Ortho R. Fairbanks, former CCH art faculty member, passed away this summer, surrounded by his family on June 2, 2015.
He was born April 25, 1925, in Salt Lake City, Utah, the oldest son of Ortho Lane and Laura Violate Smith Fairbanks. Upon returning from service in World War II, he continued his university studies at BYU and later married Myrna Jesperson on Feb. 18, 1949 in the Salt Lake Temple five days before he left for a mission in New Zealand.
Fairbanks was one of a number of famous artists in five generations of the Fairbanks family. His uncles, Avard and Leo Fairbanks, were the artists primarily responsible for the sculptures that decorate the grounds of the Laie Hawaii Temple and the friezes which decorate the top of the temple on all four sides.
Fairbanks taught at The Church College of Hawaii from 1960-1968. Among his many sculptures he made over a nearly 70-year career, there are three on our campus.
One is a marble bust of David O. McKay located in the Front Foyer, former President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and “Founding Father” of our university.
The second is a marble bust of Edward Clissold also located in the Front Foyer, former Laie Temple President, mission president in Japan and later Hawaii, Oahu Stake President, Zion’s Securities Manager overseeing all land and church facilities in Laie and first Chairman of the CCH Board of Trustees.
The third sculpture is a bronze of Ralph Woolley located in the library near the administrative offices, who was a participating architect for the Laie Hawaii Temple as well as a number of other prominent buildings on Oahu like the Royal Hawaiian Hotel.
Woolley was also the first President of the Oahu Stake and organized the first committee to consider the possibility of the establishment and building of a college in Laie in 1949. Our library was first named the Ralph Woolley library before later being named after Joseph F. Smith.
Thanks to Bro. Fairbanks, we have permanent remembrances of the three individuals who played the biggest roles in our university’s establishment.
Note: There is a bronze sculpture of Hamana Kalili (local hero) in the Pacific Islands room by Ortho’s uncle, Avard Fairbanks . . . but that is a story for another time.