vocal dissenters. It seemed as if the whole area was in turmoil. Milling around were anti-Mormon mobs and Danite bands organized by a Mormon to fight fire with fire, along with bands of militia trying to keep peace.

One day, a company of immigrants came, bringing word that John’s sister, Phoebe’s husband had just died at Huntsville, Missouri, and that Phoebe was deathly sick. John and Julia headed out the next day to go get her.

Before they reached the ferry, a company of about 30 armed men met them and asked if they were Mormons. John answered with a simple “yes,” and they were told to follow them to the group’s camp. Immediately they were accosted by Sashiel Woods, a Methodist minister and leader of this mob force. He told Julia “We take you for a spy,” and “You can bid your husband goodbye; you will never see him again.”

Julia was told to go to a nearby log house, but strongly protesting, she said she would die with John. John leaned over and whispered, “Stay with the wagon and take care of the horse. I am not afraid. I will be back soon.” Led by Woods, a group of five or six men took John through the brush to a grassy clearing. Woods then delivered an ultimatum: “Here will be your grave. We are going to kill you unless you deny Joseph Smith.”

John swallowed hard. He was not one to be cowed. “Joseph Smith is a prophet of God,” he said. “Reverend Woods, you claim to be a preacher of the gospel. So do I, and I will meet you at the day of judgment.”

At that point, no one seemed willing to shoot him, and finally one of the men standing by the wagon called out, “Let that damned Mormon go.” John was brought back to the wagon, and the entire group escorted them to the ferry with the warning, “If we ever find you around here again, you won’t get off so easy.”

Arriving at Huntsville, they found Phoebe near death, so they left her three oldest children with another family and brought Phoebe and her six-month old baby back to their own home on the Grand River. Things were not much better there. Rufus, John’s brother was down with the chills and fever, and John’s 69 year- old father George was seriously ill. Sometime in October he died and was buried in Far West.

Fear of the mobs drove John to move his family into Far West. He purchased some logs and on the edge of town put up a one-room structure. It was in this “poorly lighted and poorly heated room” that twenty persons lived during the winter of 1838-39. After a number of mob encounters and the Battle of Crooked River, Governor Boggs issued the infamous extermination order that stated “the Mormons must be treated as enemies and must be exterminated or driven from the state.”

Conditions deteriorated rapidly with mob violence everywhere. After the Haun’s Mill massacre, the state militia descended on Far West, and Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon, Hyrum Smith, Lyman Wight, George Robison and Parley P. Pratt were taken prisoners and escorted to Liberty Jail. Brigham Young was left in charge.

Finally, in February of 1839 John Pack and his family left for Illinois. He settled in Perry, Illinois for about a year and then moved to Nauvoo in April of 1840. By this time, Joseph Smith and the other leaders had escaped and come back to Nauvoo. John had served a ten month mission, preaching in southern Illinois. The Nauvoo Legion was organized, and John became a captain and then a major in 1843.

Nauvoo grew rapidly, the first story of the Temple was built, John and Julia received their endowments and were sealed, and many new doctrines were introduced, including baptism for the dead and polygamy.

John Pack was called on another mission to New Jersey along with Ezra Taft Benson. They were to preach the gospel and also to promote Joseph Smith’s plans to run for president. While on this mission, in June of 1844, Joseph and Hyrum Smith were killed.

Finally, after hearing of their deaths, John returned to Nauvoo. Here, he became a member of the “Council of Fifty” and he worked in the Temple with Julia where they received all their endowments, and in January of 1846, John added three wives to his family. He was now 36, and Julia was 29, with five children of their own.

Opposition to the Mormons was now fierce, and on February, 1846, John and his entire family left for the Rocky Mountains. Their 10-month old Julia died and they moved into Winter Quarters.

In the spring of 1847, John was called to be one of the pioneers to the Rocky Mountains and they were led by the Twelve, Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball. After many trials, they reached the valley in July, where Brigham Young became very sick with mountain fever, and had to rest a few days while others pushed ahead. John Pack was in charge of the main company, bringing it into Emigration Canyon.

On the morning of July 22, he joined a small party of eight to go into the valley by horseback. Some in this group were Orson Pratt, George A. Smith, Erastus Snow and Porter Rockwell. “This is the Place Monument” has one panel showing John Pack in this group.

John Pack and the other pioneers returned to Winter Quarters in the fall of 1847 to get their families, and by April of 1848 the entire company started across the plains, reaching the Salt Lake Valley in September of 1848 after suffering many great trials.

John served seven missions, including a three -year mission to France and the Channel Islands. He died April 4, 1885, leaving many descendants. He had married eight wives and had 43 children.

New John Pack Writings Found

New John Pack Writings Found

In the September 1851 issue of “L’Etoile du Deseret” (The Deseret Star), the informative magazine published by John Taylor during the time that he and John Pack were in northern France founding a mission, there was an account of a joyous excursion on July 24th, 1851, on the Isle of Jersey, with John as president of a group of Saints, to celebrate the fourth anniversary of the entry of the Pioneers into the Salt Lake Valley. John gives an impressive address, of which the following is an excerpt (translated from the French):

“I am happy to be here amongst you, under such favorable circumstances, to celebrate with solemn ceremony the day when the Pioneers, of whom I am one, entered the valley, today the place where the Saints of God Most High live in peace. Already seven years have passed since the martyrdom of the Prophet of the Lord, since the earth drank the blood of this just and sainted man, he whose heart, filled with love for humanity, did not abandon his friends even at the moment of death, thus giving himself in sacrifice for his brethren. . . . I give thanks to God for having given me the privilege of living in these times, for having permitted me to see this day, after [many miles] of journeying with my brethren, who, like me, had left their families, their homes, to come and declare the Gospel of Christ. . . . I thank God for permitting me to see his Kingdom progress among the nations; for many prophets and patriarchs have desired to see such things, but have died without doing so.”

