DeLyte Arnett

Evelyn DeLyte Cronquist and her twin brother Royal DeWayne were born on September 23, 1927, in Haxton, Colorado to Emil and Sallie (Johnson) Cronquist when they were both 35. She attended high school in Longmont, Colorado, and college at Pasadena Nazarene College, in Pasadena, California.

DeLyte growing up on a farm, really ran with the boys and was never outmatched when it came to run or work. She would ride the calves on the farm, play in the barn on a swing, or work helping in the field or in the home with her mother Sallie. As she grew up and her brothers moved away, DeLyte put her life on hold to stay with her mother and father and help them. She worked doing the books in local grain mills in Colorado and would then use that money to help her parents out as they got into their upper years. She finally decided to venture out, but she knew she had to move away, to make her own life in her late 20 to early 30’s. This is when she decided to move to California.

When she moved to California to go to school at Pasadena Nazarene College, she did not have a lot of money. In addition to her studies, she worked 2-4 jobs on and off campus to pay for her college education. After graduation from college she worked as a school teacher in Pasadena, California. She loved working with the children, but one of her great loves was getting out on the playground and actually playing games with the kids, not just teaching them. She was about interacting and becoming part of their lives.

A few years after graduation, a friend introduced her to Leslie Arnett, who had a farm in Fresno, California. DeLyte and Leslie were married on August 17, 1962, and DeLyte moved to Fresno, California. They had two children during their marriage, Scott Arnett and Mark Arnett.

DeLyte taught in Fresno, as a substitute in some of the rural area schools. She later became a school board member for the West Park Elementary School District, in Fresno, California. As time went on, she moved up to be on the Fresno County School Board and served on boards of education for 25-35 years.

She attended Calvary Church of Nazarene in Fresno for most of her life. She was an active member, Sunday school teacher and vocalist. DeLyte loved teaching and typically taught grades between 3rd to 6th grades for Sunday school. She took this very seriously but also had fun with the kids. She would bring them either cupcakes or cake sprinkled with powdered sugar for their birthdays. She spent many an hour cutting out bible figures out of felt or later paper to h

help teach the bible lesson of the week.

DeLyte not only had a passion and love for the children, she loved to sing. Each time she sang in church, at funerals, etc. she would tell people that it was not just a song, it was from her heart and soul. One of her favorite songs was His Eye is on the Sparrow. There were also many others, like Amazing Grace, How Great Though Art, and Holy Holy, Holy. These were not just songs to her, they were a praises to God.

DeLyte was a hard working woman. She had worked in the fields as a young woman in Colorado and after getting married and moving to Fresno that did not change. She worked an untold amount of hours on the citrus orchard alongside her husband and boys. There were many days that she started at 6am in the morning to get Les off to work, then her boys. Then she would pick oranges and pack oranges. As the boys got older she would work right alongside them picking oranges and even climbing ladders. You would never hear her complain, even when she was in pain from her bad hip from an accident that left her with a hip replacement in her 40’s. She never missed fixing a meal or taking care of all the family that would come to visit and sometimes stay for extended periods of time. She loved them all.

If you don’t know the behind the scenes of DeLyte’s faith in Christ, you missed something special. Many don’t know the hours spent reading and studying the bible, but that is not where it stopped. She would pray for people, not just family, but friend, acquaintances, her children, grandchildren and down the line. We will never know the lives she changed with those prayers and she many times didn’t either. But her prayers reached heaven we know and comforted many in their times of need. She many times would write people letters, letting them know she was praying and sometimes the answers from God that were revealed to her in those prayers. Let’s just say if DeLyte was awake, there was a prayer going on for someone in this world at that time.

DeLyte is preceded in death by her mother and father, twin brother Royal DeWayne, 2 other brothers and one sister, and one stepson, Allen Dale Arnett.

DeLyte is survived by her husband Leslie Arnett, son Scott Arnett of Fresno, and Mark Arnett of Fresno, stepson William Arnett of Oshkosh, Nebraska, stepdaughters Ellen (Leonard) Wilson of Lyman, Wyoming, Carol Kringler of Susanville, California, and Verti (Thomas) Fruichantie of Nampa, ID, and 18 grandchildren and 38 great grandchildren.