Born into a large, hardscrabble Pennsylvania Dutch family, John Zook lived in the era of hand-propelled washing machines and gas lamps.

Years later, he was in St. Joseph. For 28 years, he pushed pencils and sold life insurance. It wasn’t him.

The stress, his doctor told him, would give him a heart attack. It was one of those fork-in-the-road moments.

Mr. Zook died on Sunday at age 87. You can probably figure he didn’t die surrounded by insurance policies.

Instead, his life took a varied new path.

In World War II, he taught young men to shoot from a plane. Mr. Zook took up flying. He even secretly owned a plane, tucked safely away from the knowledge of his flying-averse wife who had lost her first husband in a plane crash.

In boyhood, Mr. Zook farmed. He bought land off Gene Field Road and started a “truck farm.” People would truck into his barn to buy sweet corn, tomatoes and green beans. He tempered his crop with fertilizer from Pennsylvania. His daughters Pam and Cindy even helped.

He loved to hunt, and raised Brittany Spaniel pups to stalk prey. When his prized bird dog was stolen, he took out a large billboard: “Sport, hunting won’t be the same without you.”

His sociable and bootstraps-nature made politics an obvious fit as a small-government, personal-responsibility Republican. He made an unsuccessful bid for state representative — “Look to Zook” — against an incumbent. He lost, but never regretted the experience.

In later years, he fell for the serene beauty of the Lake of the Ozarks. In 1978, he left St. Joseph almost on a whim.

In Theodosia, Mo., Mr. Zook sold advertising merchandise to politicians, companies and Little League teams — their names emblazoned on pens, hats and T-shirts. He only stopped selling in the last two months. Heart problems eventually wound down an active life.

“When he died, he wanted people to say ‘But he was just here.’ One day he’d be there and then he’d be gone,” daughter Cindy Harmon said.

Ahmad Safi can be reached

at ahmadsafi@npgco.com.