MATTIE WINKLESS
KUNKEL
By LaVone Kunkel
Moulton
Mattie Winkless Kunkel was born September 16, 1890 in Salt
Lake City, Utah, the tenth
daughter of Sarah Ann Priday and Joseph Winkless. She was a lovely blue eyed blond child. She remembers the circus given by the Winless
girls in their back yard. Mattie was the
fairy, Doretta, a younger sister was the gypsy, and Adell, the next older was
the singer. All the neighbors and the
children turned out to see this performance.
They had many such entertainments and were the talk of the neighborhood.
On July 24, 1897
just fifty years after the first settlers came to Salt
Lake City, they had a great celebration and
parade. The old Salt
Palace had a float made of solid
salt, drawn by horses that won one of the top prizes. Mattie was the fairy, riding on the front of
this great float. Adell, Mabel, and
Doretta rode on the other end under a great salt canapé.
Before she was old enough to go to school, Mattie was kidnapped. This was a traumatic experience in her
life. As young as she was she knew the
man was up to no good. This kidnapper
came out of Snarr’s driveway in a nice buggy and told Mattie he needed some
things from the store. Mattie purchased
the articles and was going to run home, but he made her get back in the
buggy. She thought he was taking her
home, instead he headed west across the railroad tracks. One of the Brimley girls saw her and jumped
on her bicycle and followed them. The
man told her what a pretty petticoat she had on. She tried to jump out of the carriage, but he
became stern. He stopped in some field
and saw the Brimley girl. He hurriedly turned
around and took Mattie home. This young
Brimley girl was wise beyond her years and no doubt saved little Mattie a
terrible experience.
One time she had a terrible abscess under her arm which
caused her a great deal of pain and sickness. Her Grandpa Priday and Bishop
Seddon administered to her and she was able to rest that evening when the sore
broke.
When she was eight years old she was baptized, December 10, 1898. Later she taught the First Intermediate
Department in Sunday School and sang in the choir of the old Fifth Ward.
Mattie went to Grant
School along with the other
Winkless children. She liked to play
basketball and was good at it. One time
the Grant School
caught on fire. Grandpa Priday hurried
to the corner across the street and waited for his grandchildren: Mattie, Doretta, and Joe with a basket of
little cherry apples for them. He was
blind, but could find his way to the school and church by hitting his cane
along the fences. Mattie graduated from
the Grant School
when she was fourteen years old and immediately went to work for Keith O’Brien’s
Store. She had the doll department
around Christmas vacation. When she was
16 they gave her the cut glass department.
The bosses at the store liked her and they liked her looks. She became a model for the store and worked
there until 1912. She went to San
Francisco to be with her sister, Rae Pett who was
expecting a baby. She stayed in San
Francisco until the birth of Paul Pett. She was treated royally by Archie and
Rae. They had a lovely little girl,
Dorothy whom Mattie adored.
When she returned to Salt Lake City,
she also returned to Keith O’Brien’s where she continued working. She had met Arthur Roy Kunkel a few years
before. He worked in the shoe department
and was a good fried of Adell Winkless, Mattie’s sister. At the time mother was engaged to another man
whom she kept putting off marriage for nearly five years. Adell used to bring Art home and he became
well acquainted with the Winkless family as well as Mattie. Mattie’s father, Joseph Winkless, especially
liked him. Arthur had made the remark to
a friend when he first saw Mattie that he intended to marry her. He wasn’t the least bit discouraged because
before she left for San Francisco,
they had become sweethearts. He gave her
the book “The Trail of The Lonesome Pine” which she read on the train. She was a romanticist and when she and Art
were married, she named their first little girl, June after the heroine of that
book. They were married July 3, 1913 by Bishop Cummings in the
Bishop’s Building in Salt Lake City, Utah.
In the fall of that year they went to Milford,
Utah to live where Art operated a “Golden
Rule Store”. He was very meticulous and
did fine weaving and mending as well as pressing. They returned to Salt
Lake City to live with his parents at 450
Redondo Avenue where their first daughter, Arlyne
June was born 6 April, 1914. When June was 5 months old they moved to Idaho
where he operated a 450 acre ranch for the Perkin Brothers. Mattie came to Salt Lake
City to stay with her sister Cora W. Chamberlain on South
State Street in December 1916. She gave birth to their second daughter,
LaVone February 25, 1917. She returned to Idaho
where Art was in charge of a ranch for Mr. Morrison. They loved ranch life, even though they both
had to work terrible hard. Because of
Mattie’s so called poor health they had to return to Salt
Lake where they moved several times
before going out on the Bird Farm in Murray,
about 1922. Here Mattie had to take care
of Mrs. Bird.
