Arnie's Life History and Some Personal Thoughts

Arnold Webber
Life History


Arnold Jay Webber was born on July 15, 1948 in Duluth, Minnesota.

When just 18 months old, he was badly burned and received one of the 1st skin graphs of the time.

Arnie grew up with 3 siblings: Christine, Harry, Warren. Their family was poor and didn’t have much so they used their imaginations a lot while playing.

When he was young, his mother and father divorced, and Arnie was raised mainly by his mom and grandmother.

Not too long after the divorce, two sister missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the “Mormon” Church) knocked on their door. They taught Arnie’s mother the gospel, she gained a testimony, and joined the Church. Arnie was baptized shortly thereafter.

His mom moved the family a lot so Arnie grew up in Minnesota, Utah, and California.

He became interested in family history and maps when he was young. They remained two of his main interests for the rest of his life.

Arnie graduated from Duluth High School in Minnesota in 1966. He worked here and there for a couple of years. Then a family friend, Shirley Collins, invited him to come stay with her family in Utah and helped him get into Brigham Young University (BYU).

While attending school at BYU Arnie majored in Historical Geography and minored in Library Science.

Also while at BYU, Arnie met a young woman from near Phoenix, Jillene King. They soon fell in love and got engaged. They were married in the LDS Mesa, Arizona Temple on June 2, 1971.

One year and 1 1/2 months later, in July, 1972, David Alan was born.

Both Arnie and Jill graduated from BYU in May 1973. Just 5 months later, in Oct. 1973, a daughter, Barbara Ellen came along.

In 1974 Arnie was hired to be the Elementary and Jr. High Librarian at Cibecue, AZ, on the Apache Indian Reservation. While there Arnie saw the need for community library and, with the help of others, got it started in a small building. Later a large community library building was built.

Also while in Cibecue, another son, Mark Robert, joined the family in June 1975.

At the end of 1976, Red Mesa High School on the Navajo Indian Reservation offered him the position of High School Librarian. The Webbers moved up to Red Mesa, AZ near the Four Corners, where they lived for 11 years.

During the years at Red Mesa, John Andrew was born in Oct. 1977 and Warren Arnold was born in Feb. 1981, giving Arnie and Jill 5 children.

As well as being the high school librarian, Arnie also occasionally taught Spanish, French, German, and Social Studies.

Through the Red Mesa years Arnie drove his family on a 40 mile round trip each Sunday to attend the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormon Church) in Teec Nos Pos, AZ.

In 1988 the National Geographic Magazine bought a series of maps Arnie had made showing presidential election data from 1800’s to 1980’s to publish in an atlas they were making. Arnie was thrilled. That same year he and Jill bought a large home in Cortez, Colorado and moved their family there. Arnie still worked at Red Mesa, commuting each day. Arnie continued working as the Red Mesa High School librarian until his retirement in 1996 due to health problems.

In 2000 Arnie and Jill sold their Cortez house (the day after it was put up for sale) and moved up to Salt Lake City, Utah to be closer to the LDS Church’s Family History Library during their retirement years.

In 2004 Arnie’s health had deteriorated enough that he was moved into a nursing home. Jill needed someone to keep an eye on her because of her epilepsy, so she moved in with him. Arnie continued to spend most of each day working of Family History until about a year ago, when his health hindered him too much.

Arnold Jay Webber passed away peacefully on June 23, 2009.


Those are the major events in Arnie’s life. Here is a bit about him as a person:

One of first things most people noticed about him was his kindness to and interest in people. He loved people. He was genuinely interested in and cared about people and made many great friends throughout his life. His love of people was also life-long challenge, partly because of abuse and rejection by his father when he was young that left emotional scars, and partly because he had manic depression, which made some people distance themselves from him. Because of the emotional scars and the manic depression he felt those people’s emotional distance more keenly and personally than most people would have. That was tough on him through the years but it didn’t stop him from continuing to reach out and love others. And many people loved him in return. He would go out of his way to help anyone who needed help or simply make someone’s day brighter.

