MEMORIES OF GRANT JAY LONGHURST
by
Glen Reed Longhurst1
August 1996
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home.
(William Wordsworth, from Ode on
Intimations of Immortality)
When Grant was born, we surely thought he was naked, and he was so shocked by the
experience, he couldn’t speak for almost two years. Little did we know then of his goodness and
charity. We could not then fully see the clouds of glory trailing after him. But now we see, and
we know the greatness of his soul, and we know he came from and has returned to that God who
is the source of life.
On September 21, 1948, our mother, Ruby Pearl Pate Longhurst, gave birth for the third time.
The first time was filled with sadness as John Longhurst was not permitted to draw a mortal
breath before he was called home. The second turn was mine, but one feisty child was not the
full family they wanted. With great effort Grant was sought and brought into the family. He
would be followed by LeMar. In the Spring before Grant’s birth, J. Glen Longhurst, our father,
had finished a basement home at 246 West 400 North, Logan, Utah to the point that his young
family of three could move in. It wasn’t a large home by today’s standards, but there were two
bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen, a bath, and a laundry. The roof was barely five feet above
the ground level, but we boys learned it was not a place to play, even though it was accessible.
The home was warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Heat was provided by an oil-burning
stove in the living room. In later years Grant and I would travel on many imaginary journeys
through space or under the sea as our bedroom closet was fitted with improvised controls and
communications systems or the bunk beds we shared were draped with blankets to make forts
and hideaways.
When Grant came home from the hospital after four or five days of life, his bed was a white
woven wood bassinet that stood on four wooden legs. Braided rattan around the top provided
decoration. We were excited to have a new family member, even if he did cry sometimes. He
was a good baby though. His disposition was calm and steady. He liked to play, but he was not
one who always had to be held. He was not particularly fussy. His blue eyes and wavy fine
blonde hair made him just about the cutest thing any of us around there had ever seen.
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I appreciate the help of LeMar Longhurst and other family members in reconstructing the details included here.
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It was not long before he learned to crawl and found a number of ways of locating mischief. As
he grew into young boyhood, I found him particularly annoying. He always wanted to play with
my toys, go where I went with my friends, ask endless stupid questions like “Why?” and in
general act just like a younger brother. It was a source of great frustration to one older and wiser
as I was who did not want to be saddled with a tag-along little brother. Looking back now, those
were years to be treasured. He used to entertain us by some of his two-year old antics. I
remember for some reason that on winter evenings as we would sit in the living room around the
stove, he would just throw his feet out in front of him and land with a resounding bump on his
lightly padded behind. The he would laugh as he saw it made us laugh.
The summer before he turned three, our mother accidentally spilled a pan of boiling water from
the stove onto her foot. When he and I came from the bedroom where we were playing into the
kitchen to see what had happened, we found large blisters growing on flesh that was essentially
cooked. I believe it was Dad who came home from work and took Mom to the doctor. She was
placed in the hospital and given a stout dose of penicillin to stave off infection. That was the
wrong thing to do. She was violently allergic to the drug and within a few hours had puffed up
like the Michelin Man. For weeks she had to lie in bed with a terribly swollen and violently itchy
body. I had many new chores then, one of which was the wash. And a major element of the
wash was Grant’s diapers. We were all very grateful for the kindness of our grandparents who
lived just across the street and helped us a great deal during those trying times.
He and I got into trouble once during a family vacation to southern Utah. I was nearly nine and
he was nearly four. We had gone to Bryce Canyon and were so taken by the beauty of the rock
formations there that while our parents enjoyed the view from the rim, he and I took a hike down
a trail into the canyon. We really enjoyed walking down among the “hoodoos” (rock pillars
carved by the rain and wind) and when we returned to the rim, which couldn’t have been more
than 45 minutes or an hour later, we could not understand why our parents were so upset. We
assumed it had something to do with Mom’s being pregnant (with LeMar). Since then, having
become parents ourselves, we understand the why.
One of the great experiences of his young life was the chance to go with our extended family on a
camping trip to Big Sandy Lake in the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming. Our mother’s
brothers-in-law organized a two-night affair that required us to hike abut four or five miles from
where we could park the family car. Dad had made a cart from aircraft tubing and a bicycle
wheel that was a great help in carrying the heavy camp gear to the lake. It had two handles on
each end, and its principal purpose was carrying deer down a mountain side. Grant was too
young at eight years of age to help much with the carrying of the heavy stuff, but he had a fishing
pole that he put to good use. The lure to have was a Super-Duper, and Grant with the rest of us
caught more brook trout than we could eat, and we threw many of them back. He told me later
that it was that trip that more than anything else inspired his love of nature and the outdoors.
