Chapter One

Parents don’t need to raise their children within the shadows of a temple to be successful in raising a righteous family; children need to be raised in a home where the principles of the gospel are taught and lived.

With that counsel from their LDS stake president in the fall of 1948, and with a promise to his wife that they would hold their church meetings in their home every Sunday, Jim and Glenna Clark of Santa Monica, California made the decision to leave the comforts they took for granted in the United States and prepared to begin a new life in the jungles of Colombia, South America.

Jim, who had recently been hired by Shell Oil Company to work in their South American oil fields, was required to go to Colombia ahead of his family and to spend six months working there prior to the company’s paying for his family to join him.

Late at night on October 9, 1948, Jim hugged and kissed Glenna good-bye and walked aboard the plane that was to carry him thousands of miles away from his five children and his sweetheart. He wrote:

I never dreaded a moment so much in my life, yet I couldn’t wait ‘till it came. I hurried onto the plane and cried like a baby. I shall never realize more fully again how much my darling wife and children meant to me. It was a stark realization that I shall suffer such pangs of loneliness until my family and I are together. I love them so much! The plane left at 12 midnight and I tried to sleep, but couldn’t. I was deep in the midst of sorrow and could only see a lonely wife and five lonely children.

Jim’s first flight was from Los Angeles to Mexico City. The planes flying to South America in the 1940’s were generally four-engine propeller planes, like the DC-4 Jim was on, which often provided a bouncy ride and air sickness. Jim’s two-day trip to Bogota, Colombia turned into a six-day adventure. During the second leg of the trip, on the flight from Mexico to Guatemala City, he began to reflect on how he had reached this point in his life.

* * *

James Richard Clark was a native-born Californian. His parents were from western Pennsylvania, and some of his ancestors were prominent in the settling of Pittsburgh. Still other ancestors were among the first settlers in America. That was his heritage, and originally his name was James Lorenzo Moore.

Jim’s biological parents, Charlie Moore, a construction worker, and Georgine Miller, who was descended from a prominent family of doctors, had fallen in love and eloped. Not long after their marriage, the young couple traveled by train from Pennsylvania to Los Angeles, California to escape the pressures of Charlie’s intrusive mother-in-law, who was extremely unhappy about their marriage. After arriving in California, the newlyweds moved in temporarily with Georgine’s Aunt, Cynthia Temple, who would later become the grandmother of Shirley Temple.1

Unfortunately, Georgine’s mother followed the young couple to California. After eight years of harassing Charlie, she finally convinced her daughter to divorce him, even though they had three sons by that time; Jimmy was the middle child. After several years of trying to reconcile with his wife, but finally realizing his efforts were in vain, Charlie left Los Angeles and was never heard from again.2

Five years later, Georgine married Otto Clark, a plumber, and a few years after that—when Charlie Moore was declared “legally dead”—her three boys were adopted by Otto and their last names were changed to Clark. Jimmy had never liked his middle name of Lorenzo, so at the time of his adoption he changed that name, too, and replaced it with Richard, the name of the judge who presided at their adoption. From then on, James Lorenzo Moore became James Richard Clark, but he was always called Jimmy by his family.

Five-foot, ten-inch Jimmy Clark was a trim, personable young man with a myriad of talents and interests, including writing and photography, which he used when he was on the newspaper staff in high school. He was also an athlete who participated in a variety of sports, including football, basketball, and tennis. A graduate of Venice High School, he appeared to be a confident young man about town, but he carried with him disturbing memories of being put in a Catholic School for three years with his two brothers, where tuition was provided by the state because they were listed as “orphans.” At a young age, he became determined to make his own way in the world, to be successful, and to have exciting adventures, like those in his favorite book The Arabian Nights. Though his mother and step-father created a caring and comfortable home for him and his brothers later on, he never forgot that his real father had not been there for him, and he wanted to do better when he had a family of his own.

