On the morning of Wednesday, December 4, 1912, two couples from the new settlement of Crystal, in the high basin north of Pauline, came separately to the Bannock County courthouse in Pocatello for marriage licenses. The two grooms were brothers, and according to the Pocatello Tribune's report that same day, neither knew that the other was getting married.
The first license went to Lorenzo Whiting Jr. and Pearline Fanning, aged 17, the daughter of Moses Fanning of Crystal. Her father had given his consent to the clerk for the license. President W. A. Hyde of the Latter-day Saint church, very probably the stake president (the Semi-Weekly Pocatello Tribune appears to give him that title in 1910), married them. A few minutes later Farris Whiting and Margery Butterfield, also of Crystal, asked for theirs. She too was 17. The second Whiting was asked whether he was the same man who had just taken out a license. After Deputy Clerk Pomeroy explained the whole affair to the couple, they went to get someone to marry them, and Judge Budge married them in the courthouse. The bride's father gave his consent to this marriage too. The Tribune ran the story under the headline "Double Marriage at Court House," and the Semi-Weekly Tribune reprinted it word for word, without the subheading, on December 7.
Who they were
The paper's spellings were not the families' own. The bride's family wrote their name Fannin, and "Farris" was Forres Whiting, whom the family called Farr. The county marriage register, as indexed in the Western States Marriage Record Index, records Lorenzo S. Whiting Jr. and Pearlina Fannin, and Forres Whiting and Margery Butterfield (indexed as "Fones"), on consecutive pages, 421 and 422 of volume 5.
The Whitings were among the first families to settle in the Crystal basin. The final-proof notices printed in the American Falls Press in January 1913 show that Lorenzo S. Whiting Jr. and Forres Whiting, whom the notices give as of Robin, in Marsh Valley, entered neighboring homesteads at Crystal on the same day, June 28, 1909. Their father, Lorenzo S. Whiting Sr., entered his own that December, and the family appear as one another's witnesses. Moses Fannin was already "of Crystal" when a land-office notice printed in November 1911 named him as a witness to a neighbor's final proof. Family records gathered for this site make both grooms twenty-eight, and they show that Pearline, known as Pearl, had lost her own mother, Sebra, in 1902, so the "Mrs. Fanning" of the article was her stepmother, Cora. They also make Margery the daughter of C. R. Butterfield, who had moved his family from Rockland to the new settlement in 1910 and 1911. The article does not name Margery's father.
Afterward
Both couples made their lives at Crystal. In May 1915 the first Crystal news column in the American Falls Press reported that the small child of "Forest" Whiting had died at the Whiting home on Sunday, April 18, and been buried on the Whiting farm. Forres is very probably meant, and the site counts this as the first recorded burial at Crystal. Ward records and family accounts make Lorenzo Jr., known as Len, bishop of the Crystal Ward from about 1923, after his father-in-law, Moses Fannin, with Forres as his first counselor in 1925 and 1926. Pearl taught Sunday school and served in the Relief Society presidency.
Drought and the Depression ended their time at Crystal. Family memoirs say that after mid-1931 Len led most of the ward, the Fannins among them, to a ranch near Salmon, as told in Drought and debt empty Crystal and Buist. Margery died at Salmon in September 1933, and Forres died at Idaho Falls in 1938.
What the article does not say is why each brother kept his plans to himself, or whether the families knew. Nor does it say where President Hyde performed the first ceremony. The register index also dates the Forres Whiting marriage December 3 rather than December 4. Since the paper is explicit that both licenses were issued the same morning, and the register entries run in the paper's order, the index date is probably a slip, but only the register itself could settle it.
On this site: the Crystal area history, the wheat of their younger brothers Ralph and Reese in Crystal, the hidden settlement up Rattlesnake Creek, their sister's story in All of Crystal plants a widow's grain, and the Whitings, Fannins and Butterfields together in Crystal almost deserted, winter 1923–24.
The article as printed
Pocatello Tribune, December 4, 1912, page 4. Transcribed from the page scan. The article is printed as a single paragraph. At the start of two lines the first letter did not print: "utterfield" is given here as [B]utterfield, which the marriage register confirms, and the word before "the second Whiting" shows only "hen" (When or Then), so it is marked illegible. The broken "kr. ws" is read as "knows."
DOUBLE MARRIAGE AT COURT HOUSE
Two Brothers From Crystal Apply for Licenses Without the Knowledge of Each Other.
Marriage licenses were issued this morning to Miss Pearline Fanning, age 17 years, and Mr. Lorenzo Whiting Jr., both of Crystal, Idaho. The bride is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Moses Fanning of Crystal, and the consent of the father was given to the clerk to procure the license. President W. A. Hyde of the L. D. S. church performed the ceremony, during the forenoon today, Miss Margery [B]utterfield and Mr. Farris Whiting, both of Crystal were also granted a marriage license. This ceremony was performed by Judge Budge in the court house. It was a rare occurrence, in the two cases, usually one brother knows about the other brother's business, but in this case neither one knew of the other ones affair. [illegible] the second Whiting was asked if he was the same Whiting that had procured a marriage license just a few minutes before. After Deputy Clerk Pomeroy had explained the whole affair to the bride and groom they proceeded to get the necessary party to tie the knot. In this last case the father of the girl gave his consent to the marriage. The girl is only 17.