Obituary: SUMMERHAYS, JOSEPH

Joseph Terry SummerhaysSinger Educator Family ManJoseph Terry Summerhays died at home surrounded by family on December 26, 2011, after a courageous battle with melanoma. Terry was born March 13, 1940, in Salt Lake City to Joseph Rowland Summerhays and Phoebe Coré Sherrig. He lived all his life in the Salt Lake area, growing up in the Avenues and living and serving for over 30 years in the Douglas neighborhood.When Terry was nine, he met Anna Keddington, and by the time he was 15 they were going steady. On June 24, 1960, they were married in the Salt Lake Temple. They devoted their lives to family, taking joy in their eight children and their 30 grandchildren. Terry was a devout Latter-day Saint, serving as counselor in two stake presidencies in the Salt Lake Central Stake and as bishop of the Douglas Ward. After he was released, Terry and Anna just kept on serving, first as Salt Lake inner city missionaries; at the time of his cancer diagnosis, Terry was in the presidency of the 15th Branch and led a choir at the Utah State Prison. The gospel of love permeated his life. He was an authentic disciple of Christ, naturally gravitating to the poor, widows, handicapped, addicts, prisonersanyone who was struggling. He was generous to a fault, literally giving away his considerable wealth to those around him.Terry's interests were unusually diverse, ranging from sports to Frank Sinatra, and he was a prodigious movie buff. He went undefeated as quarterback for East High, excelled at softball and basketball, and had an infectious lifelong passion for golf. He was a professional singer, the first voice heard at Utah Opera's very first production, Turandot. Favorite roles were Gianni Schicci and the Big Bad Wolf in Little Red Riding Hood, which he performed hundreds of times. For nearly ten years he sang for and soloed with the Tabernacle Choir, and he founded Intimate Opera Company. With Anna at the piano, Terry was always singing. His booming baritone voice, shaking the walls of homes, churches, and concert halls, will be sorely missed. Terry graduated with a B.A. in sociology from the University of Utah and spent his early career at "the plant" of J. W. Summerhays and Sons, the family wool business, and later at DesaRose, another family company. His dream was to have a business of his own, and in 1986 he bought Metra Publishing, bringing literacy to thousands of children throughout the world. As an educator for Metra and BYU and as a singer, he traveled to all fifty states and many countries, from Guam to Morroco to South Korea to New Zealand. He and Anna had a special love for Paris, and another highlight was seeing Michaelangelo's Pieta in Rome. Terry loved most to travel with family to the cabin his father built and, in recent years, to his small house in Sedan, Kansas, where he and Anna had many dear friends. No one can capture in words Terry's big heart and larger-than-life quality. You had to be there. Here is Terry, eating ice-cream and belly laughing; there he is, driving his family seven hundred miles just to see a musical that got good reviews; now he's on a plane, flying across three states overnight to attend a routine morning church meeting; he's in a car now, driving to California at the drop of a hat because his daughter was having a bad day there. Now he's rushing home from a great movie, recruiting everyone at the house to go back and see it. See, there he is, finding excuses to chauffer a kid or grandkid to school in the morning, but mainly just finding excuses to fly to New York one more time. And here he is on Pebble Beach with his boys, full of cancer and hardly able to stand, defiantly swinging at the golf ball anyway. But mostly, there he is, year after year, on his big chair in the big room, just chatting and laughing with his family gathered in close around him. Dear father, how mighty was your song, how happy was our life with you. Terry is survived by Anna and their eight children: Joe (Holly), Danbury, Conn.; Tom (Karen), Pleasant Grove; Mary (Neil) Glad, Salt Lake; Katie (Randy) Zimmerman, Salt Lake; Christy, Salt Lake; Jim (Mary), Provo; Liz (Rex) Hale, Lake Point; Laura, Salt Lake. He is also survived by 26 grandchildren; five great-grandchildren; and by brothers Jeff, Steve, and Dan and sister Susie Hailes. He is preceded in death by his parents and sister Janet.Funeral services will be held on Friday, December 30th at 1:00 p.m. at the Salt Lake Central Stake Center, 951 East 100 South. Viewings will be held at Larkin Mortuary, 260 East South Temple, on Thursday, December 29th from 79 p.m. and prior to the funeral service at the stake center at 12 p.m. on Friday. Interment at Salt Lake City Cemetery.