[birds chirping] Woman 1: Um, sometimes I am overly optimistic, overly positive where I don't think logically.

[laughs] I just believe that everything's going to work out great and I guess I kind of twist situations so they do.

♪♪ - I spent a year in Venezuela doing some volunteer work and had some problems with parasites and amoebas as, as a lot of people do, um, but it got pretty bad and so after a year I needed to come home to do some tests and they, they did a colonoscopy and it was mainly to be able to find parasites and instead they found some pre-cancerous polyps.

In about five to fifteen years from that time that-- those pre-cancerous polyps would have turned into cancer.

it's, it's kind of scary to think that I-- maybe I would have had cancer by now if I hadn't had that happen.

Lise: A student of child life at the University of Utah, Katie Newbold has struggled with health issues for years, but a shocking diagnosis of pre-cancerous polyps in her colon caused her to ponder about her life and her ancestors, especially about her great-grandmother who died of leukemia in her early thirties.

- I’ve wanted to know more about my great-grandma, um... her personality, to know how she dealt with finding out that she was dying.

I feel an even deeper connection to this great-grandmother of mine because she died at about my age and knowing that if they hadn't found those pre-cancerous polyps that I too could have died.

I’m hoping that I will find out who my great-grandmother is and hopefully more about my medical history.

Lise: We never know what will connect us to our ancestors and it could even be something as challenging as a serious medical condition, but it's these links that ultimately make us family and form the stories of our lives.

From the studios of BYU Television in Provo, Utah this is The Generations Project.

- Hi everybody, I’m Lise Simms and each week on our program we bring you the story of someone who, for one reason or another, wants to connect with an ancestor or perhaps an entire generation of their family tree and we help them do just that.

We're an ongoing project dedicated to connecting people across generations and today that person is Katie Newbold.

Hi Katie.

- Hi Lise.

- You have such a fascinating story, but first I have to start out with this bubbly, positive, "I twist everything to turn out the way I want" attitude.

Katie: Don't you love that?

Lise: I do, I’m kind of that kind of girl myself.

- Are you?

Lise: Yeah, have you always been that way?

- I have, yeah.

- Do you think it was a product of some of the health issues you've had throughout your life, or do you think you started like that?

- You know, I think I started like that.

My mom is a lot like that.

Lise: Mm.

- Um, my grandma is too, but I think that the medical problems probably helped me to just have that positive perspective and see that everything works out, I mean, life's good.

Lise: Who says that?

The medical problems actually helped me see the positive side.

I love that.

So you've actually, you had medical issues before the parasites in South America.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Um, and was there any information about them at the time?

What was happening?

Did you know?

Katie: I really didn't know.

I visited a lot of different doctors.

Um, we knew that... things were just not working right, um... Lise: But your family didn't have answers, doctor didn't have answers.

Katie: Mm-mm.

- Then you're in Venezuela-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

- You have parasites so bad you have to come back to the States and what do they discover?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Pre-cancerous polyps, so pre-colon cancer.

Lise: A gift in disguise because if they hadn't-- if you hadn't had a colonoscopy-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

what would have been the outcome?

Katie: Yeah, I mean how many 20 year olds go in and have colonoscopies, so most likely I would have ended up with colon cancer.

- You are good at turning things in your favor.

Katie: I know.

- Nicely done.

Katie: Yeah, it's amazing 'cause in retrospect, I mean parasites weren't fun at all, but it was worth it-- Lise: Yeah-- - definitely worth it.

Lise: could have saved your life.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- So, you're coming to your family genealogy from a really interesting perspective.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Starting with your own medical history, you're propelled to learn about your family medical history-- Katie: Yeah.

- and in the process, this opens up your whole ancestry to you in a way you've never been exposed to before.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Tell me about your great-grandmother Romania and what about her in this story is important to you?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

I really didn't know anything about Romania except that she died at a young age of cancer... Lise: Ah.

- and so I had that connection with her even though I didn't know anything else.

I felt like wow, I mean, I could of had cancer and she died of cancer at about the same age, and so it made me want to know more about her, about her personality and about the kind of life that she lived.

Lise: Yeah.

Interesting, and the times that she lived in.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- So was it scary starting out not knowing what you were going to discover?

This is a really intimate thing to do on camera and I know that.

- Yeah.

Um, no.

I wasn't scared.

I was just excited.

I wanted to find out as much as I could, and I knew that this was gonna be a great resource to find out about my genealogy, find out about all of the medical issues and hopefully help me live a long and happy life and be able to pass on great stories to my children about Romania and about my own life.

Lise: Well, it all starts with your medical history, and it turns out there are people in this world that can help a lot with that, and you met one of them.

Katie: Yeah.

- Let's look.

♪♪ Katie is on her way to meet Vickie Venne, a genetic councilor in high-risk cancer at the Huntsman Cancer Institute in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Katie hopes Vickie will give her tips on where to start her family medical history research.

- You are asking the perfect question.

It's sort of like why did this happen to me?

Was it a spontaneous thing?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Or did it happen because of my family?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- One of your other questions is gonna be, Will I pass this on?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Well, so, let’s get a little bit of information about your family, okay?

So, you've got a mom and a dad... Lise: While Vickie gets some background information on Katie's family, she also gives Katie specific information to look for.

- So, we're gonna find out a couple things.

One is I’m actually also gonna want to get the pathology results from your, your records-- - Okay.

- but then what I’m also gonna want to do is I want to get information from your family.

If somebody had cancer what I’m gonna want to know is, How old were they when they had cancer?

and if they believe there were any other extenuating circumstances.