Another experience he remembered was going as a scout to Camp Hunt on Bear Lake. He spent
way too long out on the water one day about mid week. That was before sun-block was
developed. He became so burned that his body was covered with blisters. Mom and Dad were
called to take him home where he could get medical help. On the way back to Logan through the
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canyon, Dad hit a deer with his car (or vice versa) resulting in damage to the car and doubtless to
the deer as well.
He had a few really close chums during his adolescent years. One of these was Terry Larson.
Terry was about a year older than Grant, but they had many days of companionship and good
times together. One time they went off into the mountains in the winter time and spent the night
in a snow cave they had built. They loved to go caving and had some interesting experiences
inside the earth. Grant told me of one experience when the went into Logan cave, a very long
and interesting cave about a third of the way up Logan canyon. Most of the year there is a stream
of water coming out of the cave, and it goes back several miles into the mountain side. This
time, he and Terry had gone far into the back of the cave. He said they had taken about three
hours to work their way far beyond where the casual Saturday-afternoon explorer would go.
There are many places on the way back where one must wade through water. There are other
places where the bottom is unsure, and one must arch over the water by placing the fee on one
wall and the hands on the opposite wall and shuffle sideways. As they were working their way
back through the cave, Terry dropped his flashlight into the water, and it went out. Nothing he
could do would bring its light back. Grant had a flashlight, but only after Terry’s went out did he
notice his light was very dim.
They immediately started back for the mouth of the cave, but after less than twenty minutes,
Grant’s light was also totally useless. So there they were, deep in the bowels of the earth with
no light. Then they remembered that they had not told anyone where they were going that day.
He told me it was a time for great meditation and prayer. But he said they had the great
assurance that the Lord would guide them out. They worked their way along, feeling as best they
could in the blackness. When they would come to water, he said the Spirit manifested expressly
to them when they could wade through and when it was necessary to arch over the water. He
said they made good time, coming out in only a little over half an hour. It was a faith-building
experience, but not enough to stop him from taking chances.
He was able in his later teens to buy a motorcycle. It must have been the summer before he
turned 17. Mother was not much on motorcycles. Her brother had been severely injured in a
motorcycle accident, and she was convinced it was the injuries her brother sustained that led to
the cancer that took his life as a very young man. But Grant wanted a motorcycle, and what he
got was a BSA 650 (cc engine displacement). I had ridden a Cushman motor scooter as a highschooler, but I was not prepared for this machine. He talked me into riding it, so I climbed on,
started it, and twisted the handle to give it some gas. The motor cycle roared to life, leaving me
spinning in the gravel, and the bike sailing merrily down the street for some 30 or 40 feet before
it lost its balance and also fell into the dust. Grant really liked that motorcycle. It was his
principal means of transportation until not long before he left for his mission.
Grant was active in high-school activities. At Logan High School, where he was a student, there
was a Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) program. It was one of the few high schools in
the area that still had this program, which was intended to provide leadership to the military,
mainly the Army. Grant participated in this activity, taking military science as one of the classes
in his curriculum. He was also a member of the rifle team. He became an expert marksman
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using the specially designed .22 caliber target rifles. He won several trophies for his abilities
with a gun. Fortunately, he never had to use one in combat, and his subsequent use of firearms in
hunting reflected his respect for the power they represented and his respect for life. I enjoyed
hunting with Grant.
Grant was also an athlete, taking part in football and track and field. He played the tackle
position on the football team. His six-foot, four-inch frame and great strength were an awesome
force to be reckoned with by the opposing teams.
A humorous experience came a short time before Grant left on his mission. I had recently
returned from mine and was assigned to go with Grant to the home of his good friend, Terry
Larson. One evening we appeared at their door to perform our duty and were invited inside.
Terry had a young sister who at the time was about three or four years old. She knew Grant well
because he had been in their home many times. As we came in she looked at him and laughed.
Then, looking at me she did a double-take. “Look, Mommy,” she said in amazement, “Two
Grants!”
