Jan Barker grew up in northern California before moving to Utah to attend BYU. She and her husband, Jeff, live on seventy acres outside of Payson, Utah, and have six children and ten grandchildren. Jan is a businesswoman and an artist. She also has twenty-four years of volunteer service in the Boy Scouts of America where she learned to “Be Prepared.” She owns American Beauty Academy in Payson with her husband and one of her daughters.