Nyla Kathrine Nye Petersen June 28, 1938 ~ April 29, 2018 After fighting with her might against breast cancer, Nyla Kathrine Nye Petersen graduated from mortality and a life well lived on the 29th of April 2018, at home, surrounded by her family and their love and affection. She began life June 28, 1938, on a perfect early summer day. She was born at home, built on a mound called Nye Hill, on 7th street in Ogden, Utah.
Nyla was the fifth child of Clyde Vasquez Nye and Bertha Annie Nye (nee Johnson). The Doctor was called for the delivery but the bouncing red-headed baby girl was born before his arrival, her Mother, Anne, assisted in birth by her Sister-in-Law Helen and Aunt Tussnelda. Nyla had seven brothers and sisters, three surviving, Michael Steven, Susan Amy Harrop, and Phillip Jon (Susan).
She was preceded in death by Clydie, Alice Diane McGill, Paul Johnson, and Dixie Marilyn (Wallace Donald) Carruth, and her parents, Clyde and Anne. In June 1944 the Nyes moved to North Ogden to be closer to the mountains with open spaces for camping and hunting. As a youth Nyla loved to hunt, fish, wrestle with her brothers, and assist in all things mechanical.
She became an excellent cook and camper, learning the skills from her parents and siblings. Nyla attended North Ogden Elementary, Wahlquist Junior High School, and Weber High School. She loved to sing, dance, and act.
She was the student choir director at Weber High and took part in school musicals. She often sang in a trio and was excellent at dancing the jitter-bug. At Weber High she dated a mission-bound young man who asked Kent Petersen, his friend from a singing quartet, to watch after Nyla so he could marry her when he returned.
But later, after breaking up with Kent’s best friend, Jim, Nyla and Kent went out dancing, which started their courtship. After dating for four years she married Kent Byron Petersen on November 15, 1957. They were sealed in the Logan Temple and were happily married for 60+ years.
Nyla studied English, Art, History, and Music at Weber State while raising her five children: Kyle Anne Petersen, David Kent Petersen, Leslie Jean (Glenn) Beus, Erin Kae (Mark) Russell, and Kelly Sue Stanton. She is Grandmother to 19 grandchildren and 10 greats (one more on the way), and loved each one with her special Grammy-passion. Before becoming a full-time Mother, and after the children were grown, Nyla worked at Mountain Bell, North Ogden Cannery, Brewers Restaurant, The Bon Marche, Deamer Finance, Cobabe & Heiner, and Petersen Motor Company.
With her love of music she sang with the Ogden Choral, which toured the World’s Fair in Seattle, in New York City, and in Los Angeles for Kiwanis International. She had a special gift for conducting and directing choirs which she used for primary children, church choirs, road shows, and writing productions for her congregation. She was an active member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints her entire life, serving wherever she was called, including twenty-seven years working with the Young Women of the Church, and as Relief Society President before Kent and Nyla’s Mission Presidency call (2002) to serve in Anchorage, Alaska where she continued using her many talents.
Nyla’s great love of the missionaries who served with her and Kent continued with recent contact with many of them. She loved to fish and spent many p-days fishing for salmon and halibut, earning the invitation to join several General Authorities from the Church while fishing during their mission tours of Alaska. She was also very successful in fishing for people who wanted to learn the Gospel and was key in helping several investigators enter the waters of baptism.
Her community service included the Junior League, President of the Ogden Symphony Ballet Association, The Kay-Anns, American Heart Association, McKay-Dee Hospital Religion Service Committee, and the Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City. Nyla, her daughters, sisters, and nieces spent a week of each summer for many years enjoying the plays of the Shakespeare Festival where she had a special bond with founder Fred Adams and several others. Nyla loved to travel and has visited lands throughout the world including, Asia, Europe, Russia, and the Caribbean.
She also visited states across the country, and much of North and South America. Most recently, Nyla traveled with Kent and friends in their motorhome down the Alcan Highway. For years one of her favorite vacations was spending a week or two with the family at Lake Powell, on their houseboat, the Serengeti.
She had a unique talent for cooking for large groups in small spaces on these vacations, while continuing to love everyone in the process. Nyla finished her time on earth a beautiful soul, full of love for her family and friends, faithful to the end with a firm testimony of the Savior, her Father in Heaven, the Prophet Joseph Smith, and the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Her time serving in the Ogden Temple as an ordinance worker was special to her and she often expressed the happy anticipation she was feeling at meeting her sisters and mother again.
The family wishes to express special appreciation to Dr. Carl R. Gray, the staff at Utah Hematology and Oncology, and Legacy Home Care and Hospice who made her transition into eternity more pleasant than we could have expected. Funeral services will be held at 11 a.m. on Monday, May 7, 2018 at the Weber Heights Stake Center, 1401 Country Hills Drive, Ogden. The family will meet with friends from 5 to 8 p.m. on Sunday and from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m on Monday at the Stake Center.
Services entrusted to Lindquist’s Ogden Mortuary, 3408 Washington Blvd. Interment, Lindquist’s Memorial Garden of the Wasatch, 1718 Combe Road, South Ogden.
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