I was born in Colonia Dublan, Chih., Mexico, March 13, 1945. My birth was attended by the midwife, Mariah Hardy, who was the midwife to several of the colonies. (It is interesting to note that after I married my husband, Randall Rayl, his mother remarried to Roy Loren Hardy, a direct descendant of Mariah Hardy!) I am the daughter of Dorothy Bowman, whose father is Claudious Bowman and whose mother is Jennie Stark Robinson. My father, Hugh Day McClellan, is the son of Samuel Edwin McClellan, who was the contractor and builder of the Juarez Stake Academy, and the rock bridge over the Piedras Verdes river in Colonia Juarez. Dad's mother is Bertha Mariah Lewis. William Carroll McClellan, my great-grandfather, was the first person to answer the call of Brigham Young to go over the border to colonize there. He waited in Ascension for ten days for someone else to show up, then went back to the States. He came back, but was not credited with being the first colonizer, although he was back with his family several weeks after the first contingent of colonists, and he and his sons built one of the first rock houses in Colonia Juarez. William Carroll and his sons, among them Samuel Edwin, at 16, came to Colonia Juarez with Jacob Hamblin, the famous Indian Scout, as their guide. Jacob Hamblin was Samuel Edwin's great uncle, having married one of his mother's aunts. William Carroll McClellan and Samuel Lewis, two of my great-grandfathers on my Dad's side, were part of the Mormon Battalion march, at ages 18 and 17 respectively.

Claudious Bowman's father was Henry Eyring Bowman, so we are related to the Eyrings also. I am the first grandchild of the Claudious Bowman posterity, that's how I got the name "Claudette". (I was supposed to be a boy, and my parents were planning to name me "Claudious", but Uncle Claudious's first son got that honor.) I lived in Colonia Dublan, and in Colonia Juarez (sometimes in my grandparents' homes), for the first six years of my life, and I have visited there several times over my lifetime. I felt deprived, in a way, of growing up in the Colonies, because my Dad moved his family to Salt Lake City, Utah, when I was six, so I didn't have the chance to experience all the things my younger cousins did, or learn Spanish well. But, the Colonies are always in my heart, and they are my birthplace and the heart of my earliest memories.

Now, I am the mother of four of my own children, and three of Randall's, and the grandmother of 13. Actually, we have 11 grandchildren, and two boys from my oldest son's second marriage. We also have six daughters-in-law and sons-in-law. I have been happily married to my eternal companion, Randall Rayl, for twenty years, a mere drop in the bucket of eternity.

Claudette McClellan Rayl