Grand marshals are true Cavemen
Jay and Linda Allen pose for a portrait at the Timpanogos Cave National Monument visitor's center in American Fork Canyon on Thursday, June 11, 2015. The Allen's will be the grand marshals in this year's Steel Days parade. GRANT HINDSLEY, Daily Herald
The grand marshals of this year’s Steel Days parade are Cavemen through and through -- in several ways.
Jay Allen was born and raised in American Fork and his wife, Linda, is a long-time resident. She moved with her family to American Fork when she was a junior in high school.
“We moved here when my father got a job at the prison as the dairy manager,” Linda Allen said. “It was the best move we ever made.”
They both graduated from American Fork High School and have resided in the community since then. But they take it further. Jay Allen has taught the Cavemen at American Fork High School for 46 years and still serves as a ranger at Timpanogos Cave in American Fork Canyon, now in his 47th year.
During that time, he has conducted approximately 45,000 tours and climbed the one-and-a-half-mile trail nearly 3,100 times. Allen now serves as a Lead Ranger at the top of the caves. Between the hike and the area covered on the tours, he has done about 84,000 miles of walking and said the exercise is good.
“It keeps me young,” he said. “To me in my mind I still feel like I am 16 or 17. After a couple weeks of hiking it each summer, it doesn’t bother me at all.”
The numbers also add up in his teaching.
He estimates he has taught 15,000-20,000 students during his years in education.
“I can’t go down the street without seeing people I know,” he said. “When I work at the cave I see lots of people I taught as students.”
He started out at American Fork Junior High School teaching math and health, then health and algebra at the high school for a short time.
“My main thing was biology,” he said. “I taught human biology bioethics, and zoology/botany.”
No matter what the subject was, he had a main goal.
“The main thing was trying to get the kids interested in medicine into the health care industry,” Linda Allen said. “They learned things other than just teaching out of a book.”
Many of his students did become involved in the medical field and sometimes Allen’s family wonders why he didn’t.
“My kids curse me and say I could have been a doctor and we could have been rich,” he said.
They have four children -- two live in American Fork, one in Lehi and one in Highland. They have 16 grandchildren.
“My claim to fame is teaching my grandkids and saying ‘love you’,” he said.
He was asked to stay at AFHS until the end of the school year this May, so he could teach his last grandchild.
“Whitley always wanted to be in my class,” he said.
From the time the grandchildren were born, he made sure to tell them he loved them. They would reply “Goodie, goodie, goodie, goodie.”
From Whitley, that tradition has spread to his class members.
“It got so most of the kids in the class would say it to me,” he said.
Communicating feelings is a good thing, Linda Allen said.
“I think that is so important,” she said. “It is something that is being forgotten -- to say ‘I love you’ and ‘Thank you’.”
Jay Allen has done other work for which thanks are appropriate. He ran on city ambulances for many years and participated in numerous calls.
“I took a baby to Utah Valley,” he said. “She was a 3-month-old girl and it turned out she had spinal meningitis. I had been doing mouth-to-mouth resuscitating on her.”
That prompted concern as meningitis can be very contagious, but he did not contract the disease.
“Three years later my partner and I went to the hospital to report in,” he said. “We went to the surgical desk and they said there was a lady and a little girl who wanted to see me. The mom said ‘Jay Allen, Andrea wants to say something to you.' It was the same little girl. It made it all worth it. She called me by name and thanked me for saving her life.”
The family’s future is expected to remain pretty much as they have been.
“I actually have been teaching primary almost my whole life,” Linda Allen said. “I plan on continuing church work. I love to sing. My mom taught us to sing. I am in the choir now.”
She also plans on continuing needle work including crocheting, knitting and quilting.
Jay Allen is a little more of an outside person.
“The other big part of my life is motorcycles,” he said. “Motorcycles, fishing, gardening, hiking, camping and being outside are my life.”
Linda Allen recalled an event when Jay was riding his motorcycle. He had purchased a large orange bucket from a home improvement store and used to carry items in it on the back of his motorcycle. He happened to go to another nearby similar store, and had comments about his bucket, then given a blue one with that store’s logo as a replacement. He joked he had to be careful where he went with a particular bucket.
He has ridden two-wheeled vehicles for a long time.
“He took me on a date on his Tote Gote,” Linda Allen said.
Her feet were on pegs and she did not feel secure.
“I was a nervous wreck,” she said. “All of a sudden I am pulled off and I sprained my ankle.”
Despite that dubious start, they have been together for many years.
Jay Allen is my best friend, Renae's, brother. I have known him for 50 years! I have known
Linda since they were married! I was with Linda on the Rose Parade trip!
