LDS Scene

President N. Eldon Tanner, first counselor in the First Presidency, was among those who attended the inauguration of President Jimmy Carter in Washington, D.C., January 20. President and Sister Tanner attended the inaugural ceremony as guests of Senator Howard Cannon of Nevada. While in Washington, President Tanner attended a number of receptions to which government and civic leaders were invited, visited the Washington Temple Visitors Center, was interviewed by the local press on the Church Welfare program, and received the copy of the original Book of Mormon that the Church loaned for exhibition on the U.S. Bicentennial Freedom Train that traveled through the country in 1976.

Fifteen hundred single members of the Church recently attended a three-day Special Interests conference held at Seaside, Oregon, at which they socialized and heard counsel and instruction on meeting the special problems of being single. The conference attracted single members of the Church, and some nonmembers, from Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and British Columbia, Canada. Chairman of the conference steering committee was Bart Tolleson of Vancouver, Washington.

Brigham Young University has been connected with a number of news items lately: Gerrit Gong, a BYU honor student from Palo Alto, California, was named as one of the thirty-two Rhodes scholars from the United States who will be attending Oxford University, England, for the next two or three years. This is the third consecutive year that a BYU student has been a recipient of this prestigious scholarship.

Monte Neil Stewart of Las Vegas, a member of the first graduating class of the J. Reuben Clark Law School at BYU, has been appointed law clerk to Chief Justice of the United States Warren E. Burger. This is a most sought-after appointment for law graduates, and it is the first time that a student from the first graduating class of a new law school has received such an honor.

Recently returned to the Law School is Dean Rex E. Lee who has been on a leave of absence to serve as Assistant Attorney General of the United States in charge of the civil division.

The United States Department of the Interior has commended a BYU program in which more than thirty-five candidates have received their master’s degrees in education without ever having seen the campus at Provo. Under the program, sponsored by the BYU College of Education and the government of Samoa, BYU faculty members traveled to the islands for two-week instruction periods during which their students were given assignments and their past work was reviewed. A similar program in undergraduate work exists for qualified students who would otherwise be unable to obtain their bachelor’s degrees from the United States because of the traveling and living expenses involved. This year, for the first time, eight educators from American Samoa will be taking up residence at BYU for two semesters while working toward their master’s degrees as interns to their local counterparts.

President Keith Buhler of the Hillsboro Oregon Stake tells conference-goers that “our finest hour is when we give of ourselves.” (Photography by Denton Bramwell.)