Gastineau Channel Memories

Gucker, Jack Walter & Lorena (Bergevin)

Terry Herda Gucker

Jack Walter Gucker was born on April 13, 1880, and educated in Marceline, Missouri. He lived in Spanish Honduras and owned a banana plantation before traveling to Alaska. In 1920, Mr. Gucker, a salesman, arrived in Juneau by steamship to introduce and sell Chesterfield cigarettes, Swift?s meats, S&W canned goods, Cutter shoes and Schendleys liquor to the Territory.

He met Lorena Bergevin, a nurse at Providence Hospital in Seattle while visiting a patient there. They were married in 1924, at Cordova, and they and Dr. W. W. Council and his wife all honeymooned in Cordova, where they went bear hunting with bows and arrows.

The Guckers had the first electric car in Juneau, around 1929 or 1930. They resided on the Alaska Steamship dock, at the Spickett Apartments, on Chicken Ridge and Gold Street, and had a cabin at Auke Bay. Jack W. did much hunting and fishing and moved easily in political circles. He is buried in Evergreen Cemetery.

Jack and Lorena had two sons, Jack B. and George (Jerry). Jack B. married Jeanne Clark of California and became a printer. They owned Miner Publishing Company. They have a son, John, who lives in Spokane, Washington.

After college and the Army, a year in Europe and law school, Jerry married Terry Herda of Minnesota at the Shrine of St. Therese near Juneau, where Jerry had served mass for Bishop Crimont as an altar boy. They moved to Anchorage where Jerry became an attorney and they raised three children: Eric, Rena and Kurt. Moving to Ketchikan, they had three more children, Anna, Gina and Nicholas, while Jerry practiced law. Later he became a judge for the Alaska District Court and also served as a Federal Court judge. Their six college graduates all reside in Alaska except Nicholas who lives in Seattle.

Both Jack and Jerry enjoy hunting and fishing in Alaska, the land they love.