Good Afternoon Friends, Family and Loved ones. I am Tyler Jurgens, Allan’s youngest son. Thank you all for coming.
In the days since Allan passed, I have had many people tell me Allan was a great man. Allan would tell you he was not a great man. Although Allan ran multiple businesses, Allan was never a millionaire. Allan was a member of many community organizations, on the board of directors for health regions, schools boards and other organizations, but Allan was never elected as an MLA, an MP, nor as Premier or Prime Minister. Even though at one point in Allan’s life he worked on road construction, Allan has no roads, nor schools or hospitals named after him. If you could get Allan to sing, you would find he could sing beautifully, but he was never a famous singer. Maybe Allan was not a great man?
Allan was the youngest of Joe and Catherine’s children, otherwise known as the baby of the family. Incidentally, that was not a term he was fond of. However, Allan embraced it anyway, gaining the nickname “Baby Big Giant” when over 40 years ago Victoria told her younger brothers, Trevor & Travis, that Allan was the baby of the family. Imagine little boys being told this giant of a man was the baby of the family. So the nickname Baby Big Giant was coined some 40 odd years ago, otherwise known as “BBG” which he would later use in his private correspondence with his wife Victoria, otherwise known as his “Chick Vic”.
One story that always gets told about Allan was when he was a little boy, maybe 3 years old. Joe had been working on the tractor one day and left it running, turning around to grab something to finish the task. Allan climbed up on the tire of the tractor and stuck his hand into the fan belt, snipping off the tip of his finger and sending it flying, where one of the chickens picked it up and took off running, never to be caught and the tip of the finger never to be found.
Allan spent his young adult life working along the Mackenzie River in the Northwest Territories working on the barges, and as a marshaler for the airplanes that would fly into Normal Wells, a town along the Mackenzie. A marshaler is the person who waves in airplanes with those large orange batons as they look to land. I know this, because I had to google what those people were called. The Mackenzie River must have had an impact on his life, as he would continue to speak fondly about working on the barges along the Mackenzie River years later.
Allan met Victoria while he was a young man, not even 20 years old. As the story goes, Victoria was told that there is this guy she should meet. However, she was also told many unflattering things about Allan, as a joke of course. We are talking buck teeth and hunchback type descriptions. Victoria was having none of it, and refused to meet Allan. Allan, being the persistent guy he was, had to find a way to meet Victoria. So Allan and his friends went to wait for Victoria and her friends one day after school. Allan was waiting across the street so he could finally get to meet Victoria, and Victoria knew it would be rude to not at least say hi. Allan quickly caught Victoria’s attention through his stunning good looks and sense of humor. Victoria was hooked when Allan used the punchline to a joke “tsk, you know”, which was apparently the funniest part of the whole joke. I guess that goes to show how witty Allan was, as he must have used that line cleverly, because it really makes no sense anymore. That must have impacted Victoria a great deal, as she still remembers this long boring, terrible joke, with a punchline that would forever change her life. Either that, or Allan must have just been really ridiculously good looking. Maybe a little of both. That was the start of the best chapter of Allan’s story, and he always referred to Victoria as his better half.
Allan always loved animals, so it made perfect sense that Allan and Victoria would start a farrow to weanling hog operation early on in their marriage. However, events would conspire against them when at the peak of that operation – a full sounder of swine ready for a new litter, a full stock of feed, and a new hog barn burnt down on Allan’s 24th birthday, forever changing the course of Allan and Victoria’s lives. Despite the devastating nature of this event, things could have been much worse, as the ash from that blaze covered their family home. Thank goodness for winter in the prairies, as the snow and cold saved our families lives that day.
Inadequate insurance hindered their ability to rebuild, despite their best efforts. Allan and Victoria called it quits 10 years later when they moved off the farm to start over.
Times were tough in those days, but Allan never lost sight of what was most important – his family. Collecting the only money they had at the time, Allan went and picked out a little pink dress for his little girl. He brought it home and Shawna was overjoyed, as she now had the dress she needed for her event. Near the end of his life Shawna asked Allan if he remembered that little pink dress he had brought home, just for her, all those years ago. Allan, of course, remembered. You see, both Allan and Shawna assumed that little pink dress was forgotten by each other. That small gesture, that one, assumed forgotten, little pink dress, had such an impact on their lives that nearly 40 years later it was still remembered so fondly by both of them. Shawna, Victoria still has that little pink dress… … and she wants you to wear it, as they are still looking to maximize their return on that investment.