I’m here to tell you right now, Katie, and I think this is really important for you to hear, you're not gonna die of colon cancer.

You're gonna die of something else.

- [laughing] - Oh, you will die.

- I will die.

- [laughing] Everybody does, so, yeah.

Katie: I guess because Vickie is a genetic counselor it just felt more casual.

She wanted to get to know me and understand my family background whereas if I were going to see a doctor you have to put on one of those scary little gowns and you worry about what tests are gonna be happening.

With her it's just calm, you can talk like she's just another normal person, a friend even, who wants to know more about you so at least at this point um, from the information that she gave me I’m more excited to continue to keep learning more.

Lise: Following the instructions from the genetic counselor, Katie's calling her doctor to order her pathology reports which she'll receive by mail in a few days.

To start researching her family medical history, Katie is on her way to see her paternal grandmother, Barbara Newbold.

She hopes to gather information about any cases of cancer on her paternal side of the family to make the research easier, Katie carries a pedigree chart that she'll fill in as she gathers information.

Katie: Hi.

We're all here.

[chuckles] Barbara: Oh you are, huh?

Katie: Are any of your brothers still alive?

Barbara: Nope, they're all gone.

- Okay, when did your brother, Ted die?

- Okay, there you go.

- [chuckles] Grandma has the answers.

- [chuckles] That's so I can keep track of them.

Okay, Ted, born in 1918 and died in 2005.

- I didn't know he had cancer too.

Barbara: Yep.

All of us, all six of us living.

Katie: Okay.

- Then Uncle Hal died at age 85 and a half.

Katie: Okay.

Barbara: But he had prostate cancer at about age 66.

And the third one's Don.

And he died at about age 74.

And he developed colon cancer at about age 60.

And then Laurie died of ovarian cancer.

And Aunt Darlene's the one that's had lots of skin cancers.

She was always the one that wanted to look like an Indian when she was young.

Katie: [chuckles] - And Margie and Darlene and I are still alive.

- And all three of you have had breast cancer.

- Yup.

- Grandma.

- Guess what Katie.

Both: [laugh] Barbara: And here's mother.

Katie: Your whole family.

Barbara: The whole family.

- How come I didn't know all this?

[chuckles] - There's mother.

Lise: Barbara Newbold was diagnosed with breast cancer and later with lymphoma.

Barbara: ...but he's never admitted to having anything burned off.

Chances are he has.

Katie: Okay, so the genetic cancers.

One, two, three, four.

While I was talking to my grandma, we calculated that there were thirteen different cases of cancer that were genetic, I guess you could say, and then six that were from the environment, from the sun most likely, so 19 different cancers um... and that's amazing.

It makes me realize that it's a part of my family and I’m not going to use it as an excuse to say Oh, well, I’m probably gonna die of cancer.

I better be upset about it and let everyone know, but it’s more of, Okay well, it’s just something that's gonna come with life and my relatives have done it, they've lived great lives despite those illnesses that they've had and they're great people, probably because of it.

Lise: Katie still needs to complete her pedigree chart with her maternal side of the family.

To do so, she's visiting her mom, Lisa Newbold.

♪♪ Katie: You don't know of any other cousins of Grandma's, or... or any of your cousins - Mm-mm - that had cancer?

- No, huh-uh, no cancer.

- You are a clean gene family.

- Clean gene.

Both: [laugh] - I hope so, but who knows.

- Well, you can balance out this side.

[laughs] - I know.

- I’m like weighed down over here.

And then what about on your mom's side?

- Okay, then on my mom's side.

Grandpa Mckell just died of the flu.

That interesting?

Katie: That's an easy way to go.

- [chuckles] Well, he was so healthy.

He was 83, never been sick and got the flu and died that week.

Katie: Hm.

Lisa: So, it was very quick.

But then his first wife, Romania, was my real grandma that I’ve never met or anything.

She's the one that we-- I really don't know what she died from.

Um, as a little girl my mother used to tell us, well I thought she said anemia which probably said-- [laughs] meant something else, and so I, as I was growing up, I always thought it was anemia or pneumonia or, you know, something like that, but I never really knew.

- So why did I always think it was leukemia?

- I don't know.

Both: [laugh] - We all come up with our own-- our own word.

Lise: Though her mother can't confirm whether or not Katie's great-grandmother, Romania, died of cancer, Katie still has questions about her life.

Lisa is showing Katie a picture that her mother, Elsa, gave her.

- And she said this is her mother, Romania, and this is her, and she's about a year old.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- And she passed away when my mom was four and we never really talked about it.

It was kind of taboo I guess, just... to talk about the past like that.

Katie: It makes me almost ache for Romania, to think that she passed away and now she has hundreds of, of posterity.

She-- Literally.

Grandchildren, great-grandchildren, great-great-grandchildren, who know nothing about her and this is gonna be a great opportunity for all of us to know her finally.

♪♪ Lise: Katie's found her great-grandmother's death certificate and was able to confirm that she did, in fact, die of leukemia.

To obtain a better understanding of the circumstances of Romania's death in 1928, Katie is meeting Dr. Paul Shami, an expert on leukemia.

Dr. Shami: The death certificate mentions chronic mylogenous leukemia.

This is not something she was born with-- - Oh.

- therefore it's not something that she transmitted to her-- - It happened-- - to your grandmother etcetera.

- when she was living.

Lise: Leukemia, a type of cancer of the blood cells starts in the bone marrow where white blood cells reproduce in an abnormal way.

The fast reproduction of leukemia cells leads to serious problems such as anemia, bleeding, and infections.