One of the growing and challenging experiences Grant had as a young man was work in the hay
fields of Wyoming. Our Uncle Alma and developed a system that would load hay bales from the
field onto a moving truck. He had three boys who helped him as he went to the Big Piney area
and contracted for hauling hay for the livestock farmers there, but he needed another hand. Grant
needed some summer work, so off he went on his motorcycle to the hayfields. He worked three
summers there with Uncle Alma, and hard work it was. Our Aunt Rose was a good cook, but she
and her family were of a different stature than Grant. It took fewer calories to keep them going.
Grant worked very hard, and though he was well cared for in most ways, there just wasn’t
enough food served to furnish his needs. He lost a lot of weight that first summer, and when he
returned home, Mother was very concerned that he may have overworked himself and done some
serious damage. The next year, arrangements were made to get him a little more substantial fare.
He worked a fourth summer in Wyoming, but for the Ranchers directly.
The friends and acquaintances he made in Wyoming were later to come into good stead as he
was called to serve in what was then the West Central States Mission, with mission headquarters
in Billings, Montana. One of his areas of assignment was LaBarge, Wyoming. It really is just a
fork in a dirt road that comes from high in the mountains east of Star Valley, Wyoming and goes
down to Pinedale. He said he thought that assignment was to babysit a companion who needed
to be kept away from people because he kept falling in love with the young women. Well, the
only people living there were the occasional ranchers, many of whom he had hauled hay for as a
teen-ager. He also served in Pocatello, Idaho, Jackson, Wyoming, Kemmerer, Wyoming, Casper,
Wyoming, Minot, North Dakota, and Gillette, Wyoming. These, for the most part are cold
places. In Jackson, Grant did tracting and traveled to meetings on snowmobiles. In Minot, he
nearly froze in the cold midwestern winter and was most grateful for a pair of thermal underwear
that his family sent him.
Grant had some interesting and somewhat harrowing experiences as a missionary. On one
occasion, he and his companion were hurrying to get to a district meeting in Kemmerer,
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Wyoming. Rather than the customary (and legal) 55 mph, they were traveling more like 70 mph.
They came around a curve and found themselves suddenly surrounded by a herd of cattle. They
were spared from injury, however, as were the cows. Grant said he looked in the rear view
mirror and the only place he could see not fully occupied by the cows was the narrow track where
their car had just been.
On another occasion, Grant was making the transfer from Jackson to Minot. He had a mission
car, and he was driving alone from Jackson to Billings to visit with the Mission President before
assuming his new duties in Minot. His route took him north through West Yellowstone,
Montana since it was winter time, and there had been heavy snow. Some distance north from
West Yellowstone, through a slight error in judgment, his car left the rode and landed in a snow
bank. The engine compartment filled with snow and ice, and he was totally stuck. It was about
5:00 p.m., and there was no traffic on the highway. Grant had learned early in his life to ask for
help when he needed it, so he sought the aid of Heaven to help him out of this situation. No
sooner had he asked for help than a large semi truck appeared, an automobile transporter. The
driver, seeing Grant’s predicament, stopped and made use of the seemingly endless length of
chain or cable he had to pull Grant’s car back onto the road. The car was about 60 or 70 feet
from the pavement. Grant thanked the driver and began the challenging task of clearing the snow
from the engine compartment so he could start the car. In the process of digging out the snow,
using a tire iron or other items available, he broke the fan belt. Again it was time for prayer.
Again, no sooner had he asked than another motorist appeared who stopped to see if he could
offer aid. He just happened to be a mechanic who had a spare fan belt, and it fit but he didn’t
have a wrench of the right size to install it. Somehow in the process of trying to make the
change, they managed to put a hole in the radiator. The driver was kind enough to drive Grant
back to West Yellowstone where he was able to get a truck and take him back to where the car
was, bring the car back to town and make the needed repairs. During all this time the mission
president was becoming more and more worried. One of his elders had disappeared, and as you
may guess, he was many hours overdue. Grant said when he finally got to Billings, it was about
midnight, and the president was going nuts. He had not thought to call the president and let him
know where he was and what was going on.
While serving in Jackson, Lyman Fearn, counselor to a stake president from Rock Springs
happened to attend a priesthood meeting where Grant was present. His wife, Maurine, and our
mother had become friends many years before in Rock Springs. President Fearn went home and
told one of his two daughters that he had just seen a young man she should be writing to. The
letters began followed up by visits after the mission was complete, and on August 21, 1970,
Grant married Jacqueline Fearn in the Salt Lake City Temple.
