Jody Wood continued
It is reported the farewell party the town gave them was more like a funeral than a party, with more crying than laughing. When asked to speak Jody said, “I never thought I could love a place more than Cedar City or any people like I did the Cedar people, but I love Bluff and all of you just as dearly.”
Before moving to Monticello, Jody got up in the night to check the children and saw a large snake coiled in the moonlight in the corner of a bedroom. She got a club and hit it as hard as she could. It jumped and writhed.
She retreated and got a long handled shovel and commenced to chop the snake to death. When she was sure it was dead, she went to bed. The next morning she told Sam and he was dumbstruck when he found his new leather horsewhip chopped to pieces.
In Monticello, Jody poured herself into her work and her new church calling, (First Counselor in the Stake Relief Society).
In late l908 she became very ill. She died February 10, 1909 in Monticello at age 56. No one knew what it was that took her, but she was racked with intense pain the last week of her life. Many said she simply wore herself out in the service of others.
It was her wish to be buried on cemetery hill in Bluff next to three of her children. The family started for Bluff in a terrible blizzard. Some of the drifts were 17 feet high and they had to drive 30 horses ahead to break a trail. The first day they made it to Verdure.
By the third day they made it to Blanding. It was so muddy there they had to switch from sleighs to wagons. On the fourth day they arrived in Bluff.
As they came down Cow Canyon, people lined the road. The Indians were in their best native dress and the Primary children were all dressed in white. Spring flowers and fruit tree blossoms were out.
Aunt Jody’s funeral was one for the ages. She was laid to rest high above her beloved Bluff where she had known such joy and sorrow. She had come home and she was finally at rest. Who could measure the worth of a life like hers?
She spent her life completely dedicated to loving and caring for others.