During a visit last Christmas, Welch found his friend reading a new book on astronomy in which he had written a lengthy list of questions. "When I get to the other side, these are the questions I want to know the answers to," he confided. "That's the kind of inquisitiveness that's always been so invigorating to his students," Welch said. "A conversation with him was always an electrifying baptism in the waters of ideas and ideals." His son, Alex, said Nibley may not have shown it on the outside, "but he was a deeply humble man . . . He loved to show that he knew stuff, but at the same time he was truly a humble man, a very complex man . . . He enjoyed (public acclaim) but never felt worthy of it."

Alex Nibley said he never viewed his father as primarily an intellectual but "one of passion, emotion and spirit. He was a deeply spiritual person," who also could be playful and "was just a lot of fun. He was great with little children. Some Saturday mornings he would shake us awake early in the morning. We'd pile in the station wagon with a loaf of bread and bunch of bananas and take off into the mountains or canyon country." "He was constantly looking at the mountains and clouds and fields as we drove. He was the most curious person I've ever known, even right up to the end."

Nibley idolized his grandmother as the core spiritual foundation childhood, and at the end of his life became "just extraordinarily affectionate" toward his wife, Alex Nibley said. "A couple of times he had a buzzer by his bed to call her at any time. He called her in more than once in the middle of the night, and when she would come running in, he'd say, 'I just wanted to tell you how beautiful you are.'"

Bedridden for the past couple of years, Nibley was able to communicate with his family until recent weeks, his son said.

Seven of his eight children have rallied around him in recent weeks with the news that one daughter, Martha Nibley Beck, has written a memoir dubbed "Leaving the Saints: How I Lost the Mormons and Found My Faith." It details what she said are "recovered memories" of sexual abuse at the hands of her father, and is set to be published next month.

Alex Nibley declined comment Thursday on the book, referring to a statement the family issued on Tuesday saying the book "is false" and contains "countless errors, falsehoods, contradictions and gross distortions" that "misrepresent our family history, the basic facts of our lives, our family culture, the works of our father and the basic principles" of the LDS Church. It says allegations that Nibley abused her and the family covered it up are "not true."

The LDS Church has also characterized the book as "seriously flawed in the way it depicts the church, its members and teachings."

At least two future books by or about Nibley are in the works, one by Alex Nibley on his father's military service to be released this fall by Shadow Mountain Publishing and another by Nibley himself.