Wiebe, Abram Jacob (1885-1975)

Mennonite Brethren Herald obituary: 1975 Apr 4 p. 38

Birth date: 1885 July 25

text of obituary:

ABRAM JACOB WIEBE

Abram Jacob Wiebe was born to Jacob and Tina Wiebe in Neudorf, Chortitz, South Russia, on July 25, 1888, the seventh of ten children. In 1895 his family moved north to a new settlement, Romanovka, Orenburg. Since the Wiebe house was the village's largest, he attended both school and church in his own living room. At an early age he committed himself to Jesus Christ and in 1905 he was baptized and accepted into the Mennonite Brethren Church.

The day after his father's funeral in 1910, Abram had to leave for Alternative Military Service for the Czar government. He worked in the forests near Great Anadol for three years. On his return he began to court Tina Knelsen. Her father told him not to bother with Tina: she was always sickly and could not last long. But he persisted and they were married January 19, 1914. In their 61 years together, they had seven children, 28 grandchildren, and 18 great-grandchildren. He often said, "Tina was well worth bothering with."

When World War I broke out he was drafted back into the service and worked as a forester for almost four years. In 1917 he returned to his family and attempted to make a living as a farmer. Out of political anarchy came the starvation of 1921 and the hard years of the 1920's. By 1929 they were desperate and so joined thousands of other Mennonites fleeing to Moscow in an attempt to leave the Soviet Union. On December 1 they were shipped out to Germany.

After several months in the Mennonite refugee camp in Germany, they were permitted to go to Canada, arriving in February, 1930. In May, they moved to Kelstern, Sask. and two years later to Speedwell, where he homesteaded the only farm he ever owned. Despite the hard work homesteading in rocky bushland, he sometimes said that the Speedwell years were the best of his life. In 1947 he moved to Coaldale, Alta., where he lived the last 28 years of his life.

The family remembers many things about their father - how hard he worked, how he loved to sing, how he loved to travel and visit his children and grandchildren, his curiosity, his long illnesses, his patience in suffering and pain, his faith in God, and his study of his Bible, underlined and marked on every page. He lived 86 years and seven months.

The funeral service was conducted on March 1 in the Coaldale Mennonite Brethren Church, with Pastor Rudy Heidebrecht and Nick Reimer speaking.