Osmond’s Samaria Ancestors had Great Musical Talents

Long before the singing Osmond Brothers became famous, their ancestors were widely known for their outstanding musical abilities in the Malad Valley.
Anna Jenkins liked to dance and play the tambourine, and while at a party near her home in Wales, she met John Martin, who found great joy in music. John had an eye for talent, soon taking Anna as his bride. Their shared musical talents helped make them a perfect match; great-great grandparents of an extremely well-known American musical family.

Mary Ann Martin was born to John and Anna on November 5, 1868, the second of ten children. Newly emigrated from Wales, John and Anna were living in Salt Lake City at the time of Mary Ann’s birth. In the fall of 1869 they made their way to the beautiful village of Samaria, Idaho- their home for the rest of their lives.

Though John was a farmer by trade, work never got in the way of his devotion to music. He taught his children to sing and play musical instruments at very early ages. John and Anna could often be found singing and entertaining in pioneer programs around the village. Later their children and others joined in, too. While not performing in front of others, Mary Ann and the rest of the Martin family circled the organ in their home, which John played as the family joined in, singing four-part harmony.

Mary Ann Martin Davis had a lovely voice, and inherited a love of music from her mother and father. Mary Ann was well-known in Samaria as a talented singer, and her son thought his mother sang at nearly every funeral in the community. Besides funerals she sang often at church, social gatherings, home parties and other get-togethers.

Olive May Davis, Mary Ann’s granddaughter, was born in her grandparents’ cabin in Samaria on May 4, 1925. The daughter of Vera Ann Nichols and Thomas Martin Davis, Olive married George Osmond on December 1, 1944. Olive went on to become the matriarch of the American Osmond singing family, including the original Osmond Brothers, Alan, Wayne, Merrill, Jay and Donny. Donny and his sister Marie became stars in their own right, along with youngest brother, Jimmy.

Olive established what is now known as the Children’s Miracle Network. She died on Mother’s Day, May 9, 2004, five days after her 79th birthday.

The love for music passed from Mary Ann Martin Davis to Olive May Davis Osmond is now continuing through the fourth and fifth generations. Who would have ever guessed that much of the Famous Singing Osmond’s roots began over a century and a half ago in the small rural hamlet of Samaria, Idaho? Olive’s birthplace, the Thomas John Davis cabin, is on permanent display in Samaria’s Malad Valley Heritage Square.
By Luke Waldrom