Zelda Cook Evans, age 95, died Friday, April 3, 2015, at Bear Lake Memorial Hospital.

Zelda was born in Paris, Idaho, on September 21, 1919, to Eldon W. and Florence Shirley Cook. She spent her early childhood on the Cook ranch in Border, Wyoming. In 1924, just as Zelda was about to start school, her family moved to Provo, Utah, where her father attended BYU and trained to be a teacher. Upon graduation, Eldon was hired as a teacher in Joseph City, Arizona. The family spent three years in Joseph City and then moved to Snowflake, Arizona, when Eldon accepted a job as principal of the grade school.

Zelda lived in Snowflake until she completed her junior year in high school. At that time, it became necessary for her father to return to Bear Lake and take over the family ranch. Zelda enrolled at Brigham Young University and completed her last year of high school and began college the same year. She graduated from BYU in 1939, taught English for one year at the high school in Payson, Utah, and then returned to Bear Lake to teach at Fielding High School in Paris. When World War II broke out, Zelda went to Salt Lake City, where she worked for Kennecott Copper for five years as secretary to the Director of Industrial Relations. During the war, she was involved in several service organizations that held dances for soldiers and visited them in Army hospitals.

In 1948, she married Joseph Evans from Raymond, Idaho, and the couple moved to Raymond and took over the Evans family farm. Their first four children were born during this period of her life – Elizabeth in 1948, Brian in 1950, Eric in 1952 and Mark in 1955. In 1956, Joe began working for the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (ASCS). After renting a home in Montpelier for a year, they built their home on Garfield Street, where Zelda lived until just a few months before her death. Her last child, David, was born in 1960.

In 1963, Zelda returned as an English teacher and librarian at Fielding High School, often teaching children of the students she had taught during her first time there. When Fielding High and Montpelier High School consolidated in 1967, she became an English teacher and education media specialist for Bear Lake Junior High. She retired in 1983, although she continued as a part-time library aide at the high school until 1991.

She became a widow when her husband Joe died in 1979.

A long-time member of the Montpelier 3rd Ward, Zelda was active in the LDS Church all her life, serving as stake Primary president and ward Primary president (in Geneva), as a teacher in all the auxiliaries and as ward librarian. She organized the first Cub Scout program in her stake. She was involved in family history through the name extraction and the UDEHome program. In 1992-1993, she served a mission in Salt Lake City, working in the missionary department. Two years later, she spent the winter in St. George in the temple apartments, attending ten temple sessions a week.

She was an avid reader and was a long-time member of the Montpelier book club. For over 20 years, she and her daughter Elizabeth, with various groups of friends and relatives, attended the Utah Shakespearean Festival in Cedar City.

In recent years Zelda spent the winters in San Diego with Elizabeth, but with the help of her son Mark and daughter-in-law Eileen, she was able to return to her own home for the rest of the year. She moved to Bear Lake Manor in the fall of 2014.

She is survived by her five children: Elizabeth Burdett (Curtis) of San Diego; Brian (Terri) of Montgomery Village, Maryland; Eric (Lisa) of Salt Lake City; Mark (Eileen) of Montpelier; and David (Donna) of Sterling, Virginia; 18 grandchildren and 18 great-grandchildren. Two brothers, Shirl E. Cook, and Edward C. Cook, preceded her in death.

Services will be held Saturday, April 18, at 11:00 a.m. at the Montpelier 3rd Ward chapel, with a viewing Friday, April 17, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. at the Schwab-Matthews Mortuary and prior to the services from 10:00 to 10:45 at the church. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to the Bear Lake Education Foundation, 110 N. 8th St., Montpelier, ID, 83254.