Women's Services

Helen

Writer, environmentalist, and mentor for women scholars, Helen Candland grew up mending and remaking clothes for her eight younger siblings. "I kept a .22 gun by the sewing machine, because we were trying to get rid of groundhogs," she recalled.
"If one would come into the yard, I'd plunk it off and go back to sewing."

Helen earned a bachelor of science and later master's degree from BYU. Serious and hardworking as a child, she felt her social life began when she was a freshman in college. "We went to dances. We went on hikes. . . . We had candy pulls." She supervised the staff of the 1923 Banyan, BYU's yearbook. After graduation Helen took a teaching job in southern Utah. At age 35 she married Henry Stark, a research chemist, and moved with him to Delaware. They adopted three children.

With help from the Starks, the Church in Delaware soon had a branch, then a ward, and finally a stake. Helen volunteered her home for Church activities, teaching Eastern friends to process food from her garden. She directed plays and taught extension classes for the University of Delaware. When Henry retired, the Starks moved back to Utah, where they became advocates for wetland preservation. They endowed the Alice B. Reynolds Forum and the Women in Science scholarship at BYU.
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Helen