Our December 2009 Rig of The Month Driver is Dean Nagy from Arnes, Manitoba.

Dean has been driving truck for 39 years and he has been talking about semi retiring since I met him. Personally I think that Dean and his better half, Bernice, are having way too much fun to totally walk away from trucking anytime soon. The first time I met Dean and Bernice, she was on top of a ladder polishing their trademark, sixteen-sided, eight inch stainless steel stacks at the Alberta Big Rig Weekend. Always smiling and teasing each other they took home the 1st place trophy for Truck Trailer Combination that year. This past summer they took home the Peoples Choice trophy from the Alberta Big Rig Weekend.

This is Dean’s story:

I was born in Taber, Alberta, then when I was two years old, our family moved to Arnes, Manitoba. My Dad was in the Army at the time and he had bought some land close to where his sister lived so our families could be together. My Uncle Sid moved there a little later and he soon became like a second father to me. I was at his side for most of my growing years.

I grew up with farm machinery and like most farm kids, I learned to drive vehicles and operate equipment at a very early age. When I left school I worked logging with my father in the winter and worked on road construction crews in the summer.

I logged for three great winters with my Dad and I take pride in the fact that one day I heard him brag to the boss that I was the best faller he ever had. Little did he know that I was working that hard to prove a point and because I didn’t want to go back to school.

Being good had its pitfalls though, as I would fall the trees faster than they could skid them out with the little TD 6 International crawler. Dad would then give me static because I’d get way ahead and then he’d find me sitting on a stump eating peanuts.

When it got too cold Dad wasn’t allowed to have anyone working in the bush for him. Apparently that didn’t apply to family members because I can remember many times when it was 35 below and he and I would be the only ones out there working. 

One time when we were falling Dad looked up and saw a big limb coming down. He shouted to warn me and I managed to turn but it still hit me on the shoulder. It’s a good thing he yelled, I had such heavy clothing on that all I got was some bruises. Another time I was falling a tree and as it started to go I saw it was going to hit a snag on the way down. Luckily I jumped behind a tree just in time as I could easily have lost both my legs or worse, not be here to talk about it.

The most exciting time for me, back then, was in the fall just before we started logging. When the weather was just right, preferably a bit foggy, I’d go moose hunting with my Dad.

One day Dad and I and a friend, Stanley, were out hunting when we came to a bog where we found the fresh trail of a cow and calf moose. Dad and I decided to follow the trail while we had Stanley stay at the bog in case they crossed back over. My Dad had his 308 rifle and I was packing my Uncle’s little 2-22 Remington. It was not really a moose gun but it was all I had at the time.

As usual I was doing the tracking while dad followed close behind, scanning the area. We came to a spot where we could see that they had slowed down and started feeding, so we knew we were getting close. Back then one of my Dad’s favorite habits, before things got too exciting, was to stop and roll a smoke. After we stopped for the ritual smoke I started tracking again. I had only gone a few feet when I looked back just in time to see Dad raise his gun and fire. I looked to see where he was aiming and I could see the calf. Then out of the corner of my eye I saw the cow. She ran about 20 ft and then stopped so I pulled up and fired. She took several steps and stopped again. I fired once more and off she went again. This time she turned towards us and stopped just thirty to forty feet away. My dad had emptied his gun getting the calf and asked if I had any rounds left. I said no so dad knelt down and started reloading his clip. Meanwhile this big cow walked right up to us, wobbled a bit, and fell over dead.

After we skinned it out we found my little 2-22 bullet had hit the heart. It goes to show you that it’s not how big your gun is - it’s where you put it. But that’s not the end of this story. It turned out to be one of those days when you wonder where your brain was. It turned out that we had both left camp that morning without our hunting knives. We ended up having to gut that cow and calf with a two inch pocket knife. It was after dark by the time we finished and headed back to camp to get our little Ferguson tractor to skid them out. We finally got them back to camp around 11pm. That was a long day.

Another time we walked a cut line for about ten miles and never saw a darn thing. We built a camp fire, had a bite to eat, and started back out when we spotted a white tail deer with two bambies. We sunk down behind a brush pile to watch them and after about ten minutes she got wind of us and jumped in the bush with the two fawns close behind. We stood up and started walking back when dad whispered, “There’s a moose.”  It was a long ways away but this time we were both carrying 308 rifles. Dad shot and we saw the head go up so I fired and dad fired again but he just stood there. Dad said, “I think we’re shooting to low.” This time I put the cross hairs level with his back and fired and down he went. I counted off 700 paces to the moose, which was a 5 or 6 point bull, one of the best we ever got. Needless to say it was a successful day. We had left in the morning and were home again that night with a big bull moose.

