Janice Lyn Nelson (Shields)'s Obituary
Janice Lyn Nelson (Shields), age 86, of Pleasant Grove, UT, passed away peacefully on March 29, 2025, in South Salt Lake. She was born on May 19, 1938, in Tooele, UT to Glen ‘Sandy’ Shields and Maxine Walters.
A dedicated lifelong member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, she held the gospel of Jesus Christ close to her heart.
Shortly after her parents moved from Tooele to Pleasant Grove, she met and married Jan Howard Nelson of Pleasant Grove Utah in the Manti, UT temple on September 11, 1959.
Jan and Janice both graduated from Brigham Young University with Bachelor’s Degrees in the spring of 1960; Janice as a Registered Nurse.
That fall, following graduation, they bravely left their family home and entered a lifetime of travel and service in the Federal Government.
Entering the United States Air Force on September 24, 1960, at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, this journey took them to Tempelhof Air Base in Berlin, Germany; Ft. Meade, Maryland; Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas; Clark Air Base in the Philippines; Goose Air Base in Labrador, Canada; Keflavik Naval Air Station in Iceland; Misawa Air Base in Japan; and Warner Barracks in Bamberg, Germany. During a relatively short pause in federal service they also lived in Alamosa, Colorado and Vernal, Utah.
In 2003, Janice retired and returned home to Pleasant Grove to fulfill her dream to have a house she never had to leave again, and where she could support and be surrounded by her large family. She hosted and enjoyed hundreds of family visits for more than two decades before moving briefly to assisted living last fall.
Her children are and will always be eternally grateful for her example of placing family first. Janice’s love of her family and her dream of being surrounded by them has truly been fulfilled.
Janice is survived by all 9 of her children, Jaelyn (Mark) Dean, Lisa (Kevin) Woods, Rebecca (Todd) Raine, Paul (Wendy) Nelson, Sheila (Bryon) Madsen, Jared (Jeanette) Nelson, Jennifer Nelson, Erik (Rachel) Nelson, and Stephanie Johnson; and by 2 siblings, Jay (Barbara) Shields, Shauna Jo (Bob) Wenger, and sister-in-law Sallie Shields; as well as by 34 grandchildren and 24 great-grandchildren.
She was preceded in death by her parents, husband Jan Howard Nelson, brother Val Shields, and grandchildren Jeremiah Williams and Katelyn Madsen.
Funeral services will be held at 105 W 1800 N, Pleasant Grove, UT on April 25 at 10:00 AM with viewing starting from 9:00 AM. The interment will be at Utah Veterans Cemetery & Memorial Park, Camp Williams at 1:00 PM that same day. For those who were unable to attend the services, a broadcast recording was made: https://youtu.be/gZ5Fkjef3hs
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