Arnie loved books and would absorb them like a sponge. He was always reading 3 or 4 books at a time. He had an amazing mind. He was absolutely brilliant. He almost had a photographic memory, which came in handy with his love of reading; he retained most of what he read. I (Barbara) used to watch the TV game show, Jeopardy, with him regularly. He would easily answer almost all the questions on each show. I thought he should try to get on the show but he said he would get stage fright.

Arnie was very interested in history. He read a lot about history and could tell you more than anyone I’ve ever met about it. Once he and Shirley Collins had to drive all night. To keep herself awake Shirley told Arnie at the start of the drive, “Tell me the history of the world.” And he did – hour after hour as they drove through that night.

Arnie was also interested in demographics (population statistics). One specific area of interest was how people voted across the country. This is why he made maps of presidential election returns as a hobby. My mom says he would watch the TV election returns/reports during the presidential elections the way sports fans watch football or basketball games.

He also knew geography extremely well. He always loved maps and globes. Jill did family history research along with Arnie and always asked him what county some city or town was in rather than looking it up on a map herself. Arnie could tell her off the top of his head. He knew much of the world that well too.

He also loved music, especially classical and folk music. He not only listened to and sang music; he also wrote songs himself. He couldn’t read music. He wrote the words and put the melody together in his head – and always remembered it.

He had a beautiful tenor singing voice. We children remember him singing from when we were babies. He sang to us kids before putting us to bed when we were very young. He sang around the house and in the car while driving. I remember many times riding in the car with our family at night listening to my dad singing to help him stay awake while driving. He usually sang two genres of songs: lovely, thought-provoking, emotion-stirring songs, or silly songs.

Arnie enjoyed being goofy, and silly songs was just part of it. He loved to laugh. He laughed easily and heartily. It was fun to tell him something funny because he’d always laugh so well.

He also loved good food. He loved cherries, strawberries, fancy cheeses, French food, Chinese food, etc. He cooked fancy food at home sometimes. I remember Webber Burgers with all sorts of things mixed in the meat – much fancier than a regular old burger. If he made a salad it was a chef salad with ham, cheese, and the works. His French fancy foods didn’t get much appreciation by anyone except me. My brothers would often microwave a hot dog instead. My dad would respond in mock offense by calling them “Peasants!”

Arnie was interested in and a dedicated researcher of family history since he was a child. He spent untold number of hours throughout his life doing family history research for his family and others.

He loved the Navajo people and many of them loved him. He had a special connection with them, especially those of high school age. Almost any time Arnie's children have run into a Navajo who knew Arnie from Red Mesa the children were told how much that person liked Arnie and were asked enthusiastically how Arnie was doing.

Arnie was also a loving and devoted father, husband, and grandfather. Here is part of a talk I gave in Church on parenting a few weeks ago:

“I would like to tell you a little about one of my heroes: my dad. My father had a rough childhood. He was abused by his father when he was young. Not much later his parents split up, leaving my grandmother to raise four children pretty much on her own. Like too many children in divorced families, my dad felt he was partly to blame for his parents’ divorce. Later my grandfather even denied that my father was his son for a while. All of these things left deep emotional scars with my father that he’s had to deal with all his life. When my father was older he made a decision to do all he could to be a different father than what he’d had. He stuck to that decision while he and my mom raised me and my four brothers. My dad was not a perfect father, but his effort to be the best dad he could had an enormous impact for good on me. He made sure he often expressed his love for me and my brothers and let us know that he thought highly of us and was proud of us. I have many, many memories of my dad playing with us. He played with us outside, played games and built things with us inside, sang to us, and simply spent time with us. He listened to me when I was older and going through the roller coaster of the teenage years. He gave some good advice, but mainly listened, which helped me a lot. My dad apologized to us if he made a mistake. He let us know he had a testimony of the gospel and tried to live it. My dad told me not too long ago that there were times he had to fight the urge to abuse us kids like he had been abused, but he didn’t give in. Overall, my dad did a great job being a dad, despite his own rough beginnings.”

I was a daddy’s girl and love my father very much. I have countless sweet memories involving him. He was one of the most important people in my life and I will miss him. Being his daughter has been one of the greatest blessings Heavenly Father has given me. I’m so grateful to know that I’ll see him again after this life. It may be quite a few years before that happens but in the timescale of eternity, it will be just the blink of an eye.