Constance Joyce Hastings

Constance Joyce Hastings, the second of two children to Mable and Walter Barker, was born on February 8, 1933, at Red Deer, Alberta. Joyce attended Castor High School where she graduated in 1951 and worked as a telephone operator until she married Hiram Irving Hastings, a teacher, on August 20, 1955. The couple had their first child, Roxanne Irene Hastings (nee Ross Irving Hastings,) in Coronation in June 1956. They moved to Rocky Mountain House when Irving was promoted to District Superintendent of Schools. There they had their second child, Robert Walter Hastings in June 1963.

Joyce and Irving and their two children moved to Edmonton in 1966 where Irving took a position with the Government of Alberta, Dept. of Education, where he stayed until his retirement as Director of Early Childhood Education in 1986. Joyce remained a homemaker until the graduation of Robert. She then became a Library Teacher’s Aid and worked very happily with students and teachers at McKernan School in Edmonton for many years.

Aside from working at the school, Joyce’s happiest times were spent with Irving at their hobby farm near Lac La Biche, Alberta. There they built a cabin and spent much joyful time birding, recording wildflowers, keeping bees and just communing with nature. Showing Joyce and Irving’s dedication to preserving nature, they donated their land to the Nature Conservancy of Canada as a Conservation Easement.

Joyce was predeceased by her father, Walter Barker (1957); mother, Mabel Barker (1969); brother, Donald Barker (1997); and husband, Irving (2012). She is survived by her two children, Roxanne and Robert Hastings; daughter in law, Cheryl Ronan; and granddaughter, Zoe Hastings; nieces, Pamela Gabriel, Lisa Tooke, Judy Weber, and nephews, Fred, Eric and Rob Weber.

The immediate family will be holding a private memorial for Joyce at their property during the summer of 2016. Any donations can be made in her name to the Nature Conservancy of Canada.

Arrangements under the direction of Hainstock's Funeral Home & Crematorium, Edmonton, AB.