Katie: Yeah.

- Without treatment the evolution of this disease-- so she would have had a large spleen, she would have probably lost a lot of weight because with the spleen pressing on her stomach she probably wouldn't have been able to eat a lot.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Shami: What people die of is uh, either bleeding because their platelets fall, so they can-- they bleed, or they can die of infections because their immune system is weakened by, by not producing normal white blood cells.

Lise: Even though leukemia was first diagnosed in 1845, by 1928 when Romania died, there was still no known cure.

It wasn't until the 1960s that the treatment for leukemia changed dramatically with the advances of multi-agent chemotherapy.

A combination of several systematic cancer treatments.

Since then, leukemia has become one of the most treatable cancers.

- So how scary do you think it would have been for her?

Do you think the doctors just told her that-- when they found out she had leukemia that she was gonna die?

Dr. Shami: Often they told the family but didn't tell the, the patient.

- Really?

- Uh, because they didn't want the patient to be scared and worried and all that.

- Wow.

I can't imagine being so sick, as sick as she was, where she was weak and suffering probably, and to possibly not know what was happening to her.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Katie's received her pathology report.

Together with the completed pedigree chart, she's ready to revisit the genetic counselor, Vickie Venne, who will determine what her next step should be.

♪♪ Vickie: So let's take a quick peek.

So, here's... this was a colon biopsy and it looks as though... oh here, perfect.

Oh, okay.

So, you did have some polyps.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Inflammatory, okay, and none of them were cancer.

Clearly there's polyps and that's a precursor to cancer, but it’s not cancer.

But when you walk in this door saying, What's the chance that I’m gonna get cancer?

One, all of these polyps that have been happening in me and then two, my family history, and you started with your moms side but now we do go to your dad's side and this is actually...

So now there's another genetic condition called hereditary breast and ovarian cancer syndrome and it seems to me that when we look at this we've got three gener-- two generations of breast cancer-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

Vickie: and three generations when you include this ovarian cancer.

What I don't know in this part of the family is if there is this genetic condition happening.

Katie: Yeah, yeah.

- What you want to do is you want to say, Okay, test me, and if I don't have something then I’m okay.

- Yeah, but that's not necessarily the case.

And what we talked about in our last meeting you said if someone, if you have two people, one has cancer and one doesn't...

I mean, test the one with cancer and that will probably give the best results.

- She's not alive, okay.

Are these gals alive?

- Yeah.

- Okay.

- All the girls are alive-- - Okay.

- and the boys have passed away.

- Okay.

And Barbara's alive?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Vickie: [sighs] What's the chance that I could touch base with Barbara?

Lise: With a simple blood test, Vickie can determine whether Katie has inherited certain genetic predispositions that would make her more at risk for cancer.

But in this case, because of her medical background Katie's paternal grandmother, Barbara, is the best person to test.

Katie: I was thinking it was gonna be me having to do a test so thanks Grandma-- [laughs] for stepping up and doing that.

We'll see what we find out.

♪♪ Lise: Following Vickie Venne's advice, Katie's grandmother, Barbara, has taken the blood test and is now going with Katie to receive the results.

- So, as you remember, we did this BRCA 1 and 2 testing primarily because in your family there were sort of three generations, you and your two sisters, your mom, and then you have the niece who has the ovarian cancer.

- Right.

Vickie: And because of that we thought that maybe you had up to like a 15% chance of having a BRCA 1 or 2 mutation.

We drew your blood and here's your test result.

Oops, glasses time.

- Yup, glasses time.

- Okay, so this is probably the important piece of information here.

We didn't find anything.

Barbara: Good, yay.

- Exactly.

- I’m surprised.

All: [laugh] - I was like expecting the worst.

No.

- But I also think that what this means is that as it relates to inheriting something from your grandma through your dad to you, we can put that one to rest.

- Good.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Good, yay!

Katie: [laughs] Yay.

I feel relieved, I do.

When we were in there, I thought for sure that the results would have been positive, honestly.

I mean it really is scary I guess when you think about it, and I, I didn't know what to expect.

♪♪ After finding out so much about my genetic family history, um, primarily on my dad's side of the family that there's a lot of cancer, I now want to know everything about my great-grandmother, Romania, on my mom's side of the family.

I wanna know... the little things I guess because the little things are what make us human and what make us people and that connect us to each other that help us see that we're so much alike even though we were born hundreds of years apart.

Lise: Hm.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Congratulations.

The results are negative.

- I know isn't that great?

Lise: I wanted to jump up and down for joy.

Katie: [laughs] - And you took it very calmly.

You know, I know we're sitting there with cameras in this moment-- Katie: Yeah.

- where you don't know what's coming.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- What was it like for you?

- Well, when I-- when we got to the hospital-- or to the um, Huntsman Center-- Lise: Mm-hmm.

- my grandma was there and she was crying and so instantly I thought, Oh no, should I be worried?

Should I-- And that made me emotional, so going into it I think I was emotional and then getting the results as positive, then it was okay, it just kind of plateaued, but-- Lise: Did it compute in the moment because I know any time I’ve had to take medical information for myself or a family member you can't always hear it all.

Katie: Yeah, and I didn't quite understand what would have been the negative effect of it, how serious it would have been if I-- if my grandma had had that um, gene to pass on, Lise: Right.

- so, yeah, it was a lot in that moment to take in.

Lise: Have you celebrated since then?

Katie: [laughs] Lise: [laughs] Every day.

Katie: Yeah, yeah.

