Why an acclaimed author from eastern Idaho is ‘all but forgotten’ 54 years after his death

RIGBY – Empty whiskey bottles were found next to Vardis Fisher’s body as he lay dead inside his secluded home in Hagerman.

It was July 9, 1968 and the 73-year-old man, who grew up in a rural community outside of Rigby and wrote 36 books, died from “an overdose of sleeping pills mixed with alcohol,” according to one report.

Though his death was ruled a suicide, many have wondered over the years whether it was accidental or premeditated. No official ruling was made either way, but those who knew Fisher said he’d contemplated suicide before.

“He’d had a lot of reasons to kill himself during his life, but didn’t,” a family member is credited as saying. “After all he’d been through, it wouldn’t have made sense for him just to have calmly decided to end it all.”

Tim Woodward, who wrote a book about Fisher years ago, says the author’s death was undoubtedly an accident. Fisher was a heavy drinker throughout his life, and Woodward says it’s likely that Fisher was depressed about something and unintentionally drank too much.

Fisher was reportedly working on several projects at the time of his death, including an autobiography. His historical novel “Children of God, is his most acclaimed work, which won a Harper Prize in 1939. And his book, “Mountain Man,” was the inspiration for the 1972 film, “Jeremiah Johnson,” starring Robert Redford.

But despite Fisher’s literary contributions, few people recognize Fisher’s name and he seems to have faded into obscurity 54 years after his death.

This point was Woodward’s main motivation in writing Fisher’s biography four decades ago. He became interested in Fisher after reading one of his novels recommended by his widow. The book was “Dark Bridwell,” a historical western based on Fisher’s life. To this day, Woodward tells EastIdahoNews.com it’s one of the best books he’s ever read.

“It seemed wrong that a man who had written so many books, some of them very good ones, was all but forgotten in his home state,” Woodward explains.

Fisher’s early life

Fisher was born on March 31, 1895 in a one-room cabin on the west side of the little butte in Annis, about five miles north of Rigby. His father, Joe Fisher, was related to the area’s first settlers, and Joe’s mom, Cindy, was “the first white woman” to spend a full year in Annis, family records say, according to Woodward.

Vardis Fisher’s mom, Temperance Thornton, is a member of the family for whom the community of Thornton is named.

Woodward’s book paints a bleak picture of Vardis’ childhood in Annis. Joe and Temperance, who lived in poverty and were considered odd by neighbors, are reported to have been aloof and distant in their relationship with each other and their children.

Joe is described as a mountain man who rose early in the morning and worked until dark seven days a week. He preferred a lifestyle of isolation, away from people, and had no interest in social interaction.

“Joe went entire days without saying a word to anyone. Displays of emotion were foreign to him, and his children, to whom he devoted his life, frequently were terrified of him,” Woodward writes.

Fear was a common theme of Vardis’ early years. His grandmother, who allegedly didn’t like him, once sent him to his room without any dinner and told him that if he made a sound, the devil lived in the closet and would come and haunt him.

Long hours spent alone made him fearful of his environment. Fisher was afraid of water and wildlife, and his dad once slaughtered a lamb in front of him, which only added to his fear of blood.

As the member of a group that had splintered from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, faith was important to Temperance and she passed this faith on to her children.

“She regularly read to them from the Bible,” Woodward writes. “Vardis, in particular, took an interest in the scriptures. Before he ever saw the inside of a classroom, he had read the Bible repeatedly from cover to cover.”

Temperance believed that Vardis would one day be a bishop or an apostle. Though Vardis was eventually baptized into the LDS Church and wrote multiple books based on Latter-day Saint doctrine, he ultimately became an atheist.

Education was also important to Temperance and no sacrifice was too great to make sure her kids got as much of it as possible. Having obtained a sixth grade education prior to getting married, Temperance taught her children as much as she could before enrolling them in public school.

Joe and Temperance provided a log cabin for their sons to stay in during the school year so they could focus on their studies. This left Vardis and his brother, Vivian, to fend for themselves in all their other needs.

