Mark Mercer Kirkham

Salt Lake City, Utah, Mark Mercer Kirkham, age 99, died March 5, 2015, at Salt Lake City, Utah. He was born at home in Salt Lake City, Utah on May 31, 1915 to Ida Josephine Murdock Kirkham and Oscar Ammon Kirkham. He married Emma Jean Palmer of Logan, Utah and Salt Lake City which marriage

was later solemnized in the Logan Temple. After she died he married Dorothy Mae Bailey of Salt Lake City.

He is survived by his three children: Mark Palmer Kirkham, Orlando, Florida; Linda Murdock Kirkham Tippets (Robert) Salt Lake City, UT; Kevin Daniels Kirkham, Ogden, Utah, nine grandchildren, twelve great grandchildren

and two great-great grandchildren; two sisters Kathryn Kirkham Bird (Victor) Layton, Utah and Jane Kirkham Bassler (David) Salt Lake City Utah. He was preceded in death by his sisters Carol Kirkham Jarvis (George), Grace Kirkham Burbidge (Leslie), and brothers Oscar Ned Kirkham (Renee), Rock

Murdock Kirkham (Clara), Norman Cree Kirkham (Brigitte), son-in-law William Tingey and daughters-in-law Karen Kirkham and Terri Kirkham.

He attended Emerson, Douglas, Roosevelt Junior High and LDS and South High schools and the University of Utah and the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois.

Mark and Emma Jean lived in Salt Lake City; Washington D. C.; Evanston, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri; and Logan, Nibley, Farmington and St George, Utah.

Mark was employed in the U.S. Government for 37 years in the following agencies: District of Columbia, Treasury, Navy, Army and the Department of Agriculture. His agricultural employment included managerial assignments in the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, Bureau of Entomology and the Plant Quarantine and the Agriculture Research Service. He was the assistant to the Secretary of Agriculture. He was a committee and staff member of the Department of Agriculture Graduate School for 20 years. His

final federal assignment was with the U.S. Department of State where he was a Foreign Service Reserve Officer.

Mark was an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He served as Bishop of theArlington (Virginia) Ward; and was a High Councilor in the Washington D. C., Potomac, Virginia and Salt Lake Eagle Gate Stakes. He was also a member of the Ensign Stake 18thWard Bishopric and Third Branch Presidency. He and his wife Emma Jean were historians in the St. George, Utah Temple and were service missionaries in the Temple Department of the Church in Salt Lake City.

He will be remembered for his love of family and friends, his sense of humor and his interest in others.

Funeral services will be held at 12:00 noon, Friday, March 13th, 2015 at the Salt Lake Central Stake Twelfth Ward, 951 East 100 South, Salt Lake City, Utah with viewing at 10:30 AM. Burial will be in the Wasatch Lawn

Memorial Park, 3401 Highland Drive, Salt Lake City, Utah.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Primary Children