To that marriage were born six wonderful children. Laurie was born on December 5, 1971 at
Provo, Utah where Grant was studying at Brigham Young University. He had originally started
college at Utah State University, but moved to Provo after his mission, partly no doubt because
he was contemplating a possible marriage to Jackie, who was just finishing her schooling. The
family was living in a mobile home on the west side of the city. Jonathan Jay appeared, also in
Provo, on October 4, 1973. Grant graduated from BYU as a manufacturing engineer in the
spring of 1978. He said he felt extremely fortunate to be able to start in a job the very next
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Monday when so many of his classmates were not able to find jobs at all. Next came Melinda on
June 18, 1979 in Salt Lake City. It was about that time that the family moved to a rented home at
72 South Main in Farmington, Utah. Later they moved to another home on West State in
Farmington. It was not too long afterward that they decided to build a home out in the meadow
west of Farmington. Christine was born October 24, 1982 in Bountiful, Utah. Seth Richard was
born March 29, 1986, also in Bountiful. And Andrew Glen was born April 12, 1988 in
Bountiful.
Grant experienced a number of close calls and faith promoting experiences in his lifetime. One
of them came while still a student at BYU. The family wanted to travel to Manti, Utah and see
the famous Manti Pageant. He said they developed a very bad feeling about going. They
struggled with that for a while, but finally decided not to go and did something else on that day.
He learned later that had he made that trip, he would probably have been caught in flood that
came as the consequence of a cloudburst in one of the canyons there. He would have become
stranded.
On his 22nd birthday, he was working on a job installing the heavy beams across freeways that
hold the road signs. For some reason, a beam that had been put in place but not fully installed
slipped from its moorings and came crashing down. It grazed his face and slammed into his
shoulder, pushing it out of the way. Then it collided with his left leg. Dr. Clark who treated him
said it should have severed the leg completely. That it did not, Grant attributed to the protective
power of the garments he was wearing.
Another time, while living in Provo, he was called on to weld some galvanized steel. When
welding that material, it is very important to have a respirator to provide breathing air because
the zinc oxide formed as the coating on the steel burns in the air is poisonous. While he was
working, sparks from the welding combined with the breathing oxygen he was using caused the
rubber mask he was wearing to catch fire. Tearing the mask from his face, Grant inhaled enough
zinc oxide fumes to make him very sick. His face was badly burned by the gases exploding in
the mask he was wearing. Through the blessing of the Priesthood, not even a scar remained to
remind him of the event.
Another time, while doing silk screening work for a company making road signs, he inhaled so
many of the paint fumes that he had to go home feeling quite ill. After going to bed, he recalled
“loosing it” and passing from his body into a place of darkness where he saw a being of light
whom he characterized as emanating the most powerful feelings of love he had ever experienced.
He remembered being asked if he was satisfied with his life. Since he was only about 26 at the
time, his response was that he did not feel that he had really experienced life yet. He was asked if
he wanted to return to mortality, to which he replied in the affirmative. From that moment he
began to heal.
He learned many other things in that experience, some of which he has shared and some of which
he could not. He said one concept that he came away with was that it is very important to our
Heavenly Father that we are happy. If we are heirs to a celestial glory and don’t live so that we
can enjoy that kind of life, we are miserable. Likewise, someone who has qualified himself or
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herself for a lower realm would be uncomfortable being placed in a habitation where a higher law
was required. Father is happy when we are, whatever station we attain to.
They had started building their home in late 1982 or early 1983. In August of 1983 it came time
to pay off the construction loan and get the regular financing for the residence. Just about that
time he lost his job at Gallagher Pump Company. The company business had gone from about
$40M per year to less than $10M per year in a matter of a few weeks, and Grant was one of those
let go. He said they were extremely blessed at that time in being able to complete the home
(mostly) and because of the timing, getting a better than normally available on the residential
loan. Soon after that, he was able to start work with I-Omega.
Another time, he was having great difficulty with one of his supervisors that was using Grant as a
whipping boy, to take out his frustrations about his own inadequacies. No matter how Grant
tried to perform up to the manager’s expectations, it just was not enough. He asked Dad for a
blessing that he might be able to get along with this boss. The blessing was given, and almost
immediately there was a change in the organization. Grant went from goat to rising star, and the
person with whom he was having the problem left the company.
