Al Boyd medalled for years of community service

Alan Boyd received his Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal during the Rotary Club of 100 Mile House Seniors Dinner on Dec. 1. Cariboo-Chilcotin MLA Donna Barnett, who nominated him, made the presentation after reading a lengthy list of Al’s accomplishments.

 

When Alan Boyd received his Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal from Cariboo-Chilcotin MLA Donna Barnett at the Rotary Club’s Seniors Dinner on Dec. 1, he was first of all surprised and then humbled by the experience.

 “I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. I do like helping and it has its own rewards. It’s a great honour and, hopefully, I am worthy of it.”

 The medal commemorates the 60th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II’s accession to the British throne and it honours the significant achievements and contributions of Canadians.

 Donna, who nominated him for the award, read a lengthy list of volunteer contributions Al has made over the years.

 Indeed, Al helped with everything from serving as a Cariboo Regional District director in the 1970s and ’80s to building outhouses for the Watch Lake/North Green Lake Volunteer Fire Department fire hall this year.

 There were too many contributions Al has made over the years to be listed here, so suffice it to note he was elected as Citizen of the Year in 1999.

 Al says he first came to the South Cariboo in the summer of 1951 to stay with his older sister, Sheila, who had just married Jim McMillan. He was 12 years old at the time and his brother, Ian, was six.

 Their mother had passed on the previous year and the boys went to Canim Lake to be with Sheila who was cooking at a camp for some of Jim’s logging crew. Jim and Glenn McMillan were contracting for the Jens Brothers at the Rocky Point sawmill.

 Al’s job was to pack water and wood, help his sister with the cooking chores and “keep Ian out of harm’s way.”

 At the end of the summer, the boys went back to North Vancouver.

 After graduating in 1956, Al got a call from Jim and was asked to come up and help out. He worked in Jim’s shop in Lone Butte and did minor repairs and lube jobs on the logging trucks at night.

 “That job didn’t last too long – about to Christmas, and then they needed me out at the bush mill in the Drury Lake area. I started by piling lumber and did just about everything over the years.”

 Then he ran a fork lift at the planer mill in Lone Butte in the fall of ’57, went back to the Coast during spring break-up in 1958 and then came back that July and worked for Jim and Glenn for the next 21-and-a-half years – until they sold out to Ainsworth.

 Al married Janet on June 24, 1961 and they raised three children in Lone Butte.

 As far as community-minded volunteering goes, he says his first experience was being the leader for the 1st Lone Butte Cub Pack, which he did for two years.

 Noting the McMillans were very involved in volunteering, including work on both of the community halls, Al says he just started getting involved, too. From there, he has been involved in just about every community project in Lone Butte since 1978.

 Obviously, a glutton for punishment, Al moved into municipal politics – slowly at first in the early ’70s and then more heavily in the ’80s.

 When Alex McMillan was the Cariboo Regional District (CRD) Area G director, which covered Lac la Hache to Bridge Lake, Al was his alternate director and sat on the advisory planning committee.

 When Alex retired in 1972, Al filled in for the last six months of his term. Noting they were putting the regional district building bylaws together at the time and meeting four out of five nights during the week, Al says it was too much time away from his family, so he didn’t run for the directorship after the six months was up.

 Ten years later the CRD formed Area L by taking it out of Area G, and then Socred highways minister Alex Fraser asked Al to take on the interim leadership role.

 Al ran unsuccessfully for the seat six months later, however, he served as Area L director off and on until 1988.

 Since then, he has served the community in a variety of ways and still does today.

 As for winning the Diamond Jubilee Medal, Al says he’s a little embarrassed when he compares it to what volunteer firefighters do week in and week out at fire practices and then are on call around the clock.

 “It’s like I said to one of my friends, ‘They must be hitting the bottom of the barrel to give me one’.”

 However, Al admits he does like helping out wherever he can and adds that wouldn’t have happen without family support.

 “I have to give my wife and family a whole lot of thanks and credit for all the times I wasn’t there because I was off doing something else for the community. They have sacrificed a lot over the years, so I could do what I do.”