Though Vardis excelled academically, graduating from high school, college and eventually obtaining a doctorate, Woodward says Vardis’ upbringing left scars that affected him the rest of his life.

“He was shy, neurotic, almost morbidly introverted,” Woodward writes. “Raised to the age of six in a crude frontier society, the son of stern and cheerless parents, friendless and disliked even by his own relatives, he had little chance of developing a normal personality.”

A tragic romance

One of the bright spots for Fisher during his high school years was Leona McMurtrey, a female classmate who Woodward described as being one of the most popular girls in school.

Deemed an unlikely pair, the duo started going together and were eventually married in 1917. The couple spent the next seven years in Salt Lake City, where Vardis attended the University of Utah. The couple had two children together.

On Sept. 8, 1924, Leona committed suicide, an act that Woodward blames on Vardis.

“He was neurotic and jealous, often accusing her of infidelities that never occurred. She was a country girl accustomed to being with her large family and was lonely and unhappy when they moved to Salt Lake City and later Chicago for him to work on his degrees,” Woodward says.

But what pushed Leona over the edge, according to Woodward, was her husband’s affair with Margaret Trusler. Vardis had taken a teaching position at the University of Chicago while working on his masters degree and Trusler was one of his students.

Woodward highlights what happened in the moments before Leona’s death.

“(They) were having lunch when Vardis and Leona began to argue. Vardis accused Leona of being a poor mother,” he says in the book. “Moments later, Vardis left, thinking the argument was over. He was crossing the backyard when he heard Leona call his name, turned, saw her drink the poison.”

The poison turned out to be Lysol.

Vardis ran back to the apartment and found Leona in a kitchen chair. A neighbor called for help, but she died before arriving at the hospital.

Though Fisher’s career as an author took off four years later with the publication of his first book, Leona’s death haunted him the rest of his life.

“He sat right here in this kitchen years after Leona died, and said my family … blamed him for her death, so why didn’t I just kill him?” Leona’s brother, Cal, said in an interview with Woodward. “I said I didn’t want his blood on my hands, that he’d just have to live and suffer.”

Fisher and Trusler were married in 1928 and had one child together. That relationship eventually fell apart as well. They were divorced in 1939. He married Opal Laurel Holmes the following year. They remained together until Fisher’s death in 1968.

‘Obscurity was probably inevitable’

Many of Fisher’s books are often compared to the works of William Faulkner and Thomas Wolfe, with whom he was friends. Despite this, Vardis Fisher is largely forgotten.

Woodward says it was Fisher’s choices, in large part, that contributed to that.

“He wasted so many years writing (Testament of Man) rather than books that would have sold better and had a better critical reception,” Woodward explains.

Fisher’s 12-volume “Testament of Man” series, which chronicles the evolution of mankind from the days of Adam and Eve, was his favorite project. But it did not resonate with readers and critics. Its negative view of Christianity was one reason for that.

One article points out that a major critic regarded this volume as “toxic.”

“She said that one of his last works (in the series) was the ‘literary equivalent of being beaten steadily with a stick,'” the article says.

And at one point, Fisher’s colleague refused to publish anymore volumes.

Another factor that contributed to Fisher’s demise as a literary giant, according to Woodward, was his tendency to alienate critics who reviewed his work.

“He … antagonized reviewers by writing negative things about them, which in turn influenced them to write negative things about him,” Woodward says. “He seemed to enjoy irritating people and making a scene, once turning over a table of books at a signing.”

While some might be willing to cut Fisher some slack for his troubled upbringing, Woodward isn’t sympathetic. He says there is very little worth remembering about Fisher and there are “excellent reasons” for his disappearance from our memory.

“If people … remember him for (his acclaimed works), great. Other than that, his obscurity was probably inevitable,” he says. “I don’t think there is a great need for people to know about Fisher. A lot of those who knew him wanted to forget him. He was a temperamental, infuriating man.”