We said goodbye today to a lovely fellow from church whose life was a splendid and tremendous story.
It was a great service, and some people commented on the great photo on the program (taken by his son-in-law Peter), how it was reminiscent of old photos depicting a cocky pilot getting into his aircraft and not a senior citizen mounting a tractor to go to work. Then I learned that John's initial career choice had been pilot, until colour-blindness ruled that out for him.
John Bocock was, on a most basic level, a farmer and fellow churchgoer. I know many farmers, but what made John (and his entire family, really) stand out, was not what he did or how successfully he did it, but what he did with it.
He could be counted on to stand up at every St. Patrick's Day dinner and tell the story of how Sinn Fein came to his father's house in Ireland and banged their rifle butts on the floor to demand food and money 'for the struggle.' I believe this incident is what convinced Bocock Senior to emigrate to Canada.
John also told us how his family would never have survived their first harsh Canadian winter without the aid of nearby First Nations families, something he never stopped expressing gratitude and admiration for.
The Bobcock family was instrumental in the founding of St. Albert United Church. John, along with his brother Bill and wife Jenny, also donated the funds for our church to install a large array of solar panels in memory of Bill's late wife Phyllis. I suspect they were behind many other anonymous donations to the church or to causes the church supported, and his philanthropy in other areas was renowned throughout the area.
We held an appreciation event for John back in 2019, and I was privileged to be asked to emcee. I introduced guest after guest who expressed tremendous gratitude to John and the Bocock clan for their generosity in time, money, and advocacy in areas ranging from Indigenous reconciliation through to environmental sustainability.
It was in preparing for this event I learned John had sold 314 hectares of land at a deep discount to the University of Alberta (his alma mater) in 2008, establishing the St. Albert Research Station as well as the Bocock Chair in Agriculture and Environment.
But these are all things I learned about John - I liked him even while ignorant of his benevolence.
I appreciated how he would invite the entire church to his farm for a picnic at the end of every summer.
I liked the methodical and articulate manner in which he spoke, and the deadpan style of humor that I am sure kept many people guessing as to whether he was trying to elicit a laugh or not.
I admired his commitment to environmentalism and ethical food production, and the pragmatism behind it: “It was just sort of common sense really. If you ruin your land, crops don’t grow, and you can’t feed people.”
I laughed when I heard that two political canvassers looking for John's support thought they might make some headway by entertaining the notion that climate change wasn't real. What I wouldn't have given to be a fly on that wall!
John had a lot he could be rightfully proud of, but he maintained his humility. This probably goes back to his encounter with the Moral Rearmament folks he met in the 1950s who explained that changing the world best began with oneself, and how that prompted him to apologize and reconcile with his brother.
To think that these two could so easily have ended up estranged and instead worked and lived alongside each other for, what, six or seven decades, is simply remarkable.
Like I said at the beginning - it is a great story, but all stories must come to an end, as John's did on August 6 following illness and a stroke.
But must they?
John's daughter Rachel today expressed gratitude how, although her father had many fanciful notions in his final days (such as driving a swather while talking to her from his hospital bed), his personality and wit remained the same right up until the end.
Rachel herself is involved in policy and advocacy through Alberta Municipalities, and I can hear her father's insight, gratitude, and common-sense wisdom when she speaks.
And I know his story has inspired others, like the brother in India who heard John and Bill talk about burying the hatchet and desisted from burning each other's crops from then on.
I hope John's story continues on, echoing in the hearts and acts of people working to people a safer, kinder, simpler, and more just world. In the meantime, I am grateful to have had the chance to get a little closer to this amazing family and all their stories, if only for a little while.
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