Description

Sarah Farr and the Stranger

Sarah Farr had just finished cleaning her kitchen after the family’s midday meal when she heard a firm knock at the back door of her home. Her family lived at 23 North West Temple in Salt Lake City, where the Family History Library now stands. The year was about 1878.

When she opened the door there stood a man poor, but tidy-looking. It was not unusual for strangers such as this to come to her door as she lived not too far east of the train station. The man asked for something to eat. So often did strangers come by looking for help like this that Sarah’s husband, John Henry, had purchased meal tickets that the family would provide to such strangers where they could get a good meal at a nearby restaurant?

However, there was something different about this man and Sarah invited him in. He took a seat at her kitchen table and she served him some food. As he was eating, he suddenly asked where was her son. She responded by telling him that the lad was outside playing in the yard. He then asked her to call him into the house. He wanted to see him.

Sarah was hesitant. This man was a stranger and she did not want to leave him alone in the house. Nevertheless there was something about him that caused her to comply with his request. 

She went out back and found her son, playing underneath a second-story balcony at a building just north of her home.

She called him and he came. Together they went back to the house. When they entered, the stranger was gone. They searched through the home, but he was nowhere to be found. Then, suddenly, there came a loud crash. Mother and son ran outside to investigate and discovered that the balcony under which the lad had been playing just moments before had collapsed. Large beams and heavy timbers had fallen to the ground and crushed the toys the boy had left behind. Had he still been there…

That inspired and obedient mother was Sarah Farr Smith and that little boy was George Albert Smith, the eighth president of the Church.

Source: Susan Arrington Madsen. The story originates from oral history delivered by W. Whit Smith, a grandson of Sarah and John Henry, on 2 May 1986, to Susan Arrington Madsen.

For more stories by Glenn Rawson visit

www.glennrawson.com

or

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Glenn-Rawson-Stories/