Kathleen Mae (Decker) Olsen (1938 - 2010)

Born 22 Apr 1938 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Ancestors

Died 20 Nov 2010 at age 72 in Lindon, Utah, Utah, United States

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Biography

Kathleen Decker was born on April 22, 1938 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. Her parents were Alma Decker and Rosalind Reeves.

Due to her father's work, the family moved frequently and she attended a number of schools. Her senior year in high school was at Enterprise, Utah.

In the Fall of 1956 she returned to Cedar City to attend CSU (College of Southern Utah) and her family moved to Winnemucca, Nevada. In 1958, she and her brother, Dean, attended the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. The following year when her other brother, Wayne, would be returning from his mission and wanted to attend BYU, the family moved to Provo, Utah. Their father was seeking early retirement because of severe arthritis and moved the family with that plan in mind. Kathleen transferred to BYU for her senior year. Kathleen was on the Honor Roll at every school she attended: Cedar High, Enterprise High, CSU, U of U and BYU. She was a talented musician (piano and cello) and a talented seamstress.

She married James Gary Olsen in the Salt Lake Temple on 12Aug 1960 and they lived in Montpelier, Idaho while waiting for a class assignment for pilot training in the USAF. That finally came for March 1961 at Craig AFB, Alabama (near Selma). She gave birth to a son while there and the following year while her husband was attending USAF Survival school in Nevada she gave birth to a daughter, in Provo.

During their 18 month stay at McClellan AFB, near Sacramento, California, Kathleen was actively involved in North Highlands Ward affairs, spent some time on the Stake Relief Society Board and gave birth to another son. While her husband spent March 1964 to March 1965 in Vietnam she lived in a duplex in Salt Lake City about a block east of Westminster College and about a mile from where her parents were then living.

In March 1965 her husband was reassigned to McClellan AFB and a new home was purchased in North Highlands. Life changed again when her husband left the Air Force and started training with Western Airlines in August 1966. While living in a small house in the back yard of another house in Hawthorne, California, Kathleen gave birth to another daughter, in Inglewood (near Los Angeles Int’l Airport). In May 1967, the family moved to Hayward, California. Kathleen again served on the Stake Relief Society Board and also started taking classes at Cal State-Hayward to get her California teaching credential so she could teach full time, if necessary. She could teach as a substitute with her Utah Credential. It took five years of study and baby-sitter trading, but she made it.

Kathleen died from cancer in 2010 in Lindon, Utah, at age 72.^[1]

• Fact: Residence (1940) Election Precinct 14 Toadlena, San Juan, New Mexico
• Fact: Obituary (2010) Utah, United States
• Fact: Obituary (21 Nov 2010) Salt Lake City, Utah, United States
• Fact: Residence (21 Nov 2010) Salt Lake City, Utah
• Fact: Burial (24 Nov 2010) Lindon Cemetery, Lindon, Utah, Utah USA

Sources

1. ↑ FamilySearch Life Sketch. Not credited. It is written by unknown person in first-person and has been edited to remove names of living individuals and to make it more generically factual.

• "Family Tree," database, FamilySearch (http://familysearch.org : modified 05 April 2022, 20:27), entry for Kathleen Mae Decker (PID https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/4:1:KW8M-LB9 ); contributed by various users.