Phi Remembered : FamRoots.Org

Phi Remembered

Some familiar stories from his Autobiography, others from family and friends

Phil's Daughter, Laurel, read the following eulogy at his funeral. Family and friends contributed their fondest memories.

Philip Adamson Woodland
1907-1999

Philip Woodland began his autobiography with these words: "I, Philip Woodland, was born of goodly parents in Richmond, Utah, December 8, 1907—and add that Richmond is a goodly town."

Phil was born in his Grandmother's home, the first child of Bill and Lydia Adamson Woodland. Younger brother Jean and sister Shelah came later. Richmond may have been a small town, but it was a place of activity and adventure, with many Woodland and Adamson aunts, uncles and cousins. Family get-togethers were frequent. The return of Phil's Uncle
Ephraim from the First World War resulted in one big celebration. Uncle Ephraim brought home his gas mask, helmet and a wounded arm. He was a hero to the boys, who let them play with his war souvenirs.

When Phil was only four years old his Dad fell off a scaffold while working on a construction project. He suffered a broken back that never healed properly. He was bedridden for over a year, and without insurance or
government benefits, the family struggled to keep together. They kept cows for milk, which they sold to the nearby Sego factory to be made into canned milk. Phil and Jean gathered eggs to sell.

The flu epidemic of 1917-18 hit the town hard. The schools closed. Bill Woodland, who had finally been able to return to his carpentry job, stopped working while he and Lydia cooked and nursed the sick, setting an example of caring and generosity for their young family.

In 1923 the family moved to Salt Lake City and Phil enrolled in L.D.S. High School. He graduated in 1925 and went to L.D.S.U. Junior College, where he played on the State Championship Basketball Team. His proudest moment in school athletics, however, was the winning of a bronze medal for the pole vault at a track meet at BYU in 1926. He was one of only three from his school to bring home a medal.

His life was busy with school and activities in the old Salt Lake 17th Ward, where he met fourteen year-old Dorothy Penrose. He began walking Dorothy home from Ward Activities. After graduation, the couple became engaged, but in the early years of the Depression, wages amounted to just a
few cents an hour. Getting married and setting up a new household was out of the question.

The engagement, with some ups and downs, lasted seven years. Life was not all bleak and depressing in those days. The last of the roaring Twenties and Prohibition brought excitement to old Salt Lake City. The Woodland children and grandchildren loved to hear his stories about making
bathtub gin in Mother Woodland's home, and about police raids on speakeasies that sprang up along Second South. He and Dorothy became excellent poker players, occasionally cleaning up at the expense of friends who underestimated Phil's innocent smile.

He always loved sports, both as a participant and as a spectator. He and Dorothy were avid skiers. They cross-country skied from Alta to Park City long before there were established trails or ski lifts. When he was in his
fifties Phil could put his sons-in-law to shame when he skied straight down a mountain in his ancient skis and bindings, leaving the young folks behind. The couple also loved to dance to the Big Bands that toured the country,
once winning a box of chocolates in a waltz contest.

After leaving L.D.S.U. Phil went to work for Elias Moms & Sons as a tile setter. On June 5, 1935 he and Dorothy married in the Salt Lake Temple. After the ceremony the couple traveled to Idaho Falls where the Company had sent Phil to work on a tile job, which was followed by a
honeymoon at Yellowstone Park.

Phil worked for Elias Morris for over fifty years, becoming a Master Tile Setter. He traveled over the Intermountain West, working on homes, schools, gymnasiums, public buildings, and Church Buildings. He took immense pride in his work, and was a meticulous craftsman. If a job didn't
go right, or if a customer called with a complaint, he went back, tore out his work and started all over again. Many contracts came to Elias Morris with the stipulation that Phil Woodland was to do the work. If he wasn't available, customers were willing to wait as long as necessary so that he could do the job. He was also a member of the Bricklayers and Tile Setters Union, and served as Union president in the 1950's. In 1973 Elias Morris sent him to Hawaii to work on the fountains of the Hawaiian Temple for a
month. That was one out-of-town job on which Dorothy happily joined him.

In 1938 Phil and Dorothy bought a bungalow on 11th East
and moved in with their 1 1/2-year-old daughter, Dianne. They took out a mortgage for $3400 and made double payments until it was paid off. Phil's home was truly where his heart was. Perhaps all those many years he had to work out of town, away from his wife and young family, account for the
strong tie he had to home. He remodeled it himself. At first he and Dorothy even made their own furniture. Over the years Phil came up with many creative and inventive solutions to practical problems.

