Allan Conway Servoss

Allan Conway Servoss was born on October 27th, 1947 in Great Falls, Montana. He was the third boy born to Evelyn Conway and George Servoss, and lived in a modest home in which he shared his bedroom with his two late older brothers, Michael and Roger. He died on May 16, 2024 at home.
Allan's love of drawing, science fiction and the ethereal stemmed from his mother while his pragmatic, man-of-few-words battalion fire chief father clearly gave him the do-it-yourself attitude. Allan drew, taught himself the guitar and enjoyed watching the heavens through whatever optics he had. He was extremely disciplined. He'd come home from teaching, be an attentive father and then go up to his studio to work. He did what he loved, and he loved in abundance.
Allan would happily talk to anyone and he enticed me, Gail, from our first meeting. I sat fascinated as he expounded on ESP, out of body possibilities, and by his obvious enthusiasm. That was our first meeting at the University of Montana, Missoula in 1968 and we were married in 1972. I guess one could say we grew up together and managed the roles we slid into. For me, he always washed the dishes before they got cold, gratefully let me do the finances and deal with technology while I delighted in his artful visions.
Throughout our marriage we'd get into heated discussions about almost anything, but his respect, love, and open-mindedness worked. (He was almost always fair.)
He was a wonderful, loving father to his children, Bria and Tanner. They will tell you that themselves.
One highlight of our married life was in 1974-1976 when we lived in Australia, free without cell phones or ties to home. We made dear friends there and returned to those carefree memories over the years.
Returning to the states, the main center of our lives was filled with our children, creating art, special music, the natural world, our friends, and each other.
I am grateful but still greedy. -Gail
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No one can see what my dad could see and that's what made him magic. No one could see through my father's eyes exactly the way he examined and painted his world, but for the compassion and spirit he instilled into his art, after which he gave us glimpses when we got to gaze at it. Besides my kindred brother, no one can understand what it's like to be raised by a man like that. And for that I am grateful because I know it is special and that I am lucky. 90% of the time he could truly see and cherish the person that I was and am. Sometimes as his daughter, usually as a fellow human sharing the earth with him - at least that's how I felt. Rarely did he ask me to change who I am or criticize the parts of me he did not appreciate (besides my tattoos and occasional piercings of course).
Space - he loved outer space probably more than anyone else I've ever met in my life. He loved it so much that when he brought out his telescope, you would probably feel like a total jerk if you declined his invitation to go outside at 11pm on a frigid night in early March or late October to look at Venus, the Andromeda galaxy, or Saturn's rings. When I was really little, he drove us out into the middle of nowhere - which is saying a lot because we already lived in the middle of nowhere - to the spot in a field where he set up his telescope, ready to show us a night when Halley's comet finally appeared like a ghost in our line of vision. He always had the contagious enthusiasm and joy of a kid. Right up until the end. I learned from a very young age to appreciate the sky under which we all share real estate, bought or born to.
From a very young age, I learned not to kill spiders, but to release them in a spot that might make me feel a little more comfortable. My dad taught me that. He taught me how to balance upon fallen timber logs in Montana, to keep going and be his "little trooper". He taught me to question everything, and especially anything that someone told me as fact.
My father demonstrated what discipline and integrity looked like - through his art career, of course, which is how most people know him - but also in how he tended his family and close friends. He has showed up on my doorstep to offer his support, love, and ideas more times than I can probably recall, just because he took his role as my dad seriously, and at all times he was there, if and when I needed him (I usually did).
My father was an oft-worried anchor in my world, and a calm place to land for his wild daughter - and after everything, he never tried to snuff out that wildness, or my loud laugh. He taught me to find humor in the most absurd places and inappropriate moments. And even when I did and kinda got in trouble for it, he would still connect with me and share a clandestine smile or mischievous laugh. From my father, I have learned to be fastidious and aware of little things that have fallen out of place, maybe to an irritating degree. My dad's bright blue eyes saw the world in a very special way - if it came down to a slightly off perspective line I was drawing or simply a feeling I was having, it was hard to get one past him. His eyes saw the details in the mess. I could feel them on me after he heard his cancer diagnosis, wondering how I was coping. He was worrying, as usual. More than anything, he wanted us all - me, my brother, and our mom - to be okay. I will say that we are trying
This list of what my dad was to me could go on and on, but what he left me with in his death is a sense of curiosity and love for the worlds that exist in our peripheral vision. To practice kindness, compassion, appreciation, and forgiveness, even when it's hard to do, maybe especially when it is. To find the things you love to do and do them with a loyal discipline and joy, because besides loving others, it might be all there is to provide meaning for us in the end. I won't say I am left feeling hunky dory, or that he is in a better place, because like my dad, I am a firm agnostic existentialist and I simply don't know that, but I hope it is the case for him, for all of us at the end of this long ride. I will say that I miss him fiercely, I am cracked to the core with sadness, that my love for my dad is almost unexplainable, and that I know so many others love him too. I feel proud knowing I'm made of some of the same magic stuff as my father, and that we got to spend so much time together on this planet. Wherever you are now, Dad, I hope you're giddily showing someone else the stars.-Bria
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My father was a searcher – of the wondrous, of the unknown, of our place in this brief flicker of eternity. He was also generous, allowing others to search with him.
I grew up listening to his ambient music drift into my bedroom from his studio space late at night as I went to sleep. This music seems profoundly apt in retrospect, reflected in his artwork that seemed to shade our world as we observed it. Those nights as I fell to sleep – amongst the sound of colored pencils brushing against art board and drifting electronic hums – I was introduced to a world of ebbs and flows, to a kind of eternal thrum. It changed how I saw the world, of my place in it. It's a small, immense thing.
My father's searching sense of wonder was one of the innumerable qualities he possessed. It was a quiet quality, inspirational to all around him, gliding unperturbed in the ever changing winds of a life. I think he was largely unaware he possessed this quality.
I will miss him deeply for the rest of my life. But I know that he is drifting along in the current beside me, along the currents of all of his family and friends. This small, immense life; this endless, wondrous search.-Tanner