Frederick Ellis Barker by Ruth H. Barker

May 6, 1861 - November 12, 1922

Frederick Ellis Barker was born May 6, 1861 at Mound Fort, now part of Ogden, son of Simon Barker and Jemima Newey.

Frederick has been described as about 5'10" with blue eyes, auburn hair, a medium build, and was built fairly sturdily. As a young man, Fred wore a large handlebar mustache, but shaved it off when it turned gray in later life.

Frederick and his elder brother, George Simon, learned farming and craftsmanship required at that time. When a family needed a home, they bought the lumber and other materials and they and their neighbors built it. Young Fred caught the spirituality of his father, and he was called to be a recorder in the Logan Temple as a young man. But, he decided not to be a farmer like his father. Fred and his brother, George, aspired to higher paid employment. They bought a book on Isaac Pittman shorthand, and in the evenings and during the winters, they learned shorthand. They first traced the forms carefully, and then increasingly abbreviated their shorthand forms so they could write faster. They heard that shorthand writers held their pens between their first and second fingers. Fred always held his pen this way writing shorthand, at which he became expert, although he held his pen in the conventional way to write longhand.

Fred liked to report Sunday afternoon meetings in the Tabernacle, both because of his love of the Gospel and his desire to improve his speed writing shorthand. At conference time, before the days of tape recorders, several young people sat at a special table, listening and taking shorthand notes of each sermon. At the reporter's table, he met a young lady, Cecilia Sharp of Salt Lake City, who also was studying shorthand. It wasn't long before they were courting, from a distance - Fred from Ogden, and Cecilia from Salt Lake. Fred also met Heber J. Grant, who was then a Salt Lake City businessman, and later became an apostle and then the seventh President of the LDS Church. Brother Grant encouraged Fred to move to Salt Lake to work for him as his secretary, which he did. The fact that he could now see Cecilia more often had probably entered his mind. Even though Fred was excited about his new opportunity, he also felt lonely in this new city, and he wrote a poem about it, which you can read in his Scrapbook. And, as most of us learn, time eases all things if we let it, and Salt Lake City became the place where Fred eventually married and raised his family.

Fred and Cecilia married in the Logan Temple on June 26, 1889 where Fred had earlier served a mission as a clerk-recorder. The Barker’s home was a one and a half story gabled house at 272 4th Avenue in Salt Lake City built with a twin house to the east; one for Frederick and Cecilia, and one for Cecilia's brother, Joseph C. Sharp, and his wife, Janie Bennett. Both homes have since been torn down. Cecilia's mother, Margaret Condie, who was a licensed midwife and non-graduate medical practitioner also lived with Fred and Cecilia. She delivered all six children in the family. The children of Frederick Ellis Barker and Cecilia Sharp are:

• Frederick George, the eldest child, became an expert shorthand reporter, wrote condensed versions of Shakespeare's plays and the Book of Mormon, and was associate professor of psychology at the University of Utah at the time of his death on January 2, 1946. He married Jenetta Stephens and had four sons, who live in the East.
• Lucile taught in the public schools of Idaho and Salt Lake City most of her life. She died from cancer on December 4, 1949, never marrying.
• Alma Sharp (Al) worked as an accountant much of his life. He lived in Los Angeles, where he raised a large posterity of talented and upright individuals.
• Joseph Ira, next younger, graduated from the University of Utah in mining engineering and died in a mine accident at the Utah Apex Mine, September 12, 1924. He never married.
• Clarence Sharp, youngest in the family, graduated from the University of Utah in education and English, and was a newspaper reporter for the Deseret News. He, also had a large family of talented and upright individuals.

As Fred and Cecilia began to raise their family, Fred was called on a mission to Australia in 1897, leaving his wife and four little ones at home. One year after serving in the mission field, Fred was called by President Wilford Woodruff to be the Mission President in Australia. What a sacrifice this must have been for the family! But, Cecilia Sharp, and her mother, Margaret Condie, willingly shouldered the responsibility of the home and four young children, (Fred, 7; Lucile, 5; Gladys, 3; and Alma, 10 months) while Fred served his mission. (Their sons, Ira and Clarence, were born after their father came home from his mission.)

While on shipboard traveling to Australia, Fred wrote two loving poems about his wife and children. He missed his family greatly, but he also felt it was important to answer the Lord's call. He served a faithful mission in Australia, and was pleased that his homecoming journey with two other returning missionaries, took him through Egypt, the Holy Land and to Europe, and his journey completed his circle around the world.

During his absence, James L. Barker, second cousin to Frederick Ellis, lived in the home while attending the University of Utah. He helped the family considerably, serving almost as a father to the young children. James L. Barker later became head of the modern languages department of the U. of U., president of the Argentine and the French missions, and author of a variety of books dealing with the history of the early Christian Church.

