Craig Shelley Morris  February 2, 1953 – December 9, 2020

Craig Shelley Morris, 67, passed away December 9, 2020, in Draper, Utah.  He was born February 15, 1953 in Salt Lake City, Utah to Ralph Bitner Morris and Crystal June Shelley Morris.  He attended Wasatch Elementary, Stewart School, East High School—all in Salt Lake, and Ricks College (now BYU-Idaho) in Rexburg, ID.  There he met his future wife, Christi Lou Gerhauser, who he married January 3, 1976 in Salt Lake Temple Religious Affiliation.

Craig was a devout member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints his entire life.  He grew up in a household that taught him the value of work and took that with him from early years working in the family business, Intermountain Leather and Findings, to a more mature role later as an adult in that same family business and in a second career with the Utah Correctional Facility, for which he trained and started in 2003.  He was a Corrections Officer through retirement in 2018.  He worked hard to take care of his family.  Craig earned his Eagle Scout Award on December 9, 1966.  He served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Oklahoma and part of Kansas between 1972 and 1974.  He and his wife, Christi, also served an inner-city mission between 2012 and 2014 in Midvale, Utah.  Craig enjoyed art when he was in school and kept some of his early work.  He took this interest up again in retirement and started painting with his wife.

Craig loved to be active and the outdoors.  He played basketball, tennis, and swam in his youth, including playing basketball on the East High School basketball team.  He also loved riding motorcycles with his brother Brent.  They had some great adventures riding together.  He continued to play basketball regularly on Wednesday nights and Saturday mornings as an adult for many years.  He loved hiking, mountain biking, and camping, which he passed on to his children, who still enjoy those activities.  Mountain biking with tired teenagers probably wasn’t the best workout, but he always invited us and was very tolerant of our skill levels and endurance.  At the top of every big climb he patiently waited for us to catch up while enjoying the beautiful mountain view.  Eventually, he traded basketball for Ultimate Frisbee, which he played with his adult children until work took some of them out of State.

Craig was interested in a healthy lifestyle.  He believed the Word of Wisdom encouraged a diet high in plant and vegetable sources with less emphasis on meat and lived according to that guidance.  I used to tease him about being a closet vegetarian — he only ate meat when offered — to be polite, of course.  We laughed about that for years.

In April of 2019, Craig was diagnosed with Stage IV colon cancer that metastasized to his liver.  He received over a year of chemotherapy, surgery, and later radiation to mitigate the disease.  These treatments gave his family little more than a year and a half longer to spend with him, for which we are grateful.  Craig was preceded in death by his parents, Ralph and June Morris.  Surviving family members include his wife, Christi; children: Alayna, Alisa, Justin and Jennifer;  16 grandchildren (10 boys and 6 girls!); and, siblings: Brent Morris, Rosalie Wheeler, and MeriKay McDonald.

Many thanks to his wife, Christi Lou (Gerhauser) Morris, for the bio & photos and to David S. Nicholes EHS'71 for notification of death.