Urval S. Warner, 100
Urval S. Warner passed away Friday, July 27, 2007. For the past month he was a resident of the Colonial Manor Nursing Home in Whitefish where he touched the heart strings of many assisting him.
He was born in Peabody, Mass., on Nov. 10, 1906. Urval was the one of eight children born to Gilbert and Mae Warner. He moved with his parents to the Manchester community near Great Falls in 1910.
He began his working career in his grade school years. Urval married Alice Nelson on March 4, 1928, in Manchester. He worked on a large ranch farming and hauling hay until a job of working on road construction in the Nyack area enticed him to move his family to Nyack in 1931. When they moved, he drove a team of horses and wagon from Great Falls to Nyack.
Two years later they moved to Columbia Falls where he did more road construction and hauled logs for several years and raised his family. In 1956 they moved to a farm in the LaSalle community where he continued to raise crops and farmed through the age of 100 years young, with the assistance and love of his son, Will.
In the '60s, for a few years, he was also a popular school bus driver on a route for contractor, Hank Larkin.
His dedicated, loving wife, Alice, preceded him in death in 1988.
Urval did not know the meaning of retirement; it was never a word in his vocabulary. The family believes his work ethic was a driving force in his longevity.
Urval is survived by two sons, Will Warner of Columbia Falls, and Pat Warner and wife, Yvonne, of Kalispell; sister, Faye Reeves of Columbia Falls, sisters-in-law, Mary Turnquist of Salt Lake City, and Jeanne Warner of Columbia Falls; grandchildren, Peggy and Bill Hoppe, Cathy and Chuck Loucks, Julie and Don Hanson, and Mike Warner; seven great-grandchildren; five great-great-grandchildren; and many nieces and nephews.
A graveside service will be held at 10 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 2, at Woodlawn Cemetery in Columbia Falls. Rev. David Kauffman will officiate.
Arrangements are with the Columbia Mortuary in Columbia Falls.