Delsa Bee Staheli

Delsa Bee Staheli

After a life of giving to others and embracing a love of education, Bee peacefully passed away while surrounded by loved ones on February 29, 2024, in Alexandria, Virginia. Delsa Bee Staheli was born on February 23, 1934, at the LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah, to Delsa Tolhurst Staheli and Franklin Byron (By) Staheli.
 
The second of four girls, at the young age of ten days, her parents moved her to Payson, Utah, where she resided in the Tolhurst Apartments, built by her grandfather, Thomas Franklin Tolhurst. In the following years, she attended Peteetneet Elementary School where she enjoyed winter sledding on the hill next to the school. She next attended Payson Junior High and Payson High School, where she was involved in many activities such as the Future Homemakers of America, the Pep Club, and sports, before graduating in 1952. She also graduated from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Seminary. During those years, she also worked for her parents at By’s Café located on Payson’s Main Street, where she learned the value of hard work and honesty in dealing with customers. Throughout her childhood years, she worked in each restaurant her parents owned – Payson, Salt Lake City, Tooele, and lastly at By’s Seafood Grotto in Provo, Utah.

Following high school, Bee attended the University of Utah. Between her graduation from high school in 1952 and attending her first year at the University of Utah, Bee was honored to be an attendant to the Onion Days Homecoming Queen. She was also an attendant between her freshman and sophomore year. At the University, Bee pledged as a member of the Delta Delta Delta Sorority and became involved in many campus activities. Possessing a quiet but deep sense of confidence, she quickly put that skill to work. Seeking greater social engagement, in her sophomore year she became a member of SPURS, a National Honor Society service organization. At the end of that year, she attended the SPURS National Convention in Bozeman, Montana. At the convention, Bee was honored to be elected as the organizations national president. During her junior year, Bee became a member of Cwean, the junior-year equivalent of SPURS. In her senior year, Bee was distinguished as a member of Mortar Board, whose members were chosen based on university scholarship, leadership and service. Another of her university activities was her involvement with the student newspaper, The Chronicle, where she became the daily editor during her senior year. Even with all these activities, Bee considered her selection to the Beehive Honor Society (BHS), an organization founded in 1913 for the purpose of honoring graduating seniors who best demonstrated leadership, scholarship, and service to the university and the community, to be her proudest achievement. Bee was one of only nine seniors from a class of approximately 2,500 students, initiated into that prestigious organization that year. In 1956, she graduated with a degree in English Education.

On August 25, 1956, Bee married Robert Alfred Lippold of Salt Lake City, Utah (div. 1980). After a brief move to Los Angeles, California, where Bob attended graduate school at UCLA and she worked for three professors, they moved back to Salt Lake City, where she became a teacher at Glendale Middle School. While she considered her learning curve to be steep, it also established her love for teaching. Bee taught for a year and a half before she welcomed her son, Kirk Staheli Lippold, on April 29, 1959. Kelly Staheli Lippold was born two years later, on June 1, 1961. In those days, society would not allow a pregnant woman to actively teach, so once her two children were old enough to attend day care, Bee resumed her teaching career in the Salt Lake City area where she taught at Bryant Middle School before obtaining a position at Skyline High School. She was very proud that both her children were college graduates – Kirk from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, and Kelly from the University of Nevada – Reno. Bee considered both to be the joy of her life and she took great pride in teaching and mentoring them.

In 1970, after one year of teaching at the high school, Bee moved to Carson City, Nevada. Once again embracing teaching, she first taught at the elementary level and then moved on to high
school. Bee received her Master's Degree in Reading Comprehension from the University of Nevada – Reno. She continued to teach at Carson High School until 2000, which, in her view was long enough to do what she loved but still retain her sanity. Bee was an engaged teacher who also supervised the student newspaper and school yearbook. With her students, she set the bar high. It showed with the production of multiple award winning newspapers and yearbooks. Bee also became involved in organizations such as the International Reading Association and Delta Kappa Gamma. Once again stepping into a leadership role, she served as the local, then state president for both organizations.

Following her retirement from teaching, Bee worked for Resource Concepts, Inc. While Bee only considered herself a “glorified gopher”, doing filing, taking care of project files, editing written correspondences, and performing duties as the receptionist during lunch hour, she was part of wonderful family of employees who valued her talents and common sense approach to work.

Once fully retired, Bee enjoyed reading, playing solitaire and majong on her iPad, making wonderful treats at Christmas, and embracing life to the fullest. In 2014, she fulfilled a lifelong
dream and attended the Kentucky Derby and won the bet on her horse of choice. For years, her routine of showing up at the gym promptly at 5:00am paid off, when she lived a full life of 90 years.

Bee is survivied by her children, Kirk Staheli Lippold of Alexandria, Virginia, and Kelly Staheli Lippold Hunter of Pearblossom, California, and her sister, Sue Staheli Wilson of St. George, Utah, along with many nieces and nephews. Her ashes were spread near her hometown of Payson, Utah, and a memorial headstone will be placed close to her parents in Wasatch Lawn Memorial Park in Salt Lake City, Utah.