Charles Rampton's Family History: A Faithful Tithe Payer

Here is part two of the autobiography of Charles Cash Rampton, Jr. The last paragraph of this part documents the beginning of his life as a full tithe payer. It was not an easy choice for him, as you will read. But, he made the right decision and the "Windows of Heaven" continue to bless him to this very day. Go thou and do likewise.

I will include a few more pictures at the end.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A True Story

There were a lot of children around our neighborhood to play with. Also there

were a lot of neat places to play in. One was the gully in back of our house and

another was a gully northeast of our house. We liked to play in the second one and walked by it each day going to and from school. Years later the Bonneville Stake Center was built in this gully. A small stream ran in the bottom of it most of the year. One spring the culvert under 15th East got plugged and the water backed up in the gully and formed a large lake. This may not seem very exciting now but back then to a grade-schooler, it was very exciting.

This second gully seemed to have more mystery than the one in our backyard.

We made underground hideaways in our gully by digging trenches and covering

them with wood from nearby building projects and putting the dirt back over the

top to hide them. The longer the entrance tunnel, the better the underground hut

was. The second gully was farther away from home and had lots of scrub oak

groves to use as hiding places. The neighbors near the gully had the city build

two walkways on each side of the gully for easy access.

I can remember one experience that happened when I was about 10 years old.

There were two brothers who had a 22 rifle. We wanted to shoot it. Because it

made a loud sound when it was fired, we decided if we shot it in the garage no one would notice. So we went into their garage and shut the doors. The garage was next to an alley that ran parallel to Hubbard Avenue. We obtained 22 short

caliber bullets and commenced shooting in the garage. We were having a good

time and became bored with shooting in the garage. We left and went to the

gully with more mystery and began to shoot again not wondering where the

bullets for going. This caught the neighbors' attention and soon we could see the

police coming on the newly made pathways. I ran one-way and my friends ran

on the other side. I got to my bike ahead of my friends and the police. I went

home and felt safe. About 30 minutes later, a knock came at the door. It was the

police. He wanted to know if I was there. He talked with Dad for a few minutes

and explained what he was there for. He told Dad he wanted to take me to jail.

Dad talked to him and convinced him not to take me. He told Dad he caught the

other boys and was taking them to the police station. They told him where I

lived. He told Dad the dinning room of the neighbor who lived across the alley

from my friends was filled with bullet holes and he was very mad but he did not

know where they came from. I knew where they came from. The bullets were

going through the target, through the garage's wood siding, through doors of his dining room, and into his house. When the people who lived near the gully called about the shooting, the police knew right where to look for the shooters. The other boys spent the night at the police station. Thank heavens that my dad was a pretty good talker and I got to stay home.

We had fun shooting, followed by the terror of running away from the police,

followed I by the relief of getting away and home, followed by the fear from the

knock on our door and followed by the comfort that came as a result of my dad's

efforts on my behalf. From then on I thought more about my actions and what

effect they might have on others. I am very thankful for a good dad, who would

and could fix my problems.

Mom and dad always had jobs for me to do around the house on 15th East. I can remember raking the fall leaves into piles and putting them in the garbage or

raking them into the gutter area in front of our house. When they were in big

piles it was fun to jump or fall into them. On some fall Saturdays I could hear the

crowd noise from the University of Utah football stadium. The announcers and crowd noise made me want to be there and see the game. lf there was a

whole in the fence or an unguarded location we could get in for free and spend

our money on treats. Mother would plant tulips early in the spring and we never

seemed to know if they were going to grow or be frozen by the snow. There was the gully at the back of our house and our property line went down the gully slope

quite a ways. I never did no how far back our property line went. Our next door

neighbors, the McAllister's, had some animal cages at the very bottom of the gully as did our other neighbors. It was always a problem to know how far back the yard had to be cleaned. Mom always wanted me to do a little bit further down

the slope. On the other side of the gully the slope was quite steep. We liked to

make "marble runs". We would try to make a track which would zig and zag

down the slope with jumps, turns and tunnels. We would put a marble at the top

and see if we could get it to go to the bottom and stay in the track. Also in our

back yard was a spot of dirt we thought of us as a sandbox. We would build

roads and tunnels to play with our toys. It was near the back corner of the

garage and under an old apple tree. The apples were always very tart to eat.

Near the rear corner of the house in the backyard was an old cherry tree. It was

so large it overhung the house. We climbed that tree so much that the bark was

polished red by our touching it. We had a hard time waiting for the cherries to

become ripe before we ate them. They were the best cherries, even though they

were usually half ripe. Also on the side of the backyard next to the Jorgensen's

were some very large lilac bushes. Most of the time they had a few blossoms.

But near Memorial Day, I can remember our parents picking them and taking

them to decorate our family graves. All of this had to be cared for.

I can remember someone gave Janet and I a printing set. This consisted of

some rubber stamps and an ink pad. We set about to print a neighborhood

newspaper. For some reason this sticks in my mind as an important event.

The floor of our single story House was about three to four feet above the

exterior grade. This allowed for large basement windows that could swing

horizontally to open and were easily climbed in and out of. This made our

basement a light and airy place where we could hang our wet cloths in to dry on a winter day. Also in the basement was "fruit room", in which we stored the jams and jellies along with the peaches and pears mother had put up. This was also of fun room to play in. Also in the basement was a finished rumpus room which later became my bedroom. I always thought it was a strange bedroom because no one ever made the bed. On the floor in that room I had my Lionel and American Flyer trains set up. I would cover the floor of the rumpus room/bedroom with their tracks. I guess that's where I learned to love trains.

Summer Jobs

Shortly after mom and dad got divorced in 1941, I got my first job outside the

home. I was about twelve years old and worked at the American Paper Company in Salt Lake City. It was a company that was partly owned by my dad. One of the big things I had to do was to get my Social Security number. I felt pretty important. My main job was sweeping up the warehouse floor. I sprinkled the compound on the floor and then swept it up again. Later I got to do other things. The thing I liked best to do was going on the delivery truck to all of our

customers. One time when we were going south on State Street, it was

raining quite hard and then all of a sudden it stopped. There was a line across the street, one side was wet the other was dry. This impressed me very much. Later I got to fill some of the orders when I knew where all the stock was. When it came time to get my first paycheck, I was going to spend it. Mother said to me "Are you going to pay your tithing?" Later Dad asked me what I was going to do with my money. I told them I was going to pay my tithing. This upset him very much. He said to me, "Why don't you save your money in the bank?" He said the church didn't need my money especially when I was twelve years old. He and mother had some heated words over the matter. In the end it was left up to me. It was a big decision for me for two reasons. I had to choose between Dad's advice and Mother's suggestion. When I chose to pay my tithing, Dad was disappointed. I did put some money in the bank but it didn't seem to make him feel any better. But I know now that I made the right choice. It took quite a while for Dad to get over that. I have been a full tithe payer ever since. It was one of those choices you only have to make once in your life. It is good to start early in your life to make right choices. I worked at the paper company until the summer of 1943.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Next week will be the third and final part. Check out these photos