Uppity Mormon Women: Rachel Ridgeway Ivins Grant

Rachel Ridgeway Ivins Grant

Single mother

Rachel started out life as a Quaker. Probably would have remained as such, but she loved music so very much. (Quaker meetings are known for their silent contemplation, and they don't sing hymns.) Being religiously-minded, eventually she ended up a Mormon.

Rachel was beautiful, and considered a pleasant person, though a bit reserved at first due to her Quaker background. It took her a while to get used to a faith that believed in laughter and joy and lots of hymn singing. The prophet Joseph Smith Jr. bemused her, for how could he be the leader of a faith and still have a sense of humour?

She knew Joseph Smith as an adolescent, and even turned down a proposal of marriage from him. ("So," sez Brer Joseph. "Ya wanna become my plural wife?" "I don't think so!" sez Sistah Rachel. "Talk to the hand!")

This isn't to say she never got married. Rachel met this really great bloke by name of Jedidiah (Jeddy) Grant when she was in her teens but didn't get around to marrying him until in her thirties, becoming wife number seven. I wonder if she ever looked back on her life and wished she'd married him sooner.

She was rather fond of him. Alas, their life together was marked by tragedy. Rachel was his wife for only a year. Nine days after she bore him one son (Heber J), "lung disease" took Jeddy, leaving her a widow.

She, and a few of Jeddy's other wives, later married George Grant, Jeddy's brother, but that marriage was a disaster. Georgie-boy, once a war hero and other publicly-distinguished things caved in under the pressure of life and soon succumbed to alcohol. Since no Mormon woman was obliged to stick with a failed marriage, Rachel and the other wives divorced him soon after. Rachel's attitude was "Good riddance!" The marriage was so traumatic for her she refused to ever marry again. Her son became her focus. She loved young Heber very much.

Being a single mother, she lived rather frugally. Still, she had an independent streak, even rejecting Church aid when offered to her and chose to support herself through seamstress work and taking in boarders.

She was more moralist than activist, but still retained a flavour of the feminism so prevalent among Mormon women by choosing to remain a single, self-supporting mother and raising her son to respect women. (Later, Heber J's ten daughters loved him very much.)

To the rest of the extended family, she became known as beloved "Aunt Rachel", a woman of education, personality and self-determination.

When it came to raising a son, she seemed to have done pretty well. This is how her son describes her, and he often spoke of her in public throughout his adult life: “I, of course, owe everything to my mother, because my father died when I was only nine days of age; and the marvelous teachings, the faith, the integrity of my mother have been an inspiration to me.” ^[1]

“I stand here today as one whose mother was all to him. She was both father and mother to me; she set an example of integrity, of devotion and love, of determination, and honor second to none. I stand here today...because I have followed the advice and counsel...which came to me from my mother.” ^[2]

"One of the greatest desires of my life has been to live worthy of the father and the mother I have had..." ^[3]

Awww, what a sweet boy to say such things about his mother. I hope my children regard me as well.

Next post: Maude Adams There's a touch of mystery about this one. I leave it up to you to decide: "Was she or wasn't she?"