Curt Buher’s death leaves big shoes to fill

Curt Buher was a big guy. The hole he leaves behind is big, too.

Buher, who died Dec. 20, came to town with his wife Lori in 1979 to housesit for Maxine Wyman and never left. “They knew that La Conner was where they wanted to be,” said Cathie Wyman, Maxine’s daughter-in-law and Buher’s sister.

As a clerk and driver for Nelson Lumber and as a freelance laborer, Buher grew to love construction. He started Atlas Construction in 1983 with Jim Robertson, his partner for about ten years.

Over the next 30 years, Buher and a crew of locals that included Mike Parker, Michael Graham and Marianne Meyer tackled memorable jobs. The Atlas team built the Hungry Moon building at North First and Center streets, remodeled and enlarged the Wood Merchant and participated in the renovation of Maple Hall. Residential projects included additions to John and Toni Christianson’s house on Pleasant Ridge and the Andrew Johnson farmhouse on Beaver Marsh Road, where the Buher family lived for many years.

Early on, he became a regular at the Round Table, the group of farmers who meet for coffee every Saturday at the La Conner Tavern.

“He was a nice man and he was good for the group,” said Roger Nelson, part of the table for 70 years now.

Though not a farmer, Buher enjoyed the camaraderie of men like Nelson, Herb Cram, Larry Hanson and Dean Swanson so much that family trips and events were planned around those Saturday mornings.

“Curt was a big guy with a big personality and a man of his mind and he wasn’t afraid to express his opinions,” said Swanson. “When Curt was there it was always fun.”

The Buhers began attending La Conner High School basketball games while their children Eric, Anne and Carl were in elementary school. They took up their long-time seats behind the home bench when Anne played girls basketball.

When freshman hoopster Carl contracted bacterial meningitis on Curt’s birthday in 2003, the La Conner community turned out in force. The Boy Scouts hosted a spaghetti dinner. The high school shop class built and auctioned off a playhouse. School staffers donated vacation hours so Lori Buher, then the elementary school secretary, could stay by Carl’s side during his six months at Children’s Hospital in Seattle. The whole family – plus the dedicated crew at Balance Point physical therapy – facilitated Carl’s multi-year recovery.

Carl returned to the Landy James gym as a member of the LCHS pep band in 2005 and the Buhers took up their usual seats. They attended almost every home game until the pandemic hit.

“Carl’s illness was a life changer for all of them,” said Wyman. “It put a different perspective on what’s important.”

Giving back to the community that had given them so much became a priority. Volunteering as a commissioner of Skagit Cemetery District 1 was Buher’s way to reciprocate.

For six of his 13 years on the commission, he answered calls at all hours, supporting grieving families through interment protocols, plot purchases and plot mysteries at the Pleasant Ridge cemetery.

“Often people call and say they heard that grandpa or mom had a plot, but they don’t know which one,” said commissioner Tim Goodman, who now shares call duty with Rick Anderson. “Or they say, ‘my grandma Johnson was buried in the family plot.’ Well, which Johnson?

“Curt would rely on the knowledge base in his mind, research the books and ask questions like ‘Who was your grandfather?’ ‘What was your grandmother’s maiden name?’”

“Curt made sure we buried the person in the right grave,” said Connie LeSourd, president of Kern Funeral Home. “He was always there at the drop of the hat any time we called him.”

As the cemetery’s unofficial sexton, his concern for details – correctly marking graves, adding flags to the graves of veterans for Memorial Day, arranging repairs to gravestones whose bases were crumbling – was evident daily. Buher also started the cemetery on the long journey from paper records to electronic ones.

“Curt had a great heart, great patience and left very big footprints to follow literally and figuratively,” said Goodman.

“I’m glad they moved here,” said Wyman. “Curt has done a lot for La Conner and the county.”