From the Improvement Era, December 1943 –

A Snowbound Christmas Dinner

By James P. Sharp

Slowly, and almost silently, the mail train pulled out of Denver late in the afternoon of December 24, 1891. Outside, a two-day-old blizzard raged unabated.

My father, Bishop John C. Sharp, of Vernon, Charles R. McBride, Charley to everyone, of Tooele, and I had been to Chicago with a train load of sheep and had left that city in what we supposed to be ample time to reach home before Christmas, but a freight train in Iowa was wrecked just ahead of us and we were delayed for twelve hours. From then it seemed that every time the wheels turned we lost time until, coming up from Omaha, Charley remarked he thought the Pioneers of ‘47 had made better time.

In those days, few trains carried a dining car, but the train would stop for twenty minutes at meal stations. We had learned this – about the time the waiter brought our food the conductor would call, “Board,” and it was up to us to miss our dinner or our train. So before leaving Chicago we purchased one of those “chip” baskets, you know, the kind with a handle over the top and two lids that are raised from the ends, and in this we had put bread, butter, some cheese, a stick of bologna, some hard-boiled eggs, a sack of gingersnaps, a shaker of salt and a bag of raw onions, for both Father and Charley did like onion sandwiches.

Just before we left Denver, Father succeeded in purchasing a loaf of bread and a small apple pie which we ate for supper. Outside the blizzard raged and blew the snow in around the windows but inside we were comfortable, for the brakeman kept the two coal stoves, one in each end of the car, red hot.

Along about eight o’clock I made my own private berth by adjusting the chair and went to sleep. Some time in the night I awoke. The train had stopped, but that was nothing unusual, so I went back to sleep. About daybreak I awoke. The train was not moving so I walked to the platform to see why the snow was not drifting in. The snow had drifted against the car and was even with the tops of the windows. Evidently we had been there most of the night.

Thoroughly disgusted with train schedules and everything and everyone in general, I went back inside the coach for it was my first Christmas away from home and I was really homesick. Father and Charley were reading.

Father looked up and asked me if I wanted any breakfast. I told him “No.” Then he said it would do us all good to fast till dinner time, for the railroad always put up a good meal on Christmas day, and he thought we would enjoy it better if we did not eat breakfast.

I walked up and down the aisle of the car like a caged coyote.

There were three other passengers in that coach. In one end sat a man with his valise open and a lot of empty bottles, as well as some full ones around him and in the valise. Every few hours he would rouse up and burst forth with about two lines of some cowboy song and then slump back to dreamland (that is, if a drunken man can dream). In the other end of the car were a young man and a young lady, possibly 18 or 20 years of age.

About one o’clock Charley finished his book and said, “Bishop, don’t you think the turkey is about cooked?”

“Should be,” replied Father as he put his book down and placed the lunch basket on his knees. Again I was disgusted. How could those men joke about a turkey dinner when we had only next to nothing to eat?

Just then the brakeman came in and filled the stove full of coal. He spoke to the young man and then came on down the aisle with a grin on his face and said, “Gentlemen, I’ll take the drumstick.”

“Have cranberries with it?” Father asked.

“No, by the looks of things I won’t, but say, I’ve got a good one. This is supposed to be the crack fast mail train and say it sure is fast – fast in a snow bank.”

“How long do you think we will be here?” Charley asked.

“Can’t say but no need to worry, for the snow always melts up here come July and then we can back down country.” To the other stove he went as Father resumed his bread-cutting and Charley his spreading the butter.

I could see the young man looking at us and talking to the lady. He arose and walked down and said to Father, “Name your price for a sandwich and I’ll pay it.”

Father looked rather surprised, and before he could answer, the young man continued, “My sister and I have been attending school up in Denver. Yesterday morning she was so excited about Christmas shopping she could not eat breakfast and at lunchtime she had to rush her packing so did not eat lunch, and now it is well over forty hours since she has eaten and I must have something for her.”

Father looked at the food and then at Charley and said, “What about having a community dinner and inviting everyone in the car to it?”

