Eloise Caldwell Adams

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    Eloise Caldwell Adams, age 88, of Roosevelt, passed away October 27, 2023 at the Beehive home in Vernal.
    It is February 10, 2021, and I want to write my own obituary.  
    I was born February 24, 1935 in Maeser, Utah, in the south room of Grandpa Frank Edwin Colton’s old brick home.  Dr. Franke was there helping my mom, Nancy Mar Colton Caldwell and my dad, Wallace Caldwell.  I was their fifth and final child so I was always their baby.  This home was on 2500 West just North of the Ashley Creek in Maeser.  I guess we also lived with grandpa and aunt Jane (grandpa’s second wife) for several years because I can remember when I was four we moved into a little home about one-half mile south when daddy was taking care of uncle Hugh W. Colton’s ranch while he was serving in World War II.  
    Mom and dad bought their only home on 1500 North in Maeser (and it even had inside plumbing) when I was twelve.  I had so many special memories of my growing-up-years–playing on the rocks in the creek, swimming in the canal and sliding on the ice in the wintertime.  In the summertime I would walk up to Doc’s Beach at least once a week to roller skate, which was located North up towards Taylor Mountain, where the Vernal Rod and Gun Club is presently located.  
    I took piano lessons from three different teachers to learn how to play grandmother Elizabeth Jane Hacking Colton’s piano that mother and dad purchased for $50.00.
    A lot of the time I would walk to the old Maeser chapel for our Maeser Ward church meetings.  I was the accompanist for Primary by the time I was eleven and the pianist/organist for Sunday School, Sacrament Meeting and Mutual a year or so later.  I would walk to the old Maeser School building, which held grades one through eight, for eight choice, memorable years for my elementary education and then graduated from Uintah High School in 1953.  
    Thoral Merkley and I were married October 8, 1953.  He was in the Air Force and his mother, Lelia, and I drove all the way from Vernal to Nashville, Tennessee, where he was stationed at Symrna Air Force Base.  While we lived in Nashville we had a baby boy, Stuart Lyman Merkley, born in 1956, who lived only eighteen hours While Thoral was serving in Korea, we divorced.  
    On March 31, 1959, I was privileged to marry my longtime friend and sweetheart, Keith Lincoln Adams, in the Salt Lake Temple.  Keith died suddenly on November 16, 2020, while we were living in Washington, Utah.  We loved the warmth; the friends in our senior branch, in our park where our little home was located and all of our “horseshoe-playing” friends.  Keith had been playing golf and billiards just a couple of days before he died.  We enjoyed 61 years of marriage, singing, working and playing together.  We lived in Cary, Idaho; Craig Colorado; Vernal, Maeser, Duchesne, Roosevelt and Washington City, Utah.  
    I am thankful I have had the opportunity of serving in the many callings in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  
    We were blessed with three children: Rochelle (Sam) Hansen, Marshall Lane Adams, (deceased at age 19), and Ryan Keith Adams; our grandchildren: Rochelle’s only child, Stuart Bret (deceased at age 26); and Ryan’s daughter, Chandra Ann; and great-grandchildren: Donovon and Kasadi (James Cooper) and Macarius and KayLyn (Justin “Hoss” Minchey).
    I’m so grateful for my heritage (grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins) and especially my kind, beloved parents, our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren, my sisters and brothers, who are all now deceased, Betty (Lynn Mecham) Barta (Lonnie Thomas and Don Shaffer), Larry (Charlene and Ellen) and Lowell (Beverly), their children and their families, and for the many, many choice friends I have had throughout my earthly lifetime. I also love and appreciate my three surviving sisters-in-laws, Beverly Caldwell, Amber Adams Tebbs and Danna Dee Adams Smith.
    The family and Eloise would like to thank all the people at the Beehive home, the nurses, cleaning staff, cooks, memory unit crew, and her friends, the residence of the home, the Good Shepherd nurses, Tina and Shyann, and Dr. Shurtliff, for their friendship, love and care of Eloise.  Thanks to all of 2nd Ward in Roosevelt that she was such a part of for so many years and a thank you to the Relief Society for helping with the funeral.     Funeral services will be held at the Hullinger Mortuary on Saturday, November 4, 2023 at 12:00 p.m., with a viewing from 11:00 - 11:45 a.m.
    Burial will be in the Dry Fork Cemetery.