Lise: Your grandmother looked really emotional, and I can imagine um, the guilt of feeling like you're passing something on to a loved one that you would never want to pass on.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Did she talk to you about that at all?

- I guess indirectly.

I’ve talked to some-- well, a lot of family members.

All of them have wanted to know how the filming has gone and what we've found out and um, so I have talked to my grandma a little bit about that, and she definitely is relieved that she didn't have that gene to pass on to any of us, all of her posterity.

But yeah, that is scary.

She has thirty grandchildren or so, and-- Lise: Well, you know, you're sitting there thinking, What if this goes that way?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Of course, how can you not think that, and she's going to be there to bear this bad news.

You know, your grandmother was such a love bug.

Katie: Yeah.

- Um, so, suddenly you're gripped with this even deeper interest with your great-grandmother Romania, Katie: Mm-hmm.

- and is she starting to come to life for you?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

At that point I was just excited to, to find out everything about her, um... Lise: Well first of all, you discovered she did indeed die of leukemia.

- Yes, yes.

- And that was what you had thought all along.

Katie: Yeah, that was-- Lise: When your mom was saying anemia and you’re thinking, what did you say?

Katie: I was so confused.

I was thinking, Oh no, this whole-- this whole episode is gonna be a lie and the jokes on me, but yeah-- Lise: But this is everyone's family history.

Katie: Yeah.

- You know, stories are told and information gets changed so that was really a very honest-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

- moment that happens a lot.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

And I think, um, when I found out about all of the cancer on my dad's side of the family, um...

I mean I felt the connection still to my great-grandma Romania, knowing she had leukemia, but when I found out it wasn't hereditary-- Lise: Mm-hmm.

- that I wouldn't have that passed on, it kind of-- it made me feel more of a connection to my Newbold side of the family where everyone has cancer, um, and one of my, my dad's cousin's sons that died at such a young age I felt a really deep connection to him too.

Um, he also had leukemia and died in his early twenties, and so-- Lise: Oh my gosh.

- Yeah.

Lise: I’m sure it makes it very real.

When your grandmother pulls out that chart, my heart just dropped.

I was like, Who?

What?

How much?

When?

Katie: Is this real?

- What were you thinking, yeah, what were you thinking then?

Grandma, give me a break.

- Yeah, yeah, I was surprised.

I knew she had had cancer, breast cancer.

Um, I didn't know any of her sisters had had it.

I didn't know her brothers died of it and had two or three different kinds-- Lise: That was the first time you ever heard that information?

Katie: Yeah.

I knew that one of her brothers had had colon cancer and I think she had told me when we found out I had polyps, six years ago, when I first had my first colonoscopy but other than that, yeah.

Lise: You must have been in shock-- Katie: I was, yeah.

- going home from that meeting.

Katie: And I think at the end I mean, as my reaction showed, I just-- I mean you realize that-- that that's life.

I mean every family has something that they pass on and you just take it good or bad.

And you learn from it and so I don't think it brought me down at all-- Lise: I don't think it did either.

- I don't think it made me sad or-- I just thought, Well, that's me, I guess.

That's the package you get.

Lise: I love that you're still smiling and laughing through it all.

I mean clearly there's something to be said for that.

Um, is there anything you thought you were expecting, along the way, to hear?

- Um... No.

I honestly didn't know what to expect.

When-- Um, everything was a surprise to me.

Each day the producer would then tell me, Okay, this is what's gonna happen, and so I thought that mainly I was gonna be learning about Romania.

I didn't realize so much of my medical history was gonna be in there-- I didn't know my Grandma Newbold was gonna be on the show-- Lise: Oh wow, right.

Katie: I just thought it was gonna be on my mom's side of the family-- - Surprise!

Katie: So, big surprise.

Lise: And you've developed a really beautiful relationship with Vickie Venne, the genetic counselor.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Tell me what a difference she's made in your life and what she brought at this point in time.

Katie: Yeah.

I just talked to her on the phone last week, she called me-- Lise: You did?

Aww.

- and she definitely cares about me.

She wants to follow up.

I’m, I'm supposed to have another colonoscopy coming up in the next couple of months and so because of this whole journey, the Huntsman Cancer um, Institute or research center is gonna help out and do a little bit more research on my polyps to find out, Okay, where are they coming from, what is causing this, so I don't have to keep doing colonoscopies every other year.

Hopefully, cross your fingers.

Lise: The next colonoscopy will feel different anyway I’m sure, because-- Katie: Yeah.

- you know, you have more information going in.

Do you think?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- So, we're gonna start learning more about this beautiful great-grandmother, Romania, who's life was cut really short.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Um, and at this point you don't have a lot of information so let's see where you go from here.

Okay.

In order to find out more about her maternal great-grandmother, Romania, Katie is going to see her maternal grandmother, Elsa, who only lives a few blocks away.

♪♪ Elsa was only four years old when her mother passed away.

For the first time, Elsa is sharing with Katie a box of mementos from Romania's life that she's carried with her since childhood.

Romania was born in 1896 in Honeyville, Utah, to Benham Hunsaker and Emily Sumerril, the third of eleven children.

Elsa: That's where they were born, just that little tiny frame house-- Katie: Oh, wow.

Elsa: Two little windows.

She had the little red schoolhouse.

Katie: This is in Honeyville.

Elsa: Honeyville.

Two rooms.

Little red brick, but that's Romania.

Katie: Oh.

This is the family 1915, so she was 17 there.

Lise: One of Romania's best friends was Elsie Harper.

Elsa: I was named after Elsie.

Katie: Uh-huh.

Elsa: They were so close.