Those were special days when I got to spend a lot of quality time with my Dad doing things that we both enjoyed. I guess you’d have to call them the good old days.

I got married to my first wife Gail in 1964 and in the spring of 1966 we left Manitoba and moved west to Lethbridge where I took a job with Mel’s Construction. I worked there for 2 seasons building the Trans Canada Highway and Highway 39 near Moose Jaw.

When that job ended I moved to North Vancouver but I couldn’t seem to get a good job out there because of the Union so I got mad and bought my own Service Station. I ran that for a year but didn’t care for it so I sold out and moved to Coleman, Alberta. I worked for Kaiser Coal in Sparwood until once again the union got in the road. I moved to another construction company and only worked there a short time before I got into an accident which laid me up for about three months.

It was during that time that I met my first lady truck driver. She drove a Freightliner Cabover owned by Joe’s Transport out of Pincher Creek, Alberta. I heard that they were looking for another driver so I went over and met Joe Kuipers the owner.  It was his daughter Alida who was driving the Cabover. She was so good at pulling the gears that I still tease her about it today. She is very proud of the fact she still has her Class 1.

I have to give a big thanks to Joe Kuipers. In 1968 he taught me how to drive a highway tractor. Then he had enough faith in me to put me behind the wheel of a late 1960’s Freightliner Cabover and turn me loose on the big roads and I have never looked back. Through the years I worked for Joe several times. I always stayed in touch with him and his family but sadly we lost Joe in August 2009.

About a year and a half after I started trucking I had a run driving an International cab- over pulling a 42 ft dry box hauling scrap paper down to Wisconsin and bringing new paper back to Winnipeg. It was raining heavy one afternoon, as I was on the I-694 going around Minneapolis-Saint Paul, when an empty tanker pulled out to pass me. He just got by when he lost control. I swerved to miss him and ended up doing a complete u turn before laying her over on the right side, half way in the ditch. All I got was a scratch and a bump on my head. After crawling out of my truck I found that the other driver was fine. His truck ended up jackknifed in the ditch but it had stayed upright.

For a few years there I moved around a lot, working for different companies. I worked for Paul’s Hauling out of Winnipeg for four years delivering fuel to various points in Manitoba. Then I worked for Gateway Packers in Winnipeg running south. I moved back to Alberta and went to work for Inter Mountain Transport in Calgary until they went broke. I then worked for Richardson until they went on strike and then West Can Bulk for a couple years. After that I went to work for Canadian Auto Carriers hauling cars.

It was just about that time that I decided, or I guess I should say realized, that I didn’t like driving for other people. I had always wanted to own my own truck so I bought a 74 Kenworth Cabover from my brother Bernard. My first job as an owner operator was with Mullen Trucking. From there I went to Federated Co-op in Calgary where over a six month span I had two more accidents.

The first one was with my 74 Kenworth Cabover while pulling a near empty dry box. It happened just south of Vernon B.C. where there used to be a sharp curve in the old road, up above Kalamalka lake. It was just before Christmas and there was slush on the road when I lost traction on the curve and found myself headed straight for the mountain. I managed to swing the truck back but then, as I went over the bank, I found myself staring at the lake way down below. With a death grip on the wheel and standing on the brakes I can remember thinking, “Boy that water is going to be cold...”  I went down the mountain about 150 feet and, just before the lake, the truck and trailer stopped on an old logging road.  

There was about eight thousand dollars damage to the truck that time and I got a mean bump on my butt and tore the muscle loose from my ribs. That put me in a ladies corset for a while but by the time I was healed the truck was ready to go again. 

Six months later I picked up a load of lumber in Canoe, B.C. for delivery in Calgary. It was a beautiful sunny day when, halfway between Canoe and Sicamous, I blew a left front outside tire on the trailer. It rolled me over and I ended up on my side in the middle of the road. Old timers will remember that they called that stretch Co-op Corner for years afterward. Federated Co-op decided that accident was my fault and fired me. The worse part was that Kenworth was on strike at the time meaning we couldn’t get parts for the truck so in the end that accident broke me.

I don’t know if it is just a coincidence but for some reason my accidents stopped when I stopped driving Cabovers. That last one was well over thirty years ago and I’ve been driving accident free ever since. (Yes, I’m knocking on wood.)

I moved around again from company to company six months here and two years there until I met my second wife Dianne from Delta, BC. That’s when I decided to buy my own truck again. I found an 82 W900B Kenworth Aerodyne and we hauled a reefer long enough for us to decide that it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. I drove that truck for a year and then traded it on a new 89 Kenworth W900B Aerodyne. 

