Wayne Arthur Hoffart

Dec. 8, 1944 – Jan. 11, 2021

Wayne Arthur Hoffart

was born December 8th,

1944 and died aged 76 on

January 11th, 2021. The

third of Joe and Angela

Hoffart’s five children, he

was raised on a farm 3.5

miles northwest of Rugby.

The life of Wayne started

in earnest on his 5th

birthday when he started

work in the machine shop

cleaning parts in a

50-gallon drum cut in half

and filled with solvent. In

his youth he extensively

traveled the Midwest on

the Hoffart custom com-

bine crew and as an adult

he traveled the world as a

businessman. Despite a

professional life that also

included being a John

Deere repo man, a foren-

sic accountant, and im-

presario of a

small-business mini- em-

pire; Wayne remained a

farmer at heart and never

stopped measuring his

worth through physical

labor. He moved to

Browns Valley, Minnesota

in 2003 to be

close-but-not-too-close to

his parents in Fargo, and

to return to the

labor-oriented version of

himself by turning his

home into an eternal con-

struction project. Seven-

teen years of constant

exertion turned his home

into a Rube Goldberg-ian

art project tottering on the

edge of collapse that the

city, at long last, con-

demned in December

2020. His long-standing

wish was to die in his

house and take it with

him and, although not in

the way he’d envisioned,

it was granted. Wayne is

survived by his sister

Margaret; his brothers

Willie (aka Frank) and

Larry; two sons Matthew

Joseph and Sawyer Blur;

and two granddaughters

Ann and Sora who were

too young to engage in his

preferred social activity:

argument. Due to a combi-

nation of the coronavirus

and Wayne’s wishes, no

services are currently

planned. He would have

been offended by the idea

of flowers or donations on

his behalf so, if inclined,

please give to the person

or organization of your

choosing and know that

outwardly Wayne would

have huffed while inward-

ly he would have been

touched.