Leo J. Canjar, who died Jan. 18 at age 87, was a pipe fitter by trade but an inventor at heart, an aptitude he shared with his uncle, Matt Canjar, who designed a trigger that converted military rifles into sporting rifles.
The son of immigrants from the former Yugoslavia, he grew up with nine brothers and sisters in Globeville. He and his siblings enjoyed the rowdy company of the 17 cousins who lived within three blocks of the Canjar home.
Like other large families withstanding the Great Depression, the young Canjars lived by that era’s axiom: They made do or went without.
Leo Canjar, who earned a reputation for running over football tacklers instead of going around them when he made the 1937 All Parochial Eleven Fullback team, preferred the former.
He created innumerable ingenious devices that saved time and labor. His inventions included a bucket with a trap- door lid and bottom. He used it to clear out his well when it was clogged with debris. Another gadget simplified installing hose clamps and nozzles.
“You’d look at these intricate little machines and think, ‘How’d he think of that?”‘ son Phil Canjar said. “And these things were beautiful. He paid so much attention to detail. He filed off and sanded the edges. Everything he made looked finished.”
Almost everything. Leo Canjar once repaired a broken part on a Model T Ford with the shoelace and tongue from one of his boots. The improvisation was hardly beautiful, but it did the job.
He often drove his Model T to the mining claim that the Canjars used to own near the town of Apex. The access road was steep and tortuous. Often, the engine sputtered because the combination of incline and gravity interfered with the gas line.
So on one trip, Canjar disconnected the gas tank, repositioned it, somehow affixed it again and reconnected the gas line. Problem solved.
He was not above telling tall tales. Often, during dinner conversations, he shared stories of his experiences with the 43rd Infantry Division serving in the Pacific during World War II. He once explained that a tornado tore out most of his hair during the war, exposing an abundant forehead. His credulous daughter retold the yarn as fact at school, where she indignantly defended her father’s verisimilitude.
Canjar was a convincing prevaricator. None of his children wanted to touch their food one night after Canjar told them that the menu featured turtle. His equally innovative wife had stitched together two flank steaks, cemented by stuffing.
Survivors include his wife, Mary, of Wheat Ridge; sons Greg Canjar of Arvada, and Danny Canjar and Phil Canjar, both of Denver; daughter LouAnn “Punks” Canjar of Wheat Ridge; brother John Canjar of Denver; sisters Lu cille Stanaway of Littleton, and Mary Canjar and Margaret Braukman, both of Denver; and four grandchildren. Five siblings and two children predeceased him.
Staff writer Claire Martin can be reached at 303-820-1477 or cmartin@denverpost.com.
