Finally retired

Meyer resigns from longtime Riverview Manor maintenance position

April is volunteer month, and Dave Meyer has always enjoyed keeping himself busy through volunteering and work. After his initial retirement 24 years ago, he still needed something to do, so he became the maintenance man for Riverview Manor in Sauk Centre. Now 90, he has retired for real this time, although he is likely to continue being a familiar face as a church usher or fish fry volunteer.

Meyer moved to Sauk Centre in 1958. He started working for the Sauk Centre Veterans of Foreign Wars annual Lenten fish fries in the early 1960s, and he has continued to help with them through this year. As a former infantry clerk typist, he is a veteran himself. He was also a member of the Sauk Centre City Council, serving for two terms in the 1960s, and in those days, councilmembers were not paid.

“That was when we handled welfare in town,” Meyer said. “The last year I was on was when welfare went to Stearns County. It should’ve stayed in town where it belonged.”

Meyer also served on the Sauk Centre Fire Department for 30 years, half of that time as the fire chief. He continues to volunteer today as an usher for Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Church in Sauk Centre.

When Meyer first came to Sauk Centre, he worked for Sauk Centre Tire and Recapping, later owning it for a number of years. In 1978, he managed the club at the Sauk Centre American Legion Post 67 for four years, and then he worked for the United States Postal Service and drove a rural route for 26 years. When he retired from the USPS, he made it three months before deciding he needed to find something else to do.

And so, in December 1998, he began working for Riverview Manor.

“That just happened to be available,” Meyer said. “They needed a maintenance man there, so I got my boiler license and worked there.”

Meyer’s maintenance experience, until that point, had included four years of agricultural education in Morris, learning much of mechanics and carpentry.

For 24 years, Meyer worked from 6:30 a.m. to noon at Riverview Manor, approximately 120 hours per month. His day could involve anything – cleaning a vacated apartment, fixing a broken pipe or plugged toilet, repairing roof leaks, cleaning or doing yard work.

“It was a job where you didn’t have hours where you had to be there,” Meyer said. “If something broke down in the middle of the night, you went. If they didn’t have heat, you went over there and made sure you got it fixed.”

With the job’s time frame, Meyer did not get to meet much with the Riverview Manor residents until later in the morning.

“They didn’t really move around until the mail came, and that’s about the time I was ready to go home,” Meyer said.

When Meyer reached 90 years old, he figured he had better quit, so he resigned in March this year. From here on out, he mostly plans to take care of his home and its yard work, but otherwise, for once in a long time, he does not have much planned.