Paying respects to 100 years of life, 77 years of marriage
Partners in love and charity for 77 years died within four days of one another
In the fall of 2014, Elmer Jensen celebrated his 100th birthday with more than 200 family and friends. Less than a year later, his wife of more than seven decades, Leona, marked her own century with a similar family-packed celebration.
Last week, Leona died at age 102; exactly four days later, Elmer followed suit, having made it to 103 years on the planet.
You don’t need to tell Jackie Jensen that this tale of life and love longevity is a remarkable one. “The phone’s been ringing off the hook,” the couple’s eldest child says from his home in Standard, about 90 kilometres east of Calgary, where his parents farmed for more than four decades. “It seems reporters from all over want to talk to us.”
It’s not every day, after all, that you hear about two people not only marking 77 years of marriage, but both making it past the 100 mark and then leaving this mortal coil, well, nearly together.
For those who knew and loved Elmer and Leona, though, it is a poetic end to a beautiful union that had its roots in an introduction more than 80 years ago. His brother, Anker, introduced Elmer, a native of Chicago, Ill., to his future wife when the latter attended his brother’s college graduation in Nebraska. Leona, who hailed from Audubon, Iowa, began a letter-writing correspondence with her intended that lasted four years until their nuptials on Oct. 27, 1940.
“It was muddier than all getout,” Elmer told the Strathmore Standard newspaper in 2015 on the occasion of his wife’s 100th birthday, of their wedding day. Guests had to use chain-covered tires to ferry from the church wedding in the village to the reception at their family farm.
The couple settled into life on the farm — a family operation that marked its 100th anniversary in 2010 — and raised four children.
“It was established by my dad’s uncle in 1910,” says Jackie, 74, of the more than 2,000 hectares of land that today grows everything from wheat and canola to peas and alfalfa, as well as raising cattle. “Today, my brother Dallas and I are still actively farming, along with our two sons.”
The two were a team both on the farm and raising their kids. Leona became famed for her quilting and cooking.
“She taught me a lot about Danish baking,” says Jackie’s wife, Janice. Like so many others who settled in the area, the Jensens were of Danish descent.
“She was such a good cook and they were such good, honest people.”
Along with drinking only socially, staying active by working on their farm and, in Elmer’s case, quitting smoking in his 30s, longtime friend Alan Larsen says their secret to longevity came from their faith.
“I’m not sure what their secret was, but I think they would say it was their faith in God,” says Larsen, who has known the Jensen family since he was a child and today is the mayor of the village with a population of 400. “Their commitment to so many causes was also incredible — they were true pillars of the community.”
Along with involvement in such organizations as the Homeschool Association, the Farmers’ Union, Lions Club and the Standard’s Nazareth Lutheran Church, Elmer also served in the 1980s as Standard’s mayor, a stint that lasted 13 years.
His parents’ greatest honour, says Jackie, came in 1966 when they won the Master Farm Family Award for southern Alberta, which recognizes both good agricultural practices and community spirit.
“There were two things they taught us to do very well,” says Jackie. “Work hard and believe in the Lord.”
“Considering everything, we’ve had a pretty good life,” Elmer told a reporter for the Strathmore Times newspaper in 2015. The couple spent their last few years in the town’s Sagewood Senior Community.
“I feel like it is important for people to do what they want to do,” he added, “and to have an occupation that they enjoy doing.”
On Saturday, the couple will be laid to rest in a ceremony attended by their four children, six grandchildren, 10 greatgrandchildren, large extended family and friends. “We’re expecting between 500 and 600 people,” says Jackie of the church service that will also be available on video at the local community hall.
“They had a big impact on a whole lot of people.”