One time, well, they decide to make a dress.

It was then the style for the hobble skirts.

- Oh, I don't even know what that is.

- So they would just gather the yardage at the waist and at the bottom and then they'd put, put just a band up there at the bottom.

- Oh, where it tightens it and then it's poufy.

- But they forgot.

They couldn't get up to step.

Katie: Oh.

Both: [laugh] Elsa: Oh, here they're horse riding.

She did horse riding.

In the summer they would weed the beets and uh, go swimming a lot.

See now this one shows more her personality.

Katie: Yeah.

Elsa: She's always posing a little differently.

Katie: [chuckles] Did she make this album?

Elsa: Yes.

- So she cut out these pictures.

Elsa: Oh, she cut them all out, yeah.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Elsa's found the most valuable keepsakes in the box, two of Romania's journals.

One from when she was a young woman, and the other a brief list of life goals that Romania wrote when she was eighteen.

The journals have helped Elsa feel closer to her mother throughout her life.

Elsa: I was-- always knew that my mother, Romania, was watching over me, and uh-- - So, did you miss her, did you think about her?

- I, I thought about her often, uh-huh.

- Was it hard 'cause you felt like you couldn't talk to anyone about it?

- Um, Daddy didn't want to talk to me about her.

I remember once when we were out weeding in the garden, he would tell me something about her.

Katie: It's amazing how you can live so close to someone and not know such a huge thing about them.

To not know about my great-grandma and just to sit there with my grandma now and to have her open up that box and have my great-grandma's whole life inside of there.

It's amazing.

But yeah, I want to know, I want to go back to where she grew up.

I want to find out more about those roots that she has and meet people and learn about people who are from that side of her family.

Lise: Katie is borrowing the box of memories to learn more about her great-grandmother and Elsa is giving her directions to Honeyville, Romania's birthplace.

♪♪ ♪♪ Honeyville, a little town located in Utah, with a total area of almost twelve square miles is the perfect image of an old agricultural community.

♪♪ Romania's paternal grandfather was Abraham Hunsaker, a prominent Honeyville settler.

Katie's on her way to meet Paul Orme, a Honeyville historian, and is hoping to learn more about Romania's family as well as Honeyville's history.

Katie: Hello.

- Hi.

Katie: Are you Paul Orme?

- I am.

Katie: Hi, good to meet you.

I’m Katie Newbold.

I just came-- - Katie nice to meet you.

Katie: Good to meet you too.

Paul: The family has compiled this.

This is a picture of Abraham and his wife, Catherine, Katie: Okay.

Paul: and all of their children and their wives.

Katie: Wow.

Paul: Now, here is Benham Hunsaker-- Katie: Yeah, I recognize him.

Paul: and his wife... Katie: Mm-hmm.

Paul: and this is Hans Peter Hunsaker and his wife and that's my great-grandfather.

They were brothers.

Katie: Really?

Paul: We're cousins.

- We're cousins then, huh.

[laughs] Paul: Now Benham-- Benham was a farmer here in Honeyville.

Uh, from what I understand he was a very shrewd businessman.

Um, and almost everything that he'd done turned to an advantage to him and his family.

Here is Benham's family here.

Katie: Yeah.

Paul: and there's Romania - There's Romania.

- on the back row.

With her, with her other brothers and sisters.

Now, here's a picture of Benham and his wife and two of the girls and I don't know-- Katie: Yeah.

Paul: one of those could be Romania, and that looks-- Katie: That's Romania.

Paul: Okay.

Katie: Yeah, right there.

Paul: Yep.

Lise: Paul is giving Katie a tour of Honeyville and explaining the key role that Katie's great-great- great-grandfather, Abraham Hunsaker, played in the formation of the town.

- This is an early picture of Honeyville.

I think it was taken somewhere in the late 18-- or 1920s.

Honeyville didn't really get its name until 1877.

My great-great-grandfather Joseph Orme, being the first permanent settler, and he suggested that the community be named after Abraham Hunsaker.

Name it Hunsakerville.

Abraham would have nothing to do with it.

He said no, he didn't want it named after him.

Katie: Huh, that's interesting.

- He wanted, he wanted-- He, he said that the area reminded him of the land of Canaan, the land of milk and honey.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Let's name it Honeyville.

Lise: In 1861, Abraham Hunsaker obtained a piece of land in Honeyville and became the first dry farmer in the area.

By 1868 a total of 6 families were living in Honeyville largely due to the efforts of the first settlers.

The construction of streets, a new school building, a general store, and more homes would gradually draw more families to the area.

- What's that?

Paul: This is a monument that the Hunsaker family has erected to Abraham Hunsaker and his family and here is Benham, your great-great-grandfather and my great-great- grandfather Hans Peter, his brother.

Katie: Wow.

Paul: It shows their birth dates and their death dates.

Lise: One of the many contributions that Abraham made in Utah was participating in the construction of the first transcontinental railroad.

Paul: Now Abraham and his boys chopped timber up here in the mountains when the railroad was being built.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Paul: And they would drag the logs out here to the river and float them all the way to Corinne, and they were used to build a bridge in Corinne.

Katie: Really?

Paul: Yeah.

Done it for the railroad.

Katie: Huh.

♪♪ Lise: By the 1800s, the need for a transcontinental railroad system created an intense battle between the eastern-based Central Pacific railroad company and the western-based Union Pacific railroad company.

Beginning at opposite ends of the country, the competing railroad companies had been laying down their tracks with the goal of being the first to build the transcontinental railway.

The government ended the showdown by stepping in and choosing Promontory Summit as the meeting point.

