CHARTER PRESIDENT:
F.W. (NICK) NICKLEN
Bio
By Ardene (Perry) Lund, daughter
Nick was born and raised
in Vernon, BC. As a teenager he became involved in athletics – a
talented sprinter, he also competed in discus.
He worked at a variety of jobs before being accepted into the BC Police
Force in 1937. Nick saw duty in Vancouver and Golden before being transferred
to Revelstoke where he met Janet (Jen) Robertson. They were married on
Sept. 1, 1939.
It was after a transfer to Kamloops that Nick’s involvement with
Kinsmen began. There was no club in Kelowna when Nick and Jen were transferred
in 1942, but in April of 1944 the Kelowna Kinsmen Club received its charter
and Nick was installed as its charter president. He was also a charter
member of the Kelowna K-40 Club several years later.
By 1946 Nick and Jen had decided to put down roots in Kelowna (having
a 3-year-old daughter by now), so Nick resigned from the BC Police, worked
for various contractors, and finally as a contractor himself. In 1951,
when the building trade was slow, he joined the work force of the City
of Kelowna as a maintenance carpenter. When projects at the city were
slack, he convinced two co-workers to form a team producing the city’s
“creative decorations”.
These began
with Christmas decorations (the nativity scene still goes up at the foot
of Bernard Avenue every year) and also included the Ogopogo, which stands
next to the “Sails” today. Nick also developed a small home-based
business tying fishing flies for sporting good stores throughout the province.
He was especially thrilled to be commissioned to tie a set of flies to
be presented to Prince Phillip during the 1959 Royal Tour. Not only did
he tie the flies – he made the case too.
Nick had not lost his interest in Track and Field either. Until the late
fifties he coached young athletes in weight training, discus and shot.
It was thanks to his enthusiasm and experimentation that Kelowna boasted
one of the first “rubberized” tracks – the pole vault
and long jump runs at city park oval.
In 1978 Nick retired from his job as Purchasing Agent for the city. He
and Jen finally took their Hawaiian honeymoon, which had been postponed
the day that Germany marched into Poland and all police leave was cancelled
in anticipation of world war. In the fall of 1998, Nick lost Jen after
a lengthy illness. On June 3, 1999 he lost his third courageous battle
with leukemia.
We will miss our beloved Dad, Grandpa and Great Grandpa.