len “Knick” Knickerbocker passed away on August 6. He was born on October 7, 1946, in Stanley, North Dakota, to Glen Morris Knickerbocker and Viola June Shoff. Knick moved to Alaska in his teens and became a master craftsman and builder.
Photo provided by Sandra Knickerbocker
He is survived by his loving family: wife, Sandra; brother, Dale; sister, Paula; children, Joe, Nick, Heath, Rainee, and Samantha; and his grandchildren, Jason, Kaylee, Josiah, Bradford, Edward, Theadore, William, Shelby, Jaycob, Brandon, Dylan, Krystal, Zackery, Jarek, and Furia Rose.
erbert “Herb” Lang passed away July 20, at the age of 95, at Alaska Regional Hospital after a brief illness.
Lang was born October 24, 1929, in Jersey City, New Jersey, orphaned at ten years old, and raised by extended family. Having dreamed of moving far away from New Jersey, at age seventeen Lang chose to attend the University of Alaska in 1947. Traveling by Greyhound bus from New Jersey to Seattle and then to Seward via Alaska steamship, he eventually arrived in Fairbanks. Lang graduated from the University of Alaska in 1951 with a degree in agriculture and animal husbandry. A highlight he often spoke of from his time at the University of Alaska was working on a reindeer farm in Sweden as an exchange student. This experience was cut short when he had to report to Fort Benning, Georgia, as a Second Lieutenant during the Korean War. During his time with the US Army, he earned his pilot’s license and later flew with the Palmer Flying Club.
Photo provided by Marianne Pfeil Lang
He met and married his first wife, Janet Lee Lamont, in 1957. The couple moved to Anchorage, where Lang worked with the Territorial Land Office. Lang became a real estate appraiser and opened his own office in downtown Anchorage days before the 1964 earthquake. The earthquake changed Alaska and his business plans. Lang formed a partnership to purchase Anchorage Sand & Gravel (AS&G) in 1965.
Over the next several decades, Lang and his business partners grew AS&G from a small family concrete and block company located on 1st Avenue in downtown Anchorage to the large operation it is today. When MDU Resources purchased the company in 1992, it had grown to include concrete ready-mix, cement, precast, rebar, soil recycling, and asphalt plants, as well as a railroad gravel operation that brought in material from Palmer.
In addition to his career at AS&G, Lang served on the Anchorage School Board, Anchorage Borough Assembly, Planning and Zoning Commission, Anchorage Port Commission, City of Anchorage Arbitration Board, and the Board of Regents for the University of Alaska. Lang also served on the boards of Alaska Pacific Bank (now Key Bank), Humana Alaska Hospital (now Alaska Regional Hospital), and the YMCA. In 1991, Lang was humbled to receive the Associated General Contractors of Alaska’s Hardhat Award. Throughout his life, Lang sustained an enthusiasm to learn, read, explore, and volunteer, all with his wit and dry sense of humor. He married Marianne Pfeil in 1994 and together they lived on Campbell Lake and enjoyed boating to her cabin in Little Jakolof Bay. They toured the world together, exploring every continent and most countries, small and large.
Lang was preceded in death by his daughter, Deborah Lang Lovs, his first wife, Janet Lee Lang, and his brother, Harry Lang. He is survived by his wife, Marianne Pfeil Lang; son, Michael H. Lang; and daughter, Cheri Lang Marston (Erin), all from Anchorage, as well as his grandson, Kyle Marston; granddaughter Brooke Ann Marston (Joshua Berg); Katelyn Lovs-Ciesynski (Jake); Kelly Lovs Bucher (Manuel); and two great grandchildren.