Joan Coulson
Joan Coulson was born Jan. 8, 1932, in Smoot, Wyoming to Reuben Earl Johnson and Lillian Melvina Swenson, the fourth of five children.
January 8 1932 – March 13, 2022
Joan Coulson was born Jan. 8, 1932, in Smoot, Wyoming to Reuben Earl Johnson and Lillian Melvina Swenson, the fourth of five children. She grew up on her father's cattle and sheep ranch in Star Valley, Wyoming where she learned to work from the time she was small. Besides raising cattle and sheep, they milked cows and raised 2,000 chickens. Her jobs were to help with the milking, chickens, housework and cooking for the cowboys. She also had a horse she loved to ride named Star that was black with a white star on its forehead.
After she graduated, she attended Brigham Young Academy in Provo, Utah and then Utah State University in Logan, Utah where she completed her degree in elementary education and received her teaching certificate, which she used most of her life teaching in Idaho and in Moses Lake and Mattawa, Washington. It was while she was at Utah State that she met Virgil Crowther Coulson, a returned missionary in the ROTC program completing his degree in agronomy. They were married for time and all eternity in the Logan, Utah Temple March 12, 1954.
Because Virgil was still on active duty in the ROTC program, their first home was in Chicago at the base. After completing his military commitment in 1956, Virgil and Joan moved with their first child Thomas Clair to Emmett, Idaho where Virgil worked for the Bureau of Reclamation as a surveyor while waiting to draw a farm with his military service. In 1958 they drew a farm in the Minidoka Project and farmed near Paul, Idaho. Besides growing rocks, they grew their family of boys: Michael Virgil, Dan Lee, Paul J., Keith Reuben and Farrell J.
In 1968 Virgil took a small break from farming and moved his family to Moses Lake, Washington where he obtained employment as a soil scientist with the Bureau of Reclamation and Joan taught school. They attended Moses Lake Third Ward where Joan served in the primary and then as RS president. Their last son Jared Virgil was born, completing the family of seven sons.
In 1969 the family bought their first unit in Mattawa, and the next spring Virgil and the boys started farming again. They moved to the home they were building in June of 1973. Later they put their land into orchard. Joan continued to raise her boys and teach part time. She served in numerous church callings and on the stake primary board. From 1991 to 1996 Vigil and Joan served as ordained ordinance workers for the Seattle, Washington Temple. In 1996 they were called for a six-month mission to Northern Idaho/Montana area.
After Virgil's death in 2002 Joan remained in the family home until 2019. She spent the last three years either living with her sons or in retirement homes. In January she celebrated her 90th birthday surrounded by family and friends. She died peacefully on March 13, 2022, in the home of her son,Keith.
Joan was preceded in death by her parents, her siblings Earl Johnson and Pearl Bruce, her husband Virgil, two sons Michael and Paul and her grandson Chance. She is survived by her siblings Shirley Walton and Reynold Johnson; sons Tom (Marilynn), Dan (Sherri), Keith (Valerie), Farrell (Tiffany) and Jared (Marta); 28 grandchildren and 24 great-grandchildren. She will be buried in Paul, Idaho beside Virgil and her two infant sons.