Mike Jensen

Mike Jensen passed away in May 2005.
Mike’s wife, Mary Canova Jensen, shares these memories with Mike’s classmates:

After graduation from BHS, Mike trained in drafting, but decided that he didn’t want to sit behind a desk all day. He knew that he loved working with his hands, but wasn’t sure yet what he wanted to do for a living. He became active in the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Days Saints and served as a missionary in Virginia. That was a happy time for him, and while he was in Virginia, he really soaked up the U.S. Bicentennial celebrations, really taking in our country’s history.

When he returned to Boulder, Mike attended the Institute of Religion at CU, which is a Mormon ward for young single adults. There he met Mary Canova and they married within 7 months. Mike remained active in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints throughout his life. They were married for 27 years and had four children, Melanie (now 30), Gavin (now 24), Allyson (now 16), and Jade (now 11). Their daughter Melanie now has an 8 month old daughter, Lily. Mary noted that their children were widely spaced because they were always receptive to God’s blessing of children in God’s timeframe.

Mike started working as a nighttime janitor at Fairview High School in his early twenties and then was promoted to shipping and receiving, and finally to maintenance where he developed carpentry skills. Over the years at BVSD he built many desks and bookcases that are still in use throughout the school district. He worked nearly 30 years for BVSD and retired at the age of 50. During this time, the Jensen family always lived in Boulder County. After his retirement, he became interested in genealogy. The Jensens were having a home built in Florida for retirement, but Mike passed away after suffering a heart attack two years after retirement, before their plans to relocate were realized.

Mike had a nice woodworking shop at his home where he built furniture; he loved to watch sports, including the Rockies and Broncos; he played on a church softball team; he took pride in maintaining a nice yard and home repairs; he bought a fixer-upper home which he resold for profit, after remodeling it himself, and adding a second story.

The Jensen family enjoyed trips to Hawaii, Santa Fe, Florida, Mt. Rushmore, California, and a wonderful trip back to Washington D.C. where he reminisced with his family about the exciting Bicentennial celebrations he had so enjoyed in 1976.

Being severely hearing impaired, Mike took great pleasure in technology. He was enormously thrilled to finally text and e-mail with ease. Mary said that if he were alive today, he would have been greatly excited to be on Facebook with his classmates, finally enjoying the opportunity to communicate without disadvantage. She said that he had lots of friends, was happy to have been mainstreamed in his education, but was quite lonely at times. He hid those feelings well, but they were a result of the isolation that deafness brought him. Throughout school, he mainly read our lips, but wasn’t able to know what was being said if he couldn’t see our faces. He felt that he sometimes missed out, though he really enjoyed people and school. Mary recalls that his good friend was Alan Jones. 

Mary remembers that Mike always helped people, whether it was building cabinets, bookcases or furniture, or bailing out their basements. She described Mike as a wonderful husband, a great Dad, a man with a sense of humor, and always industrious. His demeanor was “constant,” considering his 30 years at BVSD, his devotion to church, marriage, children, home, and woodworking where he so enjoyed working with his hands.. She said “We miss him a lot.”

Chuck Smith shares this memory with classmates:
Mike worked for years in the Boulder Valley School maintenance department. I used to see him in the mid 1990s when he came to Centaurus on a project. We talked a lot about the old days at BHS and also playing against each other in North Boulder Little League. I don’t know if he retired, but I hadn’t seen him at all the last five or six years I taught. I read his obituary, or we got notification from the district. I don’t remember which it was. Anyway, Mike was a good guy and overcame a major hearing disability during his much-too-short life.

Mary Sigley Brown remembers:
Mike was a really nice guy back in high school. Very kind and gentle, with the sweetest smile. Nice looking, too! It was very touching to speak with his wife, Mary, and learn, not surprisingly, what a terrific husband and father he was.