This photograph shows Everest Raymond Watrous behind the counter of his Brighton Village Store. It was located in Big Cottonwood Canyon outside of Salt Lake City, Utah. It was a wonderful, busy store and a favorite destination for skiers and those just out for a drive in the canyon. The store sold food and some groceries. It sold gasoline as well. It carried a variety of goods associated with camping and hiking. It sold Utah-oriented keepsakes which appealed to tourists. Many members of Ray’s family worked in the store throughout the years. Winter was as busy or more so than summer at the store. Skiers came in for lunch, dinner and snacks. They bought hats, boots and other clothing items. The store also sold fishing poles and an assortment of tackle and bait.
The store was sold in the 1970s and was eventually razed to make room for an overflow parking lot for local skiing.
This is a photograph of the construction of the Brighton Bowery in Big Cottonwood Canyon outside of Salt Lake City, Utah. It was built on the property owned by Everest Raymond Watrous where he owned and operated the Brighton Village Store. It was built in 1966 from logs cut and transported from Oregon. Ray and his son Tom helped with the construction. It was a beautiful building designed for large gatherings. Upstairs it had a dormitory-style room where youth groups could sleep. The Watrous family held many family gatherings in the building. The children and grandchildren loved to play the jukebox and roller skate on the cement floor.
When the Brighton Village Store and surrounding property was sold about 1972, the bowery was part of that sale. It still stands today but resembles the original building only somewhat and on the outside only. The inside has been divided into rooms including a store and a cafe.
The Brighton Village Store itself has been razed. In its place is an overflow parking lot for skiers.
This keepsake photograph of Mildred Bates was taken in about 1928. Her parents are Nephi James Bates and Flora Louise Maiben. Mildred married Everest Raymond Watrous in 1932. They became the parents of three children.
Mildred Bates is the daughter of Nephi James Bates and Flora Louise Maiben. She was born in 1909 in Richfield, Sevier County, Utah. This keepsake photograph was taken on the steps of their Richfield home. Mildred Bates married direct ancestor Everest Raymond Watrous.
This keepsake photograph of Mervin Reynolds and Wayne Elliott Watrous was taken in front of the family cabin in Big Cottonwood Canyon. Their father Everest Elliott Watrous and mother Mary Maria Jenkins, and other family members worked at mining in the canyon and lived there until the children were ready to go to school. After that time they spent summers at the cabin. It was located in the area now known as The Spruces and was near the family mine which was later incorporated as the Cottonwood Metals Mining Company. Direct ancestor Everest Raymond Watrous was a baby at the time these photographs were taken. He is found on this site in photographs taken on the same day.
Jesse Rowley was born in Connecticut to Elnathan Rowley and Lydia Wells. He was the eighth child born to his parents. The seventh child died at birth and had been named Jesse. When our ancestor was born, his parents used the same name for him. About 1774, Jesse and Bathsheba married. They became the parents of six children. The fifth child, Mary, is our direct ancestor by her marriage to Timothy Watrous. The youngest child Mabel, first married Timothy Watrous but after her young death, her sister Mary became his wife.
Jesse and his family were members of the First Congregational Church in Colchester, Connecticut. Their marriages, deaths and christenings are recorded there. Jesse owned land in Colchester. Of interest is the fact that his adjoining neighbor was Daniel Watrous. Much is known about him, but no record gives us a connection to our ancestor Timothy. At least not yet.
In 1804, the records of the church indicate that Jesse Rowley took his own life.
Mabel Rowley was born in Connecticut in 1787 to Jesse Rowley and his wife Bathsheba. She was the youngest of five children. We know nothing of her childhood. Sometime before 1807, when her first son was born, she married Timothy Watrous. Their first son, William, was born in 1807 in Connecticut. Their second son Samuel was born in 1809 in the same place. We are not certain when Mabel died except that it was about 1815. Following her death, her sister married her husband Timothy and cared for her two sons.
