Jeffery Clair Peirce

Jeffery Clair Peirce, 68, of Taylorsville, UT, passed away due to unexpected heart failure on November 26th, 2019, at St. Marks Hospital in Salt Lake City, UT.

Jeff was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on May 26th, 1951, of the late Earl and Ida (Stauffer) Peirce. He is survived by the mother of his children, Agnes (Lawther) Forsdick, three children, James (Jenny) Peirce, Franny (Greg) Johnson, and John (Ella) Peirce. He is also survived by his sister, Pamela Alligood, numerous nephews and nieces, and three grandchildren, Ava, Maddox, and Simone, and a very good boy, his dog, Corkey.

After attending Provo High School, he went on to serve a mission in South Korea for the LDS church from 1971-73. This experience was the driving force behind his Asian Studies degree. Upon completing his mission, he moved back to Provo, where he received his Master’s in Public Administration with an emphasis in Health Care from Brigham Young University in 1978. He worked in the Health Care field for a few years before deciding to return to school to certify in Secondary Education in order to follow his passion and knowledge of history. He went on to teach Utah and U.S. History, Civics, and World History in the Salt Lake valley for Granite School District at schools, including Thomas Jefferson Junior High, Granite High School, and Kennedy Junior High School, from which he retired in 2014. A voracious reader of books dedicated to United States history, warfare, and politics—including any intersection with European and Asian histories—one would be hard-pressed to produce a detail of a president’s life that he did not know or a historical biography that he had not read. It was usual for him to fly through a new book every other day. Jeff kept a daily journal which documented his personal history, contributing in his own way to future historical records.

Alongside his passion for history, books, and a concerning obsession with Winston Churchill, he had a quick wit and an enormous, irreverent sense of humor (which would either get him in trouble or make a new friend). He held a territorial attachment to his radio, much to the displeasure of his children, forced to listen day and night. He was also a self-proclaimed fountain pen aficionado. He reveled in the craftsmanship of an intricate mechanical watch and produced remarkably finely-detailed models of ships and airplanes.

A private memorial service will be held on December 15th. Contact farewelljeff@jpeirce.com for details.

Should friends desire, memorial contributions may be made to the churchhillscholarship.org. Jeff is dearly missed. We wish we could have had so much more time.