Delma Satterthwaite Turner Obituary (1929 - 2020)

Graveside services for Delma Turner will be broadcast via Facebook Live on Saturday, December 19, 2020 beginning at 1:00 PM MST. To watch these services, please click on the link below. Click HERE to view Graveside Services for Delma Turner ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Funeral services for Delma Turner will be broadcast on Friday, December 18, 2020 beginning at 1:00 PM MST. To watch these services, please click on the wording "View Funeral Webcast" below. View Funeral Webcast In her 91st year, Delma Satterthwaite Turner, our beloved mother, and grandmother passed peacefully into the next life December 11, 2020. Delma lived an extraordinary life, attested by the fact that all who knew her, loved her. Any day spent with her was a uniquely special day. She loved music and singing, had a beautiful alto voice and was a member of The Tabernacle Choir. She enjoyed painting beautiful landscapes, creating stunning stained-glass windows, growing delicious raspberries, flying kites as high as they could go and creating gorgeous quilts. Delma was quite famous in the Bear Lake Valley for her lead foot. She often said she had a secret desire to be a race car driver. She practiced her driving skills often in Logan Canyon while her daughters were frozen with fear in the back seat. She learned to work at a young age, spending many summers working at Ideal Beach and picking raspberries in the local fields. Growing up, her best friends were her cousins and especially her dear sister Ellen. They were such good friends; she could never remember having a disagreement or argument with Ellen. Delma, a Garden City, Utah native was born in her home still located on Bear Lake Blvd. Her father died when she was six years old leaving her mother a widow at the age of thirty-six with four young children to raise. But the family soldiered on and Delma’s memories of her youth were always sweet. Delma’s ancestral roots trace back to the first settlers of the Bear Lake Valley. She is also a direct descendant of Mayflower passengers Edward Fuller and his son Samuel Fuller. Delma attended Utah State University and it was there during her freshman year, she met the handsome and ambitious Howard Turner at a dance. After meeting Delma, the Turners had hopes that she was the one for Howard. They married September 3, 1948 in the Salt Lake Temple. After their honeymoon to the Utah parks, Zions, Bryce, and Arches, they came back with one thin dime in their pockets, bought a popsicle and split it! In 1960 the Turner family moved to Pittsburgh, PA where Delma and Howard were highly instrumental in growing the Church in that part of the world. She was the Choir Director for many years and forged deep friendships with many members there. She became known as the Easter Egg Queen as she organized and headed the yearly building fund and/or budget project. Each spring the church building transformed into a giant chocolate covered divinity Easter egg factory. The popular eggs sold out every year. When retirement came, she and Howard moved to warm and sunny Gilbert, Arizona. Again, she found true friends, many who are greeting her now on the other side of the veil. Delma had a deep and abiding testimony and was a faithful member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She enjoyed serving wherever she was called. She loved serving as a Temple worker in the Mesa Arizona Temple. She served as Relief Society President, Young Women’s President, and the Choir Director many times over. She and Howard would spend their retirement summers in her childhood home in Garden City, Utah. She continued that “snowbird” tradition after Howard’s death in 1996. When in Garden City, she continued painting, stained glass making and growing gorgeous flowers, fruit trees, raspberries, and a vegetable garden. She could supply most of her own food from the gardens and trees in her yard. August was always a busy month canning raspberry jam from her patch of berries and plum jam from the trees her mother, Lazette, planted nearly one hundred years ago. Delma grew her own apple trees which supplied years of yummy applesauce. In Arizona she grew citrus trees, oranges and lemons and could make the most perfect lemonade in the world! Delma was also well known for being quite frugal and because of that virtue, she was blessed with an abundant life; having everything she needed, wanted and more. She was well known for her homemade bread and rolls and dinner at Grandma’s was always a culinary delight! Even when it seemed the refrigerator was nearly empty, in no time, she could whip up a delicious spread of tuna pasta salad and things from her garden. Delma is the daughter of Lazette Sims and Victor Owen Satterthwaite. She is preceded in death by her husband, Dr. John Howard Turner, a brother Duane Satterthwaite (Alicia), and a sister Ellen Caldwell (Glen). Delma is survived by her brother Vaughn Satterthwaite (Gail), her four children, Randy Turner (Christy), Toni Gledhill (Vern), Jacque Petrey (Mark) and Dee Ann Young (Walter). She has thirteen grandchildren and twenty-five great grandchildren. This is just a brief overview of the mortal life of Delma Satterthwaite Turner. We all agree that we could write volumes about her wonderful life. We invite you to add more to her story by adding your own memories, stories, and photos of Delma to www.FamilySearch.org . There they will be preserved forever and can be treasured for generations to come. You can login to FamilySearch and find her dedicated person page in the Family Tree tab. Here is Delma’s direct link in FamilySearch: https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/LXDY-B5N. If you need any help doing this, please contact Dee Ann Young at dayimaging@gmail.com or talk to your Ward Temple and Family History Consultant.