Hi Lovell had been working as an electrician on a commercial project in Wyoming. He was driving home to Idaho Falls for Thanksgiving when he hit a patch of ice on the highway near Palisades — the canyon stretch of U.S. 26 along the Snake River near the Idaho-Wyoming border. His car slid off the road.

Hi got out to see what had happened. While he was standing outside the car, a woman who had been drinking hit the same patch of ice and struck him.

Both his legs were broken, along with his ribs. He was hospitalized for a long time. Norman, who estimates he was about fifteen when it happened — placing the accident in the early 1960s — remembers visiting during the recovery and watching Hi work a board with pegs, moving them from peg to peg as part of his rehabilitation.

Hi recovered. He returned to work as an electrician, eventually taking a position at the Idaho Falls LDS Hospital, where Gayl also worked. He later retired and served on a mission to Hawaii with Velda — the Church College of Hawaii building project — from 1956 to 1959.

The Palisades accident is separate from Hi’s later stroke, which occurred on January 1, 1979, at Knott’s Berry Farm in California.

This page is a stub. The precise year of the Palisades accident needs confirmation from Norman or additional records.