Obituary of Alfred Reinhold Glastetter

Alfred Reinhold Karl Glastetter was born in Mannheim, Germany on November 25, 1927 to Kurt and Rosa Glastetter. Two years later Brother Karl joined the family. Dad did well in school and was studying for his Electrician papers when he was unfortunately drafted into the war at the age of 15. Many of you have been privileged to hear his accounts of the hardships and experiences he endured during this time. Fortunately for us he was captured in Italy and spent the last year of the war as a POW where he befriended the American and Canadian soldiers. After the war he returned home at the ripe age of 18 and completed his schooling. He went to work with his father at British Petroleum and Gulf offloading the oil from the tankers to the storage tanks. During these years our dad competed competitively as a cyclist and was very proud that one of his teammates became German Champion and went on to compete in the Tour De France and other world class champions. Members of the German Olympic team were also from his Cycling club. Another passion of his was Kayaking where he competed at a national level. One of his medals is on the back table. Dad also loved getting on his motorcycle and touring Italy, France and Germany, camping wherever he stopped. Dad decided to immigrate to Canada in 1954 and landed first in Montreal and then made his way to Vancouver. He stayed with family friends from Germany and started working as a labourer for a construction company. Around this time he decided he would take carpentry as a trade and chose to attend night school so he could still keep working. In those days his English was not very good and Canada hadn't yet adopted the Metric system. Dad would go home after class, transfer the English into German, transfer the math into the metric system, do his work and then transfer everything back to English and his answers back to the Imperial system. In spite of all this, he did well and received his journeyman's papers and went on to work as a carpenter. Something you may not know about our dad is that he used to teach ballroom dancing. He was an amazing dancer and frequented the Commodore Ballroom in Vancouver. That was the place to be in those days and as you can see from the pictures around the room he was a pretty good looking young man! One night he spotted a girl across the room and wanted to ask her to dance. As he made his way over to her, his friend beat him to it so dad asked her girlfriend instead. Lucky for us that girlfriend became his dance partner for the next 56 years! Our mom was a young divorcee with a beautiful 4 year old little girl. In no time at all mom and dad were a couple and Dad was thrilled to have Kim as his new little fishing partner. Kim was sharing with me stories of her and dad spending may happy hours on the water and dad would reminisce about how hurt he was when Kim decided when she was 13 that she didn't want to go fishing anymore! He truly didn't understand why a 13 year old girl did not want to get up at 4 in the morning to go fishing! In 1960, I came along so dad decided at 6 weeks old that I was old enough to become his new fishing partner. Throughout these early year's dad worked throughout BC, building many schools and government building in very remote areas. He spent many years in the Queen Charlottes as well as other remote areas and took full advantage of the fishing and in those years the hunting. In 1966 Andrew was born and our family was complete. Dad (or mom, I'm not sure which) decided Dad needed to work closer to home so dad started a contracting company with his partner Horst. For many years in Vancouver dad and Horst built or remodeled many homes in Vancouver. Our family vacations were mostly spent camping and fishing. Dad had no problem at all taking all of us kids as well as our friends camping without the moms. I don't remember what we ate or whether or not we were showered, I do however remember having the best time ever! In the late years we spent many happy Christmases in Hawaii. Andrew turned out to be a very good soccer player so we many hours at the soccer field or attending tournaments throughout the lower mainland and Northern Washington. In 1973 we moved to Surrey and shortly thereafter dad went to work at the Compensation Board as a Carpentry instructor in the Rehab department. It took him no time at all before he was also running the welding shop as well as the machine shop. Dad loved his job at WCB and became involved I am proud to say as a shop steward. When dad retired he continued to work odd jobs for a contracting company in Surrey. Mom and Dad were on their own in Surrey, BC as Kim had moved to the Shuswap and Andrew and I were up here in Chetwynd. Mom and dad joined us here in 1997. It didn't take long for dad to find work doing carpentry and he was very happy to only have to drive 5 minutes and be able to go fishing or golfing. Dad had a hard time with being retired and soon became a commissionaire and worked for the Chetwynd RCMP as an auxiliary Jail Guard. He loved being a part of this detachment and was very proud of the long service medal he received when he retired. Most importantly dad had discovered his new social club..Murray's pub! "Table 13" as some of you know is apparently the place to be in Chetwynd! Dad's daily trips to go and pick up butter or dog food somehow always managed to land him at Murray's. I think that his little white car only knew one way to the grocery store and that was via Murray's. It's going to be hard to attend a Gray cup or Super bowl and not see dad sitting there with his Keno tickets. Dad's biggest accomplishment in his eyes was his family. Unconditional love for all of us, amazed that he had what he considered to be the most beautiful grandchildren in the world. Proud as a peacock of his eight amazing great grandchildren, he would regularly remind us of the dynasty he created. Never shy to tell us how much he loved us, and on a regular basis tell us that they all got their good looks from him. In 2007 at the age of 79, dad had bypass surgery. So began our journey for the last 6 years. I am still amazed at the strength of that little man as he endured countless procedures and tests. His strength and willpower still amaze me! On two occasions we called the family to Chetwynd as we thought dad was in his end stage. Both times, after vigils at his bedside, he would wake up and ask when he could go home. Since November dad has pretty much been housebound and the past few months have been very hard. Throughout all of this our mother has been at his side, refusing to go and get some rest even when we were there to take over. Between all of us and with the amazing help of our home support team we were able to keep him home. The morning dad passed he was finally pain free. Mom and I were at his side and I will cherish the memory forever. Fred Glastetter, a resident of Chetwynd, B.C. passed away on Tuesday, June 4, 2013 in Chetwynd, at the age of 85 years. A celebration of Fred's life was held on Wednesday, June 12, at 5:00 pm at the Royal Canadian Legion Hall in Chetwynd, B.C. Interment will be at a later date. Special Memories of Fred presented by his daughter; Angie Panoulias. Very Respectfully Reynars Funeral Home & Crematorium