Paul is taking Katie to the Golden Spike National Historic Site in Promontory Point, Utah.

On May 10, 1869, the very last spike, referred to as the golden spike was placed here as a symbol of the completion of the trans-continental railroad.

Abraham Hunsaker appears in the famous picture that immortalizes this historic event.

Katie and Paul are talking to Ron Wilson, a technician at the Golden Spike historic site.

- So, then the men in this picture, my-- one of them is my great-great-great-grandpa.

These are all men that helped work on the railroad, right?

- Yes, and they were hired both by the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific to help do the grade work which is the rockwork underneath.

Here that doesn't seem like a very big project where it’s just the rails laying on the ground with a little bit of rock around them.

But all of the cuts, all of the tunnels, all of the fills, all of those parts all the way across the country had to be done and they were done by hand and done by manual labor and that's probably where your Hunsaker family came into it.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Hm.

♪♪ - Before leaving Honeyville, Katie is stopping by the cemetery to see if she can locate any of her ancestor's graves.

- James Hunsaker, Amos Hunsaker, World War I. Orme.

Ah.

Wow, okay there are a lot of Hunsakers.

I bet this is gonna take a long time.

♪♪ Is it supposed to be taking this long?

[laughs] ♪♪ [gasps] I found it.

[chuckles] I found it.

Benham.

May 18, oh, I can't read it.

Yeah.

That's her, that was their first daughter.

She died in 1894.

There's something very different about staying here where you're from and going deep into your roots and finding out more about your own family.

It just ties the past so much more to the present and made Abraham Hunsaker so much more real, not only in my life, but to realize that he was a significant person for, I mean, this whole-- this whole town, and it’s beautiful.

Look at it.

It really is a heaven on earth.

I can see why Abraham called it Honeyville.

But now I understand that I came from somewhere and I owe them a lot.

♪♪ To have the opportunity to read my great-grandma's journal is like stepping inside of her.

While she was writing, she probably looked up to these same mountains.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: After learning about the roles that her ancestors played in Honeyville's history, Katie is reuniting with her grandmother, Elsa, to hear about Romania's life after she and her family moved from Honeyville to Ogden, Utah.

Elsa and Katie are on their way to visit the house where Romania lived for several years before she got married.

Elsa: All the family gatherings were here.

And when family needed a place to stay, they would come and stay here.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

They had, had a big swing right there.

Looks like they do have a swing or a couch there, but it would swing and that's where we would entertain ourselves.

Lise: Valerie Dunn, the current resident, is giving Katie and Elsa a tour of the home.

Katie: Hi.

Valerie: Hi, how are you?

Katie: Good.

Elsa: Hello.

I’m, I'm Elsa Lyndsay.

- Nice to meet you.

Elsa: I’m sure they've arranged-- - Yes.

Elsa: My grandparents lived here.

But it's, it's changed quite a bit, right, now?

Valerie: Yes, it has.

Much smaller.

When I opened this.

This was the entrance, and I think that's the place where they'd put the boots through that.

Katie: So it was like a whole entryway-- Elsa: But then you went-- There was just a, a little wall right here.

Katie: Uh-huh.

Elsa: And then you went into the living room.

Katie: Okay, 'cause this was bigger right, like twice the size?

- Oh, this was twice the size.

This was the, this was the dining room with a big table that would seat twelve.

This was filled in with cushions so that you could just-- Katie: How fun.

- just sit up and read Katie: and look out the window?

- and look down.

Oh, this is nice.

- What was it in here?

It was...?

Do you remember?

Elsa: Is this down as far?

This was the bedroom.

My bedroom.

Katie: Whoa, they've totally redone things.

- Redid it, everything.

Elsa: Yes.

Valerie: Wow, okay.

Lise: Elsa's taking Katie to another significant home just a block away.

- This is where Heber and Romania first lived when they were first married.

Katie: Aww.

They're cute little apartments.

Elsa: And, and let me show you the pictures.

Look how happy they are.

Look how fun she is.

Ring around-- ring around the tree.

Katie: [chuckles] Elsa: And here they are, snuggling.

Katie: Just right here on the corner.

Elsa: Yeah, right here on these apartments.

Katie: Wow.

Elsa: Isn't that special?

Katie: Yeah.

Lise: In the following years, Romania and her husband would re-locate several times before having Elsa, Katie's grandmother.

On Memorial Day in 1928, Romania Julia Hunsaker passed away, leaving behind her four-year-old daughter, Elsa.

Elsa's taking Katie to the apartment where she spent her last moments with her mother, Romania.

The apartment has changed significantly since 1928.

Katie: Oh, yeah.

- And that's where Uncle Rans and Aunt Leah lived and that's where momma was staying with them when she passed away.

Katie: Mm.

- And so that, that is special for me.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Lise: Elsa is showing Katie a letter that Leah, Romania's sister and best friend, wrote to Romania less than a month before her death.

Elsa: "No one really knows how sick you are "because no matter how sick or tired you may be, "always you put the bright side forward.

"Not one in a million "would have the grit, the pluck, or the power "to smile and say the cheerful things you do.

You're a good cook; you can manage wonderfully."

- [chuckles] Elsa: "To me you are perfect as any human being.

"I would give anything to be like you.

If anyone has ever affected my life for good, you have."

And then, "Lovingly, Leah."

- Oh, that's so sweet.

♪♪ Lise: Katie's back home now and thinking about everything she's experienced and learned about her family medical history and especially about her great-grandmother, Romania.

