My Father's Other Life

My sister Lynn is writing my father's biography. I realize now he had another life without me, a life I knew nothing about. It is a life that shaped and formed his work ethic, his faith in God and an unwavering testimony of the restoration of this gospel. In 1936 he moved his family out to Washington, DC, a family of only four but by the time they left three more children were added.
He was the private secretary to the congressman from Arizona, John R. Murdock. He also earned his PhD at George Washington University, bishop of his ward and found out his wife had breast cancer with three months to live. She was pregnant with Joe at the time. This is a long story, a sad and a happy story. It is a story that changed the lives of many people, including mine. It makes me so sad sometimes to realize I would not have been here without the death of Virginia. I would not be here without the sorrow of my father and his five children. In many ways, it shaped their lives, the death of their mother. I know it shaped mine.

These are pictures of the United States Department of Agriculture building. My father resigned from his position with Rep. John Murdock to take another government position in the United States Department of Agriculture as chief of the training, personnel division. He was over 25,000 people. Lynn said it is the same building that he worked in so many years ago. I am sad I didn't ask him more questions about how he felt. How he managed. How his faith was strengthened. I am sad I didn't thank him for his sacrifice but grateful for his choice to continue to acknowledge God, always.