Edna Romney

Sharing our Links to the Past
by Wally and Frances Gray

Back to Ann Lewis's Table of Contents

Edna Romney (Mrs. Elmer Noall) (1896-1991)

The Theodore Turley Family Book, p. 374

I was born in Colonia Juarez, Mexico, the third child of Frances Turley and Miles A. Romney. When I was four I had spinal meningitis and sometime later, pneumonia. So I did not start school at the age of six. Being ill so long made me a little shy. I remember Florence, two years younger, taking me by the hand and leading me to school. However, it did not take long to catch up. It was said that I was the smartest student ever to go through the Juarez Stake Academy.

At the time of the Exodus in 1912 we went out to El Paso. There I worked for a while. I wanted to go on a mission but my father said that he couldn't afford to send me. Florence and I went to school at Gila in Thatcher. There I won 550.00 in an oratorical contest. Of course the money came in handy. I was asked on a Friday if I would enter the contest. I worked on it over the weekend and gave it on Monday. The subject was on Forestry. I remember the next Sunday at church President Kimball telling a visiting authority, “This is the girl who won the essay contest against my son.”

During World War II served as Secretary in the Demolization Unit with the Navy. My title was Yomenette. I served two years. Then I went back to school at the University of Utah. They gave me some credit for serving in the Navy. I graduated from the University of Utah in Speech Arts. I was a member of the Professional Dramatic Fraternity. I obtained a job teaching school in Ogden. I was nominated secretary to the faculty. One day I was reading the minutes in a faculty meeting. Afterwards Elmer Noall, who also taught in the same school, came up and asked me for a date. This led to other dates and on the 18th of June, 1924 we were married in the Salt Lake Temple.

Twins were born to us on March 12, 1926: Audrey Edna and Elmer Ray. Imagine our surprise when there were two babies instead of one, especially when Elmer was enrolled in the Medical School at the University of Utah. He had to take time from his studies to help with the babies. He also attended the University of Chicago, where he got his degree as General Practitioner.

We made our home in Santa Rosa, California, and Elmer became well known in that area as a doctor. Many times he was called out at night to attend to some sick person or to deliver a baby, or to calm some woman who would later deliver a baby. We moved into a beautiful Georgian-type home about 1940 and have lived there ever since.

As a girl in El Paso, Bishop Arwell A. Pierce described me as a very beautiful girl with gorgeous auburn red hair, a creamy skin and a Grecian type nose. I have read avidly all my life and should have been a reporter or a writer. I. guess success comes to those who are not faint hearted. As of this writing, 1976, I am 79 and my husband is 83.

[Birth and death dates from IGI]