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Tim Yerigan, was a man of many words. And when he died in November of 2021, he left a special farewell for his family and community. Tim Yerigan was 57 years old when he died on November 14, 2021 from mesothelioma.
"It's a cancer that you get by breathing asbestos," said Tanya Yerigan, Tim's wife.
When we visited Tanya Yerigan and their kids in mid-December, the Yerigan household was brimming with holiday decorations, Christmas presents and photos from Tim's recent celebration of life service. Their dog Sigmund helped sort them. Tanya said, Sigmund could sense Tim's missing presence.
Tanya and Tim met in the late 80s, started dating in 2000 and got married in 2003. Tanya said that medical experts believed that Tim was exposed to asbestos in his late teens working and commercial construction projects with his dad. According to mesothelioma.com, mesotheliomas latency period, or the time between exposure and when symptoms occur is long, typically 20 years, which is directly related to the diseases poor prognosis. The website also notes that there have been reports of mesothelioma developing anywhere between 10 and 70 years after initial asbestos exposure.
Tim was a Sheriff's deputy for Yellow Medicine County for almost 30 years. He retired in February of 2019.
"I worked with Tim for 25 years," said Bill Flaten, who has been the Yellow Medicine County sheriff since 2007. "He worked here when I first started and ... my first night that I rode around in Yellow Medicine County was with Tim. And I mean, it was classic Tim. If I had to guess, that's what I think Tim's favorite part of this job was, was just being a respected person that people could get help from and ask questions to, and just a friendly face," Flaten recalled.
Tim was an avid sportsman, going hunting, fishing and spending time at the family cabin in new London. "That's a funny thing," Tim and Tanya's daughter Megan Ryder, said with a chuckle. "We didn't really like hunting with him. He was very into hunting, so when we would first go with him and he would try to teach us, ... you need to be very quiet. He was the type of guy who, you can't move a muscle, you can't make a noise. If his nose was running, ... he just lets it go and he'll wipe it later," she said.
One favorite memory of the Yerigan's youngest child, Brianna Ahrenholz, was fishing in Canada. "Of course he's with his family and he's fishing. I mean, he loves it," she said. "He never had time to fish because there was five of us kids in the boat. There's ... lines getting stuck, getting tangled, getting fish off, getting a fish unhooked. He was just like, never had time, but he enjoyed it. He always went, he was always good sport about it."
But everyone said that above all, Tim Yerigan was a family man. "It was wild when we were younger. There were five kids packed into this house and it was loud, it was noisy," remembered the Yerigan's son Garrett McCoss. "It was fun though."
McCoss is the Yerigan's second youngest child. He also went into law enforcement and attended this same school as his dad, Alexandria Community and Technical College. "I admired what he did and, I never would tell it to him because that's how his son is, but I looked up to him," McCoss said with pride. "I can't explain how much I looked up to him. At Al Tech, they have a big blue line. Everybody that graduates get to sign their name in the year they graduated. Well, they just kind of got this room done when I graduated. So me and him got sign our names next to each other."
Kayla Yerigan is the Yerigan's second oldest child. Dad has always been about family. Him and mom, ... they were the greatest love story."
And yes, Tim's wife Tanya was truly the love of his life.
What makes it extra hard is, we were everything to each other," Tanya said. "Se were husband and wife, but we were best friends, we were confidants, we were business partners, we were parents together. There wasn't anything we weren't to each other."
After Family, the other thing people agreed on was that Tim was a talker. "I'd like to say we are very private. We're not very public people," said Ryder. "He was. He loved talking to people. He was the talker. He would walk into a store and it's like the Minnesota goodbye. It would be a half hour later, 'Is dad coming? Oh, he's still talking.'"
Tim even acknowledged as much in his final farewell. He wrote his own obituary, or final love letter, to his family and community, which opened, "My life has been quite a journey. Like in life, I've got a lot to say. You all know I was never without words."
Tanya and Tim's Inspiration to write their own obituaries, their own final goodbye letters stemmed from another tragic family incident involving their son Clint.
"For years we talked about it because when our son passed away in 2006, we sat at a table for hours with friends and family trying to write an obituary. And it was beautiful. But it wasn't something that we ever wanted our kids to have to do for us because it was painful," remembered Tanya. "And we thought, you know what better way to honor them than to give them the gift of a goodbye letter."
And their kids had no idea. "I'm glad he did that, because I didn't know he did," said McCoss. "And it's special because years down the road, I can go back and I can read it whenever I want."
Tim's love letter concludes, "Remember me active. Remember my laugh, my smile and the sparkle in my eyes. When they shut for the last time, which they must have by now, I can't wait to be greeted at the gates by God. I will ask him to allow me to continue to watch over Tan, our kids and our grandkids. Once God and I are done, I will mess up Clint's hair and give him the biggest hug. Until we meet again, see you later."