Marinus Deleyser

Marinus Anton DeLeyser
1922 ~ 2014
To choose between an evening with Anton at his piano or organ, or one of his fascinating tales about his early schooling, his your, his romance, his entry into the Church, World War II or his business life filled with special interests, leaves one destitute for a proper choice. Born to a school teacher father, Cornelius Peter, and Lena Waterman, on March 22, 1922, in Rotterdam, Holland, he has known the depths of deprivation in war-torn Holland and the heights of ecstasy in the Temple of the Lord. It was an invitation to attend an LDS meeting with the girl he was dating that required a full day to go to and from the meeting location. In six months he was led to marry Christina Nederhand on his birthday in 1943. Anton was later baptized in the Salt Lake Tabernacle in 1953. Chrisi passed away in 1987 and in August the next year she was sealed to him in the Jordan River Temple. Their children are: Peter, Matilda, Anton and Robert. Peter and Anton gave war service in Viet Nam. On October 20, 1989, Anton married Betty Ferguson Whitehead, adding six children to Anton’s family of four.
It was Anton’s father who taught him piano at age 12. He participated in soccer, swimming and skating in his boyhood giving him a yearning later in life to see that young children in his new home land would have similar chances. He enjoyed sail boating, canoeing and photography. His European schooling favored subjects in the mechanical field, including drafting, and he graduated in 1941. Four years of advance training in Technical College equipped him for his life’s work. He commenced work in the ship yards of Waalhaven, in Rotterdam, then moved to the Royal Dutch Steel Mill to work on rolling equipment in Ymuiden, N. Holland. Anton arrived in Salt Lake City on December 7, 1951. After three months with Hygeia Ice Co., he spent three years at Hill Field. There he was an instructor in the machine shop training new employees to manufacture parts for aircraft, such as B-26, B-29, P-51 and F-86. Then came 30 years at Eimco where he was foreman and general foreman of mining machinery manufacture, retiring in 1985 after 13 years as manufacturing engineer.
World War II began for Holland in May, 1940, when the Germans invaded. Hardships were immediately imposed and the greatest being the diminished food supply. Often food stamps, entitling him to some items, were of no values since supplies had been exhausted. In 1944, being taken from his home by the Germans, he left his wife and three-month-old baby to survive as best they could. Anton was forced to repair locomotives in the railroad repair shop near Bremen, Germany. After six months, good fortune led him and a group of eight men from Rotterdam to trains back to Holland. Severe hardship continued and when he arrived home it was the last day his wife had any food for their now nine-month-old son. The twenty-pound relief package he had carried five days, after meeting up with the Red Cross, was all that saved them at that time.
In 1969, he became involved in youth hockey and helped to organize The Utah Amateur Hockey Assn. He served as President in 1970-1972 and vice president in 1972-1974. In 1976, he organized the Utah Referee’s Assn., had his first 2nd grade Soccer team 1979-1983, and was commissioner of the Eimco Softball League. Anton assisted in organizing the Thunder Boat Club and assisted in staging the 1979 Willard Bay Hydroplane Races.
After he became a high priest in 1988, Anton worked at the Jordan River Temple sealing 31,200 couples, sons or daughters, over a 10-year period. Betty joined him in this work in 1989. Anton assists in sealing work even today, when needed on the ward team. Now his is a home teaching supervisor for the high priests, is president of a ward Gospel Doctrine class, and also 1st counselor in the Sunday School presidency. He assists Betty with Relief Society decorations and set ups, and also works with the ward activities committee (in his spare time). He is the music director for the Salt Lake Organ Club as he has been the last four years.