Mary Rowley is our direct ancestor. She was the fifth child of six born to her parents Jesse Rowley and Bathsheba. Nothing is known about Mary’s childhood except that her father took his own life in 1810 and her younger sister Mabel died sometime before 1816. In about 1816, Mary Rowley married her deceased sister Mabel’s husband Timothy Watrous. She cared for his two sons William and Samuel who were her nephews and her step-sons in this arrangement. She migrated with Timothy, his children and many others including many members of the Richardson family from Connecticut to what would become Monroe Township, Muskingum County, Ohio. There, her husband bought land and prepared to make a home. By the next year of 1817, Mary was expecting a child.
In March of 1818, Timothy Watrous unexpectedly died. Two months later Mary gave birth to a son. Jerome Timothy Watrous is our direct ancestor. In 1820, Mary married a man with whom they had migrated. He was Rufus Richardson. Rufus and Mary cared for William, Samuel and Jerome Watrous and added to their family a daughter Olivia in 1820 and another daughter, Julia in 1822. It was upon the birth of Julia in 1822 that Mary Rowley Watrous Richardson died. She was buried on the Richardson Family Farm in a private graveyard. It is located in Monroe Township in Muskingum County, Ohio. William and Samuel Watrous were old enough to be on their own. Jerome was only eight. His step-father Rufus remarried. Her name was Jemima Gittings. She did not want to raise Jerome but we must assume that she and Rufus did raise his daughters Olivia and Julia. Olivia grew to adulthood but Julia died at the age of four and is buried in the same graveyard as her mother.
Our ancestor, Mary’s son Jerome was sent to live with Benjamin Gittings. His sister was the new wife of Rufus Richardson. His summary on this site provides interesting information about his life.
Things come full circle. With the passage of time, our ancestor grew to adulthood. When he was newly married, he and his step-father Rufus Richardson and his family with Jemima Gittings and Benjamin Gittings, Jemima’s brother along with his family, left Ohio for Illinois. They settled in towns in both Hancock and Henderson Counties which bordered each other. They were LaHarpe and Terre Haute. Eventually, Jerome Timothy Watrous’ daughter married a descendant of Benjamin Gittings.
Timothy Watrous is the oldest known ancestor in our Watrous line. He was born about 1785 in Connecticut and died in 1818 in Muskingum County, Ohio. He migrated to Ohio in the company of many others. They all bought land or received “bounty lands” for their service in The American Revolution. It appears that ancestor Timothy simply bought land or was eligible to buy it because his father had served. Just a surmise. Timothy bought 180 acres of prime Ohio River Valley land for $2 an acre. After only a few months, Timothy unexpectedly died. We don’t know how or why.
His first marriage had been to Mabel Rowley. She was the daughter of Jesse Rowley and his wife Bathsheba. Mabel and Timothy became the parents of two sons named William and Samuel. Mabel Rowley Watrous died. Our ancestor Timothy married his deceased wife’s sister Mary Rowley. She migrated to Ohio as Timothy’s wife in the company of her nephews who also became her step-children. Two months after the death of Timothy Watrous, his wife Mary Rowley Watrous gave birth to a son. He is our direct ancestor. His name is Jerome Timothy Watrous.
Timothy was the first person buried in the newly formed township. The History of Muskingum County Ohio tells us that he was buried “where the Walker tannery once stood” but “was taken up and moved to the Waters graveyard in section 10, Monroe Township”.
Today, this land is owned by a mining company. The place of the graveyard is likely still there, but since none of the graves were ever marked it has not been found and there is no record of who is buried there. The search for the parents and siblings of Timothy Watrous has occupied our thoughts and efforts for ten years. We have turned over every stone and feel no closer to finding his origins today than we did when we started.
The migration of Timothy Watrous
Connecticut to Ohio
William Thomas Gale was the seventh child of twelve born to his parents Charles Gale and Amanda Jane Cloward. Six of his siblings died in infancy. His father heard the message of the Gospel from missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day-Saints and was baptized in his native England. Charles came to America and in 1869 married Amanda Jane Cloward. The family settled in Payson, Utah County, Utah.
In 1910, William married Hulda Priscilla Hjorth who was also the daughter of Mormon emigrants. William and Priscilla became the parents of five children. Four grew to adulthood, including direct ancestor Floyd Calvin Gale. One child died in an accident at the age of four. Her name was Maxine.