{"id":110946,"date":"2025-09-11T05:01:30","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T11:01:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uswps06.newsmemory.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/2025\/09\/11\/samuel-nykolayow\/?destination=northern-plains-independent"},"modified":"2025-09-11T05:05:35","modified_gmt":"2028-02-28T05:05:35","slug":"samuel-nykolayow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/2025\/09\/11\/samuel-nykolayow\/?destination=northern-plains-independent","title":{"rendered":"Samuel Nykolayow"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> Samuel \u201cSam\u201d Dean Nykolayow,  88, of Florence, Mont., passed away peacefully on Aug. 23, 2025, holding the hand of his beloved wife of 52 years, Georgietta.<br \/>\n\t  Sam was born on Feb. 19, 1937, in rural Wolf Point, Mont., to William Wasal and Barbara (Oshanek) Nykolayow. The youngest of a large farming family, Sam\u2019s early years were marked by resilience and responsibility.  With his siblings married and or drafted during World War II and Korean War, he began farming alongside his father at an early age. He attended a one-room schoolhouse  through the eighth grade, where one teacher famously  remarked that he \u201cput the mule in Samuel.\u201d<br \/>\n\t  Despite long days of work, Sam cultivated a lifelong love of reading, often staying up late with a flashlight and a good book. After graduating school, he proudly served his country as a U.S. Army radio operator in an artillery unit in Germany from 1959 to 1961. He returned home early to help his father, who passed away that same year.<br \/>\n\t  Sam\u2019s career path was as diverse as it was adventurous.  Over the years, he worked in the oilfields, ran his own dump truck business,  co-owned a feed store, managed a concrete plant for Simplot Company, and operated  precious metal and gem mines in Colorado, Minnesota  and Mexico. His industrious  spirit and willingness to take risks reflected his determination  to provide for his family and explore life\u2019s opportunities.<br \/>\n\t  On Oct. 20, 1962, Sam married  Wendy Ellen Worthington  in Fallon, Mont. Together, they welcomed two children, Deena Marie and James John, before later parting ways. On Aug. 25, 1967, he married Judy Lee Stahl and, together, they had one son, Jeffrey Sam. After  their divorce, Sam found his lifelong partner, marrying Georgietta Dachtler in 1973. The two built a life of over five decades together, filled <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"news-destination":[14],"news-source":[11],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110946"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110946"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111173,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110946\/revisions\/111173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110946"},{"taxonomy":"news-destination","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-destination?post=110946"},{"taxonomy":"news-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernplainsindependent.com\/northernplainsindependent\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-source?post=110946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}