Marsha Lee Pickett Wright

Marsha Lee Pickett Wright lived a life filled with love, family, faith, testimony, teaching, curiosity, and passion, strengthened by a humility that comes from facing life’s difficulties with determination. One of her greatest gifts was her ability to make others feel so loved. While cancer ultimately took her life on May 31, 2023, she lived with grace, gratitude, love, dignity and concern for others until she passed peacefully back into the presence of her Father in Heaven, encircled by her family singing some of her favorite songs.

Marsha was born to Louis and Willy VanGelderen Pickett on November 13, 1955, in Salt Lake City, Utah. She lived in Sandy, Utah for most of her youth with her parents and four younger siblings, and grew up close to her grandparents. She met a young neighbor, Steve Wright, shortly after she moved to Sandy as a child. After years of friendship, she recognized her love for Steve on the night he proposed. She chose to continue their friendship and love for eternity when they married in the Salt Lake City Temple on February 18, 1977.

Marsha graduated from Brigham Young University summa cum laude with a degree in Elementary Education and taught at Riverton Elementary School until shortly after the birth of her first child. She remained a teacher at heart all her life. While living with her family in France for three years, she took advantage of the schools’ two-hour lunch break to read extensively to her four children. In addition, she relished planning and leading educational and enriching family vacations around Europe during her family’s time living there. This perfectly encompassed her passions for motherhood, education, and adventure.

As her children grew, she combined her longtime love of teaching youth with a more recently acquired affinity for French to create and pioneer a French teaching program in elementary schools in the Madison, Wisconsin area. She later persevered until her programming was implemented within schools in Sandy, Utah. As with most anything she really wanted to accomplish, her Dutch persistence took over until she prevailed. In more recent years, she had the good fortune to join her love of the gospel of Jesus Christ and teaching youth in her role as a seminary teacher.

The gospel of Jesus Christ played a foundational role for Marsha. She is a lifelong member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and shared her testimony of Jesus Christ with her life’s priorities and example. She intently researched her genealogy and compiled and curated the histories of her ancestors throughout her life. The gospel augmented her innate love and acceptance of people and helped her focus on the best of each individual while always refraining from critical comments about others.

Marsha’s heart grew with the addition of every new family member. She had an endless well of love for each of them. She seemed happiest spending time with her family, and spent countless hours creating and sharing a wide variety of learning experiences with them. Ever the educator and lifelong learner, she enthusiastically shared summaries of the book she was reading with her family while at the hospital in the days before she passed away.

Mom made sure her family understood that her bond with them would not end with her passing.

Marsha is survived by her husband Steve, children Jim (Karen) Wright, Angela (Ben) Williams, Rachel Wright, and Stephanie (Mark) Torrie, her baker’s dozen grandchildren Kaden, Amelie, Ryley, Julien, Kallista, Lucas, Emmett, Miles, Theo, Norah, Gwen, Arden, and Elaina, her mother Willy Pickett, her siblings John (Tami) Pickett, Steve (Rose) Pickett, Lori (Kelly) Jorgensen, David (Hilari) Pickett, along with many nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles and cousins. She is preceded in death by her father Louis Pickett.

Friends and family can attend a viewing on Wednesday, June 7th from 6 to 8 pm at Larkin Sunset Gardens located at 1950 East 10600 South, Sandy, Utah. Her funeral will be Thursday, June 8th at 11 am at the Granite South Stake Center, located at 2130 East 10000 South, Sandy, Utah. A viewing will precede the funeral from 10 to 10:45 am at the Granite South Stake Center.

Her family expresses deepest gratitude to Dr. Clarke Low and the team at the IHC Cancer Center, and the team at the LDS Hospital intensive care unit.

Those wishing to view the COMPLETED services via Zoom can click "Watch Services" or follow the link: https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/HlfxWczvo4eWwWkEXOXpXDFOIr_zen6HFQ7CFmkoqkdtu6mz6c2N87ZRZQa_Jlu0.RXp8Mmc5QYQAEXjw?startTime=1686242005000