New Video of William Wallace Casper

(Note: after the video went live, it has had some issues.  I have taken it down, and will fix it then update.  Stay tuned.)

Hey, welcome to my blog today.  I recently finished a editing a video honoring my Great-great-grandfather.  I've talked about him before, and he was amazing.

William Wallace Casper

On 14 June 1997, the current Mormon Battalion Association honored William Wallace Casper by installing a Plaque at his grave site monument recognizing his service for the Mormon Battalion.  In conjunction with that there was a ceremony.  If you want to visit the grave, it is at Elysian Burial Gardens, 1075 East College Street, Millcreek, Utah.  It is on the north east corner, near a tree....  More of his family is buried around there as well.  I consider it my family cemetery.


Back to the movie.  Before traveling to the cemetery for the ceremony, Sharon Casper Frandsen, and family visited with my Grandpa, Kenneth Burton Casper. And yes, that is me in the video, please excuse my outfit, I wasn't the most stylish then, although I did love it.  We gave him a picture of William Wallace and a Utah Founding Pioneer certificate, saying that William Wallace Casper was a founding pioneer and that Burt was a descendant of his. It is not hard to get the certificate for yourself, just visit the Utah Genealogical Association at http://www.infouga.org and get your own.  It doesn't come with the fancy picture and frame, but that isn't hard to get either.  Since my Grandpa passed away, we have that framed artwork now, and people always fall in love with it when they see it.  My Grandpa really loved his Grandpa, and would always talk about him like he was the greatest person who ever lived.  It is cool to see this video because he really looks like he is excited about the present, and he rarely got excited about things.

The rest of the video is part of the ceremony.  Most of this video is made up of Kenneth Burton Casper, William Wallace Casper's grandson, speech.  William Wallace Casper had three wives, and so he has a lot of descendant, I am probably the youngest Great-Great-Granddaughter (oh my gosh, I bet I am!) but it makes for a big family when honoring him.  We didn't know a lot of the other people, so didn't film them.  Yet, parts of the rest of the ceremony and celebration are included as well.  At the end I am holding William Wallace's sword and picture of him.  It is a lot of fun to see those sorts of things.  Although apparently we didn't know how to move on video, because that shot is totally of me just standing there not knowing what to do.  Ah, good times.

If you want to check out the video, and I suggest you do, visit it here.  You can skip through my Papa is you get bored, he talks for like 10 minutes.  Please excuse the imperfections in the video, it was 1997, we weren't that experienced with filming and we used a large, bulky video recorder.  I've attempted to get it to the best I can, it's been a long process.