You will be able to read the entire speech in the new biography of John Pack when it is published. Completion of this major work is still in hand; we look forward to being able to report a publication date in a future issue of the Newsletter.

~Alison Pack, JPFA Treasurer and VP-Lucy Giles

A New Era in Family Research

A New Era in Family Research: “Those who may be mourning the closure of 24 family history centers in south Salt Lake Valley need only to step inside the new Riverton FamilySearch Library to appreciate the high-tech benefits of consolidation. The library conveniently duplicates nearly all the offerings of the Church’s larger, well-known Family History Library in downtown Salt Lake City.

 

“The Redoubtable John Pack” book, special pricing – just $12.50

Special Pricing on The Redoubtable John Pack hardbound book!

Now just $12.50, the perfect gift for your family members!

The Redoubtable John Pack: Pioneer, Proselyter, Patriarch by Davis Bitton (hardbound, 232 pgs text, maps, photos) through PayPal by clicking on the book below (You can now order more than one book, $10/each, shipping/handling IS included in the price, and you do NOT have to join PayPal to buy the book):

Updating our Genealogy

We are working on updating our John Pack Genealogy.

Look for cool new features like:

a Pedigree Chart – to easily see how you are related to John

Google Maps – to see birth, death, gravestone, locations. Click here to see a list of the locations with “castle” in their name in the UK associated with John Pack’s ancestors – just click on the magnifying glass at the end of each listing to see them on a google map.

and more – keep checking back here and we will let you know what’s new!

One area just for fun: John Pack’s In the News. It is interesting to me to see what people with the same name as John Pack are up to.

Thank You,

Brad Pack
Webmaster
JohnPackFamily.com

John Pack Family Photos DVD

This text below is from a note that is included with the DVD and it should explain more about the DVD contents:

To buy it you can either buy one at the reunion in person if you are going to that, buy one on the internet using paypal (from this page click the “Buy Now” button or DVD image on the bottom left):

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/donate.shtml

or you can send a $10 check to:

John Pack Family Association
c/o Leland Horton
1870 Laurelhurst Drive
Salt Lake City, UT 84108

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The DVD shows John Pack’s image on the This Is The Place monument and shows photos of the two plaques on the monument that list his name, it has the same photos as shown here:

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/gallery/thum…ls.php?album=19

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/theplace.shtml

It has many photos including:

The John Pack home location in Salt Lake City and the plaque there, reproduction of the John Pack home in the This Is The Place Park, First Encampment Park where John Pack came into the Salt Lake valley and his a name is on a plaque, photos of his gravestone in the Salt Lake Cemetery, location of his lumberyard in Kamas, photos of his wives, their children, their gravestones, their homes. In general it has all the photos here:

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/gallery/

And probably at least 100 more, and the photos are in a format (the highest resolution possible) where you can take them to a photo processing store (Walmart, Sam’s Club, etc) and get reprints made of any or all of them. Each of the photos has a description on the top left of the screen (this is cut off on some TVs and we are probably going to adjust where it is in the next version) to explain more about the photo.

Here is more description from a note included with the DVD.
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John Pack Family Photos DVD

I hope you enjoy this DVD. Many hours of work went into it and hopefully it will motivate us to find, and take even more photos and copy and share them with each other.

It has approximately 400+ photos that fill approximately 570 MB of the DVD. The movie portion of the DVD lasts approximately 30 minutes and most slides are displayed for 5 seconds.

Some of the photos are very small (in dimensions) or not clear. If you have any better copies of ANY of these photos, or especially any very OLD photos that you do not see on this DVD, please send those copies (you can make quality copies at any copy shop: FedEx/Kinkos, etc) of photos (along with as much of a description of the photo as you have) using our Contact form

or post them to our photo gallery on our website (the photos will have to be scanned or a .jpg file from a camera in order to do this) :

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/gallery/

To make prints of the photos on this DVD pause your dvd player on the photo you would like, and copy the caption that is displayed in the top left of the screen (this caption will be the name of the photo on the DVD but the name may be shortened). Take the DVD to any photo processing lab and tell them exactly where the photo is on the DVD

JOHNPACKFAMILYPHOTOS1>jpfareal DVD-ROM Contents> (this is the location for all of the photos except the journal scans) (and it’s filename) and they should be able to make prints of it for you (all photos are saved as .jpg)

This is a video and data DVD:

Besides the photos, it also includes the latest Genealogy (in the folder listed above) .gedcom file from Gary Pack that you can open in Family Search or other Genealogy software. Please feel free to do this and see what information you have that is missing and give that information to Gary. You can email him at: packgb@ldschurch.org

It also includes the .jpg scans of all the pages in the John Pack Journal in this location
JOHNPACKFAMILYPHOTOS1>jpfatest DVD-ROM Contents>

I would particularly like to thank these individuals for supplying many of the photos on this DVD:

Margie and Wade Grider

The Ure Family

Jo Ann Merrill

Some photos I received were not included in this first edition because I ran out of time (this DVD is about one half full) so I am hoping to include all those photos in an edition next year, along with many more photos from you. Again I look forward to any additional contributions I can receive from you (the older the better).

***Note: I am also hoping to upload all the photos from the DVD to our web site photo gallery when I get some time.

http://www.johnpackfamily.com/gallery/