Katie: Reading that letter, knowing what my Great Aunt Leah thought about my great-grandma has helped me understand my grandma because everything that she read in that letter, like being the best, most perfect person she could be or being thrifty with her money or just being friendly, someone that everyone loves, I can see exactly why my grandma strives to have those qualities.

And I hope that those same things that were said about her in that letter could also be said about me some day.

That letter-- I can't even talk about it.

It has so much um... meaning in there.

So much insight into my great-grandma and I’m staring at a picture of her right now, and it’s so weird because... Um, she's like my friend now.

And before she was just decoration on the wall.

This journey has been... so much more than I could have asked for.

♪♪ - Sorry.

[chuckles] I feel like she's my friend now, too.

And that letter from your Great Aunt Leah.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- You received such tangible little gifts in this journey.

Katie: Yeah.

That had to be one of them.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- I want you to share what was happening for you.

We hear traffic going by and your grandmother reading this beautiful letter-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

- but something magical was happening for you.

Katie: Yeah.

Um, it was almost like it was such a deep part of Romania that I was finally finding out.

I was standing in front of the home where she passed away, um, and it was almost like time was standing still.

It was this amazing moment that I was sharing with my grandma and with Romania.

Um, the things that Aunt Leah said about her helped me realize so-- she is such an amazing woman.

- Yeah.

Katie: This Romania that I haven't known anything about until now and all of a sudden she's just come to life and even when she was dying she was so full of life and she never complained.

She was strong.

She just kept going.

- It was a special era of women, I think.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- You know?

I love the pride that your grandmother took in showing you the pictures and look how-- Katie: [laughs] - look how fun she was, she says.

Katie: Yeah, yeah.

Lise: And you do, she flies off the page, doesn't she?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Yeah, you can-- I instantly saw a different side of my grandma, Elsa.

I could see-- Lise: Oh.

- how much she loved her mom, how much she wanted to tell me about her.

Um, when we first found out that we were gonna be filming this whole documentary, we were under strict rules that we couldn't talk to any of our family members about anything and so my grandma, Elsa, was so excited she'd come running over and say, Guess what I just found!

And I'm, Grandma stop talking, I gotta leave the room, but she was just so happy and so just thrilled to be able to share so much about her mom.

Lise: It was very touching to me that she hadn't had a lot of conversations about her mom-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

- with her dad.

Understandably he married in order to provide.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- And maybe felt that it might be disrespectful.

Katie: Yeah.

- Um... Katie: Yeah, you can see, I mean, drastically how different today is than back then.

It was a lot of, you didn't want to be disrespectful to, to a new wife and mother, and... - And yet in the garden he would tell her little snippets.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- That's such a precious little image, isn't it?

- Yeah, yeah.

Lise: Were you shocked at the bounty that your grandmother had in her hands?

Katie: Yes!

- There's this box of journals and-- Katie: Yeah.

- pictures, and-- Katie:, Yeah, there we so many books that I’ve been able to read since we filmed all of this and it's like my journey is just beginning.

I’m learning so much about Romania and she is coming to life even more.

Um, there, there are a couple little books that I’ve read through, um... Lise: Tell me about them.

- One of them, this is her little-- the ideal of 1915 and she put all of her life goals, all the things she wanted to accomplish.

Lise: What did she want-- Give me a few.

Katie: Okay, this is the really funny part that I just love because she was such a fun person and she loved to kind of be a troublemaker-- Lise: [laughs] - and goof off, and so one of her goals was um, "if I possibly can, I want to try to be good, but not an angel."

Lise: [laughs] Katie: "I will butt in when I want and do daring things"-- Lise: [gasps] Katie: "but not too soft."

Isn't that so funny?

Lise: 1915.

Katie: Yeah, yeah.

So-- - Adorable.

Katie: she's trying to be good, she's trying to still have fun, and-- Lise: But not too good.

Katie: Yeah.

So this was priceless to read too, just to see what she wanted in life and then there was this other little book that I found that um, my great-grandma, Romania, spent some time on the East Coast and she made some friends while she was there and they wrote things about her and so-- - Aww.

Katie: I think because of those things that other people wrote about her, like Leah, Lise: Mm-hmm.

- we know so much about her-- Lise: True.

- and so in here it just talks about how there was one friend of her's that said how she was the best tree climber and ditch jumper - [laughs] Katie: and she would go walking in the mud in her high heels and try to get all the-- all of her other friends to follow her, and-- Lise: Sassy.

- see who would, yeah, fall over first, and um, let's see, there's another part that's just really funny.

She just-- she was confident, she was daring, she was fearless.

Lise: She was modern.

She was modern.

Katie: Oh yeah.

Yeah.

- Um, progressive, that was one of the words that they used to describe her.

Progressive in her actions and she never would back down.

Lise: Wow.

- She knew what she wanted, and she would do it, and you could count on her for that.

Lise: Mmm.

- And then um, someone else said "where there is need of sparkle and pep, she can bring it."

Lise: Wow.

- I love that.

Lise: I do too.

No wonder you want someone to write those things about you-- Katie: I know!

- and you know what, Katie, they will.

You are all sparkle and pep.

I see you, I see her in you.

As you read those things I’m thinking, Well, that's what you are.

Do you see yourself?

Katie: I do.

I do.

I have, I’ve learned so much about myself as I’ve read about her and as I’ve learned about her life and...

I think it's made me think to the future too, to think who my posterity will be and what they will read about me and what they will know about me and also to think, Okay, what can I pass on to them that comes from Romania too so that she doesn't die when I die.

Lise: Oh, That would be beautiful to pass it on.

