Obituary of Joyce Hilda Boyler

Joyce passed away on Sunday, January 29, 2017 in Regina, Saskatchewan from Alzheimer’s Dementia. She lived in the best place and best time that ever was. It did not start that well. Her father, Bernard John Peterson left Sweden in 1901 in a sail powered cargo ship, the SS Prince Oscar. He was 16 years old and did not speak English. Bernard intended to meet and work with his father and older brother. He travelled across Canada and the United States looking for them. Bernard never found them. They had gone back to Sweden. He stayed in Canada and in 1916 married Joyce’s mother, May Cousins Gedny. May had immigrated from England in 1910, allegedly, because of the poor marriage prospects there. Together they homesteaded near Gull Lake, Saskatchewan. Their first child, Joyce’s older brother Bernard, died at age 4, seven years before she was born. He died of an infection after a short illness. No medical care was available. He never saw a doctor. Antibiotics had not yet been invented. Subsequently, three girls, Mildred May, (July 3, 1919), Phylis Roberta, (May 29, 1922) and Joyce (May 21, 1928) were born in Gull Lake Saskatchewan. Surprisingly, Joyce remembered her childhood as a happy time. She lived in a one room shack on the open prairie. Her weekly bath was heated on the kitchen stove with dried cow chips. But as youngest, she got to go first. She didn’t always have to walk the miles to the one room school. Sometimes she could ride Smokey, the family horse. But, when pressed hard she could also remember the blowing dust and hunger of the depression years. Her childhood ended in 1941. The local school ended after the seventh grade. To continue, she took a job for room and board as a household servant in Swift Current, Saskatchewan. This town about 35 miles away had the closest high school. She graduated from Mount Royal High School in 1946 and moved to Regina to enter Nursing School at the Regina General Hospital. The tuition was free, but the students lived in the hospital day and night. Half their waking hours where devoted to education, the other half was pay back of pure labor. They were locked in their dorms at night. 1949 was a big year. Not only did she graduate from nursing school, she married Keith Martin Maxwell Boyler and had her first child, Lawrence John. Douglas Keith followed in 1951. At first the family lived with Joyce’s parents in a rented house. But, soon the young couple where swept along in the great post war economic boom. Within a few more years they had the first of many new houses and new cars. Keith’s talent in sales carried him through many promotions and relocations. In order, the family lived in Regina, Calgary, North Battleford, back to Regina, then Sudbury, Ontario and back to Regina again. Joyce continued to work, at times as a floor nurse, special duty nurse, office nurse, CNA instructor, and at the Sudbury Red Cross Blood Donor Clinic. In 1972, with her children grown and married and restless for more adventure, Joyce enrolled in the University of Edmonton to study Advance Practical Obstetrical Nursing. This included a stint of field training in Grand Prairie, Alberta. Following graduation, Joyce then worked for six months at the “fly in only” village of Uranium City in the very far north of Saskatchewan (Average January low temperature: -31.9C, -25.4F). There were obstetrical adventures in this very isolated community. Next year she returned home to balmy Regina to an even more stressful job as the personnel manager of the large, multi-specialty Regina Clinic. Several years later, the clinic dissolved after a protracted union dispute. Joyce then finished her career working for Dr Hunter in his family practice office. Throughout all these toils and adventures, Joyce recognized the amazing benefits brought about by technology. While her brother died without any care, Joyce delivered advanced care. While her parents never once in their lifetimes revisited their homelands or spoke to their distant families, Joyce travelled by jet to Great Britain to see her mother’s ancestral home. She communicated by Skype and face time with her far flung family and visited much of Canada, the United States and Mexico by car and plane. From cow chips, oil lamps and a shallow well to central heating, hot and cold running water and electricity, starting with so little, she clearly recognized what she had achieved and benefited from. She knew and was grateful that she lived in the best place and time that ever was. For some reason, she never liked camping. Joyce is survived by her sons Lawrence and his wife Pamela Lombard of Shippensburg, Pennsylvania and Douglas and his wife Shannon (nee Watson} of Calgary, Alberta; grandchildren Anna Hammond (husband Neil) of Winchester, Virginia, Elizabeth Hawbaker (husband Tim) and Kathrine Kallet (husband Josh) both of Medina, Ohio, Timothy Boyler (wife Angie) of Bakersfield, California, Tamara Labonte (husband Scot) of Doha, Qatar; eleven great-grandchildren; sister Mildred May Herzog of Swift Current, SK; four nieces Joanne Anderson of Regina, SK, Carol Pister Herzog of Swift Current, SK, Evelyn Rosen of Webb, ON and Penalope Phillips of Richmond Hill, ON; three nephews Randy Ehman of Craik, SK, Michael Ehman of Regina, SK and Glen McArter of Calgary, AB; friends Phylis Wise and Isabelle Warmke both of Regina, SK. Joyce was predeceased by her husband Keith, 1987, her brother Bernard Peterson, September 21, 1921, her sister, Phylis Roberta Ehman August 11, 2006.