At about this time, Balderas met a missionary named Rhea Ross. Rhea was the daughter of Milton H. Ross, a teacher of penmanship at LDS High School in Salt Lake City. She had been born in Payson, Utah but raised in Salt Lake City. She had been serving as a missionary in Los Angeles before being transferred to El Paso and had sought out occasion to meet Balderas since she had heard him praised as a great teacher and speaker by members in Los Angeles. Rhea first met Balderas when he was at work in a lumber yard, dirty from his tough manual labor, and wondered if this man covered with sweat was the great missionary she had heard of, but later on hearing him speak in church meetings she fully knew it was true.