After Dad departed for Germany on his mission, Mom continued to reside at her parents’ home, finally beginning her education at the University of Utah in the autumn of 1925, to become a qualified primary school teacher. With older siblings who had already paved the way on campus before her, she became involved in many social activities, as well. She received a handwritten note with an embossed crest from the Alpha Chi Sorority at the University of Utah inviting her to become a member of its inner circle, which she did. 17 Nonetheless, she was evidently painfully shy. Diane remembers Mom telling her that she took an “F” in one of her university classes rather than get up in front to participate. 18
One sad occurrence at the university is remembered by Sue, who recalls Mom telling her that while taking a beginning swimming class, she broke her nose on the side of the pool. 19 The fracture was evidently not formally set and created a nasal bridge deformity which she was self-conscious about for the rest of her life. As a result of this unfortunate accident, she never learned to swim, because water went up her nose when she put her face in the water. It wasn’t until three decades later, after a swimming pool had been built in the backyard of our San Mateo, California, home that Mom decided to take up water exercise with some regularity—and this was not with great enthusiasm, either, because the pool had been constructed where her prize chrysanthemum bed once stood.
On 8 June 1926 (at age 22+), she was awarded an Associate in Education/ Primary-Kindergarten Diploma from the Junior College of The School of Education, University of Utah 20 and began her three year long, before marriage, teaching career.
We also know from photos taken together at about this time that Mom and Mary Pratt Ure, another Farmers Ward member, were “bosom buddies.” They would later become sisters in law, after Mary married Dad’s younger brother, Sheldon, in 1929.
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