Inside the large and lit Vic Juba Community Theatre sat the man himself, Vic Juba.
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It was a moment for the ages, facing the theatre seats as Juba recalled
countless stories of his time in Lloydminster during an interview with Source staffers.
When it comes to volunteering and the spirit of Lloydminster, there’s no one closer to that sentiment than Juba.
Juba was born in Lavoy, Alta., and eventually made his way here to
Lloydminster answering an anonymous box ad that turned out to be Husky.
He met his wife locally in Lloydminster and has called the Border City home since 1953.
Volunteering has been something close to Juba’s heart as he’s been a member of the Lloydminster Lion’s Club for 75 years not missing a meeting.
Juba’s been involved in more initiatives than anyone I’ve ever seen, from the theatre itself to the Alberta Winter Games in 1982, to the Alberta sports council he’s done it all.
Of course, his personal claim to fame wouldn’t be any of these monumental achievements but rather a phone book.
An item of a bygone era, Lloydminster used to have a directory in the back of the Edmonton phone book. Juba and the Lions’ Club took it upon themselves to go door to door and create a local book.
He would receive a cease and desist from the Alberta Attorney General as the phone numbers were copyright of Alberta and couldn’t be used. Lloydminster residents were in an uproar before it was finally settled. There would be regional
directories to cover the area.
I learned a lot getting to sit down and chat with Juba for over an hour, but I learned more about the moment he found out the theatre would be named after him.
As I wrote about in my previous column, Juba was a driving force for the new theatre. Helping raise money for it to be a reality, he even planned the agenda for the official sod-turning of the new theatre.
During our interview he mentioned that usually to name something after someone, permission is needed. Well for Juba, it seems like they simply changed the rules to surprise him in the moment.
The moment he found out the theatre would be named after him was
profoundly emotional and even reminiscing over 20 years later it still made Juba emotional.
When I thought about writing this column and researching for it, I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. I didn’t know if I wanted to retell his life story or maybe discover a tidbit of information that wasn’t out there.
Instead, what I found was a man deeply passionate about his community who wanted to leave things a little better than how he found it. Someone who may have a hard time saying no to things and was always up for a challenge.
Without Juba I know Lloydminster wouldn’t be what it is today. He said there’s a poem, The Bridge Builder by Will Allen Dromgoole, that describes his life.
There’s a line at the end that talks about why the subject of the poem is building the bridge.
“A youth whose feet must pass this way,” the poem reads, and it was for them the bridge was being built.
I don’t think there’s something that describes Juba better; he’s always building something for the next generation to more easily walk the path he already had.
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