Pioneer Day

I spoke with my son in Utah and it is a state holiday today - July 24th - the day they celebrate the entry of the pioneers into Utah.
I am not from Utah and do not have any "pioneers" in the sense of individuals who crossed the plains to religious freedom around 1847 through 1870.
However I do celebrate another kind of pioneer - Sarah Minnie Melissa Imogene Honeycutt Zimmerman. She is my grandmother and she is the first person in both of my family lines to read the Book of Mormon and conclude - this is the true church.
She too made many sacrifices as her husband was adamantly opposed to her joining the church. She had to wait two years till his heart softened enough for her and my mother to be baptized. Even then, he would not take them to the small branch six miles from their home and they had to walk to church each Sunday.
When I would visit her she would show me all the genealogy she was doing for her family lines. Her own family that lived in North Carolina had also distanced themselves from her over this "new religion" and she thrived on the knowledge that she could do the work for those who had passed on - like her mother and father. She would save her "pin money" and ride the bus to the Los Angeles Temple and do a full day of temple work and come home.
On this Pioneer Day, I celebrate all the pioneers (such as Rachel Roark, Mary Reid, Wendie Ke, Rainey Martin, and so many others) who are forging a path of their own for generations to follow.
My Grandmother Zimmerman (she has been gone for 41 years) has posterity into the hundreds who call The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - the true church.
BLESSED, HONORED PIONEERS!