{"id":43790,"date":"2022-10-27T06:11:02","date_gmt":"2022-10-27T12:11:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.timesandseasons.org\/?p=43790"},"modified":"2022-10-27T06:11:02","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T12:11:02","slug":"ann-madsen-and-spencer-w-kimball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2022\/10\/ann-madsen-and-spencer-w-kimball\/","title":{"rendered":"Ann Madsen and Spencer W. Kimball"},"content":{"rendered":"

While Ann Madsen isn\u2019t as well-known as her husband, Truman Madsen, she is a notable woman who has been described as \u201cevery bit the disciple-scholar\u201d that her husband was.\u00a0 In a recent interview over at the Latter-day Saint history blog From the Desk<\/a><\/em>, Ann discussed some of the events in her life, focusing particularly on a few interactions with Truman Madsen and Spencer W. Kimball.\u00a0 What follows here is a co-post (a shorter post with excerpts and some discussion).<\/p>\n

Ann Madsen notes in the interview that Spencer W. Kimball \u201cwas like a father\u201d to her and her brother.\u00a0 She explained that: \u201cI grew up two houses away from President Spencer W. Kimball. Even though he was an apostle, I grew up calling him \u2018Brother Kimball.\u2019 My father and I would often come out of the house each morning just before President Kimball. He\u2019d come out of his house and call down the street to my father, \u2018Barnard, hold the bus!\u2019\u201d\u00a0 She went on to share a story from her childhood:<\/p>\n

When I was about 10 years old, I was watching my 7-year-old brother when my parents went out. The last thing my mother said was: \u201cDo not walk up to 21st East to get ice cream at Duffin\u2019s. Do not do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

As soon as they left, my brother said, \u201cI think we can go up there. We\u2019d be alright. We only need a nickel for ice cream cones and we\u2019ve got the money. So, should we go?\u201d<\/p>\n

And we said, \u201cSure. Let\u2019s go. We can do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

We took Freckles with us\u2014our darling little black-and-white Cocker Spaniel. Now, there are no sidewalks on 13th South, and Freckles was going in and out of the street running and playing with us.<\/p>\n

He got hit by a car hard. The guy in the car just left. My brother and I both yelled at the top of our lungs. And Elder Kimball came running across the lot. He said, \u201cI thought something happened to Robert.\u201d<\/p>\n

I told him, \u201cIt\u2019s our dog.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brother Kimball picked up the dog, who was almost as big as he was, and carried her home with us. And then the dog tried to bite him because she was dying.<\/p>\n

He put her down and asked, \u201cWhere are your parents?\u201d<\/p>\n

I said, \u201cThey\u2019re out to dinner.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe better call them,\u201d he told me.<\/p>\n

So, we called them and they came home. That\u2019s when I learned to obey. I loved that dog, and she was gone\u2014all because we made a wrong decision. We made a wrong choice and disobeyed. I mean, if my parents hadn\u2019t given us those instructions, it would be one thing. But they said it, and we didn\u2019t do it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This was a difficult way to learn, but Elder Kimball helped her through the incident.<\/p>\n

She also shared another, happier story with Elder Kimball:<\/p>\n

He\u2019s the one who made sure we got married. Truman and I came to a place where we had to make some decisions. He\u2019d been away to graduate school at Southern Cal for a year. I was wearing his diamond, but I was also getting tired of waiting.<\/p>\n

He was saying, \u201cWell, let\u2019s fast and pray to see if we should get married this summer.\u201d<\/p>\n

But my decisions were different depending on when we got married. Should we get married in the summer because I was graduating from the university? And if I graduated, where was I going to teach and what was I going to do?<\/p>\n

I remember going up to This Is the Place monument to break our fast and pray. It was quiet and nice.<\/p>\n

And we came up with different answers. He thought one thing and I thought the other.<\/p>\n

I was so upset. Not because Truman got an answer saying no, but because we didn\u2019t both get the same answer. It felt like I hadn\u2019t been in tune enough, and that the Lord had told Truman the right answer, but I got the wrong one.<\/p>\n

