Elba Charles Bentley

Elba was born in the little mining town of Ibapah, on the border of Utah and Nevada. He was the youngest of six children born to Charles and Emily Jane O’Carroll Bentley. His mother was of Irish descent, her family moving from Ireland to Canada in the mid 1700’s. Even though 6 generations separated Elba from his Irish heritage he spoke with an Irish lilt and sang the tunes like he was born to it. Elba writes of a memory when he was three years old. His mother had inherited some land from her grandfather in Vernal, Utah so the family was moving from Ibapah to Vernal. He remembers riding on the buckboard of the wagon with his father, they had a 4 team horse pulling to help them over the mountain passes. This was the first time he saw a train, he asked his father what it was his father replied that it was an iron horse. Elba thought it was a mighty funny looking horse. Elba went to school until he was about 10 and in the 4th grade. At that time his parents separated. Charles was a rover, wandering here and there shifting from job to job. While he was working at a job in Wyoming he wrote a letter home to Elba and told him he wouldn’t be coming home anymore unless he wanted him too. Elba would take that letter out and read it and have a good cry. His mother was away from home at the time so he showed it to his grandmother. Her advice to him was to follow his heart. Elba loved his dad so much that he chose to leave his mother and wander the western states with his father. In 1904 Elba’s father had a stroke, Elba couldn’t care for him and work too so he left Moab and went to Bennett on the Uintah Reservation near Vernal, Utah where his sister lived. He left his father there in the care of his sister. His brother Ray had a home stead on Antelope Creek on the reservation and he went to work for him, Ray eventually left leaving the property to his brother. This is where Elba met his wife Vivian Hamilton. They were married in Heber, Utah on June 13, 1913. They lived in the Duchesne/Bennett area for about 10 years but eventually moved the family to Price, UT where they settled in a little home on the corner of 300 East and 600 South. Elba was employed at the Carbon Ice Cream Company (1923) and delivered ice to the community. Elba recalls how the little children would run after the ice wagon and beg for ice chips. He started his career in a wagon but finished it in a refrigerated truck. Elba was a jack of all trades. He had a talent for building, working with wood and gardening. His car, woodshop, yard and home were immaculate and kept in good repair. Elba was a jolly person who loved to sing and tease. He loved his family and enjoyed the time he spent with them. In his late years Elba was crippled with arthritis, at first he used canes and crutches to get around but eventually he was confined to a wheel chair which was hard for a hardworking man to take. The day he died he was out weeding his garden in his wheel chair, he was hard-working to the end.