“Fine idea,” voiced Charley who continued, as he spoke to me. “While this young man brings his sister, you go wake up our singing cowboy friend and invite him to dinner.”

I went and shook him, then told him to come to dinner. With bleary eyes he looked at me and shouted. “I’m billed for Rifle Creek. Whoopee.” Then he slipped back into an easy position and was dead to the world.

Evidently the young man was having some trouble getting his sister to come, but finally reluctantly she came down the aisle, and when they arrived she said, “Can you imagine my humiliation in having to beg for something to eat?”

“Can you imagine our humiliation at inviting company to dinner and having nothing more to offer them than we have?” asked Charley.

She sat down next to him while Father finished slicing the bread and onions and Charley finished spreading the butter. While they were doing this, she said, “About fifteen minutes ago I offered up a silent prayer to God, asking him to send me something to eat, for I was famished and almost desperate. It seemed useless, but look at the food he sent me.”

“Are you Christians?” Father quietly asked the young man.

“Yes. Methodists.”

“We, too, are Christians. Mormons,” replied Father and continued, “Brother McBride, if we were home neither of us would think of sitting down to a meal without thanking the Lord for his goodness to us and asking him to bless the food. Will you return thanks?”

Never before nor since have I heard such a prayer. He just seemed to be talking to God like one man to another and then –

“Especially do we thank Thee for the food we are about to partake of. Bless it to our use and bless the strangers who are with us that they may accept our humble fare with the same spirit in which it is given. Amen.”

We all echoed “Amen” and then there was a long silence. Possibly the others were like me – thinking of that wonderful prayer. It was Charley who broke the silence.

“Besides our regular turkey dinner we have – one cheese sandwich, and one bologna sandwich, and being the guest of honor, lady, you may choose the one you wish.”

“If it’s all the same –” she hesitated.

“Sure. go right ahead.”

“Then I’ll take an onion sandwich for I have a failing for that kind. often up at the boardinghouse when I had been studying quite late I would sneak down to the kitchen and get a piece of bread and butter and then rummage around and find a raw onion. Then back to my room I would go to thoroughly enjoy myself.”

Me? I got the bologna one and really imagined I was back home enjoying a turkey wing, my favorite part of the holiday bird. That was a jolly party and finally Father said, “And for dessert we have neither mince pie, pumpkin pie, nor plum pudding, but we do have some ginger snaps, so eat them and imagine you are eating your favorite dessert.” I did and believe it or not – no mince pie Mother ever made tasted better than that ginger snap, for I really did taste like mince pie to me.

When the meal was over, our basket was as empty as Old Mother Hubbard’s cupboard. All that remained on one of the lids was one half of an onion and some salt in the shaker. But we were happy.

We talked and joked for a short time and then there was a jar from the rear of the train. Then from an engine up in front faintly came four or five long blasts of the whistle which were answered by two short blasts from an engine in the rear. Then there was a lot of puffing and spinning of drive wheels, but finally the sand on the rails furnished traction and we slowly moved ahead.

Not long after, the brakeman stuck his head in and shouted the name of some station I could not catch and said, “Twenty minutes for dinner.”

“Hear that, Sis?” excitedly asked the young man.

“Sure, but who wants any more dinner?”

“No. This is where we get off. We’re home,” said the young man as he arose and shook Father’s hand, thanking him most sincerely. My hand he shook and then Charley’s. The young lady stood up and shook Father’s hand and as she did, great tears began to form in her eyes which soon began streaming down her cheeks. Her voice trembled when she spoke. She shook my hand and when she took Charley’s she choked up and could not utter one word. Again he was master of the occasion for he said, “Too bad we could not have eaten the other half of that onion and then it would not have caused those tears to come in your eyes.”

She straightened up, swallowed hard and bit her lip to get hold of herself, and although the tears continued to run down her cheeks, there was no tremble in her voice when she said, “They are tears of gratitude and thanksgiving. Gratitude to you gentlemen for providing me with the most enjoyable meal I have ever eaten. Tears of thanksgiving to God for hearing and answering my prayer.”

The drunken cowboy in the end of the car began to sing. What a difference between him and this young lady and her brother, all living in the same world, or were they?