I was crying as we drove back. I couldn\u2019t explain it very well. But I tried to tell Truman: \u201cI thought I knew how to pray. I thought I knew what was the right thing to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just before we got to my house, one of us said, \u201cLet\u2019s go in and talk to Brother Kimball.\u201d So, we knocked on the door. Brother Kimball came to the door in the little house where he lived and he invited us in.<\/p>\n

Afterward, I thought, \u201cOh, he thinks we must have fouled up, that we would come to him like this.\u201d Because both of us knew him very well. But it wasn\u2019t that. It was because we had gotten a different answer.<\/p>\n

It took him about five minutes. He started asking Truman questions: \u201cSo, tell me, what are the reasons for this? And what are the reasons for that?\u201d Truman started telling him and Brother Kimball stopped him. He said: \u201cTruman, I want you to marry Ann in two weeks. I want you to get married in two weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, both of us would do anything an apostle said to us. So, suddenly, we had the same idea. That\u2019s what we were going to do. I said to Brother Kimball: \u201cI graduate from the university in two weeks. Could you make it three weeks?\u201d<\/p>\n

He said, \u201cYes, but not one day longer.\u201d<\/p>\n

And he lectured us not to live with either of our parents. \u201cAnd if you find you have to,\u201d he said, \u201cDon\u2019t. Come to me. I will give you the money to rent someplace else, because you need to start your marriage together someplace else.\u201d Which we did.<\/p>\n

We left and went down to my house. My father and mother were in the kitchen. We walked in. I\u2019d been crying\u2014and I looked like I\u2019d been crying.<\/p>\n

Truman said, \u201cWe just thought we\u2019d come and tell you that we\u2019re getting married in three weeks.\u201d And my father said, \u201cWell, Truman, it\u2019s about time.\u201d<\/p>\n

I remember that so well.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was an important moment in her life. \u00a0And while it took a leap of faith, it did work out for the best.\u00a0 As Sister Madsen shared, about four years after they were married:<\/p>\n

After he\u2019d [Truman] finished graduate school and received his PhD. We had two children and I was expecting a third. And Truman got an appointment with Brother Kimball.<\/p>\n

Truman went in and said, \u201cI just want to tell you, I thought marriage was a shock to begin with. But I also thought I didn\u2019t have much part in it because my dad and I had decided that I needed to be able to graduate and support a wife.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was extra gratitude because we were no longer able to have children. He told President Kimball, \u201cThank you very much. We now have three children that we would never have had if we\u2019d waited four years.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While they married sooner than Truman had expected, it allowed them to establish their family in a way they wouldn\u2019t have been able to if they had waited.<\/p>\n

For more insights and stories from the life of Ann Madsen<\/a>, including three things Truman Madsen told her and some of her experience of being with him during the final days of his life, head on over to read the interview at the Latter-day Saint history blog From the Desk<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While Ann Madsen isn\u2019t as well-known as her husband, Truman Madsen, she is a notable woman who has been described as \u201cevery bit the disciple-scholar\u201d that her husband was.\u00a0 In a recent interview over at the Latter-day Saint history blog From the Desk, Ann discussed some of the events in her life, focusing particularly on a few interactions with Truman Madsen and Spencer W. Kimball.\u00a0 What follows here is a co-post (a shorter post with excerpts and some discussion). Ann Madsen notes in the interview that Spencer W. Kimball \u201cwas like a father\u201d to her and her brother.\u00a0 She explained that: \u201cI grew up two houses away from President Spencer W. Kimball. Even though he was an apostle, I grew up calling him \u2018Brother Kimball.\u2019 My father and I would often come out of the house each morning just before President Kimball. He\u2019d come out of his house and call down the street to my father, \u2018Barnard, hold the bus!\u2019\u201d\u00a0 She went on to share a story from her childhood: When I was about 10 years old, I was watching my 7-year-old brother when my parents went out. The last thing my mother said was: \u201cDo not walk up to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10397,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2890,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-desk","category-women-in-the-church"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10397"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43790"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43791,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43790\/revisions\/43791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}