I was born in Provo, Utah; September 1st 1870. My parents came from Switzerland, in 1863 and they settled in Provo, Utah; here five sons and one daughter were born; John N., Emil, Joseph A., Fred, and my sister Josephine. Fred died at the age of three years. Father worked at his trade as watch maker; as there were very few watches in the country; he was obliged to work at anything he could get to do. Father and John Liechty joined in the purchase of a small farm near the foothills East of Provo; they bought the place from Robert Thomas. There was a small spring on the place known as the mudspring. We developed this spring so that it provided sufficient water for the home and cattle.

Father borrowed $500.00 from Richard Brirton at 10% interest. This was in 1882 and in 1886 several of the boys worked transferring coal from the narrow gauge to the broad gauge; the railroad cars would hold about 20 tons; for this we received 50¢ per car. We would unload from two to three cars a day. In the fall of 1886, six of us boys (three of the Liechty and three of the Muhlesteins) went to Scofield, Utah to work in the coal mine, I worked with Brig Liechty; my brother Joseph with Fred and Emil with John Liechty. We would send our money home [by mail] without [declaring] any value with our dirty clothes which our parents would wash and return to us; it was more good luck than management, for we did not lose one cent of the money we sent home in that way. We did send as much as $200.00 and $300.00 at a time. Although the work was very slack (only two or three days a week). We soon paid off the debt to Mr. Brirton. In the Summer time, the work at the mine was very slack; so I worked for Mr. Harkness who had a large ranch near Scofield. My cousin Brig Liechty; would go up to the mine and work in the Blacksmith shop with Mr. Will Phiph who was the smith for the mine; and so learned the trade. He became a very proficient smith and worked at the trade for many years.

We worked there for five years; then all but my brother Joseph went to the farm at Provo…

On the 1st day of May 1900, an explosion accured in the mine; my brother Joseph and I were among the few who came out alive, although we were working in different parts of the mine, which is a great wonder to me to this day….

The explosion accured at 9 a.m. May 1st 1900. As I came to the mouth of the mine all the women and children of the town were there with the few men who worked on the outside. They were frantic and asking for their loved ones. Not knowing the extent of the disaster I was able to give them little or no comfort; for it [eventually] proved to have taken 200 lives. My wife was about to become the mother of our second girl at the time; and she begged me not to return into the mine; I promised her upon my knees I would not enter the mine again; but when the Bishop called for volunteers to try and rescue some who might yet be alive, I forgot the promise to my wife, and was among the first ones to attempt to reach some of the entrapped men; we had no breathing apparatus; so we had to carry the fresh air in with us by bratticing, which was slow and dangerous, many were overcome by the afterdamp, we were successful in rescuing twenty or thirty of the men. Several died after they were outside.

I loved Bishop Parmley very much, so I promised him I would stay with him until all the bodies were taken out of the mine; but after 199 were taken out and identified by friends and kin; one young man, James Pittman, claimed his father, John Pittman, was not out. Although his wife and brothers and friends had identified a body as that of John Pittman his son James insisted that his father was not out of the mine, he had come to him in a vision and told him that his body was still in the mine, and not to give up until it was out; but we knew the place in which he was working at the time the explosion accured. After James Pittman told Bishop Parmley of his vision, he said to him we must do something which will satisfy you that your father is out. That night the Bishop had a dream in that he stood at the mouth of the room or place in which John Pittman was working, and he could see plainly through the caved rock, as looking through clear water, and he saw the body under a large rock with only his foot in sight; on the rock were three little girls putting flowers on the rock. This was the dream.

I helped tunnel under the cave in the direction given by Bishop Parmley for 110 feet. When we came to the rock which Parmley saw in his dream, we soon found the foot protruding from under the rock. I called the Bishop to the place, and he said: “This is just as I saw it in my dream, but I do not see the three girls dressed in white putting flowers on the rock.”

This was one of the most remarkable things I have experienced in my life….