Family, friends mourn man they all looked up to
By Pamela DickmanReporter-Herald Staff Writer
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A memorial for Alan Albertus rests this week on a cottonwood tree along the road where his house was destroyed in a fire last Thursday. The fire took Albertus' life. Reporter-Herald/RJ Sangosti |
Alan Albertus was tall.
And he loved freedom, the outdoors and his family.
That is how friends described, and said they will remember, the man who perished in a house fire at Carter Lake on Thursday.
 Albertus |
“He was a very tall and very slender fellow,” said Longmont resident Mark Call, estimating his friend’s height at 6 feet 6.
“I think he was tall in more than one way. He was a man people looked up to in an emotional sense as well as a physical sense.”
Albertus loved being outdoors, hunting and fishing.
He and his wife, Crystal, lived in a home at Carter Lake, surrounded by the outdoors.
Last Thursday, their home caught fire.
Investigators are still trying to determine how.
As the fire consumed the home, Albertus died inside from carbon monoxide poisoning and smoke inhalation.
The 51-year-old, whose memorial service is in Longmont today, had three children and six grandchildren.
For years, he worked as a mechanical engineer before his health forced him to retire. His career involved calibrating lab equipment to make sure it was precise or laboratory grade, said friend Tom Buchanan of Loveland.
That, Buchanan said, is how Albertus got the Web name “labgrade.”
Outside the charred remains of the Carter Lake house, those who loved Albertus placed flowers and crosses under a tree in his honor with the message: “We miss you.”
Among those flowers, a small American flag waves.
The foundation of America, freedom, was very important to Albertus, according to his friends.
He helped rally like-minded residents to form the Tyranny Response Team and was never shy to speak up on behalf of freedom, according to Buchanan.
“He was just a freedom-loving guy who believed in his rights and stood up for them,” Buchanan said. “He was a very intelligent, articulate person about how our freedoms are being taken away ... He just loved freedom. There’s no other way to explain it.”
Buchanan wrote a tribute to Albertus for his memorial service.
“I described him as a brother in arms and a brother with big arms to lean on,” Buchanan said.
“You felt like he was your brother. The world is a little sadder place.”