Lewis E. Burnham

Lewis Edward Burnham

Lewis Edward Burnham August 8, 1932 – December 30, 2025

Lewis Edward Burnham, beloved husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and friend, passed away peacefully on December 30, 2025, at the age of 93. He lived a life marked by curiosity, service, humor, hard work, and generosity, leaving the world better than he found it.

Lew was born in Blanding, Utah, the eighth of nine children, delivered at home with the help of a midwife. He often joked about growing up in a two-bedroom house with no electricity, an outhouse, and that he had to watch TV by candlelight. According to him, the outhouse had only one moving part-a club for warding off bears. His parents were exceptional cooks who grew their own food and ran a small restaurant, instilling in him a lifelong love of gardening, self-reliance, and sharing the harvest.

As a boy and young man, Lew worked as a ranch hand and cowboy, learning early that integrity mattered: "Hire one boy, you get one boy's worth of work," he liked to say. "Hire two boys, you get half a boy's work. Hire three boys, you get almost no work." He resolved to always give a full boy's-and later a full man's-worth of work.

He was nine years old when Pearl Harbor was attacked and closely followed World War II through maps and newspapers, with older siblings, Stewart, Owen and Ruth serving overseas.

In high school in the late 1940s, he began his professional life in accounting at a sawmill-though family members were quick to note that he also lost the tips of two fingers in shop class, proof he was never just "a back-room numbers man."

In 1954, Lew served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints among the Navajo people. There he learned a lesson that shaped his life: if you truly want to communicate, you must speak the other person's language. His love for the Navajo language and culture endured throughout his life, and he gave many presentations on the Navajo Code Talkers. In 1967, Navajo was added as a language taught at the Missionary Training Center, due in part to the efforts of Lew and his missionary companion.

Lew met the love of his life, Gail, at Brigham Young University. They married in the Manti Temple in 1956, beginning a partnership that spanned nearly seven decades. Together they built a life filled with faith, travel, learning, and family. Gail faithfully accompanied him around the world, raised their children, and preserved the bounty of their gardens-grape juice, pears, applesauce, goji berries, walnuts, and the family-famous dried Italian plums known as "monkey ears."

Lew served honorably in the U.S. Navy, as well as in ROTC with the Air Force and Army Reserves. He learned Japanese aboard a US Navy ship near Japan. He graduated from BYU in 1958, became a Certified Public Accountant, and embarked on an international career that took the family from Los Angeles to Bogotá, Colombia; Brussels, Belgium; Cleveland, Ohio; Bartlesville, Oklahoma and finally back to Provo, Utah.

In Colombia, Lew became fluent in Spanish and decades later, well into his 80s, continued translating and editing accounting manuals in Spanish. Even in his final days, he delighted nursing-home staff by conversing with them in Spanish. In Belgium, he immersed his children in European culture-museums, cathedrals, battlefields, tulip festivals, and ski slopes-teaching them to see beauty, history, and value everywhere.

A gifted linguist, Lew spoke English, Navajo, Spanish, French, and had working knowledge of German, Dutch, Portuguese, Japanese, and Russian. A lifelong member of the Modern Language Association, he loved words-especially those that captured ideas English could not. A favorite book was, The Meaning of Tingo. Tingo means to borrow from your neighbor until there is nothing left that you want. Those who knew him smiled at the irony: Lew was a man who endlessly gave.

An avid gardener, he shared fruit, vegetables, and even Christmas trees with neighbors and friends wherever he lived. There are families across Utah, Ohio, Oklahoma, Belgium, and beyond who tasted of his harvests.

Lew spent more than 20 years with Ernst & Young before becoming General Auditor for Phillips Petroleum for 15 years. After returning to Provo in 1995, he served as an adjunct professor and advisory council member at BYU's Marriott School of Management. He didn't retire, instead volunteering with Executive Service Corps, the Financial Services Volunteer Corps, the World Bank, UNICEF, and the United Nations, he worked in more than 50 countries until the age of 85.

Lew is survived by his beloved wife, Gail; their five children: Kim (Elizabeth), Linda (Gary), Jim (Cynthia), Paul (Kim), and Karen (Mike); his sister Evelyn; 19 grandchildren; and 14 great-grandchildren. He is remembered for his wisdom, humor, discipline, generosity, and deep love for family and humanity.

Burial services will be held January 10 at 11 am at Nelsen Funeral Home in Provo, Utah.

He is dearly loved and profoundly missed.