The following biographical sketch is adapted from
the "News of the Church: Elder G. Homer Durham Of the First Quorum of the
Seventy" published in the Ensign for May 1977 on the occasion of
Elder Durham's call to the First Quorum of the Seventy.
It was the first time that all the Saints in the British
Isles had been invited to one great conference, and in June 1935 hundreds
of Saints from England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland assembled
in the town of Kidderminster, just south of Birmingham, for an MIA conference.
The conference had been months in the planning. And behind the project,
from the first dream of such a conference to the last detail of its execution,
was Elder G. Homer Durham, a missionary serving as president of the British
Mission YMMIA.
He had gone throughout the entire mission, exciting
the Saints about the project. Then other missionaries had tracted out the
entire city of Kidderminster—not for investigators, but for room and board
for conference visitors! And the three-day
conference was a success, especially because it was the first time
that the British Saints had been able to gather in one place and feel each
other’s strength.
It was during the depression, and the seven shillings
and sixpence for each night’s lodging cost dearly—but it was worth it when
the Saints gathered in the town meetinghall and sang “Let Zion in Her Beauty
Rise.” Elder Durham retells the story
now with tears in his eyes: “I think it was the first time they had
heard all those voices. It seemed to raise the roof. A great experience,
feeling the testimonies of so many others along with yours.”
His mission was the foundation on which the rest
of his life was built. During a train trip with European Mission President
Joseph F. Merrill, the apostle said,
“You must go get a Ph.D.”
“But President Merrill, do you think I could really
qualify?”
Elder Merrill answered, “No question about it.”
No question indeed! Since that interview, Elder Durham
not only earned that Ph.D., but also went on to preside over Arizona State
University after years of service in teaching and administration (including
service as academic vice-president at the University of Utah). From 1969
to 1976 he served as the first commissioner and executive officer of the
Utah System of Higher Education.
Elder Durham was born on 4 February 1911 in Parowan,
Utah, but was raised in Salt Lake City, where his father, George Henry
Durham, came to teach after five years at the New England Conservatory
in Boston, Massachusetts. The whole Durham family was musical, and though
Elder G. Homer Durham pursued a career outside of music, he helped support
himself during his undergraduate years by playing trumpet and later piano
in small dance bands. Also, he used his musical training throughout his
mission.
Not only did his mission launch his long career of
Church and educational service, but also it was the start of what he considers
the most important part of his life: for there he met Leah Eudora Widtsoe,
youngest daughter of Elder John A. Widtsoe
of the Council of the Twelve who was then presiding over the European Mission.
They corresponded after Elder Widtsoe returned to Utah, and less than a
year after Elder Durham came home from his mission the young couple were
married. The parents of two daughters and a son, they now have eighteen
grandchildren.
Elder Durham has long been known in the Church for
his more than two decades of columns in the Improvement Era and for his
excellent compilations of the writings and addresses of Church Presidents
John Taylor, Wilford
Woodruff, Heber J. Grant, and David
O. McKay. He has also served on the high councils of the Emigration,
Maricopa, Tempe, and Bonneville stakes, as president of the Salt Lake Central
Stake, on the Sunday School general board, and as a Regional Representative
of the Twelve.
After a lifetime in education, Elder Durham urges
young Latter-day Saints to “get as much education as you can afford—and
profit by. The world needs no ‘professional students’ but workers, and
the time must come for students to get out of the academy and serve.
“The benefit of education to the individual is unquestionable,
and the benefit to society is enormous. We need trained people who can
think straight and do the work of the world and the Church. Whether this
requires a lot of education or a little depends on the individual’s needs
and the direction in which he is going. But one of the great glories of
this church is its support of education.”
On October 1, 1981 Elder Durham was called into the
Presidency of the Seventy where he served faithfully until his death on
January 10, 1985 at Salt Lake City, Utah at the age of seventy-three.
