Ilean G. Corbridge
June 18, 1928 – October 4, 2025

Ilean Corbridge was born on June 18, 1928, on a ranch near Red Rock Junction, Idaho. Her father was mowing hay with her brother, Gordon, when a white dishtowel was waved from the ranch house, a signal to hitch up the buggy and go to Malad for the doctor. Ilean was the fifth of six children born to Thomas Griffiths and Ida Palmer. Ilean, Gordon, and Maria (Jones) were the only children who lived to maturity.

The year she was born, Ilean’s parents purchased a car. One of the highlights of her childhood was driving to town on Saturday nights with her cousins. They would deliver cream to Dick Evans’s Creamery and get ice cream at Horsley’s store. She grew up working on the farm without many of the modern conveniences available today.

Ilean was educated in the Malad schools. While in high school, a young Lon Corbridge noticed Ilean at an LDS Stake Conference. Their first dance was at the LeGrande Hall. World War II interrupted their courtship when Lon was drafted into the army and left the day after graduation. During the war, Ilean did her part by working twelve-hour night shifts at the old Brigham City cannery, even when German prisoners of war were brought in to do heavy manual labor.

When Lon returned from the war, he continued to date Ilean. Wanting to serve the Lord as a missionary after the war, Lon asked Ilean to marry him only if she was willing to let him go on a mission when the call came. They married on June 5, 1947. Lon left to serve in the Western Canadian Mission in November of that year. It was a lonely time for Ilean, but she enjoyed working as a secretary at Crowther’s Mill. Ilean was officially called to serve as Lon’s missionary companion for the last six months of his mission.

When they returned from their mission, they began their family and eventually became the parents of seven daughters: Janet (Andrew Skinner), Karen (Martin Hinckley), Debbie, Cherie (Phillip Lee), Annette (Tad Morley), Kathy (David Walton) and Mary (Mitch Simkins). Ilean has twenty-nine grandchildren and thirty-seven great-grandchildren.

In 1948, the Corbridge family purchased a ranch in Soda Springs for Lon and his brothers to farm. Lon, Ilean, and their family had many pioneering experiences on that ranch without electricity, telephone, and other conveniences during the early years. However, it was a wonderful place to teach children to work hard, and over a century and a half of family reunions have been enjoyed in those lovely surroundings, due in no small part to Ilean’s tremendous work ethic.

Ilean had many opportunities to serve in the Church: She served in Mutual and Primary for 25 years; she was Stake Sunday School secretary, Stake Primary president, and Ward Relief Society president. She also typed more than one thousand patriarchal blessings for her husband, Lon, and for Patriarch Edward Crowther.

Ilean was a talented quilter and seamstress, and she cultivated a prolific garden. Her dinner rolls are a must for family gatherings. As a homemaker, she could make a little go a long way and made everything she touched more beautiful.

She was an exemplary daughter, sister, wife, mother, aunt, grandmother, and friend, who will be missed and remembered by the many lives she touched.

Funeral services will be held Saturday, October 25, 2025, at 12:00 noon at the LDS Chapel at 200 N. 400 W. Malad, Idaho. A viewing will be held prior to the service from 10:00-11:30 A.M.