Gordon Samuel Hermansen
Lifelong Alaska resident Gordon Samuel Hermansen died at his home in Anchorage on Wednesday, June 18, 2003, from complications resulting from a stroke. He was 74.
Funeral services will be held at 2 p.m. Sunday at Evergreen Memorial Chapel at 737 E. St. in Anchorage.
Born July 4, 1928, in Kenai to Martin and Theodora Hermansen, Mr. Hermansen grew up in Kenai. The house in which the family lived on the bluff overlooking the Kenai River is listed on the Kenai Historical Register as the Hermansen-Miller house and now is a bed and breakfast.
After moving to Anchorage in 1939, the Hermansen family lived on the edge of town, which then was the Park Strip, in a house that Martin Hermansen Sr. refurbished. It now is on the Anchorage Historical Register and a is a bed and breakfast, called the Oscar Gill House.
Mr. Hermansen trained as a plumber and was a member of the Local 367, Plumbers and Steamfitters Union for more than 50 years. He worked for Hasco Inc. for a number of years before starting his own commercial and residential plumbing service business, Hermansen Plumbing and Heating. He served in the U.S. Army and was a member of the Moose Lodge and the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
He married Frances B. LeDoux in 1951 and spent the winters in Anchorage and the summers in Cohoe commercial setnet fishing. In 1956 they homesteaded in Cohoe and Mr. Hermansen still maintained a summer home and commercial fishing business in that area on the Kenai Peninsula. In later years, he was a co-owner of Alaska Display and Retail Supply in Anchorage.
Mr. Hermansen was preceded in death by his wife, Fran, in 1994; his parents, Martin and Theodora; and his brothers, Martin and Alfred Hermansen.
He is survived by his daughter, Laura Hermansen of Anchorage; son and daughter-in-law, Martin and Karin Hermansen of Anchorage; sisters, Marie Shepard and Ella Secora of Anchorage; brother, Herman Hermansen of Cohoe; and many nieces, nephews and cousins.
Arrangements were made by Evergreen Memorial Chapel in Anchorage.