Mark Collet was born on June 8, 1870 at Payson, Utah
and Emily Wilhelmina Rasmusson on November 21, 1880
at Bear Lake, Idaho. They were married December 23,
1899. By April 1903 two children had blessed their home,
a girl Myrtle May and boy Mark Anthon. At two years of
age, Myrtle developed rheumatism which later affected
her heart. She never recovered from this and when she
was nearly six years old she passed away. Six weeks
later an epidemic of spinal meningitis took four year old
Mark from them. Following on the heels of this experience
Emily gave birth to another son, Celdar LaVern and went
through a serious sick spell. Two and a half years
later on October 15, 1909 another daughter, Venice Wilma
was born to them. The spring of 1912 they sold their home
and furniture and immigrated from Vernal, Utah to Canada
with two other families. Their journey was made by team
as far as Salt Lake City. Here they boarded a train, shipping
their horses and cattle via the Great Northern Railway.
They entered Canada at Coutts, Alberta.

Mark stood in line for a whole day at Lethbridge in front of
the Land Office in order to get his turn to file a homestead.
The next spring they started from scratch on one hundred
and sixty acres of sod land of the McIntyre lease near
Shanks Lake.

When they took up residence on their homestead there
wasn't a road, not even a fence post as far as the eye
could see. Their first dwelling was a one roomed shack
covered with tar paper and a dirt floor which Mark had
constructed before sending for his family. He had also
built a barn in the side hill. Two sides of the barn were
in the hill while the other two sides were of sod. The
barn housed the milk cow and calf. Ere long other shacks
began to dot the prairie as more settlers moved in.
During the winter of 1914 a terrible snow storm swept
across the lease country. Emily was alone with their
two children, Celdar and Venice, as Mark was away
herding sheep for the Harkers at Magrath. When they
awoke next morning they saw the sod barn completely
covered by a snow drift. The children and their mother
with the help of Violet and Florrie Carter dug a path to
the barn door. The digging took all day, and by night
fall they were relieved to find the cow and calf safe
and warm. A few days later a chinook wind arrived and
took the snow with it.

They burned cow chips in the summer and coal in the winter.
The first year they planted potatoes, the plants came up
between the rows of sod. They grew a good crop but the
potatoes were rather flat because of the heavy sod.

The homesteaders didn't get their mail that first summer
unless one of them went to town for supplies, then that
person brought the mail for all the nearest neighbors.
Later they got a mail route from Magrath with a weekly
delivery by horse and buggy.

The first church service of any kind held on the lease
was held in the Collet's home. Elder Harris of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints presided at and
conducted the services.

Entertainment in the form of parties or dances was held
three or four times each year in the various homes.
Mark and Emily put their children in the buggy and
travelled many miles just to go dancing. Mark played
the accordion or mouth organ at these dances and Andrew
Spence's son sometimes played the violin. These parties
usually lasted until daylight as no one dared go home in the
dark for fear of getting lost. However, one evening while
Mark was in Magrath working on a thresher Emily had taken
the two children, Celdar and Venice, and driven a team
of horses to a dance held at the Munday homestead.
(That place later became Jenk's farm). It was light when
they started for the dance but dark when they left for home.
It was an eerie night, no road to follow and the coyotes
were howling. The children were scared as well as their
mother and on arriving home there was a team to unhitch
and turn out to pasture. The children were too scared to
go to the house alone and the coyotes still howled. That
was the last party she went to alone. She sometimes said
she could still hear the coyotes when she thought of that
night.

The following is a true pioneer story as told in Emily's own
words: "Mark had a span of horses that were going to foal
and he wanted us to watch them closely. He was away
working at Ririe's in Magrath. We fed the mares at night
and turned them out in the daytime. It was a lovely
sunny day in February and the horses had wandered out
into our neighbors', so I sent Celdar and a friend, Arthur
Carter, after them. They got up there and started playing
in an open wheat bin. Celdar was about nine or ten at the
time. All of a sudden they looked up, and there was a
blizzard coming, and it was nearly dark. "If it isn't dark
when a blizzard starts, it soon is", Celdar said, "All we have
to do is get home". There weren't any trail's to follow,
except horse trails, so they set out to find their way home.
The snow was blowing around so they couldn't see
where to go. Arthur didn't have any mittens or a warm
coat, so Celdar gave him one of his mittens, and they
held hands and put them in one of Celdar's pockets.
My land was I scared! I just stood there and prayed that
I would know what to do to help bring those children home.
The thought came to me to get a bell down in the cellar.
I went down and put my hand out and felt around in the
dark for the bell. Some fellows had lost it off their sheep,
and Mark had put it down there to give it to its owner. I
went out and walked up and down hollering for them to
face the wind, and I was ringing the bell. Celdar said he
never heard a word or what I was saying, but he heard the
bell. He would say to Arthur, "Listen! That is where our
sheep are. We'll go straight to that sound and we'll get
home". He thought we were trying to get our sheep in,
and they were running back and forth. Well, with the help
of the Lord those kids finally did get home. When they did,
their faces were just a slick of ice. The steam from their
faces and the snow and sleet blowing had frozen on them.
A blizzard starts warm, and then suddenly the air turns
cold and the snow starts falling as sleet, then it just freezes.
I know I would never have thought of that bell myself. I
would have thought that I could make as much noise
hollering. Luckily the horses had come home by themselves
and were safely put away. That night a man got lost and
froze to death up in the other end of the valley. Arthur's
dad had walked to the post office, and the storm hit while
he was on the way home. He had gone the three miles
up in an hour, but it took him three hours to make it back
because there were no fences nor roads to follow. They
stayed with us that night.

Mark hauled most of the lumber for the first school house
at Del Bonita. When the building was completed all entertain-
ments, socials, and church services were held there.

During the time they lived on the farm three more children were
born; William llof, July 28, 1914, and two daughters.

For the sake of the children's education and social life Mark
and Emily rented the farm and moved to Raymond, Alberta
for a time. Sorrow again shadowed their lives when on
December 13, 1928 they lost their fourteen year old son, llof.
In 1938 they returned to Del Bonita.

Mark passed away, May 23, 1948. Emily then rented her farm,
later selling it to Harold Farries. She lived with her daughter
and visited the other children frequently until her passing
October 28, 1978, just twenty-four days prior to her ninety-
eighth birthday.

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