The next day, Saturday Morning, we ate breakfast in Cheyenne, Wyoming. By dinner time we were in Nebraska and ate at the LDS chapel there a fine meal of farm produced corn, ham, and mashed potatoes. Bishop Hunter was very concerned about the safety of the long bus ride and had new bus drivers flown in every eight hours. That night we drove across Iowa and saw a tremendous lightning display flashing all about.
On June First, Sunday morning, as the bus crossed a large bridge over the Missouri River, Dad was moved by how huge the river was. Most everyone had woken up by then. He spoke so everyone on the bus could hear him. Dad paraphrased Joseph Smith and said, "A man might put forth his puny arm to stop the mighty Missouri River in its course, than to stop the work of God." (See Doctrine & Covenants 121:33.) That made quite an impression on us youth. What a great object lesson at that moment!
Later that morning the bus arrived at a college in McComb, Illinois where everyone unloaded and got cleaned up for a trip to Carthage. It was a sacred experience to visit the Carthage Jail where Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum were martyred. We were deeply touched as we stood in the same room where the martyrdom had taken place in 1844, one hundred and thirty-six years ago, that month. It was also Dad's forty-fifth birthday. One of the tour guides was from Utah and had actually served on the Wells Stake high council with Grandpa Loveless. Small world. We returned to McComb and had a Sacrament Meeting in the college cafeteria. Dad and I were room mates.
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