For some people, it takes a force of nature to get motivated.

For others, like Bob Erickson, it took a force of nature to slow him down.

This past week, it apparently was time for Bob to come to a full halt. It was a shock to learn that Bob had died last Saturday.

Almost everyone in Webster City knew Bob in some capacity. He not only owned Foster Funeral Home, and helped families struggle through the loss of loved ones, but it seemed he was everywhere, working on projects, encouraging new people, taking care of flowers and property and serving as a volunteer for many different organizations.

For over 60 years.

I probably first met Bob when I was a child; when my family was burying family members. Like many long-time Webster City residents, I remember the original Fosters funeral home, which was a two-story home where Arch Foster carried out the grim task of embalming our loved ones. I didn’t know this then, but Bob Erickson had to be on the scene for these events.

My mother was asked by Arch Foster to repair and cane the many chairs used in that facility, chairs that we sat on as we buried my grandfather and grandmothers, aunts and uncles. At that time Bob would have been a young man, and working with Fosters connected him with countless family members. I asked him about the chairs. Some still existed when I asked. A piece of me connected then to the funeral home forever.

Bob probably knew more people than anyone else in Webster City. He has buried more friends than most of us have.

When I moved back to Webster City to run the Chamber of Commerce in 1995, Bob was one of the first people to welcome me to the job. He wore the green jacket as a Chamber Ambassador, and his positive attitude was refreshing. There was a lot of work to be done, and the Ambassadors of the day helped carry out many projects throughout the community. When I wanted to have a lighted Christmas parade, he got excited. When we held a home show, he helped set up the staging.

He had ideas, he wanted to do more, to get more things done.

He was always at the coffees, always at the ribbon cuttings, unless of course a family needed him.

The sacrifices his own family made were massive, while he comforted and cared for other families, his own family had to wait. Not because he didn’t love and care for them; but because that was the job, and he cared about this community.

That was Bob.

My last conversation wasn’t long ago. He was grateful for the new ramp at the Mulberry Center Church located at the Wilson Brewer Park, and was excited to be able to attend the historical programs. He attended ribbon cuttings for new businesses. He stopped me whenever he saw me and thanked me for my writing. He took time last month to write a card of congratulations to the Freeman-Journal staff when we won awards from the Iowa Newspaper Association.

He offered praise often, and made sure we knew he cared.

Bob was a local boy, growing up in a farming family. He lived outside of Duncombe. He knew how to work, (if you lived on a farm you had to.) He never complained much, but he liked things to be look nice. For years he took it upon himself to keep parks cleaned and trimmed bushes in areas that needed it, he wouldn’t wait for someone else to do it.

He learned how to serve at a young age. He was a former Jaycee, an organization for young men, then later women, who worked together on projects, starting as young as 18 years of age, learning leadership skills and organizing events. It’s an organization that is missing today, a group that probably was undervalued, until they were gone. They were often referred to as the Junior Chamber of Commerce.

We had that in common. We spoke the same language about volunteerism, and the bonds developed in Jaycees were important to him, as they were to me.

He followed that up with work later in the Rotary, in Kiwanis, the Chamber, The Legion, The Elks Club, the Moose Lodge, the Fair Board and Meals on Wheels and to many to list. His service to others benefitted Webster City in so many ways, it would take dozens, maybe hundreds to do as much as he accomplished during his life.

Bob worked as hard as any individual I ever knew to make things better here in Webster City. His legacy of volunteerism is important to emulate; he believed volunteering was good for a person. There are two creeds I know he believed in: the Rotary creed “Service above Self,” and the last line of the Jaycee creed: …that service to humanity is the best work of life.”

Bob didn’t just talk about it.

He lived it.

Kolleen Taylor is the community editor for the Daily Freeman Journal