1 Francis Webster – Immigrating to Utah
Francis Webster was born in Norfolkshire, England in 1830. As a young adventurer he traveled to the goldfields of California twice, crossing the isthmus of Panama on a mule to reduce his travel time. He returned from his second California foray having saved $2000, a small fortune for a young man of such humble beginnings. Having converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints he and his young wife, “Betsy” Parson decided to leave their homeland and immigrate to Utah in the United States. With the stake from his gold mining efforts, Webster and his wife could have traveled in luxury, but heeding a petition from church leaders, they elected to forgo their earlier travel plans and instead helped nine other British immigrants with few means to accompany them on the long trip. In October of 1856, he and his wife made their way to Utah with the Martin Handcart Company, enduring frigid temperatures and snow when winter arrived early on the Great Plains, his wife giving birth to their first child along the way. The Websters were among several groups from that company that came to Cedar City to make their homes.
To meet another member of that handcart company visit the Pioneer Monument featuring Nellie Unthank on the Southern Utah University campus.
2 Francis Webster – Civic Leader
Francis Webster was a key figure in the early establishment of Cedar City serving in virtually every important civic office at one time or another, including Justice of the Peace, School Trustee, Alderman, councilman and two terms as the city’s mayor. During one of those stints as mayor a complaint was made that the city was holding the price of city lots and some dry land acreage outside of town, too high. The then “Chamber of Commerce” petitioned the City Council for a reduction so that younger families might have a chance to acquire land of their own. The Hon. Mayor Webster sided with the up-and-comers announcing that prices for city lots would be one dollar and twenty-five cents and dry farmland seventy-five cents per acre. Many homes near Cedar City’s downtown still sit on those buck and quarter lots.
Webster also served on the Building Committee when Cedar City was selected as the site for the Branch Normal School, that in the course of 90 years would become Southern Utah University. It has been well said that, “the success of that herculean [effort] was due to [the] dauntless courage and dogged persistence” of Francis Webster.
3 Francis Webster – Betsy Parsons Webster
As the mother of ten children, Francis Webster’s wife Ann Elizabeth Parsons Webster, known throughout her life as Betsy, devoted most of her time to her family while also serving actively in her church and using her sewing skills working from home as a tailor. It was reported that she had a unique ability to remake worn, shabby clothes so they looked almost new. One of her great-granddaughters once wrote, “It was said at one time [that] every man in Cedar [City] was either wearing a coat or suit made by Ann Elizabeth Webster, or had worn one.”
Her nephew, Dr. George Middleton, said of her, “Aunt Betsy … was to me one of the most adorable women I ever knew…[she had] an education unusual for the times, … Her handwriting was superb, and her language was that of the upper class of English…My more mature judgment of her confirms the estimate of my boyhood days that she was the embodiment of all that was dignified, and noble and true…”