Shortly after Andrew was born, I was traveling on business on the East Coast. I was finished
with my meetings and could have probably gotten an evening flight out of Washington, but my
tickets and hotel reservations were for a Thursday morning flight, and I just felt that it would be
better to wait and go later. When I got to Salt Lake City, about noon on Thursday, I routinely
called LeMar at work to say hello and find out how things were going. He asked if I had heard
about Jackie, and of course I had not. She had become very ill, and it was very useful to Grant
and his family for me to go to his home and help out with some things there while he was
attending to Jackie’s illness. We were pleased to be able to have the younger children stay with
us for a few weeks while Jackie recovered. The inspiration to wait and travel on Thursday was
another instance where Grant and his family was being watched out for. Several other instances
connected with Jackie’s illness, too private to discuss here, were even more miraculous.
In 1990 Grant was working for I-Omega Corporation, a company that manufactured computer
disk drives. He had done very well with them, helping them to find inexpensive ways to
manufacture their product by his innovations in production line set up and other skills he had as a
manufacturing engineer. The company asked him to go to mainland China to help in the setting
up of a new production facility there where labor costs were a fraction of the domestic rates. He
was reluctant to accept the assignment because of his heavy responsibilities at home, due in part
to Jackie’s continuing illness, and only after considerable prayer did he accept the proposition of
being in China for three weeks or so, then coming home for two or three weeks. Grant had many
great experiences in that assignment, not all of them pleasant. Because he was the representative
of western industrialists, he was treated royally while he was there. The local businessmen went
out of their way to see to his every comfort. That included several things that he was most
uncomfortable with including liquor and the offer of the company of young ladies of the evening.
He experienced many types of Chinese cuisine most of which he found very palatable, even
good. He ate chicken feet, tripe, and various other local specialties. He said the most trouble he
ever had with a meal, though, was one in which the entree was a stew or soup made with sections
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of snake (skin intact), turtle feet and other short things floating around in it. It was an occasion
of some concern because of the great honor that was being bestowed on him by those who
provided this delicacy and the great care needed not to cause them embarrassment or affront.
Grant served the Lord in many ways through his life. Before his mission he served in Aaronic
Priesthood and scouting offices. He served in an Elders quorum presidency while a student at
Provo. Later he served in a Sunday School presidency. Most of his years in Farmington, he was
in scouting in one way or another. He really enjoyed being out with the boys in the woods, and
he looked back on those times with great satisfaction. He also served his family. Dad and his
second wife, Mildred, made special note of the great patience and care he gave his children,
taking time to carefully explain answers to their questions. As he was able to do less physically,
he spent many hours reading to them and eating salt-water taffy. Among the best loved books
read were the Tolkein fantasies about Hobits and the Lord of the Rings.
Just at Christmas in 1990, Grant discovered that the reason for some unexplained bleeding was
cancer of the bowel. It was over the holiday season that he went in for surgery at what was then
St. Benedict’s Hospital in Ogden. His surgeon was Dr. Alder, who grew up in Cache Valley.
The cancer was in a very difficult location to remove, deep inside the pelvic cavity, but the
operation was pronounced a success. Part of the procedure was the attachment of the upper
bowel to the abdominal wall in a colostomy that would allow the lower bowel to heal where the
cancerous section had been removed. The plan was that after a few weeks, the bowel would be
reconnected in another surgery. Within about two days of that reconstructive surgery, Grant
began to feel very ill, and food was not getting through. It was discovered in yet another surgery
that a part of the lower bowel that had been idle had become atrophied and plugged and needed
removal. So in the space of about six weeks he had three major surgeries. Grant had radiation
and chemotherapy that lasted for several months, and the prognosis looked excellent. He
resumed traveling when he became strong enough to do so.
These trips to China continued for several years. In early 1994 as he was coming home for a
visit, he was passing through Hong Kong when a disk ruptured in his back. He was in extreme
pain, but with help of the airlines and others he made it home where surgery was performed to
correct the problem. Later that year, in June, he was able to fly with Jackie to Europe where
daughter Laurie had just completed a mission in Italy. She had spent most of her time in the area
south of Rome. Grant and Jackie were able to pick her up in Italy and visit many points of
interest there, in Florence, and in Switzerland and France. They returned home on July 4th, 1994.
The cost of the airfare was covered by some of his many frequent-flyer miles (a reward given by
the airlines for those who travel with them a lot). That was one of the real highlights of their
married life.
