Eris (McClellan) Waller was born on October 31, 1923 (yes, called a “little spook”) in a small house north of Zurich, Kansas (still standing, barely).
Later her family moved into Zurich where as a child she became popular one day giving candy to the other kids after “charging it” at the local grocery. Her father had quite a shock when he received the grocery bill and commenced to scolding Eris, who refused to cry because he had never scolded her mother when she charged things!
In her junior high days she lived for a period in Osborne where she met friends she remembered for a lifetime. Eris tells of the boys trying to set off the fire alarm at school without getting caught whenever they won a game. They’d run and hide when the teachers all came out. She spoke of the fun she had with her friends riding a horse-drawn cart up and down Osborne’s main street on Saturday advertising the upcoming sale at the Hoagland sale barn.
In high school, Eris learned tap dancing and then taught her sister Bonnie and cousins, Marion Renner and Bob McClellan how to tap dance.
Back in Zurich, she hopped on the “Jitney” (a short-run train that went to Salina) and attended the Brown-Mackie School of Business. The country was in the throngs of World War II and she was told it would be “good practice” to take the Civil Service Exam. She scored high and shortly thereafter received notice to report to Washington DC so she and another girl from the area traveled by train to Washington. There she clerked for various government agencies.
It was in Washington she met and was courted by her future husband, Lamont (Chuck) Waller. Chuck was very popular with the girls but the same night after meeting Eris at a nightclub known as Eddy’s he said to his friends, “That’s the girl I’m going to marry!” In the basement of Eris’s landlord, Chuck taught Eris how to Jitterbug and they were good dancers.
Eris eventually decided that clerking in Washington was not the ideal career and chose to move back to Kansas to attend Fort Hays State University. Chuck decided to come back with her so he saved cans of gasoline (rationed at the time) and stored them under his parent’s porch unbeknownst to them. Eris, Chuck, and another girl from Solomon, Kansas set out in Chuck’s 1935 Ford convertible and drove back to Kansas non-stop using the cans of gasoline stored in the car’s rumble seat.
Due to her Civil Service and Washington credentials, Eris found herself reporting for duty at the Walker Airbase east of Hays. The guard at the gate held a gun to her head wondering why she was there until she presented her papers. Eris was to report to the supply depot and was directed to a building where she heard men singing and water running and thought to herself, “what a crazy office”. Turned out she was sent to one of the men’s showers as a joke. Later that day, being one of the few to have a vehicle, she drove out of the base with the “high brass” in the car, no doubt worrying the gate guard, but she never told on him. She took her work administrating the supply depot very seriously and didn’t take any guff from the officials. She knew all the parts and pieces and recalls knowing when airmen were being sent “over there” by what equipment was being ordered for a crew.
One day Chuck sold his ’35 Ford to buy Eris a ring. They were married and honeymooned in Wichita at the Hotel Allis. The first married years were hard as Eris had a day job and Chuck a night job. Eventually Chuck got a job at the base as mechanical crew chief.
Later, Chuck built (literally) their first house in Zurich. Eris tells a story about how she had just cleaned house from top to bottom to remove all food (to keep out the mice) before they went on vacation. Chuck came in the house all cheerful carrying a package of crackers. Eris got after him and in a “short-lived marital spat” Chuck eventually threw the package of crackers down and stomped on them. But Eris always laughed when recalling the story.
Chuck started working for Eris’s father at the Chevrolet/John Deere dealership in Zurich. Ultimately Eris and Chuck bought what is now the Waller Motor Company dealership in Stockton in October of 1949. Chuck was the youngest franchised car dealer in the nation. Chuck did the selling and Eris did the bookkeeping. They were a team.
Driving was a family tradition. The kids remember fondly the Waller driving trips that took them to nearly all of the 50 states and Mexico and Canada. Eris and Chuck particularly liked going to the World’s Fairs.
Eris had a fascination for a house in town, the Coolbaugh mansion. It came up for sale and often on Main street Eris would pass the attorney, Bob Osborne, selling the house. They would hold up fingers to (jokingly) represent the 1000’s of dollars each might agree on. One day Eris put up her fingers and to her BIG surprise, Bob nodded yes! That house became Eris’s passion. For a while, it was rented as apartments sometimes occupied by Stockton teachers. It became home for Bill (the oldest son) and his family when Bill moved back to Stockton. It was the site of her daughter’s wedding reception. Then Eris got the idea to make it a museum of sorts, calling it the “Twentieth Century House” with each room furnished for different periods. Chuck grew up near the Civil War-torn Spotsylvania County, Virginia area and Eris was fond of that “Gone With the Wind” period of time (so there’s some 19th Century things in the house too).
When they retired, Chuck and Eris spent the winters in central Florida, going to Epcot and Disney World and Cypress Gardens and Universal Studios and watching the Royals farm club.
Eris was a member of the Stockton Methodist Church. She enjoyed being part of the Bellringers group there. Eris loved music and played piano and organ. She and Chuck also enjoyed playing Bridge in a Stockton Bridge club and that was a long-standing tradition even after Chuck passed.
Eris passed away in her sleep on August 14, 2018 while rehabilitating from a fall that broke her leg. She was 94. She was preceded in death by her mother and father, James and Gladys McClellan, her brother Wayne, and her husband Lamont (Chuck). She is survived by her oldest son, Bill and wife Alison of Hays with grandsons Jason and Brandon, her daughter Becky and husband Kevin of Wichita with grandson Alexander, and her youngest son Brad and wife Vicki of Stockton with grandson Drew and granddaughter Brooke, and her sister Bonnie and brother-in-law Bethel McElroy of Palco and later, Hutchinson. Eris will rest in the Stockton Cemetery, always proud to have Stockton as her home.
Funeral Services will be held at 10:30am on Monday, August 20, 2018 at the United Methodist Church in Stockton. Interment will follow at the Stockton City Cemetery in the Waller Family Mausoleum. Visitation will be from 1:00-8:00pm on Sunday at the funeral home in Stockton with family receiving friends from 5:30-6:30pm.
