Remembering the Wyckoffs
Burl Wyckoff and Aloha Maw met when they were teenagers at the United Methodist Church in Nyssa, Oregon. Burl was three years older, and four years ahead in school, on track to graduate at age 17. Most of the other young men from their small town went straight from high school to military service in World War II. But Burl’s dad wouldn’t let any of his boys join up until they turned 21, so Burl headed to college in Caldwell, Idaho, while Aloha started high school. They reconnected at Wallowa Lake Methodist Camp over the summer. The next fall, Aloha took a job as a nighttime telephone operator. One of its perks was the ability to make long distance phone calls to Caldwell in the middle of the night.
Just before Burl turned 21, he volunteered for service with the Navy. The year was 1943. While he trained as a radio repairman, Aloha finished high school and started college at Willamette. But her heart was elsewhere, and she had an adventurous spirit. In April following her first semester of college, she married Burl, becoming Aloha Wyckoff. She moved to Washington, DC with him while he finished his training, and joked that with the Navy setting his schedule, she saw more of the capitol than he ever did.
Burl shipped out, but never saw combat; by the time he would have reached the ship near Japan where he was to be stationed, the war was essentially over. He quickly finished his bachelor’s degree in agricultural husbandry at Oregon State University, and then the Wyckoffs went about the business of building a career and a family together.
The two of them had a knack for growing things. Wherever Burl’s work managing farm co-ops took them, Aloha always put in a big garden with lots of vegetables and flowers, especially irises and roses. They raised two daughters: Chris and Cindy. Both girls remember attending Moses Lake UMC when it was a new church start meeting in a movie theater, with upholstered seats rather than pews. Their parents helped to grow that congregation, and in due time, their father used his carpentry skills to help build it a permanent home. Cindy remembers standing among the curled wood shavings from the enormous beams that he had helped set in place to frame the new sanctuary.
Burl’s job moved them frequently, and in each community where they lived, the family plugged in to the local United Methodist Church. When they moved to Seattle, they joined Queen Anne UMC. Then back to Moses Lake, then to Trinity UMC in Ballard, then to Richland, then to Royal Slope. Cindy remembers singing hymns in three-part harmony on family road trips. Aloha sang soprano, Burl sang tenor or bass, and the girls sandwiched their voices between, carrying the alto line.
With relationships in so many local churches, it was only natural for them to be active at the denominational level as well. “It took my mom a while to find her way,” Chris remembers, “but my dad was so supportive of her.” He knew she wanted to work outside the home after the girls were grown, so when an entry-level job opened up at the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference office, he suggested she apply. She got the job, and as Chris says, “worked her way up from there.”
Aloha served twelve years as vice-chairperson of the Conference Council, eight years as Conference President of the United Methodist Women, and four years as Conference Lay Leader. Burl also served as Conference Lay Leader for a four-year term. Aloha sat on the denomination’s General Board of Higher Education, making frequent trips to Nashville. Meanwhile, foreseeing a need for faith-based asset management and planned giving, Burl was a founding board member of the Foundation, its first recording secretary, and one of its past presidents.
In time, they took their lay ministry even further than conference leadership. Aloha had felt called to missionary service ever since high school. So at the end of Burl’s career, the couple sold their house and moved to Zambia. They worked at Kafue Secondary School from 1981-85. While Burl cleared brush, put in irrigation, and planted corn on 200 acres that would support the school for years to come, Aloha taught sewing and adult literacy in the village. Their mission received financial and prayer support from the Foundation and the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference.
When their missionary term ended, with only a fifth wheel trailer to come “home” to, they took their time! Originally they had planned to return via Egypt and Europe, but there was some problem with their visas. Burl and Aloha were the types of people who turned problems into adventures. They came by way of Johannesburg, to Durbin, to Capetown, to Buenos Aires, to Rio de Janeiro, to Recife, to Caracas, to Puerto Rico, to Florida, to New York, to New Hampshire, and then back to the Pacific Northwest to visit with family and friends.
They finally settled in Arizona where they could enjoy sunshine year-round. Burl put his carpentry skill to work, designing and building a new home. They joined Prescott Valley United Methodist Church, and went on several mission trips to construct churches in Mexico and Chile. In their retirement, they loved to travel, and visited every continent except Antarctica.
Burl and Aloha joined their Prescott Valley United Methodist Church family on mission trips. This one was to build a church in Mexico.
They never lost their connection with the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference. In 2001, the Foundation received a call from Burl about a gift of farmland. Since farming was what he knew, he had invested in land throughout his career as opportunities presented themselves. He had some land near Moses Lake-- two adjacent parcels that a neighbor wanted to buy-- and he’d like to turn it into a gift, but also earn some income and a tax write-off. Could the Foundation help?
After making sure he understood their goals, Executive Director Tom Wilson worked with Burl and Aloha to set up a Charitable Remainder Annuity Trust. They used the farmland to fund the trust, earning a significant tax write-off over the next several years. The Foundation sold the farm and invested the proceeds. They received 6% of the trust’s starting value-- or $18,000 per year-- as partially tax-free income for the rest of their lives. Upon their death, the remainder would support charities of their choice.
Over the next 19 years, their gift worth $300,000 grew to $450,000 in value, including more than $320,000 of income for them. Aloha passed in 2008 from Alzheimer’s. When Burl had a major stroke in 2019, his daughters Chris and Cindy sang hymns at his bedside in his final days. After his death, the $130,000 remainder of the trust became a gift. Some of it went to the Habitat for Humanity in Prescott, Arizona without restrictions. Some of it created an endowment for mission projects. And some was given to the Foundation’s operating endowment, which will support our work in perpetuity.
It’s such a privilege to carry Burl and Aloha’s legacy forward. The Wyckoffs knew how to grow things, how to support each other, how to lead people, and how to turn adversity into opportunity. Here at the Foundation, our goals are much the same. We are forever grateful for the ways that Burl and Aloha helped to shape our organization and the wider United Methodist movement in the Pacific Northwest and beyond.