A family that kept almost everythingThis is mgwfamily dot com — the home of the Mike and Joyce Williams family. One photograph, taken in Vladivostok in 1995, and behind it, everything from 1952 to the present — a family that moved a great many times. This is perhaps the most formative era for the family.
Seven eras, seven placesThe story is told in seven eras, and every one of them is a place the family actually lived. Beginnings. Germany. West Valley. Vladivostok. Centerville. Colorado. And, for Mike & Joyce, with the family from afar, the Russia Novosibirsk Mission. Each has its own page now — the photographs, and the years written down while there is still somebody to ask.
Beginnings · 1952–1976Beginnings holds more than any other era — over three hundred photographs from before this family was a family. Both of their childhoods. Mike's mission to Hong Kong. Joyce's valedictory high school success. A courtship at BYU. And a wedding in 1974 that set everything else in motion.
The Army, and the long middle yearsThen the Army, and three years in Germany, with a final year in Fort Huachuca Arizona. Home again to West Valley City. And the many Centerville years, where most of the seven children grew up — with a new page that summer on the 20th Ward, 1988 to 1994, that had never been written down anywhere.
Vladivostok · 1994–1997And then, in November of 1994, Vladivostok. Again, Mike and Joyce write that, of all their eras, this one was the most uniting, and the most formative. A hundred and forty-one photographs — and two pages that exist nowhere else. AKOS Cellular, the first cellular telephone company in the Russia Far East. And the establishing of the Church in Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, and Magadan.
Broomfield, and a mission served togetherColorado comes next — Broomfield, for eleven years. Then Novosibirsk for three years and a mission served together. Both of these eras have room for more. If you have photographs from those years, they would be very welcome. Mike & Joyce will provide more on Novosibirsk.
Lava Hot Springs, 2026 — Warm Springs, 2027Reunion Memories is the newest room in the house. Lava Hot Springs, in 2026 — more than three hundred and sixty photographs and videos, most of them put there by family members while there or within days of coming home. And the next one is already set. Warm Springs, near Hanna, Utah, the 28th of June to the 1st of July, 2027.
It opens when you sign inThere is more than the eras. Thirty-one of Joyce's recipe cards in the Family Kitchen. A page for each of the seven families and their children. An Extended Family page, and ancestor stories. The photographs stay private until you sign in — and then the whole thing opens to your enjoyment!