GROVER HOOPES
Grover Hoopes was born April 20, 1892 near St. David, Cochise County, Arizona at a place called Horne Holler. He was the first born child of George Arthur Hoopes and Charlotte Iris Curtis, the oldest grandchild of his grandfather, J. N. Curtis and Sarah Diantha Gardner, who had a ranch north of Tombstone, the famous silver mining town. Grover's parents moved to Thatcher in 1894 in a covered wagon.
About the time Grover started school his father was called on a mission to Indian Territory. Grover graduated from Normal School in Thatcher in 1908, receiving a large diploma.
When Grover was 14 and his brother Cece (Cecil) was 12, his dad let them go alone on horseback to St. David to visit their Curtis grandparents. They weren't allowed to take guns because they might provoke the indians, so they used bean flippers to kill rabbits and quail to eat along the way. The trip took two and one-half days.
Grover went to Gila Academy for high school. He was two years older than Spencer Kimball, son of the stake president, and was well acquainted with him. Grover told a story of being with Spencer when Spencer was packing his bags to go on his mission, and that he went with worn out clothes. Grover studied to be a carpenter and to read and make blueprints.
Grover progressed through the priesthood and served a three year mission to the Northwestern States, during the time of the First World War. He was also able to build some LDS churches in Washington (Seattle, Tacoma, Everett) and Montana. To support him on his mission, his brother Melvin worked and sent him money.
On returning home from his mission Grover married Nora Estelle Lamoreaux, to whom he wrote while on his mission. She was teaching home economics in Thatcher. They rented a small house, one-half block south of Main Street, on College Avenue in Thatcher, where their first son, Lamro was born.
In 1926 Grover and Nora bought a 20 acre farm from Nora's parents which had a frame lumber house in which they lived until 1934, when Grover tore it down and built an adobe house in front of it using all of the 2x4 lumber to frame the roof and make partitions for the new house. Grover started building this new house early in the summer and had it ready to live in before winter came, about four months. Two Mexicans, a father and son, dug the basement for the house and used the dirt to make the adobes for the outside walls of the house. They made 2000 adobes and laid them in the wall for $50, the price was $25 per thousand. Grover did all of the framing, carpenter and cabinet work, trading his skills of carpentry with friends who did the plastering, plumbing and electric work. Grover's three sons, Lamro, Wyeth and Avon, who were 14, 12 and 11, helped with all of the work. The whole house cost less than $2000 and was completely paid for when it was completed.
Grover and Nora had five boys, Lamro, Wyeth, Avon, George Arthur (GA), and Jerry and a daughter, Nora Nel. Avon died of a ruptured appendix following a fishing trip when he was 17 years old. When Nel was born in 1939 she had a rash and the doctor suggested she be taken to the mountains (Mt. Graham) for the summers, so Grover bought a little cabin, ten by fourteen feet. He worked on the cabin, enlarging it, and enjoyed going there during the summers for the rest of his life.
In the church, Grover served in various organizations, including Sunday School superintendent and Mutual Improvement. He was ordained a high priest and was called to serve in the bishopric, but accepted a job in Ft. Grant to teach manual training to the young inmates at the reform school there.
Grover liked to work with wood and made several cedar chests and other furniture. He also loved to go hunting and fishing, which were his favorite hobbies. He liked horses, as he was raised with them.
Nora died in 1947 and a year after that Grover married Olive Palmer Robinson, who had some children about the same ages as Grover's. Grover ran a hardware store on Main Street in Thatcher, next to his brother's (Glen and Nat) Drug Store, for many years. He had red pickup truck and would give his grandchildren a ride home as they stopped at his store on their way home for lunch.
Grover died at home at the age of 83 on October 16, 1975. He was buried in the family plot in Thatcher alongside Nora and Avon.