You know, I was thinking as you were talking about all these things that were written, and we don't write any more.

Katie: Yeah.

- Where is our history going, you know?

Katie: Well, I’m a journal writer though.

Lise: [gasps] - I love, I love to write.

Lise: Good girl.

Katie: So... Lise: Good girl.

Katie: At least I guess I can pass on my journals.

Lise: Absolutely you can.

Katie: The crazy things I’ve done.

Lise: Have you learned more about Romania since we've finished shooting?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Yes.

Um, it was kind of funny because the last scene when we're in Honeyville-- Lise: I want to talk about Honeyville, yes.

- Yeah.

It made me want to go back there, it made me want to, to be where she grew up.

To be in that setting because somehow that just brings me closer to her and when we were looking, we were driving around, trying to find the perfect spot to shoot-- Lise: Yes.

- and I had heard that some of the Hunsakers, some of my family members, had a waterskiing lake that was there.

Lise: [laughing] That's right!

Katie: And so I called up my friend who just admires that, he envies it, he loves to water-ski, and so we went driving and found it-- Lise: You did-- - and it was right by that wheat field.

Lise: Yeah.

- and it was private property so we drove on there and walked over and said, Hi!

I just said, Hi, I’m a Hunsaker.

Both: [laugh] Lise: Using your heritage now to your advantage.

Katie: And they were like, Oh sure, come waterskiing right now.

Lise: I want you to talk about that 'cause you said, I’m a Hunsaker!

and everywhere you went they're like, Oh, you're a Hunsaker, come in.

Katie: Yeah, everyone in Honeyville is a Hunsaker and so instantly by me being a Hunsaker I was family.

I was just part of that group automatically, and it’s, I don't even know how to describe it.

It's like I have this whole other family that I didn't know existed.

I have a whole other part of me that I need to find out about.

Other roots that I didn't know about.

Lise: Mm.

Katie: So... Lise: Beautiful.

- Yeah.

Lise: Um, going to the present day just a little bit.

You're studying in a very interesting area.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Definitely because of your lifestyle, so let’s talk a little bit more about that.

Katie: Yeah.

Well, just recently I decided to go back to school.

Um, I got a first degree in English and now I’m doing another degree in child life, and-- Lise: And what does that mean exactly?

A degree in child life?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

It’s something where you work in the hospitals with kids who have cancer, or who have other illnesses, are constantly having treatment or surgeries, and I am there to explain to them what's gonna be happening, and they're just little kids and so I teach them on their level, and I learn play therapy so that while they're in the hospital they can feel safe and they can feel like they have someone there who's not a doctor um, that they can feel secure with and, and also to help the family.

A lot of times, the parents know that their child is dying, and they need someone there with them to help them understand what's happening.

- I can't think of anybody else I'd rather have with me in those circumstances, Katie.

Just the joy and bubbliness that you bring into the room, I’m sure it's a gift for all to see.

Have you, um... has it changed your relationship with your grandmother Elsie?

Elsa?

- Elsa, yeah, yeah.

Lise: I have an Elsie in my family-- - Oh, do you?

- on my husband's side, yeah.

Katie: Yeah.

Um, I actually went over to her house on Saturday and, and ate lunch with her and talked to her some more about Romania, just to find out more.

She was telling me how Romania used to make bets with all the boys, Both: [laugh] Katie: and I thought that was hilarious.

Make wages.

Or wagers.

Lise: [laughs] But I, I do have a different relationship and because I, I know now that I can talk to her so much about Romania, I’ve talked to her even more about other family members that I don't know anything about.

Lise: Mm-hmm.

- Other great aunts that died at young ages-- Lise: Mmmm.

- and I love it.

I love that there's so much that my grandma can teach me.

Lise: I know and she's so excited to give that information to the next generation, to someone who's so fascinated by it and enveloping it.

It all started with your family medical history-- Katie: Mm-hmm.

- And needing some answers that might benefit you, and it turned out they did benefit you.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- Was it worth it?

Katie: Oh yeah.

Yeah.

I mean I had no idea what to expect.

I'd never filmed anything like this.

Um, part of me was a little worried 'cause I’m not an actor at all.

Lise: Thank goodness.

Katie: I know, at least here I can just be me, and I can do that, I can be Katie.

And it was exciting.

I loved it.

It was like putting together a puzzle, a work of art behind the camera.

Just piecing it together.

I mean it was hard in the sense that I couldn't eat all the time.

Lise: I’m an eater too, so I know when you don't get fed on a regular basis, Katie: Yeah.

- shooting is tough.

Katie: Yeah.

- It's tough.

Katie: Yeah.

- And you were such a good sport because-- because of these, these dual stories that we were sort of juggling with you, this, this story of researching your family history and the unknown.

I think that adds a lot of emotion and um, you know, exhaustion to the journey.

Katie: Mm-hmm.

- So I wonder if it did for you.

Katie: It was, I mean, we crammed in-- we filmed in just three days, and-- Lise: Yeah.

- just all day long, and so a lot of moments-- Lise: Emotions.

- I didn't have time to process everything.

Lise: So since then, do you feel like you have a new perspective on it now that some time has passed?

Katie: Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I feel like it was the beginning and now I’m kind of in control.

I’m in charge and I can just go with it.

Lise: Go with it, Katie.

Katie: I have, I have that direction now.

- Good.

Katie: And there's so much I still want to know.

Lise: Ah.

Thank you so much, Katie.

And thank you for watching.

Please join us next time for another episode of The Generations Project.

So happy you were here.

Katie: It was great.

Lise: [chuckles] ♪♪