Description

Tin Cup

Thomas Parry was born in Wales in 1845. By late 1861, Thomas had emigrated and was settled in Brigham City, Utah with his mother and siblings. Being the oldest boy in the family, Thomas felt the need to help support his mother and family, so he began hauling freight from Corinne, Utah to Butte, Montana—a distance of 355 miles. He was just a teenager.

On one of those trips he stopped to camp at a summit about twenty miles north of what is today Soda Springs, Idaho. Here Thomas met some men who were running horses north from Mexico into Montana. They set to bartering and trading. When it was all over, Thomas acquired a beautiful Spanish saddle and a unique collapsible tin cup.

A couple of days later, up the trail, Thomas went looking for his cup and couldn’t find it. He remembered that he had used it to take a drink from the creek on the day he got it. It must still be there. He started telling the other freighters about his tin cup lost in the canyon, and if anyone found it, please leave it at the freight office in Corrine. Unfortunately, Thomas never saw the cup again, but he had told enough people that the word spread. People started calling the pass, the canyon, even the creek “Tincup.” Today that beautiful pristine area of southeast Idaho is known as Tincup.

Now the sequel to the story.

In 2010, the great grandson of Thomas Parry, Kim Moss, and Kim’s son, Jason were exploring the area of Tincup and needed directions to a nearby town. There were a number of homes they could have stopped at for directions, “but a whisper prompted [Kim] to turn off the road and up a long driveway to a nearby ranch. After getting directions and visiting with the rancher for a time, Kim was again prompted to ask the man if he knew how “Tin cup” had received its name, assuming that the rancher wouldn’t know, Kim was eager to share his proud heritage and great grandpa Thomas Parry’s story. This man, whose ranch lies at the mouth of Tin cup canyon, pipes up and says, “I sure do!” Kim, a little surprised and taken aback, listened to the man as he continued. “My great granddad was exploring the area to homestead. One day he rode to the top of the canyon here, got off his horse to get a drink from the stream and found a collapsible tin cup sitting there on top of a rock. We had it sitting here on the fireplace mantle until just a year or so ago when I gave it to my son from California and he has taken it home with him.” Kim responded, “Wow, someone actually found it, my great grandpa is the guy that lost that tin cup.”

Now, was that a coincidence? I don’t think so and more importantly, neither does Kim.

Source: https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=rm&ogbl#inbox/FMfcgzGrbvBmhDsfrBFvJKtzxqgmTnnH