Phyllis Woolf Cutright, age 92, passed away peaceably on January 18, 2017 in Salt Lake City, of causes incidental to old age. Phyllis was born October 24, 1924 in Preston Idaho to Milo and Varetta (Taylor) Woolf. On November 24, 1945 she married Phillip M Cutright, the love of her life. They were later sealed in the Logan Temple. They started their life on a farm in Idaho, and in 1950 moved to Salt Lake. Mother was an active member of the LDS Church and held callings up to the end. She loved to be with her family which includes 6 children, 27 grandchildren, 42 great grandchildren, 2 1/2 great great grandchildren and 1 loving sister. She was greatly loved and will be dearly missed.
Our mom grew up on a farm in Riverdale Idaho. There were only 2 daughters, Mom and Aunt Carma, and no sons, so the sisters were expected to do the chores. Mom didn't like the outside chores such as milking and irrigating and did the inside work as much as possible. This is how she learned to cook from her mother who was an excellent cook. We loved mom's food, especially fried chicken, which she learned to cook from Grandma Woolf. She also learned to cook biscuits and gravy from her mother-in-law Grandma Cutright. We had our own nicknames for some of her meals such as mud soup (which was lentil soup over cooked), and green goop (which was a green jello salad with cottage cheese and pineapple). These name still persist in our families.
Mom was very frugal and we didn't have much money , so we picked and bottled fruit, ate a lot of deer meat, when Dad went hunting, and sometimes even cut up the deer on our kitchen table. Now that was an experience!
Mom was a hard worker and raised the 6 of us while working out of the home a lot of her life. She came to Salt Lake after high school and lived with some girls in an apartment on south temple. She had a job for what we used to call the phone company, and quickly became a supervisor. She worked there for a year or two before marrying dad and also worked there later when they asked her to come back. Later, when she had 4 children, she went to work for Sperry, later Univac, full time, helping build minute man missiles. She worked on building the memory boards, soldering wires all day for 25 years. Here too, she was quickly moved up because of her hard work and skill.
Probably the thing that was most important to mom was her testimony, and devotion to the gospel. Because of her faith and desire to do her best to raise her family so we would also have a testimony, she held may church callings, (some that she was not comfortable with such as teaching), and supported dad in his callings, which were often very time consuming and took him away from the family a lot of the time. Mom was also a dedicated visiting teacher, and a good neighbor and friend.
In later years, after she and dad retired, she was the compassionate service leader in the ward which was a very busy job. She had to call sisters to bring food to people, and was in charge of funeral luncheons. Of course, my Dad was always with her and together they spent many hours in the service of others. Mom and Dad were devoted to each other and were called on a mission together to serve the Cambodian people in California. They didn't learn the Cambodian language, but they spoke the language of love and love of the gospel. They spent hours helping their Cambodian friends get their medical and physical needs met, took them to appointments with doctors and sat in waiting rooms playing with the children while the parents went through the red tape of moving to a new country with a new language. They loved their mission and would have liked to have done another one, but Dad once again had been called to another church position, and so mom once again supported him in his new calling.
Of course, we could tell you many stories of raising 6 crazy kids, but throughout all of it, Mom and Dad worked hard to make sure we had everything we needed and most importantly, they taught us the gospel and were great examples to us every day of Christ-like love.
Phyllis's survivors include: children, Patricia (Ron Winkler), Craig (Jeannine) Cutright, Susan (Vaughn) Broadbent, Brian Cutright, Eileen (Reid) Hall, David (Kathy) Cutright and their children and her sister Carma Kirkland.
Funeral services will be held Monday January 23, 2017 at 11:00 am at the Rosedale Ward, 1148 W 500 N Salt Lake City. A visitation will be held on Sunday evening January 22, 2017 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm atLarkin Mortuary 260 E South Temple, Salt Lake City, and at the ward from 9:30 to 10:30 prior to the service.
