LDS Scene

April Dates Announced for Sunday School General Conference

Sunday School general conference will be held in conjunction with the April general conference of the Church instead of with the October conference.

As a result, Sunday School general conference will not be held in October 1974, but will be conducted April 3, 4, and 5, 1975.

The April Sunday School conference will be an annual event and will include workshops, seminars, and resource exhibits formerly scheduled during the October conference.

Home Teachers Aid in British Crisis

Brother Arthur Hickman, a high councilor in the Hull England Stake, was working in his garden last June 1 when he heard a “terrific explosion from the direction of Scunthorpe,” just southeast of Flixborough, site of a major chemical plant.

“I ran to my back gate from where I could see Scunthorpe five miles to the north, and saw a huge cloud of gray smoke mushrooming two thousand feet in the air,” said Brother Hickman. “At the base was a billowing mass of flame which I estimated to be two or three hundred feet high and one hundred yards wide.”

After having his fears of an explosion at the chemical plant confirmed by police reports, “I picked up the telephone and called my home teaching companion, who luckily was at home,” said Brother Hickman. “He immediately agreed to come with me to check on our group of families who all rived in north Scunthorpe, which was in the three-mile radius named as a disaster area.

“We had some difficulty reaching our destination due to excessive traffic and the closing of some roads by the authorities, but we were able to visit all our families and find all well, though shaken, and only two homes with damage to their windows,” said Brother Hickman.

He concluded, “As we left our area, a little embarrassed by the gratitude shown and freely expressed by our people at being so promptly visited, we overheard one good sister tell her neighbor, ‘That’s the way our church does things—they are our home teachers.’ She said home teaching is the Lord’s work, and we agree wholeheartedly!”

New Assignment for Elder Stone

Elder O. Leslie Stone, Assistant to the Council of the Twelve, has been called by the First Presidency to serve as an associate managing director of the Church’s Internal Communications Division. According to Elder J. Thomas Fyans, Assistant to the Council of the Twelve and managing director of Internal Communications, Elder Stone was chosen for the new position because of his extensive background in control and distribution. Functions of Internal Communications include correlation and curriculum planning, administrative services, internal printing and mailing, production coordination, Church magazines, and the distribution and translation services. In addition to his new calling, Elder Stone is also managing director of the Church Music Department, director of the church-owned Deseret Trust Co., and a member of the Church temple committee and the Church’s investment advisory board.