Albert F LoewenHesston, KS

Albert F. Loewen was born November 2, 1925, the fifth of seven children born to Abraham S. “A.S.” and Elizabeth “Lizzie” (Fast) Loewen. (His youngest brother lived less than a day.) Albert grew up on a farm between Goessel and Lehigh, Kansas.

Albert’s family attended Springfield Krimmer Mennonite Brethren Church, about a mile north of their farm. His parents’ faith was central to their lives. Life was framed by Bible reading and prayer. His mother would sing German hymns and choruses as she worked. The brothers sang back and forth as they worked in the barn, and when the family sang on the front porch on Sunday evenings, they could be heard singing a mile away. Albert accepted Jesus as his Savior at age 19 and was baptized.

At age 6, Albert began attending Springfield Grade School,

a two-room school near the church grounds. In addition to learning reading, writing, and arithmetic, his teacher taught the students many songs. Albert later sang many of these songs for his children.

His education at Goessel High School was interrupted after three years to work on the farm during World War II—young men needed on the farm could apply for an exemption from the draft. During this time his father became sick with cancer and passed away. After returning for his senior year, Albert graduated in 1948.

After high school, Albert had several jobs. He worked as a dairy tester for several years, traveling from farm to farm to test the quality of the milk. He joined a custom cutting crew one summer, following the wheat harvest from Oklahoma to Alberta, Canada. Later that year, he entered the 1-W Alternative Service Program, working in the kitchen of General Rose Hospital in Denver during the Korean War. During his time in Denver, Albert studied accounting at the University of Denver.

After his alternative service ended, he returned to Kansas and took a position as a bookkeeper at the Crossroads Co-op in Goessel. He worked there for more than 30 years, as bookkeeping transitioned from paper to computers.

Shortly after Albert returned to Kansas, a young teacher from Hillsboro, Martha Thiessen, began working in the children’s program at his home church. He took an interest in her and asked her to attend a concert at Tabor College with him. They began seeing each other.

However, Martha had plans to spend the following year in Gulfport, Mississippi, where she had been in Voluntary Service the previous summer. Albert made several trips to Mississippi to see her. On one of those trips, he brought a ring. They were engaged one evening on the beach.

They were married on June 28, 1957, at Zoar KMB Church near Inman, Kansas, Martha’s home church. After a honeymoon to Colorado, they made their home in a small rental house in Goessel. Unable to find a suitable house to buy, they built a new house on the south edge of town. It was a race against time, but they moved in shortly before the birth of their first child.

Three children were born to their marriage: Lois, James, and Duane. Albert came home at noon each day for lunch with his family. And when he came home at the end of the day, he sometimes played with the children to allow Martha to finish preparing supper uninterrupted.

When Springfield Church closed at the end of 1960, Albert and Martha helped the young Koerner Heights Church plant get going, and attended there the rest of their lives— close to 64 years. Albert was the church treasurer as often and as long as allowed by the term limits. During the years that he was not treasurer, he was an internal auditor for the church books. He also sang in the choir, often the only tenor during the early years of the church.

After living in the house in Goessel more than twenty years, Albert and Martha built another house, this time in North Newton, in anticipation of Albert’s job moving to the North Newton branch of the Co-op.

After his job with the Co-op ended, he worked a variety of jobs, including painting, interim bookkeeping at First Baptist in Wichita, and working in the mail room at Bethel College for several years. He also had a motor delivery route for the Newton Kansan, a daily newspaper, for fifteen years.

Albert sang in the Kansas Mennonite Men’s Chorus for almost 40 years. In its early years, the group was known as the 500 Mennonite Men, after its large number of members. The chorus presented concerts in Central Kansas each spring, and some years would travel out of state to sing. Starting in the year 2000, the chorus took some extended singing tours. Martha accompanied Albert on his trips with the chorus to Europe, California, and Canada.

As Martha’s physical ability declined, Albert assumed many of her former responsibilities around the house, learning to cook, clean and bake under her instruction. He also gradually took over the care of over 60 African violets.

When Martha could no longer do it, Albert would walk the Release Time children from the school to the church for their class and back again. Then, when Martha suddenly lost strength and feeling in her legs, she required full-time nursing care. Albert lived alone, visiting Martha faithfully every afternoon, except when he was not allowed to during the pandemic of 2020-2021. During that time, they talked by telephone, sometimes several times a day.

Finally, after some health struggles of his own, he joined Martha at Schowalter Villa in Hesston in May 2023. In this setting, he did well, enjoying the food and excelling at dominos, balloon bat, and more. Hospitalizations in March and April 2024 seemed to precipitate some changes— frequent falls, a broken shoulder, and increasing weakness. He began having trouble with eating, and lost some of his fine motor control, so he could no longer enjoy the activities that once filled his time. But he maintained his faith and his sense of humor. Martha died November 1, 2024 and Albert began hospice less than two weeks later. When his flesh and his heart failed, God became his portion forever. Surrounded by loving family, Albert passed into the loving presence of his Savior on November 19, 2024.

Albert was preceded in death by his wife: his parents; brothers Bernhard (Ben), David, Peter, and infant brother Aaron; sisters Martha and Hulda; daughter-in-law Naomi Loewen, an unborn child and several unborn grandchildren. He is survived by his daughter Lois (and husband Siegfried) Snyder, sons James and Duane (and wife Kathy), 13 grandchildren, and 15 great-grandchildren.