Francis X. Nolan
Sep 30, 2021
Francis X. Nolan Jr. died at home in Anchorage on Sept. 30, 2021.
Born in Washington, D.C., Francis spent his childhood in Japan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Oklahoma and Virginia as his parents moved for their assignments in the U.S. Air Force. He graduated from Kecoughtan High School in Hampton, Virginia, in 1966 and immediately moved to Fairbanks, where he enrolled at the University of Alaska. The following year he transferred to the New School for Social Research in New York City, where he studied poetry and psychology before realizing that Alaska was where he really wanted to be. He returned to Fairbanks and UAF.
While traveling in Mexico in 1970, Francis met another Fairbankian, Susan Reilly. They hitchhiked up the West Coast together, staying with friends, participating in demonstrations protesting the Vietnam War, and, at one point, getting involved in an actual car chase. They returned to Fairbanks, where they were married on March 26, 1972. They built a home in Goldstream Valley from logs that he cut, hauled, and peeled. That house burned to the ground in 1974, and they rebuilt on the same site.
After the completion of the second house, it was difficult to get Francis to leave the state even for a vacation. His idea of a beach getaway was ocean camping on Kachemak Bay or fishing two tides on Cook Inlet with Susan's grandfather.
Francis spent most of his career as a first responder, beginning with a summer stint on a hotshot crew fighting wildland forest fires. In the late 1970s, he was a founding member and assistant chief of the Chena Goldstream Volunteer Fire Department EMS Service, and he was part of the earliest generation of civilian paramedics in the U.S., earning his Mobile Intensive Care Paramedic certification from Daniel Freeman Memorial Hospital in 1981 and later continuing his education at the National Fire Academy. From 1983 to 1985, he was the regional training coordinator for Southern Region EMS Council. In 1985, "FX" joined the Anchorage Fire Department as a paramedic and remained with AFD for the rest of his career, rising to the rank of battalion chief and earning a reputation as a demanding and dedicated leader (and a bit of a loose cannon). As EMS training chief, he wrote grants and helped develop programs for numerous public safety improvements that benefit Anchorage residents to this day, including the municipal emergency operations center and the first automated external defibrillators on Anchorage police cars.
Resuscitation and education were FX's two greatest career interests, and for many years, he was one of Alaska's most prolific teachers of EMT, ETT and CPR courses, often enlisting his children to serve as mock patients for his practical exams. He was a co-founder and board member of the Loren Marshall Foundation, a former member of the IAFF Local 1264 executive board and bargaining committee, a trustee of the Police and Fire Medical Trust, and a thorn in the side of more than one Anchorage mayor.
After his retirement in 2007, Francis and Susan bought a sailboat, "Little Wing," and taught themselves to sail on Puget Sound. Francis became an Alaska Master Gardener and served on the board of directors for Alaska Master Gardeners Anchorage. Along with his apple and cherry trees, he had a passion for cannabis cultivation and was a longtime proponent of legalization and amnesty. He played guitar and ukulele, volunteered as a poll worker, traveled to Mexico and Hawaii to snorkel and scuba dive, and made numerous trips to visit his grandchildren in New Mexico and Wisconsin.
Professionally, Francis specialized in health and safety; personally, he was dedicated to freedom and equality, and social justice was core to his being. As a teenager, he was present at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where he witnessed Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech firsthand, and he was a longtime supporter of organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union and the Southern Poverty Law Center. He was a voracious reader and free thinker who reveled in an intellectual challenge and was delighted to see the same tendencies in his children. He loved loud music and good conversation, building and tinkering, gadgets, Kachemak Bay, cocktails, action movies, prime rib, fishing, jelly beans, popcorn and being out on the water. And oh, boy, did he hate cheese.
Francis is survived by his wife of 49 years, Susan Reilly; daughter Maia Nolan-Partnow (Seth Partnow) of Milwaukee, Wisconsin; son Galen (Geneva) of Albuquerque, New Mexico; sisters Patricia and Monica; nieces, nephews, great nieces, great nephews, brothers- and sisters-in- law; and his beloved grandchildren: Donovan, Reilly and Bruce. He was preceded in death by his parents, Francis X. "Mike" and Sara Ward Nolan; brother, Peter; parents-in-law, George and LaVerne Richard; and Buster, the best dog ever.
The family will celebrate his life and times on the first anniversary of his death, Friday, September 30 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Bayshore Clubhouse. Flat caps and FX stories are encouraged. To honor Francis' memory in the meantime, his family suggests a donation to the Southern Poverty Law Center or Special Olympics Alaska.