Then the specter reappeared. Again at Christmas time in 1994, Grant learned that the cancer had
returned. He had been having trouble in his abdomen with stiffness and soreness. He had
noticed some thickening and swelling there, but he thought it was probably just scar tissue
growing at the site of his previous incisions. Through biopsy he learned that the abdominal wall
had become cancerous, possibly by the unintentional dropping of cancerous tissue from the
earlier surgeries into the wound in the abdomen or possibly by the metastasis of the earlier
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cancer, only to show up somewhere else. In early January of 1995 he was in the hospital again.
About 1:00 p.m. he and Jackie came to the Primary Children’s hospital where a team of surgeons
were prepared to remove his entire abdominal muscle, replacing it with a web of nylon mesh that
was to perform the containment function until skin could be grafted over it to make a more
natural closure. The surgery began about two p.m., and we were prepared to wait five to seven
hours before we heard the prognosis. By three there was a call from the surgeon to Jackie
informing her that the cancer was much more widely spread than they had supposed and that they
had simply closed the wound, unable to do anything to help him. About 45 minutes later, Grant
was brought from recovery into his room. As Jackie sat by his bedside and took his hand, Grant
opened his eyes and looked at her. He said softly, “It has spread hasn’t it?” to which her reply
was a simple “Yes.” Grant leaned back on his pillow, closed his eyes, and gave a deep sigh.
Grant’s life since then was one of hope and increasing faith. He was reasonably comfortable and
managed to work part-time for a while, but in about September or October of 1995 he was forced
to quit to undergo chemotherapy. That lasted for several months with sometimes a hope of
success, but never convincing proof. In May 1996, he had become quite ill and was moved first
to the hospital, which by then was renamed the Ogden Regional Medical Center, and then to
Manor Care facility, where he could get nursing help at a lower cost than the hospital could
provide. The discomfort increased, and there was great concern. The problem was alleviated in
part by a return to the hospital and the installation of a new colostomy. The lower bowel had
become blocked by the cancer and could no longer function. He was able to get up now and then
after that, but his strength was spent, and he was loosing weight rapidly.
During this time, his ward members were most generous in their efforts to improve the quality of
the home Grant and his family were living in. Grant got a good deal on some vinyl siding, and
the ward members installed in over one weekend. Previously they had installed a new roof.
They subsequently finished the stonemasonry that Grant was never able to get done, and they
paved the driveway, replaced some worn and aged concrete on the steps, and completed the
water-sealing of the foundation. They set footings for a patio deck and did many other items of
great service that Grant and his family (not to mention the rest of us) really appreciated.
Grant knew that his condition was very grave, but he felt perplexed, like he was not sure what
would happen. In a blessing given by a faithful home teacher, he was told that there were still
some things he needed to resolve in his life. He determined that they would be made right, so
after much fervent prayer and introspection, he was given to understand what those matters were.
He earnestly sought to correct them, and after interviews with his bishop and stake president, he
finally was given to know that those problems had been removed. A week or so later, after he
had removed the intravenous needle that was providing him nourishment, he bore testimony of
how grateful he was to the Lord for making it possible for those matters to be taken out of the
way. He thanked us all for the role each of us had played in his life. Then he said it was time for
him to go and asked our blessing. After the blessing was given, he smiled at Dad and said
“Thanks for letting me go.”
After that day, he became disoriented and spent most of the time sleeping. Early in the morning
of September 1, after a long night of fitfulness and thrashing around, he said clearly, “I feel
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warm.” Then he described to Jackie that his mother and paternal grandparents were there to see
him. The agitation and discomfort returned and continued into the day. LeMar came over about
11:00 a.m. About mid-day, the bishop and his home teacher came for one last blessing. He was
told that it was time to return home. Immediately he began to rest and became quiet. It was
about 3:00 p.m. when LeMar noticed his breathing had stopped, and he had returned home.
Only they who have experienced great suffering can know the great joy of life and wholeness.
The prophet was told of Christ, “…he descended below all things, in that he comprehended all
things, that he might be in all and through all things the light of truth;” (D&C 88:6) Grant, by his
suffering, has come to know himself, life, and the Lord in ways few of us can. We look forward
to that great reunion in which we will be together again.
Grant at age 9.
Family when Grant was 12.
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Grant, LeMar, parents, and Grant’s cat in
April 1963.
Costume Grant wore at age
14.
Grant and Jackie at Christmas, 1995.
By age 15 he had learned to
fish.
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