Gladys JoAnn Eddington Nichol Obituary (1937 - 2021)

Funeral services for JoAnn Nichol will be broadcast via Facebook Live on Saturday, August 7, 2021 beginning at 12:00 PM MDT. If viewing this broadcast from a mobile device, the Facebook App is required. If you are viewing this broadcast on a desktop computer, a Facebook account is not required. To watch this service, please click on the link below. Click HERE to view Funeral Services for JoAnn Nichol Born May 11, 1937, our beloved wife, mother, step-mother, mother-in-law, grandmother, great-grandmother, sister, sister-in-law, aunt, cousin, and piano teacher left us on August 1, 2021, to join her husband, parents, and two siblings, Robert Eddington (Jane) and Sonia Jividen (Pat). Released from great suffering, she has joined her heavenly family with great joy. She is survived by all the children of her heart: Nord Anderton, Todd Livingston (Debbie), Kevin Nichol (Vivian), Laura Smith (John), David Eddington (Silvia), Sandra Livingston Turner, Steve Nichol (Jodi), Joy Crawford (Steve), and Barbara (Pettersson) Lenear, as well as her siblings Linda Moore (Grant), and Douglas Eddington (Jan). Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Reed and Nora Eddington, JoAnn was a child of the farm and fields. She loved green and growing things, especially her home along the Jordan River on Germania Avenue in Murray. On her last full day of life, bent from scoliosis and recovering from surgery, JoAnn nevertheless pulled tiny weeds from her flower garden and picked rhubarb, cursing the former and anticipating the latter. JoAnn endured many hardships, including two divorces, but she was a mother and a father to the children from those marriages, Todd, David, Sandra, and Joy. In 1981, she married her sweetheart, Jack Wayne Nichol. Through this marriage she gained four more children, Nord, Laura, Kevin, and Steve, and her existing children gained a father. Five years later, they were blessed with a teen-aged daughter, Barbara Lenear, and the family was complete. Two other things anchored JoAnn's life, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and music. She sang in trios and quartets and played piano, bass fiddle, and French horn in high school, understanding and cherishing the sacrifice her parents made to give her this gift. JoAnn taught her first piano lesson in junior high, and in ninth grade, she began accompanying a noted vocalist, Arturo Martinez, at her father's suggestion. This launched a 60-year career of piano and, later, organ, accompaniment. She passed on her musical gift through piano lessons, choral performances, road shows, and many music-related church callings. With music JoAnn spread love, light, and a demand for performance of the highest caliber—even in impromptu living room concerts and plays. Through courage, conviction, and faith, she persisted in her musical callings in spite of arthritis, scoliosis, and shingles in her left eye, as well as deafness in her left ear, which was caused by high doses of aspirin prescribed to treat her arthritis. But by age 79, sitting at the piano or organ without spinal support became too painful, and she begrudgingly limited her playing to short stints with family and at home. Though they are too many to list here, some of JoAnn's additional accomplishments include attending LDS Business College, Brigham Young University, and the University of Utah; managing rental properties, accompanying the Olympus Male Chorus, learning American Sign Language, working as a secretary and administrative assistant, obtaining her long-term care insurance license, and assisting her husband, Jack, with various entrepreneurial ventures. Her strong will and deep devotion to him are best demonstrated by the year they spent living under the radar in a warehouse in Denver, Colorado, without a full kitchen or bath. Today, she suffers none of those discomforts and accompanies holy choirs, continuing her mission of spreading love and light through music and the gospel. The family is grateful for all of the angels in JoAnn's life, her extended family, friends, neighbors, caregivers, medical staff, and the Visiting Angels who helped her during the final months. Funeral services will be held on Saturday, August 7, 2021 at 12:00 pm at the Murray 23rd Ward, 755 East Three Fountains Drive, Murray, Utah with a viewing from 11:00 – 11:45 am. A viewing will also be held on Friday, August 6, 2021 from 6:00 – 7:30 pm at the church with a singalong to follow. Interment at Elysian Burial Gardens.