Grandpa Don...

A beautiful tribute that Larisa wrote about our grandpa yesterday...

“Today was Grandpa’s funeral....a celebration of almost 94 years of a life well-lived. 

He was always a gentle, kind, quiet presence. While generally a man of few words, he could talk for hours about vehicles, engines, or the latest mechanical puzzle he had solved. He was a gifted mechanic, builder, and fixer of all things. In fact, when he received his draft notice during WWII, a group of local farmers went the the draft board to protest. “Agriculture is essential,” they said, “and we can’t run our equipment without him!” So Grandpa didn’t head off to war, but he helped to keep things running on the home front.

I’m the oldest of the 25 grandchildren, and when I was young, 6 of Grandpa & Grandma’s 9 children were still living at home. Their youngest, my Uncle Randy, is only 4 years older than I, and we bickered and played like siblings. I spent so much time walking down “the path” to their house, and I had a front row seat to the rhythm of their daily family life. I remember Grandpa reading the Bible and praying out loud at the table, and I can hear his calm, “Now Joey....” when Grandma Josephine was in high dudgeon over something. 

Grandpa was diabetic, but he loved his sweets. I can remember many times when he’d be helping himself to dessert, and one of my aunts would say, “Dad, that’s not good for you!” He’d reply in his slow, soft voice, “Oh, a little bit won’t hurt.” 

He was a hard worker, and he taught his children to be as well. You have to be on a farm. He was always puttering about in the shop, working on something. I remember watching in fascination at the sparks flying as he welded. My siblings, cousins, and I played around the bins, tried to weigh ourselves on the grain scale, climbed the stacks of seed corn in the shop, walked beans, ate supper with our dads in the family station wagons during harvest and planting so they didn’t have to leave the fields, and ran through the test plots on Pioneer Field Day. Grandpa was there overseeing all of it. 

Grandpa had a tender heart, and as he aged, he became more emotional. He often had tears in his eyes as we arrived or said goodbye when David and I visited him at their home or in the hospital. 

In August, Grandpa told my uncle Randy that he’d never caught a fish before and that he’d really like to before he died. Randy took him out to their pond, and Grandpa caught his fish. Just a few days later he was diagnosed with the cancer that took his life. 

I was blessed to grow up next door to Grandpa Don. He left a beautiful legacy, and I am thankful to have known him.”