Parents:
Joseph Henry Behunin
Mary Zwahlen

A Celebration Of Life ?Mary Violet Behunin Smith was born in Ferron, Emery County, Utah on April 24, 1907, the seventh of 13 children, to Joseph Henry Behunin and Mary Zwahlen, who were both children of Utah pioneers. Violet grew up in Ferron, Utah, and was an important helper in the large family. She graduated from local schools, and then moved to Salt Lake City and attended the LDS Business College. There she worked in a local restaurant. Her beauty attracted Glenn Elbert Smith of Cottage Grove, Oregon. He was employed by the Telephone Company and ate lunch at the restaurant where Violet worked. A few months later they married on October 9, 1926, and shortly thereafter were transferred to Los ?Angeles. In 1932 they were sealed in the Manti Temple, which started a life-long love for family history and temple work. The couple spent the next 46 years in California, where their five children were born: Gerald, Shirley Williams, James Elbert, Mary Bodily and Anne Reay. Violet was a very active member of the LDS Church and a busy leader and teacher in nearly all the Church organizations. She loved to arrange flowers and bouquets, and was called on each Christmas and Easter and other important occasions to employ her talents at many church and civic functions. After retirement Violet and Glenn served as Senior Missionaries amongst the Cree Indians in Alberta, Canada, and later in the mission at Grantham, York County, England. After returning home they moved from California to Salt Lake City, where they spent the remaining years of their lives, serving in several LDS temples. Preceding Violet's passing were her husband, Glenn (age 80), and son James Elbert (age 47). She is survived by four sisters, Nedra Edmonds, Roxella Gordon, Elma Pala and Dortha Lou Nethercott. Violet's posterity number into the hundreds. She will be long remembered by all who knew her for her long service to mankind. She may be viewed at 10 a.m., February 4th, at the Jenkins-Soffe Mortuary located at 1007 West South Jordan Pkwy (exit 10600 South, west of I-15.) Her "Celebration of Life" will immediately follow. Interment will be along side her husband in Greenlawn Cemetery, The Garden of the Good Shepherd, Colma, California, Monday, the February 9th, 2004.