Sometime in the summer of 1923 Arthur’s mother, Isabelle,
became quite ill. Her husband had died
in 1916 and she was quite alone. The Art
Kunkel’s moved again to 450 Redondo Avenue. Mattie was an immaculate housekeeper and kept
the home beautifully clean. She also
obtained a job at the Paris Company in downtown Salt
Lake where she worked in the
lingerie department. Both girls went to Whittier
School by then. The summer of 1927 she took a vacation to be
with her husband camping up Little Cottonwood Canyon, and quit the Paris
Company job. In the fall she went to
work for the Boston Store where she was saleslady, model and buyer. She loved to get dressed up and go to work,
even though she came home with tired feet and legs. She taught her children to work in the house
and the yard and gave them so much to do that they never had time to get into
trouble. Their Grandma Kunkel became
their confidant and second mother. In
1929 after a big Thanksgiving dinner with the Kunkel brothers and sisters, it
was decided by them that Art and his family should move so that someone could
come in and take care of Isabelle as she was blind and was alone during the day
until the girls returned from school. It
was a sad move. They hadn’t been gone a
year when the family that was supposed to be taking care of her let her fall
off the porch. It killed her; that
dreadful, dreadful day in September 1930.
The family then moved to a nice little house, 935
Bryan Avenue for awhile, then on to 417 West 6th
South to live with Mattie’s mother and father as they were old and her family
decided that she should go and take care of them. Joseph Winkless died just a little over two
months after moving there. Mattie’s
mother died in September 1945 and her husband Art in October, 1951.
The depression had started in 1929. People were jumping out of windows and killing
themselves because the fall of the stock market. It hit the west a little later. The banks had failed and many men were out of
jobs, Arthur included. Mattie was the
sole support of the family for awhile. Arthur’s
health became steadily worse.
June graduated from East
High School in 1931 and could find
no employment. Many men were working at
the jobs that young girls used to have.
Mattie committed the worst mistake of her life when she quit her job in
1933. The family was in dire
circumstances. Art took any job that
would give him enough money to put food on the table. It was a terrible time. LaVone graduated from South
High School in June, 1934 and she
couldn’t get work either. She left for Minneapolis
that summer and stayed for two years.
Mattie never returned to the commercial world. In the 1940’s after both girls were married,
she used to volunteer her time at Welfare Square
for the Church. After the death of her
husband she became a full time employee taking charge of a big department where
she did the buying, assisting the Stake Relief Society Presidents and taking
full responsibilities until she was 75 years old. She had many beautiful experiences here. She knew many of the General Authorities of
the Church and was loved by all her many co-workers. Mattie had a way with the people on
welfare. She never looked down on them
and could always think of something to say that would lift them up. She always looked beautiful and insisted that
those that worked under her had nice, clean cloths and a smile on their faces
when helping those less fortunate. She
was a great success in that position.
When she quit work at 80, she well deserved the rest that followed. She had major surgery and several smaller
operations the average woman would have retired after any one of them.
She sold the house on 6th South
Street and moved in with her daughter June to a
nice little home on Arapahoe Avenue. Later she moved to a nice small apartment
where she continues to live at 90. Her
daughter, June cooks most of her meals and straightens her house for her, but
she refuses to live with anyone.
All her life Mattie Kunkel has been devoted to any job that
befell her. It seemed her lot in life to
care for old people; first the Perkin Brothers, then Mr. Morrison, Mrs. Bird,
Art’s mother, her own mother and father.
Her mother lived fourteen years after her father had died.
Mattie Winkless was born 16 Sept. 1890 in Salt Lake City,
Utah
Baptized 10th
December 1898
Marred to Arthur Roy Kunkel 3 July, 1913
Sealed to Arthur Roy Kunkel 13 January 1953
They were parents of two daughters, June and LaVone
They have eight grandchildren
At the time of this copying, they have 26 Great
Grandchildren, 25 living and 1 deceased.
Dear little Mary Elizabeth Johnson, daughter of Jay Russell,
died in Oregon in November, 1977