Marshall &Kay Family Histories
B. VAUGHN MARSHALL
1955 - 1956
School
Vaughn’s mother volunteered to take care of our little son, so that I could work the day shift instead of the night shift as we had planned. She acted in a vary kind and generous way. She had to quit work in order to do that and I’m sure it was a sacrifice for them. Vaughn continued to work for his dad on Saturdays. During the week he went to school and studied and studied. He went straight through all year including summer quarters so that he could finish as quickly as possible. He ended up taking a few extra classes because he had changed his major from engineering to geology. He was give a promise by Elder Marion G. Romney (later to become President Marion G. Romney, President of The Quorum of The Twelve Apostles for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) when he was set apart as a missionary, that he would not lose out on his education. He was able to graduate with honors from San Jose State University receiving his Bachelor of Science Degree in June 1956. He majored in Geology and minored in Physics.
During those school years we lived first in a small upstairs apartment in East Palo Alto. That’s where we were living when our son was born. Poor little guy had such bad colic that he cried and cried. I would hold and walk him all the time but it was difficult for Vaughn to concentrate on his studies. It was a very small two-room apartment. We then rented a home in East Palo Alto and shared it with our friends Jack and Callie Kelly. We were hoping to cut our expenses by doing that. It did cut the expenses a lot but we learned an important lesson. It is very difficult for two families to share a home no matter how much they like each other. It just lasted a few months. We were blessed again to rent a small cottage behind a house, that belonged to some friends from our church. They didn’t charge us a very high rent. We stayed there until we moved to his folks’ home awhile before he graduated.
First House
Before Vaughn graduated from San Jose State he had decided to continue school at Stanford University and get his masters degree. We wanted to continue our family too. He asked his folks if we could live with them for awhile so that we could save enough money to start Stanford in the fall. They generously said yes. I was going to continue working until our next baby arrived and Vaughn would continue working at the U.S. Geological Survey while going to school. Before graduation he had been offered a job at the Survey. At the time he wasn’t sure that he would make that his permanent job but it offered good security and was right by the university so he took it.
All was going as planned --- and then I became very ill. That’s right! I was pregnant! We were both taken by surprise because, for some reason we really didn’t think I would be so ill again. I was invited by the hospital to take a leave of absence. By that time we had been with his folks for a few months and had saved a fair amount of money but not enough to get through the first year at Stanford. This was a disappointment for Vaughn but he made the best of it by planning to go to Stanford part time instead. After praying about the matter we felt that if we invested the money we had saved in a home it would be to our advantage. We were $600 dollars short of a down payment. With help from his sister - Elaine & Tom -her husband, his folks and my folks we made it. We moved into our first home in Aug 1956 and were able to pay them all back within a few months. The house turned out to be a very good investment. It was a small older home but prices in the whole bay area steadily increased so that we were gradually able to upgrade into larger homes as our family grew. That little house gave us the start.
Stake Mission
For The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
When I remember our life in that first house, there are some important events that occurred that I think Vaughn would want me to put in his history. Vaughn started back to school part time the fall of 1956 as he had planned. He took a few classes every quarter for a year. It was a challenge to do that because there were always demands on his time from his family and church callings. Field work for the survey was also taking a lot of his time. But he was managing. Then along came one of those very difficult decisions. He was called on a Stake Mission by his ward mission leader. He was expected to do missionary work five nights a week and Sundays. The decision was difficult because he had hoped to continue his classes. He had been accepted by Stanford Graduate School and was expected to complete a certain number of units in a certain time. He knew he could not do that and complete an honorable mission at the same time. He explained that to the mission leader and asked if he could fulfill that calling at a later time. The leader could not understand why Vaughn could not do both things. He told Vaughn that other men were able to figure it out. But Vaughn knew two things. If he accepted the call he would not do it “part way”. He would put in the time required. Many of the stake missionaries had difficulty doing that. He also knew he was a person who had to study hard when he was in school. He always worked hard for the grades he got. There would be no time for study while on a mission. He prayed about it and asked the leader to inquire for him to see if his circumstances would make a difference in the call. He told me that he never found out if the mission leader did inquired about it, he was just told that the call was still extended. So he was faced with a decision between his loyalty to the gospel and his desire to finish school. He choose the gospel. He never turned his back on the gospel ever in his life. That didn’t make it easy though. He felt that interrupting the momentum of going to school at that time would make it difficult to start school again at a later time. And it was! He completed his mission in 1960. He was able to attend Stanford again in 1963. He took classes on and off until 1967. He was in the field so frequently by that time it was really difficult to continue. However he had completed all the units he needed and was working on his thesis. The thesis got bogged down because in the time between the approval of his thesis subject, and the completion of the thesis, a new department head was in place at Stanford and Vaughn needed to start the approval process all over again.
Concussion
In the fall of 1956, we had one of those special priesthood experiences. Vaughn was running an errand in our old car and had taken our son along with him. In those days there were no seat belts. Our son was in the back and had opened the car door somehow and quickly fallen out. Vaughn wasn’t far from home driving on one of our neighborhood streets. He stopped the car right in the street and jumped out to get our son. They were blessed that there were no other cars around at the time. Our son had hit his head pretty hard though. Vaughn told me that he immediately gave him a blessing. He brought him home for me to check out. He seemed to have some signs of concussion so we took him to the Palo Alto Hospital emergency room. One of the pediatricians I worked with was on duty. He had x-rays taken and was watched in the ER for awhile. The doctor wanted to admit him but the hospital was overflowing with patients at the time. There were no beds, not even a cot, so he sent him home with us because I was used to working with kids in the hospital. There was a time during the night that we almost took him back in, but then all his vital signs started getting better. At 6 a m in the morning we started to finally relax and we’re going to try to get some sleep when there was a knock at the door. It was the doctor. He said that he’d been at the hospital early and took another look at the x-ray. He saw a crack going from the top of the skull to the base of the skull. He said it hadn’t looked as bad the evening before while the x-ray was still wet. Anyway he was quite worried and came by to see our son. It really surprised us. The doctor was surprised too because he expected to find our son in a lot of trouble. But he was doing fine with no signs of a concussion. The doctor said something about "miracle” and left. That was when we realized what a really great priesthood blessing our son had received at Vaughn’s hands through the power of the priesthood.
Vaughn had bought a used motor scooter that he rode to work on. It was something like a miniature motorcycle, small and very lightweight. It was wonderful on gas consumption – used hardly any, so it saved us on our gasoline bills. While he was riding on it one day he was hit by a car. These were the days before helmets and other protective devices. He and the scooter were thrown across the street. His head just missed the curb. He told me that the blow was pretty severe. He expected to be cut and bruised pretty badly. The scooter was destroyed. When he was able to get up he couldn’t find any major cuts or anything. He did have one small cut on his hip that was sutured up, but nothing else. He spent a few days feeling sore and stiff.
PREVIOUS PAGE MAIN PAGE NEXT PAGE