As if the Depression years hadn't been hard enough on the young family, shortly after the birth of the second Woodland daughter, Susan, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. During the War years Phil worked closer to home in Salt Lake. He did his part in the defense effort by working in the Arms plant, making bullets. By the end of the war another Woodland daughter joined the family. She was named Laurel.

Phil Woodland was a simple, unpretentious man. He was modest and self-effacing, but he had a wonderful wry sense of humor. Sometimes his humor was gentle and self-deprecating. At other times his humorous comments were quick to deflate the egos of the pompous and pretentious. He was known all of his life for his absolute honesty and integrity. He loved the Church, especially Priesthood meetings. He had different
callings, but he loved being Ward clerk. He enjoyed his Stake mission, and he and his companion, Laurence Dean, became close during the hours they spent together calling on prospective members.

He was a generous, helpful person. His own father had suffered pain throughout his life because of his back injury. Phil and Jean help care for their Dad during his last illness. Phil went to his mother's house every day,
carrying his father from the upstairs bedroom downstairs and back again. He bathed and changed his Dad, sparing his mother from having to do some of the strenuous, unpleasant duties of caring for a terminally ill person.
Throughout his life, Phil watched over his siblings, Jean and Shelah, both of whom he outlived much to his sorrow. He did his best to keep an eye on Jean's daughters, Adrienne and Marilyn, after their mother died. Whenever a family or ward member needed help, Phil was there.

He was straightforward and totally honest. While serving as a missionary, some members tried to persuade him not to admit his own faults and failings so readily. "Well," he replied. "I have lived in Salt Lake most of my life, and a lot of people know me. I don't want a potential convert
turned away from the Church because someone said they knew Phil Woodland and he was no saint."

Phil was intelligent, curious, and was a great reader. He did not accept something as fact just because someone important said so, or because
it was written in me newspaper. He always read the papers, and after a lifetime of reading the Salt Lake Tribune, he switched to the San Francisco Chronicle after moving to California, figuring that as a new California resident, he ought to be reading a California paper.

Some people thought Phil was completely stubborn, but he was
flexible enough to switch his allegiance from the University of Utah football team to the BYU where his grandchildren attended.

When he was sixty-eight, Phil got it into his head that he was going to die. He wrote his daughters farewell letters, telling them he was about to kick the bucket. One day he woke up on his seventieth birthday. The three daughters had grown up and gone but HE wasn't dead; actually he felt pretty good. Phil got a new job working for a title company. He and Dorothy traveled, fished and hunted rocks to polish, joined clubs, and welcomed grandchildren into their world. One Sunday he stood up in Testimony meeting and declared: "The seventies," (meaning his seventies) "are truly the
golden years."

In his eighties Phil developed Parkinson's Disease, but stubborn as always, he refused to give in to it. Although it threatened to immobilize his body, he didn't let it dull his mind. At age ninety he fell and broke his hip. When he was taken to the convalescent home to recover from surgery, Phil
made a decision. Life had handed him a lemon, but he was going to make lemonade. He worked hard on his exercises in physical therapy to regain his strength and to walk again. Almost everyone who had ever known Phil Woodland liked him, but the staff and his physical therapists at Woodland Park Care Center adored him for his spirit and humor and dignity. Yet throughout this difficult time, his first concern was for Dorothy, whom he wanted at his side.

Phil and Dorothy lived in their home on 11th East for over sixty years. They were sad to leave it, but when the time came, they had the courage to put the house up for sale and move to Northern California to live with daughter Laurel and son-in-law Peter Mayland. Once again his home was a small rural town. "Yes," he said. "You can sit here on the porch and maybe after a half-hour a jackrabbit will hop by. Later in the afternoon, I might see a deer. This is an exciting place to be." Not quite as exciting as Richmond, Utah, when five-year old Philip Woodland broke the lock to the
town jail and freed it's only two inmates, or pretended to knock down German soldiers while wearing Uncle Ephraim's World War One helmet. The sale of the home on 11th East was final on December 24th. At Christmas time the Woodlands enjoyed visits from the family, but soon afterwards, Phil's health declined. Perhaps he missed the old house too much. Perhaps he saw that he had achieved his goals. His family had come together. Dorothy was safe and cared for. His sons-in-law all had steady work.

He was a good man and he had lived a good life. Philip Woodland died on January 14, 1999 at peace with himself, and his family, and his world.

Contributors:

Autobiographies of Phil Woodland and Dorothy Woodland
Dianne Hyde
Susan Howard
Laurel Mayland
Adrienne Buckley
Grandchildren and friends

File name
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ID	15100
Linked to	Philip Adamson Woodland

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