Nancy Park

 

Nancy grew up in Pleasant Grove Utah in Utah County. She lived in the same home the whole time she was growing up.

She said her upbringing was very simple.  She went to school, worked on her dad's 10 acre hobby farm, and played outside. When her work was done, she would go outside and play until her mother called her in for dinner.

Her parents taught her to value of work. It was very important to her dad. Her dad loved to work and if they went on vacation it was to go fishing. Otherwise, they were busy with the farm. On their farm they had horses, cows, chickens and fruit trees. In the summer she would pick fruit for her family and they would sell it at a fruit stand.

Nancy is the 4 th of 5 children. Her older siblings are much older than her and she is 11 years older than her baby brother. Basically she was raised as an only child. She spent a lot of time with her mom. They took care of all the work for the inside of the house. Her mom also taught her how to sew do crafts and helped her with her schooling.

After graduating from Pleasant Grove high school, Nancy went up to Ricks College for 2 years graduating with a degree in general studies. She then came back to Pleasant Grove and began working at the Bank of Pleasant Grove. At first she just answered the phones, but after a year they promoted her to secretary to the bank president.

Although she liked working at the bank, after 2 ½ years she decided she needed to work somewhere that she could have more of a social life. So she took a job as secretary in the dean's office of the School of  Management at BYU. She liked it and enjoyed being around more people her own age. She also started attending a BYU student ward. 

While attending the student ward she was called to be the appointment secretary for the bishop. However, the current executive secretary to the bishop wasn't really doing his calling so she started doing it too which included attending all the bishopric meetings.

About this time the bishop had a neighbor who was young adult age. He approached Wayne Park about accepting a calling in the singles ward as a ward clerk. It was at Wayne's first bishopric meeting that Wayne and Nancy met. They met in January, were engaged in March and married in June. The bishop joked that it was the first time the ward clerk and executive secretary of a ward ever got married.

Nancy and Wayne lived in the area for another year while Wayne finished his masters degree in Agricultural Economics. They had their first baby, Renae, while at BYU. From there the family moved to Illinois so Wayne could work on his PhD at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. They lived in the middle of Illinois farm country.  After 5 years, Wayne still had not completed his dissertation and they were out of money. Wayne wanted to quit, but Nancy insisted he finish his degree. So they came back to Orem and lived with Wayne's parents while he finished his dissertation long distance.  Their second child, Curtis, was born in Illinois.

 Wayne then accepted a post-doctoral position working for the USDA on the University of Florida campus in Gainesville and lived there for 2 1/2 years.  They became University of Florida Gator fans and still are to this day.  It was here that their daughter, Corinne, was born.  When she was a week old they once again packed up and moved.  This time they drove across the country to Kennewick, Washington.  In fact, Corinne was blessed en route in Orem so they could have family participate in her blessing.

Wayne and Nancy lived in Kenewick for 19 years and this became their home.  They never thought they would come back to Utah but after their youngest graduated from high school there was a desire to move back to be closer to family.  Wayne asked for a transfer to SLC thinking that maybe in a few years it would happen but were surprised to be making  preparations to move within about six months.

While Wayne was down here looking for a house, he found our neighborhood and wanted to move Nancy here because of the fabulous view of the mountains. Their whole married life, except while living in Orem, they hadn't had mountains to look at and they missed them. They also liked Kaysville because it was so close to their daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren.  They have three children and three granddaughters with the youngest granddaughter born just two weeks ago.

Nancy says her favorite thing about living in our ward is the neighborhood. She says she knows more about her neighbors here than she did with her neighbors in the 19 years in Washington. Nancy is kind and generous. We are lucky to have her.