In 1990 I separated from Dianne and left the truck with her. I went on to buy a James Bond Series 1990 W900L Kenworth Aerodyne. Both of these trucks were on at Cougar Freight Systems out of Manitoba. As time went on I expanded my fleet to four trucks and worked at Cougar for four years until they started paying by the mile. Once that happened I wasn’t making money so I started selling them off.  By that time both my brothers Bernard and Brad and two of my sons Dean (Lee) and Daryl had joined me at Cougar. I sold one truck to my oldest son Lee and traded another in on a 93 W900L Kenworth Aerodyne. I had that one on as a company truck and then sold it to my nephew Leon (Woody) Nagy. 

In September of 93 I started my own company, Unique Freight Systems. My brothers Bernard and Brad, all three of my sons and my sister Darlene worked with me at Unique. Darlene did the books and she was a huge help in getting the company up and running.

My son Lee was my first owner/operator and Woody, my nephew was the second. Daryl was a company driver and Dale my middle son was in dispatch. I ran Unique for thirteen years before selling out.

When I sold Unique, Woody went to work for Snowy Owl Transportation out of High River Alberta. Lee had moved to Butte, Montana where he eventually started his own trucking company. Daryl moved to Duncan, BC where he is Branch Manager for Oak Creek Golf Equipment in Duncan. Dale is now an owner/operator working with me today contracted to Snowy Owl Transportation. We all get together now and then for family re-unions but I wish it could happen more often than it does.

The most unusual load I’ve hauled were coolers out of Oklahoma. They were eighteen feet tall by fourteen feet wide. Anything I’ve hauled after that has been a piece of cake. Thank goodness we had a pole and pilot car; he saved our bacon more than a few times.

All my life I have driven fancy cars and pickups and that’s why I drive show trucks today. I never wanted to be a run of the mill kind of guy I always wanted to be different.   You know the expression, “if it doesn’t shine, it’s not mine”.  I’m always on the look out for something unique or different that looks good on my truck.

I’ve driven Freightliners, Macks, Internationals and Petes but my favorite has always been a Kenworth. I’ve often said that I bleed Kenworth from one arm and Cat from the other.

Today I drive a dressed up 2005 Kenworth W900L with a studio sleeper 550 cat programmed to 725 hp. I have always set my cat engines to my specs not Cat’s but it was easier when they were mechanical and I could do it myself. This one I had to have done through the computer. I have a 13 speed double over transmission with 336 rears and it is definitely the fastest truck I have ever had.

Bernice & I met in 2002 on Country 105 dateline out of Calgary. Before we met, Bernice ran a cafeteria at a junior high school in Calgary for fourteen years. The cute part of this story is that I had to pass her boss’s approval before she would go trucking with me. (Thanks Jo.) After we started dating Bernice took two weeks holidays to see if she could handle trucking and she has never gone back. Eleven months later we were married and she is still enjoying the truck today. She does all the phoning, paperwork and navigating thanks to GPS. It keeps her busy but she enjoys it and it sure makes my life a piece of cake without all that hassle.

I’ve always preferred running south mainly because of the good roads. Even through some of the largest U.S. cities like Dallas, Houston, L.A., Sacramento, Phoenix and Minneapolis you can do fifty to sixty MPH. Canada has good roads for the most part -except where they have decided to put lights and or stop signs on the Trans Canada. While I’m at it - we could certainly use some rest areas - they are sure few and far between up here. Clean would be nice too.

In March of 2005 we started at Snowy Owl Transportation- High River, Alberta.  The trophies we won in 2005 (with much thanks to Pro-Trucker and all the staff and our pit crew Darlene, Judy and Vickie) we did for Snowy as our appreciation. They didn’t have to hire us when they did.  Clara and Jim run a tight ship and treat the drivers like part of their extended family. As far as Dean is concerned it is the best company he has ever worked for including his own. Many thanks to the people who voted us the Peoples Choice Trophy this year; we did this one for us.

I’m one lucky man, Bernice is not afraid to get her hands dirty and she gets out and helps with the tarping and tying down as well as untying and rolling up the tarps.  I look after the engine repairs and she cleans the outside “bling-bling” but she draws the line at doing rims. She also cooks in the truck so we have lots of good meals and she is always ready to invite another trucker over to share.

Bernice: We are looking forward to taking some time off over the winter. We are going to jump in the motor home and towing the quads we’ll head south. There are many places that we’ve driven past that we want to take a closer look at. I know I will have to break Dean in slowly on this idea as this is going to be somewhat new for both of us. For years he has claimed he was semi retired but he tells a pretty good story about other things too...