Inez Tuttle Foy Barker

Inez Barker
July 12, 1929 — August 8, 2021

Inez Tuttle Foy Barker returned to her heavenly home August 8, 2021, at the age of 92. She passed away at her home from causes incident to age.

Inez was born July 12, 1929, in Logan, Utah to Leslie Thomas Foy and Florence Howard Tuttle.

In her early childhood Inez’s family lived in Logan, UT, Malad, ID, and in Monticello and Moab in southern Utah. After the death of her father, her mother moved her six children to Bountiful, Utah to be near their Tuttle relatives.

She attended Stoker Elementary School, South Davis Junior and Davis High Schools. In high school she was a sophomore class officer and an officer in the Pro Schola pep club. As a teenager she enjoyed drama and theater. She gave readings, took elocution lessons and participated in plays.

During her high school years Inez met her future husband John Forest Barker. Inez said, “In my sophomore year I had a biology class with the cutest dark-haired boy from Kaysville.” Their friendship grew as they waited in the lunch line. Their first date was to the Sophomore Tucker school dance. Inez participated in the Golden Gleaner program. She attended Gold and Green balls, and was chosen queen of the Ball as a high school senior with Forest as her escort.

Forest and Inez were married August 30, 1949, in the Salt Lake City Temple, and made their home in Fruit Heights, Utah, working together to build the home where they raised five children and a foster son.

Inez was an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some of her church service included teaching in the Primary, Relief Society and Young Women organizations and serving as an ordinance worker in the Bountiful Temple. She lived a faith-filled life, and loved reading from the Doctrine and Covenants. On Sunday afternoons she enjoyed perusing the weekly edition of the Church News and reading aloud to family members what she found to be noteworthy or particularly inspirational. For many years she also had a personal tradition of having a phone visit with a nephew after General Conference to discuss what they each had found to be of greatest value to them during the conference.

Inez worked on a farm owned and operated by her uncle’s in Bountiful, Utah, in her youth. As a young woman, she worked at the Greyhound Bus Company, Primary Children’s Hospital, and the Salt Lake Genealogical Society.

She enjoyed being a member of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers and was active in that organization for over 50 years. She loved history and was a writer of many family and local histories as well as many journals and poems. She was a prolific journal keeper, recording her life experiences in several large volumes. Additionally, she has written much of her own life history.

Inez cultivated many talents during her lifetime. She sewed, she loved to sing, she did home canning and freezing, she was a typist and a writer, she quilted, she learned to dip chocolates and do cake decorating. She loved her flower garden and lily pond and assisted in the success of Pine Ridge Nursery.

Inez’s talents were best displayed in her mothering and grandmothering. After Forest passed away, Inez wondered what she would be remembered for. One of her granddaughters has said that she will be remembered for her ability to lovingly play with children. All of Inez’s posterity can attest to her talents with fingerplays, tea parties, storytelling, book sharing, singing and playing games.

Inez wore out her life in service to her family and others. In addition to caring for and nurturing her five children and grandchildren she freely offered and spent a great deal of her time serving her widowed and aging mother. She provided transportation for her mother’s errands, including grocery shopping and stopping in at Mrs. Cavanaugh’s Fine Chocolates. They often also had one of her aunts along on those excursions as well. In the last weeks of her mother’s life Inez and Forest cared for her in their home. Her acts of kindness and time spent in serving others are part of a worthy legacy she has left behind and will long be appreciated and remembered.

Inez is survived by sister Sarah Foy Moore; sisters-in-law Linda Barker Nance and Susan Barker Bradshaw; daughters Fawn (James) Morgan, Amy Jo (Brent) Webb; sons John (Jan) Barker, Jed (Judith) Barker, Andrew (Martha) Barker, Gary (Nora) Louis; twenty-two grandchildren; sixty-two great grandchildren; three great-great grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents; three sisters, Jean Foy Call, Lola Foy Smith, Julia Foy Brough, and her brother Leslie Foy.

In her last years, Inez was attended by professional healthcare givers Stefanie Reed and Sheri Schlagel. The family is deeply grateful to them for their compassionate care of our mother.

Funeral services will be held, Saturday, August 14, 2021, at 11:00 a.m. at the Fruit Heights Stake Center at 170 North Mountain Road, Fruit Heights, Utah. Friends may visit with family Friday from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at Lindquist’s Kaysville Mortuary, 440 N. Main Street, Kaysville, Utah and Saturday from 9:00 to 10:30 a.m. at the church.

Services will be live-streamed and may be viewed at www.lindquistmortuary.com by scrolling to the bottom of Inez’s obituary.

Interment, Kaysville City Cemetery, 500 E. Crestwood Road, Kaysville, Utah.