A Clyde man is dead following a farming accident early last week.
On April 15 at 8:20 p.m. Westlock RCMP responded to a farming fatality on a rural property near Clyde.
Along with the RCMP, roughly 15 emergency personnel from the Clyde Fire Department, Alberta Emergency Medical Services and STARS Air Ambulance were on scene to help transport Gordon Fraser to a hospital in Edmonton, but ultimately the air ambulance was not used.
“For privacy reasons, we’re just not giving out many details,” Westlock RCMP Cpl. Sandra Milner explained. “It was tragic.”
Fraser, 67, made dairy and cattle farming his life. Fraser’s entrepreneurial flare led him to a joint tree-moving venture with friends many years ago, a custom silage operation and a manure hauling business. However, Fraser is better remembered for having a passion for agriculture and being an avid Christian.
“Church was a central part of his life,” said Ken Jersch, a close family friend for more than a decade. “He was a Christian seven days a week, not just on Sunday. I’ve known him for years and years and years, and even if we were sitting around on a tailgate of a truck or sitting on bales of hay having lunch, he always said grace before we ate and he always started it by saying, ‘Let us be thankful.’ He always prayed for safety.”
Fraser was known for having unending patience, whether it was with broken machinery or offering young people the opportunity to learn how to operate heavy equipment. He provided employment to people who had limited skills and always kept his door open to friends, family and strangers.
“Their home was your home,” Jersch said. “It was always full of people and a good measure of how he touched people’s lives was that the day after he passed away, over 150 people stopped by their home to convey their condolences.”
Fraser was notorious for being a humble and down-to-earth man with an innate ability to take others under his wing and ensure their happiness, both personally and professionally.
“His vocabulary wasn’t really good,” Jersch added. “He didn’t know words like ‘no, can’t or won’t’ and his vocabulary also did not include any — and I emphasize any — profanity. I never heard that man swear once in his entire life.”
But most importantly Fraser and his wife Sharon were a team. He was a family man and would do anything for his family and friends.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to find several hundred people at the funeral tomorrow,” Jersch said last Thursday afternoon. “If 150 people stopped by the house, it’s probably a good indication many, many more than that will come to the funeral.”
Fraser, who died April 15, is survived by his wife Sharon and children (Kristy, Scott and Mark).
A two-day celebration of his life was held between April 18-19. It included a viewing at Clyde Christian Bible Church, an interment at Dungannon Cemetery and a celebration of life at the Westlock and District Community Centre.
