Floyd Gift
Floyd Dale Gift Jr., age 60, passed away on July 31, 2023, in Holyoke.
Floyd, aka “Junior,” as he was called by family, was born Sept. 3, 1962, in Garden City, Kansas, to parents Floyd and Mary Lou Gift. He spent his younger years in Kansas in Garden City and Logan. His grandparents, Walter and Leola Ross, lived in Liberal, Kansas, on the farm. Many memories, summers and holidays were spent there by all of the family learning to work on the farm, getting served great food made by Grandma Ross and making memories.
When he was a sophomore in high school, the family moved to Wills Point, Texas. There he played football and was in FFA, raising chickens. His siblings say that Grandma Gift would make them eat his chickens and help prep them before dinner. They would refuse to eat dinner if they knew it was one of Junior’s FFA chickens; his mom would simply say, “Then you don’t get to eat.”
He graduated from Wills Point High School. Then he moved to Liberal, where he worked and also helped on the farm and met Esther Comstock. They were married within the year, then Alana came along, and again they headed back to Texas. Floyd began to do some local trucking when he got back to Texas and then started long-haul trucking.
All over the states he would travel, calling the kids to tell them which state he had been to that week, or sending postcards of the places he had been. Justin came four years after Alana and kept everybody busy, always asking questions. Life happens, and Esther and Floyd divorced. He stayed in Texas and continued to long-haul truck.
Years later a coworker of his said, “You should meet my sister,” and that is how Donna Pinner and Staci came into his life. He and Donna were married and all settled down in Phalba, Texas, for the next few years. Justin and Alana would come every summer and spend the time with Floyd, Donna and Staci. They always took a long camping trip all over Texas, each year to a different place that was planned out by Donna, spending time out at the lake swimming, or one summer having a boat to ride around the lake.
Logan was born years later, and the family welcomed another sibling to the bunch. Paul, Floyd’s brother, had moved to Holyoke, and in 2000 the family went up to visit, and Floyd fell in love. He was tired of being on the road, not sleeping in his own bed, and wanted to be in a small town where he could raise his children. He moved up to Holyoke without the family and worked for a few months and then drove down to Texas to bring everyone to their new home.
He worked driving truck and operating a sprayer. He continued doing these jobs up until he was no longer able to. Again, life happened; he and Donna divorced, but he remained in Holyoke because it felt like home and it had become his home.
He met two amazing women later who passed all too soon from the same disease that took him. One was Liana Wanczyk, and from this relationship, he gained emotionally adopted daughter Krystyna Wanczyk.
After Liana passed, he met Kate Sumners and emotionally adopted four more to add to the pack: Taylor, Lauren, Ben and Phoebe the dog. Kate herself fell in love with Holyoke and moved there. Though they never lived in the same house, they lived two blocks away from each other. You would find either one usually at the other one’s house.
When he wasn’t at work, you would find him drinking a cold drink and most likely next to his grill. Low and slow, he’d say, using the same grill he’d had for 30-plus years. If you asked him, it was well seasoned; if you ask anyone else, they would say rust.
Once he was given a train game for his computer, and it became a love of his. He would sit there and drive a train, getting a new train game every couple of years to upgrade. He even got a keyboard that looks like the inside of a train to control the game.
He loved to read or listen to books; he had a whole wall of books in his house. He enjoyed watching TV and watching cooking shows, westerns or anything about history.
His children have so many memories of being in the kitchen with him making homemade pizza, having to stop at historical markers on road trips, drives to Texas to visit Grandma and Grandpa, and being packed in the car making memories. He taught all his kids to work hard and how to cook. He loved to not use a recipe and just glance at one and make his own thing. This didn’t always turn out as he thought, but 99% of the time it did.
He loved music and always had music playing in the truck, at home, in the sprayer. It was common to not get a text from him but a song he had heard, and he would send the YouTube video with no other context but the song.
He loved to travel and be on the open road. Hammer down, he would say when heading out or when you were headed toward him on a long drive. Even after stopping long-haul trucking, he still loved to drive. He would drive to Texas, Oregon, Utah, all over Colorado, to have family visit with siblings or with his children. He drove from Holyoke to the Oregon coast one time just to stand on the beach to hear the ocean and feel the breeze.
Floyd was known for his hard work, his smile, his barbecue and jokes. He loved his children, his grandchildren, family and his puppy. Some of his children even say the dog was his favorite child. It was not hard to have a smile when talking with him because he always had something to say that usually ended in a punch line.
Floyd is survived by his daughters, Alana (John) Wolever of Sidney, Nebraska, and Staci (David) Foos of Sterling; his sons, Justin (Adrienne) Gift of Rockwall, Texas, and Logan (Meagan) Gift of Sterling; grandkids, Paige, Harper, Tymberlie, Taryn, Austin, Oaklee and one more on the way; siblings, Paul (Sheila) Gift of Holyoke, Janice (Kory) Aoyama of Plano, Texas, Jenifer (Mitch) White of Indianapolis, Indiana, Chuck (Carolyn) Gift of Terrell, Texas, and Mark (Kristi) Gift of Wills Point, Texas; and numerous nieces and nephews, who he always gave ornery advice to, and their parents knew exactly who it came from — Uncle Junior.
He was preceded in death by his parents, Floyd Gift Sr. and Mary Lou Gift, and sister Vicki Bowyer.
A memorial service is scheduled for Friday, Aug. 18, at 5 p.m. at the Phillips County Event Center. All are welcome to attend and celebrate Floyd’s life. The family would like to thank friends, coworkers and neighbors for all the love and support, especially in the last few years.
Baucke Funeral Home is directing the service.