Allan and Victoria value family above all else, so it was a regular occurance to bring a few of my cousins over to stay at our place during the summer. One of those times a few of us boys decided to go out and play in the garden. There were clear rules of course – the most important one was “Do not get dirty”. Being adventurous kids, we decided to grab a garden hose and make some mud, because hey, what’s better than playing in the garden than playing in the garden with mud involved? One thing led to another and a mud fight broke out. That was all good fun, until we decided it was time to come inside. You see, it wasn’t just a little mud. We were covered in mud from the top of our heads to the tip of our toes. It was in our hair, in our ears, and every other nook and cranny. Allan was furious! He knew we knew the rules! He dragged us all back outside, grabbed the garden hose (with the nozzle adapter of course) and started hosing us down with water that was so cold it must have come straight from the Mackenzie River itself! The one thing about that story I learned years later, was that Allan wasn’t actually furious at all. Sure, breaking the rules wasn’t the smartest thing we’ve ever done, but Allan’s anger was all for appearances only. Allan said years later that he had the hardest time not laughing at the whole situation. How he kept his composure we will never know. …
Allan had many different jobs throughout his life. Notable positions he held included a Marshaller in Norman Wells, a meat cutter, a heavy equipment operator, a hog farmer, business owner operating multiple companies focused in forestry, and a Silviculture and Agroforestry Technician for the Canadian Forest Services. Allan really hit his stride when it came to forestry when his love for the outdoors and his love for business came together perfectly. Allan was well respected in the forestry industry as a honorable and trustworthy man. So well respected in fact that he was brought in multiple different times to solve disputes between landowners and logging companies pertaining to the volume of wood harvested from the property. Allan was smarter, and more clever than he ever gave himself credit for. Without the logs being able to be measured directly, Allan still found ways to measure the volume of wood harvested from the property to within such a degree of accuracy that his results were never disputed. Clearly the man had a skill that wasn’t easily matched, and had earned such respect that all parties understood Allan would give them the unbiased facts.
Allan spent much of his time working on his yard and special projects around the house. The most impressive of these projects cumulated in the hidden gardens located in the backyard of Allan and Victoria’s home. A labor of love involving multiple hundreds of hours of effort that resulted in a beautiful, tranquil area to relax and enjoy some quiet time with family and friends. Picture in your mind when you walk into the backyard being greeted with a large fenced off area with giant saloon style swinging doors. Upon walking through those doors, you walk along a beautiful gravel path. At the end of the path is a fire pit, surrounded by five suspended wooden bench swings. Turning to the right you can see a row of cedar trees with raised garden beds hidden just behind, often filled with tomatoes. In one corner a large garden shed that looks like an building straight out of a western, in the other corner a smaller tool shed designed to look like an outhouse. Turning to the left you can see additional seating and a children’s swing set made just for their grandkids, of whom Allan cherished so much. Not a single person who has been to those hidden gardens has been able to walk away without sitting in those bench swings. Even in the last few days before today, Allan’s immediate family has all found a chance to sat on those swings and reminisce about the impact Allan had on our lives.
If you have not had a chance to grab a seat on those bench swings and sit around a fire in those hidden gardens, I would strongly recommend you take some time to visit Victoria and share the serenity of those hidden gardens… I mean, not today, but sometime soon.
Allan put those same skills to use to help all his children, as he was happy to do whenever it meant spending time with either his children or grandchildren. He helped Shawna rebuild her fence, and repair the damage to her basement. He helped Scott build this magnificent pirate ship in his backyard. I guess, despite all the many jobs Allan had in his life, he was never a pirate, as that pirate ship somehow got landlocked. However, it being landlocked was probably for the best, as it makes it far easier for Cecily and Everett to get onto that pirate ship and sail those imaginary seas.
Allan also helped me renovate my basement when I needed the additional space in my home to accommodate my son’s arrival. Allan was more than happy to help as he knew I am far better with building the digital world, than the physical one. For two weeks Allan and I worked long hours to remodel that basement into a livable space. Now it is a basement where Charles and Jasmine spend many hours playing, and an office where I spend many hours working. Despite the good times we had on this father/son project, there really is no place like home. Allan, not one for long goodbyes at the best of times, was so eager to get back to Victoria he practically ran out of the house to his truck to get on the road back to PA.
This is but a snapshot in the life of a man called Allan Jurgens. Just like the pictures you’ve seen, it tells a story, but not the whole story. To tell the whole story would take 64 years, and we just don’t have that kind of time. I know we, his children, will still have more fences to repair, more basements to renovate, and maybe even more pirate ships to build, but we know that Allan taught us along the way how to handle that ourselves. I remember thinking as a teenager how little Allan knew, where now I find myself wanting just a little more time to learn something more from the man who knew so much. Allan may not be that great man that you have read about it the history books, but there is nothing about the impact that Allan had on those around him that wasn’t great. As with a good book that you don’t want to finish reading because you don’t want it to end, we know we must. Although his book has come to an end, we are saddened, not because the book has ended, but because the book the ended too soon. It is ok though, because the best chapter in Allan’s life started with meeting a lady named Victoria and the last chapter ended with that same lady, 44 years later, at his side.