Gottlieb GESSEL

                   NOTES:
    Frederick was not married
                  

                       History of Margaret Rachel Gessel Nielsen

    I was born March 10, 1893 in Providence, Cache County, Utah in a little two
    room log house with a lean to on back.  When I was about five years old, this
    house was replaced with a large ten room brick house father built with brick
    made at his brickyard.  I was the seventh daughter and the thriteenth of
    fourteen children born to Gottlieb and Catherine Brandt Gessel.  My brothers
    and sisters are:  Jacob Gessel born 3 sep. 1873; Barbara Gessel Jensen born 5
    Mar 1875; Katherine Gessel Schiess born 4 May 1876; Frederick Gessel born 8 Nov
    1877; Carl Gessel born 18 Jun 1879; Anna Gessel Vogel born 19 Jun 1881;
    Gottlieb Gessel born 25 Mar 1882; Mary Gessel Barker born 22 Jun 1883; Emil
    Gessel born 3 Jun 1885; Clara Eliza Gessel Tibbitts born 17 Nov 1887; Henry
    Brandt Gessel born 29 Mar 1889; Julia Gessel Pickett born 7 Mar 1891; David
    Brandt Gessel born 29 Sep 1894.

    I lived my entire life in Providence and most of it in the same house.  We
    always had plenty of work to keep us busy, with a big family and a big house to
    take care of.  Besides the housework and cooking there was always work to do
    outside.  Father had some farmland and a pasture out by River Heights, (south
    and east of the New Providence Stake Center).  He raised sugar beets and we had
    to thin and take care of them.  He always had cows that we had to feed and milk
    and in the summer we drove them to and from the pasture.  We also had pigs and
    chickens to take care of.  Every once in a while, mother would let us take a
    few eggs to the store to spend for candy for a special treat.  My brother,
    Dave, and I always seemed to get the chore of milking the cows, and if no one
    else was around, mother would help, although she had a hard time sitting on the
    milk stool.  The older boys all helped at the brickyard and as the girls got
    old enough, they went out and cooked for them.  When it was across the street
    from the old Grove south of Logan (the Gas-a-mat and trailer court are there
    now) we would take dinner down to them.  When the brickyard was moved to about
    sixth or seventh north on sixth west in Logan, a house was built there so they
    could stay there if they had to and the girls would cook dinner and supper for
    them.  Father made the brick for many of the houses in Cache Vallen and a lot
    of the older buildings at Utah State University, and Logan High School.

    Since we had the largest house in Providence at the time, whenever anyone
    needed a place to stay, they were sent to our house.  I especially remember a
    negro fellow coming  once--he must have been very superstitious--he said he
    didn't care which room he stayed in, just so it wasn't number thirteen.

    I attended the Providence Elementary School completing the eighth grade.
    Mr. Joseph Campbell was the teacher and a very strict one.  I especially
    remember being made to share a desk with a girl from a rather unclean home.  I
    got lice from her but it didn't last for long.  My sister, Ann, scrubbed me
    from to to bottom with homemade soap until I didn't think I had any skin left.
    She then informed the teacher that I wasn't to sit anywhere near tht girl
    again, and I didn't.

    When father built our home, he also built a nive granary to the east of
    it.  Shortly after, Grandma Brandt decided that she wanted to come and live
    with us so father fixed a really nice apartment in the granary for her.  We
    were all disappointed though when after just a few months, she decided she
    wanted to go back to Eureka, Utah to live near her other children.  Her sister,
    whom we called Grandma Kraus, lived in Providence, though, and spent a lot of
    time at our house.  She was always good to help mother with things she needed
    help with and they spent many afternoons darning socks and mending or just
    knitting or doing fancy work while we children played.

    I started taking piano lessons when I was about ten or twelve years old
    and Maurine Frederick and I would walk from Providence to Logan every week to
    take lessons from Ethel Napper who lived between Main street and first west on
    second north stret.  I loved to play and was the only one of the girls who
    really did play.  Because of this, father and mother promised me the piano and
    organ when they died.  Being the youngest girl didn't give me much authority
    thou and I never did get either the piano or organ or my music.  This made me
    very unhappy, but I still played whenever I had a chance and was the Primary
    organist in the Providence Second Ward for several years when we lived up in
    "the Hollow" (Edgewood Hall).  I also played for Relief Society and other
    things as well.  Joe Smith told me several times that I was the best
    accompanist he had ever had for the choir.  My sister, Julia, and I also sang
    together for several years at various church and civic functions.  She had a
    beautiful alto voice and I sang soprano.
                  

                   NOTES:
    David Brandt was not married