Alma
Helaman Hale
Born:
24 April 1836, Bradford Massachusetts
Married: 24 December 1861, Grantsville, Utah
Died: 30 March 1908, Logan, Utah
Parents: Jonathan Harriman Hale &
Olive Boynton
Wife: Sarah Annie Clark
Items extracted from "Bishop Jonathan H. Hale
of Nauvoo - His Life and Ministry
Acquisition
of Hale Genealogical Record
It was imputed by Alma and his brothers
as providential the way by which the Hale Genealogical Record came into their
possession.
It appears that United States Senator
Robert S. Hale of Vermont approached Congressman George Q. Cannon of Utah in
1874, In Washington, D. C., and made inquiry about the family of Jonathan H.
Hale, who migrated with the Mormons to the
Rocky Mountains, information concerning whom the Senator needed to
complete a Hale Family Genealogical Record, which he was compiling.
Congressman Cannon knew all the Hale
boys very well and he so informed Senator Hale, adding that he had married
Elizabeth Hoagland, whose brother, Lucas, had married Rachel Hale, the only
surviving daughter of Jonathan H. Hale. Through information given the Senator
by Brother Cannon, the Hale boys in Utah were communicated with and the
desired data secured for the completion of the Record. However, the book was
actually published by Senator Eugene Hale, and George Hale of Maine, as the
author died before this accomplishment had been realized.
As strange as it would appear to an
outsider, but readily perceived by members of the Church, Senator Eugene and
George Hale had no appreciable interest in the record after it had been finally
completed and published. Even though it had required many years of toilsome
research and an expenditure of thousands of dollars. Senator Eugene Hale at once
sent to the Hale brothers in Utah a copy of
the Record, which to them was a providential blessing, as it made immediately
available an authentic record of their ancestry back for hundreds of years,
for whom they could perform, vicariously, the saving ordinances of' the Gospel
of Christ in the Temples of God.
A
Faith Promoting Experience
In regard to the recording of Hale
family records, Jonathan H. Hale, son of Alma H. Hale and Sarah A. Clark,
recorded the following experience in his journal:
When the Hale family worked in the
Logan Temple in the winter of 1888-89, they arranged with Brother Samuel
Roskelley to prepare the sheets for temple work. A great deal of temple work was
done during the following years .... [Some time later] Brother Roskelley's
health began to fail, and he decided to give up all his record work. He brought
the Hale records to sacrament meeting one Sunday and gave them to Father [Alma
H. Hale] and told him it would be necessary to get someone else to take over the
books.
During the following week, Father was
very depressed and worried all the time, and was hardly able to work or eat. He
could not decide what to do, for neither he nor any of the Hale family knew how
to proceed with the work. A great deal of information had been gathered, and the
family made it a matter of prayer, morning and evening, for a whole week.
The next Sunday at meeting, Brother
Roskelley came to Father and said, `Bring the records back to me. I have to
finish them.' Then he told Father and me this story:
"Friday evening as I was returning
from the Temple, near Hyde Park, a messenger on a white horse appeared by the
side of my buggy and said he wanted me to finish the Hale record. He assured me
that the work was done right and that it was all being accepted. He said
thousands of members of the Hale family were anxious that the work go on. I
explained that I was too busy to do any more record work, and that my health
would not permit it. Then the messenger made me this promise: that if I would
continue, the Lord would bless me with health and strength, and the way would be
opened so I would have the necessary time to do the work. He stayed by my side
until I finally promised to do it, and then he blessed me and disappeared."
When Brother Roskelley described his
messenger to Father, he answered, "Why, that was my own father, Jonathan
Harriman Hale, the first of the Hales to join the Church in 1834. He died in
1847 at Winter Quarters."
When Brother Roskelley finally finished
the record, he said that the greatest load he had ever carried was lifted off
his shoulders. He had made a promise to a heavenly being and couldn't rest until
the work was completed. He enjoyed much better health and found more time for
the work than he had ever hoped for.
A
strange Phenomenon
It was Authoritatively recognized that
up to the time Aroet, Alma and Solomon had completed their personal
ministrations in the Logan Temple, their labors in behalf of their progenitors
had far exceeded that performed by any other family in the Church, at least in
that Temple. It was at this juncture, upon the completion of their record of
sealings of husbands to wives and children to parents, following a Hale program
in the Logan Temple one evening in February, 1896, that a strange phenomenon was
reported; the sacred structure, it is said, became suddenly illuminated ‑
flooded from dome to foundation with a blaze of light. Apostle Marriner W,
Merrill, who was then president of the Temple, observed the phenomenon as he was
traveling on the highway that night from Logan to Richmond. It was likewise
observed by many residents of Logan.