Alvin Decker has lived all of his seventy years in Champaign County, Illinois, near the town of Philo, except for two stretches in the service, at the end of World War II and during the Korean War. He graduated from St. Thomas parochial school and Philo Public High School. He worked on the family farm until he was twenty-one, then worked as a painter, roofer and mechanic before establishing his own farm.

He married his wife Ethel in 1955, and they have seven children. Although he turned his farm over to his two sons in 1988, he still helps at planting and harvest. A life-long member of St. Thomas Catholic Church, he has served on many school and church committees and has also served as township trustee and supervisor, county chairman of ASCS and chairman of the legislative committee of the Farm Bureau.