Boyd Campbell

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Boyd Oscar Campbell died peacefully at his home in Hyrum, Utah on Friday, March 29, 2024. He was 96 years old. He was born March 8^th, 1928 in Logan, Utah to Oscar Isaiah Campbell and Margaret Fifield Campbell. He was the eldest of five children.

He was raised on the family farm in Weston, Idaho where, at an early age, he was given the choice between working hard and working hard. He was euphemistically described as an active child and bears sole responsibility for every gray hair on his mother’s head. There were incidents involving extreme underage driving, wet dynamite-powered explosions, and at least one granary fire. When he was 8 years old his left hand was tangled up in a tractor pulley which crimped off the tips of two fingers. The slow-healing wounds ultimately became infected resulting in a nauseating stench of such magnitude that his father famously banished him from the dinner table. And although the skin of his finger tips was eventually restored, they remained tender for 88 years.

Speaking as a child of the great depression he said, “we didn’t know we were poor, we were just like everyone else.”  As his younger siblings came along, he was cast farther and farther into the outer reaches of their small farm house for sleeping accommodations until he ended up in what was essentially an unheated porch. He attributes the lavish body heat of his labrador retriever and sleeping companion, Tip, with saving him from death by freezing.  

Ever industrious and easily charmed by exponential return, as a youngster he leveraged a single wiener piglet into a full litter which he sold to finance the purchase of his first cow. He earned money raising livestock and milking cows throughout his youth. He loved the outdoors and spent many idyllic, childhood days hunting, fishing and riding horses in Weston canyon. He was a confirmed devotee of education. In fact, he loved the third grade so much that he stayed for two years. He played multiple sports at West Side high school before graduating in 1947.

In 1949 he served an LDS mission to Australia. Enroute to California to board the ship to the South Seas, he caught the last train through the Sierra Nevada Mountains before a January blizzard closed the railway. He then set sail on a slow-moving freighter with four other missionaries that stopped at nearly every port along the way and took 3 months to reach its final destination. At that time the Australian Mission included the entire continent. He twice traversed it by train from Perth on the west coast to Sydney on the east coast, a distance of 2700 miles. The trip included the entire length of the Trans-Australian Railway across the Nullarbor Plain, a vast desert where summer temperatures reach 122 degrees Fahrenheit and which boasts the single longest stretch of straight train track in the world—297 miles. These were unairconditioned passenger cars whose only amenity was a large bucket of room temperature water with a single wooden dipper, no cups.

After living two and a half years on the opposite side of the earth, he was happy to return to the family farm and his tiny Idaho town. Sadly, this much-anticipated period of bucolic bliss was short-lived. After only a few months at home he received an invitation for an all-expenses paid tour of the far east curtesy of the United States Army. He served in the Korean conflict from 1951 to 1953 where he saw combat and was assigned to man a water-cooled, .30 caliber machine gun. His family has been left to imagine the horrors of war he must have endured because he never talked about it.

While on leave, he met Beverly (Bunny) Joy Christiansen on a blind date. After discharge from the army, they were married May 7^th, 1954.

He joined his father-in-law’s plumbing business and eventually came to own it. He was very successful in the business owing to his boundless energy, his farm-grown work ethic and his legendary early mornings. Boyd and Bunny had three children which they raised mostly in the green house in Smithfield.

A faithful member of the LDS Church, he served in a variety of leadership positions and was possibly the only home teacher in the church with perfect attendance. As an advisor to the priest’s quorum, he was especially revered by his charges for his genuine regard for young people and his willingness to help them find their way. And he had a boat.

His family never had to ask him for anything because he anticipated their needs and generously offered the help before they could ask. A single-file line of unrelated beneficiaries of his time, his wealth, his expertise, his advice and his friendship would trail off into the horizon.

At the absurd age of 72, when most men of sound mind and weary body are sagely engaged in the leisure of retirement, he purchased a commercial, set net, salmon fishing operation on Alaska’s Cook Inlet in order to provide summer jobs and northern adventures for his nieces, nephews and grandchildren—and all their friends. He continued his jaunty management of that rigorous endeavor well into his 80s, and helped out on the beach until age 92.

He once said, as an Idaho farm boy, that he never dreamed he would travel farther north than Pocatello, and farther south than Salt Lake City. Since he made that wildly, short-sighted statement, he has visited every state in the union and sojourned through several countries on every continent except Antarctica. And one thing is for sure, whether in the mission fields of Australia, the battle fields of Korea, or the dirt fields of Idaho, Boyd Campbell made his mark.

He was preceded in death by his wife Bunny, his son Kelly, and his grandson Jesse Johnson. He is survived by his sister Patty Fisher, his brothers Roger and Paul, his daughters Julie and Teri (Corey Johnson), 10 grandchildren, 20 great grandchildren and his two lifelong friends LaVor (Newt) Neuenswander and Farrel Simpson.

Boyd was a quiet minister of good will. Humility and gratitude were his base virtues. He would be embarrassed if a special thanks was not paid to his care givers from Sunshine Home Health Care and Hospice. These kindness professionals include Kris Friedli, BraeLyn Friedli, Pam McDaniel, and Erin Hyde.

In lieu of flowers, Boyd requested donations to the Cache Community Food Pantry. Please contribute by Venmo to Cache Community Food Pantry @Cache-Pantry and write Boyd Campbell in the memo. If by check, send it to Cache Community Food Pantry at 359 S Main, Logan, Utah 84321 and write Boyd Campbell in the memo.

Of note, the address for the funeral in the death notice was incorrect.

Funeral services will be held at the Providence 10^th ward church located at 262 Canyon Road on Wednesday, April 3^rd at 11:00 AM, with a viewing at 9:30 AM. Interment will be at the Smithfield City Cemetery on Saturday, April 6^th at 12:30 PM. with Military Honors.