1974
LDS Scene
March 1974


“LDS Scene,” Ensign, Mar. 1974, 78

LDS Scene

Four-Year Term

Dr. Leona Holbrook, professor of physical education at Brigham Young University, has been selected as a representative to the International Council of Health, Physical Education and Recreation. Dr. Holbrook is a past president of the American Association for Health, Physical Education and Recreation, and has been chosen by its board to serve the four-year term on the international organization.

Receives Top Diploma

Sister Betty Fitzgerald of the Mount Druitt Ward, Parramatta Australia Stake, recently became the fourth Australian to receive the coveted Teacher of Music in Australia diploma. This highest diploma awarded by the Australia Music Examination Board for teaching singing came at the end of a three-year course during which time Sister Fitzgerald also earned two performer’s diplomas, the Licentiate of Music in Australia, and the Licentiate of Trinity College, London, England.

During the final year of her diploma course, Sister Fitzgerald was called as stake music chairman and conducted leadership classes for all ward choristers and organists within her stake. Her husband, Brother Leonard Fitzgerald, serves on the stake high council and is chairman of the Aaronic Priesthood MIA committee. Brother and Sister Fitzgerald have three children.

Holland Named Dean

Dr. Jeffrey R. Holland, manager of the Melchizedek Priesthood MIA program, has been appointed to succeed Dr. Roy W. Doxey as dean of religious instruction at Brigham Young University. Brother Doxey is retiring from the deanship but will continue with some teaching responsibilities.

Brother Holland, who assumes the deanship this summer, was born in St. George, Utah, and taught religion at BYU prior to serving as director of the LDS Institute of Religion in Seattle, Washington, and as an instructor at institutes in Hayward, California, New Haven, Connecticut, and Salt Lake City. He has served as bishop of the University Second Ward in Seattle and as a counselor in the presidency of the Hartford Connecticut Stake.

Of the role of religion at BYU, Brother Holland says, “A student who enrolls at BYU has the opportunity to study the gospel of Jesus Christ with a remarkable selection of master teachers. Furthermore, he finds the gospel to be at the heart of every other academic purpose and pursuit of the university. Such educational experience is uniquely Latter-day Saint, and we look forward to working with the faculty and administration who provide it.”

Official Papers Donated

The personal and official papers of Utah pioneer Jesse N. Smith and the private Senate papers of the late Senator Arthur V. Watkins have been placed in the Harold B. Lee Library at Brigham Young University.

The youngest cousin of the Prophet Joseph Smith, Jesse N. Smith died in 1906 after a lifetime devoted to his church and community. He settled in Parowan, Utah, where he served as city clerk, mayor, district attorney, colonel in the militia, and member of the Utah territorial legislature. He twice served as president of the then Scandinavian Mission and was the first president of the Eastern Arizona and Snowflake stakes. He also served as a member of the Arizona territorial legislature, and was an LDS agent in securing townsites, farmland, and water rights. The collection donated to the library includes his patriarchal blessing from John Smith, and letters from a number of Church presidents.

Senator Watkins was prominent in America in the mid-1950s as chairman of the Select Senate Committee that recommended censure of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy. Papers related to that period of time are included in the material deposited in the library.

Secretary Named

D. Arthur Haycock, who was secretary to President Harold B. Lee, will serve President Spencer W. Kimball in the same capacity. For Brother Haycock this will be the fourth president of the Church whom he has served as secretary. He worked with President George Albert Smith and President Joseph Fielding Smith and also has been assistant secretary to the First Presidency and executive secretary to the Council of the Twelve.

Brother Haycock is a Regional Representative of the Twelve.

Financial Sabbatical

Dr. Robert H. Daines, director of the Master of Business Administration degree program at Brigham Young University, will spend his 1974–75 sabbatical leave as an assistant vice-president and cashier of Aetna Life & Casualty Company, Hartford, Connecticut. In addition to managing Aetna’s 130-member treasury services department, which handles a cash flow of approximately $17 billion, Dr. Daines will evaluate managerial procedures.

Sister Betty Fitzgerald

D. Arthur Haycock