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J
oseph Dean was born the third of August 1831 in Hazelbury, Somerset, England, a son of Barnard Dean and Joanna Elliot…. On May 21,1855, he was married to Catherine Knott in the parish of Taunton St. Mary Magdeline by Henry Parr, Vicar….
“Joseph Dean was listed on his marriage certificate as a carpenter… [He] was a rough-and-ready uneducated man, known for his honesty, but had no use for the churches of the day, so it was always a conundrum how he came to marry Catherine, a refined, pious woman, raised in a religious family, her father being a clerk in their church…. After their marriage at bedtime she would ask that they have prayer. He would reply, ‘You do the praying, and 111 say the Amensf… One night he heard some men preaching a new religion on the street corner.The more he listened, the more he liked it. He went home and told his wife he had heard a new religion that sounded good to him, and persuaded her to go with him the next night to listen. They became converted [to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints] and were baptized November 20,1856….
“On March 30,1860, they left their native land and took steerage passage on the ship Underwriter, a sailing vessel which took six weeks to cross the Atlantic. Having little of this world’s goods, they went through the trying experience of taking steerage passage…. [His oldest son, Joseph Henry Dean] being about five years old, remembers little of the trip, but said he did remember a burial at sea….
‘Soon after arriving in Salt Lake, after all the hardships of the trip, they were asked by Brigham Young to settle in Morgan, Utah, situated in Weber Canyon.They just lived in a dugout in the side of the hill, and suffered many privations until a house could be built….
‘Joseph Dean was offered work on the Salt Lake Temple, so in 1872 he had all his family move to Salt Lake, 60 miles by ox team. His oxen, Buck and Bright pulled the belongings in two days. He rented a house and lot at the corner of 4th North and 2nd West in the 19th Ward from Edward Hunter. The lot contained an apple orchard. A. H. Raleigh, was Bishop…. [ Joseph H. Dean], in his journal, tells how he helped his father at various jobs while he was waiting to obtain work….
‘[Another of his sons]: Jacob LeRoy says his father was a man of great principle. He often told them to be honest; to depend on the Lord in time of sickness, and they would be healed by faith…. Jacob LeRoy tells of his father taking him up on the high scaffold of the Temple so he could put his feet on the capstone where the Angel Moroni was to stand.The great height made him sick.’1
1 Lawrence J. Dean,’Joseph Dean,’’gordonbanks.com, online
