Although born in Burley, Idaho, Larry spent virtually all of his growing up years in West Los Angeles. Southern California was then and still is a culture of fast and unusual automobiles. Larry was clearly marked for life. Racing cars was his main pass-time in those days, unfortunately most of the racing was done on the street. After one rather harrowing experience where his hopped-up 41 Ford crashed into and tipped over a school bus he decided to settle down and attend Santa Monica Community College.
It was also about this time he began working in the family business of painting and wallpapering. After a 3-year stint at a 2-year school he dropped out and went to work hanging wallpaper full-time. Marriage and family were part of his life at this time, too. It appeared that Larry was ready to settle down in the family business, however this wasn't to be the case.
In 1962 he began taking night classes at El Camino Jr. College in Lawndale, California and within a year was able to transfer to BYU. By the spring of 1966 he graduated in History, English and Education with a certificate to teach secondary school in the state of Utah. Larry taught first at Payson Jr. High and later at Meadowbrook Middle School at Poway, California where he also served one year as the librarian.
His library career actually started in the Spring of 1966 when he enrolled in the newly started Library Science program at BYU. Later he took classes at the University of San Diego while teaching at Meadowbrook. Finally in 1969 he returned to BYU and finished his MLS degree. In 1971 he began his career at Ricks College (Idaho) as the Serials Librarian and later he became the Directory. While at Ricks he began working on a doctorate at Nova University (Ft. Lauderdale).
In 1984 Larry was hired at BYU as the Assistant University Librarian for Information Services.
He finished his Ed.D. in 1985 and also found time to mentor many librarians as they assumed major managerial roles in the Lee Library. Currently he is responsible for Personnel and Staff Development. He has shared his expertise with libraries in China on two different lecture tours, worked on the national level in ALA's LAMA and has also contributed to the state by serving on the LSCA Council for six years.
Larry and Dolly are the parents of five boys and one girl (in that order). They are the grandparents of 16 challenging darlings. Larry still fiddles around with old cars as time allows.