Soon after the birth of Fred and Cecilia’s youngest child, Clarence, they moved into a new two story brick home at 145 Fourth Avenue where the family lived from then on.

The Frederick Ellis Barker home at 145

4th Ave., SLC, UT

After lots of practice, Fred became expert enough in writing and transcribing shorthand to become a court reporter. He could write shorthand fast enough to record legal testimonies as they were spoken in the courtroom. Fred became a district court reporter for many years, traveling between Ogden and Salt Lake to serve in the courts of the day. After his mission, Fred studied law and became a member of the Bar. He was widely read and spoke and wrote excellent English although he had only elementary school training.

Eventually, recording machines came to replace shorthand in the courtroom.

[Need to upload image of letterhead, ebf, 10/2010]

As an insight into the home life of the Barkers, the following incidents come from Clarence Barker's life story:

“Frederick Ellis Barker and Cecilia Sharp Barker were hard working and religious parents. We had family prayer around the front room table together every night. I enjoyed particularly the prayers of my father and grandmother, who were very fervent.

L to R: Alma, Clarence, Ira, Frederick Ellis, Fred, William Westwood (son-in-law)

“We had a red astrakhan apple tree, a pie cherry tree, a peach tree, a plum tree and a prune tree in the back yard; also a chicken coop and an area where my father early each spring would spade up and plant green peas. My, but those peas were good!

“Returning to our home; although it had a hot air furnace, this was so inefficient that my folks used the kitchen coal range and small hot blast heating stoves in the front room and parlor for heating. Ira and I had the job of keeping the kindling box stocked and the coal scuttles full.

The Frederick Ellis Barker Family

Standing left to right: Margaret Condie Sharp, Lucile, Clarence, Cecilia Sharp, Frederick Ellis

Kneeling: perhaps Ira

“The north room in the basement had a table piled with 50 pound bags of flour each fall. Beneath the north window was a big box which was filled each fall with potatoes. Boxes of apples also were stored. Mother baked bread raised by yeast which she grew in a fruit jar of potato water.

“My father had bought a Model T Ford touring car the spring of 1921 (just before Al's marriage). I soon learned to drive. This became my chariot for dates after that time, although the car had no heater, and the streets were not cleared by the city in winter, so the car was put up after heavy snows and not taken out until early spring.”

In those days, one could request a patriarchal blessing any time it was especially needed, and with each big challenge in his life, Fred received a blessing from the patriarch. At the time of his mission call to Australia, the whole family received patriarchal blessings, and he recorded them all and put them together in his scrapbook, as he called it, to read all during his life. Fred must have read his blessings often, for it looks like every talent was developed, and every promise in those blessings was granted to him during his life.

Fred was a very religious man, and he wrote poems about the Savior and about Heavenly Father, and attributes in life that he felt were important, including chastity and being cheerful. He wrote poems about many of the characters in the Book of Mormon, good and bad. He wrote several poems about the prophet Alma's life, and he loved Alma so much that he named one of his sons after him. Fred also wrote a play, and for special occasions, he indicated that some of his poems should be sung, writing at the top of each poem which tune to use, just as Emma Smith did in her early hymn book for the Saints. Many of Fred's poems show his love for the gospel, his family, missionary work, and the temple.

Towards the end of his life in 1920 when he was living in Salt Lake, Fred was again called to be a temple worker in the Salt Lake Temple this time. He lived close enough to the temple to walk there and he gave many hours of devoted temple service.

Fred died at a fairly young age, 61, of a brain tumor. He was bothered by rheumatism, and toward the end, his sight failed him. At the time of their father's death, Lucile, Ira, and Clarence were still living at home. Al had just married a year before. Cecilia, and her mother, Margaret Condie, continued to raise the children to maturity, and their Uncles James Barker and Joseph Sharp always showed great interest and support to the family.

Frederick Ellis Barker is buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery.

The grave is located on the northeast corner of Grand Avenue and 1060 E/Cypress Ave., in the cemetery.

Headstones of Frederick Ellis Barker’s unmarried children

located in the Salt Lake City Cemetery

Graves are located on the northeast corner of Grand Avenue and 1060 E/Cypress Ave. in the cemetery,

next to their parent's graves.

Edited by Ruth H. Barker

Sources: Clarence Sharp Barker Life History, by himself

Tape of Al Barker's voice, taken in November 1977, transcribed by his daughter, Cecilia

Gladys Barker Westwood Life Sketch by Clarence S. Barker

Marjorie Cecilia Barker Sorensen life history written July 18, 1979