Since the commencement of 1830, I had been living with Mr. Joseph Travis, who was to me a kind master and placed the greatest confidence in me; in fact, I had no cause to complain of his treatment of me.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
He was somebody who made me think, I suppose, about the contemplative life. I've always been a city fellow, but I've often had vague thoughts about 'checking out' and perhaps going into a monastery and just seeing what it was like.
He was a great man, my granddad, a very calm, logical and methodical guy. I suppose I'm trying to be more like him as I get older.
My mother and father, Joe and Theresa Montana brought me along and taught me to never quit, and to strive to be the best.
My father followed, during most of his life, the precarious occupation of a country school teacher.
I count Joseph Smith among those whose testimony of Christ helped me to develop my own testimony of the Savior. Before I recognized the tutoring of the Spirit testifying to me that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, my youthful heart felt that he was a friend of God and would therefore, quite naturally, also be a friend of mine.
My father was a good man, but he was a con man. He was a wanderer, nomadic.
Being a native of Spain, the country to which I owe much of my education and cultural background, I was deeply influenced by my great predecessor Santiago Ramon y Cajal.
He was a very strict father, which in a way has helped me to become who I am today. He never pampered me, as he wanted me to live a normal life. No film magazines were allowed at home, and we weren't allowed to watch any movies.
He brought a sensibility and a hard-edged reasonableness to operating restaurants that had a lasting impact on me and still affects how I run all our restaurants today. The passing of 'Restaurant Man' - the original gangsta 'Restaurant Man,' my father - was the passing of an era. No one can replace him.
The Prophet Joseph Smith lived in troubled times.