* * *

Jim was jolted back to reality when one of the plane’s engines stopped. As he was seated near the failed engine, he kept his eyes on both sides of the plane to make sure the remaining motors kept running. By then, Jim was beginning to wonder if he would ever arrive safely in Colombia, and he worried about his wife and children making a similar journey the following year.

To keep his mind off the laboring engine, he thought of Glenna and pondered about their unlikely meeting nearly fifteen years before. He remembered that day distinctly:

Jimmy and a few of his buddies had gone to the city tennis courts near the Douglas Aircraft Company in Santa Monica. Tennis was one of Jimmy’s favorite sports, and he often went there with his friends. On that day, there were some sports-minded young ladies already at the courts, and they challenged Jimmy and one of his friends to a game of doubles. Winifred Farley, one of their opponents, was from Ogden, Utah, and she was visiting her aunt and uncle who lived nearby. After their match, Jimmy learned that Winifred was a Mormon. He offered to give her a ride home, and she invited him to meet her relatives. Eighteen-year-old Jimmy knew nothing about Mormons, but he had been impressed with the vivacious Winifred and was anxious to see what a Mormon family looked like. When Winifred returned to her relatives’ home that afternoon, she brought with her a handsome, dapper young man.

What Jimmy found in the home of Glenn and Gladys Farley Leavitt that day was a special spirit and a warm and loving family who obviously enjoyed being together. Both Glenn and Gladys were descended from Mormon Pioneers; grandparents from all sides of their ancestral lines were pioneers who had crossed the plains to Utah. Their ancestors included the prolific Leavitt family from Canada and the Malan family from the Piedmont area of Italy. Many of their family lines came from England, including the Farleys, the Middletons, the Barkers, and the Horrocks. Mary Horrocks, a member of the ill-fated Martin-Willie Handcart Company, was Glenn’s grandmother.

In the early 1920’s, a few years after their marriage, Glenn and Gladys had moved their young family from Ogden, Utah to Los Angeles, California—the sunny and promising land of opportunity. Glenn had been trained by his Grandpa Middleton in the fine skills of interior house painting, and it wasn’t long before his painting talents were recognized in California. He was hired regularly by wealthy homeowners in the Santa Monica and Beverly Hills areas and by several Hollywood celebrities. The Leavitts prospered during those years in California, and their family of three daughters increased in size with the arrival of two sons.

When Jimmy arrived at the Leavitt home that first day, one of Winifred’s cousins—eleven-year-old Glenna—was playing marbles with her brother on the floor of their family home and barely looked up from their game when Jimmy entered the room; but he noticed her.

Glenna, a sensitive and tender-hearted young girl, loved her family, her Mormon faith—The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—and almost every kind of animal. If she had any major concerns thus far in her young life it was the very dark complexion she had inherited from her equally dark-skinned mother. Glenna was often taunted at school and went home crying more than once.

Glenna’s mother wrote:

Glenna was especially sensitive about it as she was the darkest in our family. She was often teased at school for her dark skin. Glenna asked me what nationality she was. When I told her, she went back to school the next day and told them, ‘I am not a Mexican – I’m a Mormon!’

In later years, when she was taken for a native Latino, she felt honored in that distinction, but as a child her dark complexion caused her to be shy and somewhat inhibited.

From that first day in the Leavitt home, Jimmy had been drawn to their family, and when he first saw Glenna, with her dark skin and beautiful eyes, he said to himself, “There’s the girl for me!” The problem was that he was eighteen and she was eleven; he would have to bide his time.

The Leavitts had liked Jimmy right from the start, and he was always welcome in their home. After their cousin Winifred returned to Utah at the end of the summer, he continued to stop by the Leavitt home. He usually asked to borrow one of their numerous books, but he later confessed that this was just an excuse to keep returning. Whenever he visited, he always brought something to entertain the kids, such as a magic trick or sometimes even a new pet. After a few years, it became obvious that while he enjoyed being with all of the family his main interest was their middle daughter, Glenna. The two officially...