Derry family weblog

Jan wrote:

“This was taken in Mom & Dad’s living room after we received word that Duke had been killed on the 12th. We were in Dallas to celebrate Mom and Dad’s 60th anniversary on the 15th of October 1973.  Susan on the left with her mother, Doyle Derry Scott.  Doyle was 58 and Susan was 31.”

-Paula

From left, back row:  Bill May, Geo W.,  Melvin, Arthur (Grandpa), Melvina (Grandma) Derry

Front row:  Sandy, Madelyn (Melvin’s daughter), Altha M (Zaida Derry May’s daughter), Arthur May (Zaida’s son), Janis (Geo’s daughter), & Duke (Geo’s son)

[Edited on August 4 2008 to replace picture with higher-resolution scam. Click on the picture to see it full size.]

Paula

Thank you so much, Paula, for your work.  Some additions to previous Ardis notes…Nell and Wallace Scott are my Aunt and Uncle.  Wallace and Frank Scott are brothers.  Wallace and Claude were very good friends and also friends of Doyle and Frank while they were all stationed in Louisiana in the Air Force.  Wallace and Nell introduced Ardis and Claude to each other originally.  When Ardis died, I talked to Nell and she told me the story of taking the train from Little Rock to Oklahoma for the wedding and all the details.  It is a great story.  We laughed at how things had changed so much.  Uncle Wallace died just after Christmas in 2007 and Karen and I went to Conway, Arkansas for the funeral.  I will have to get Nell to write down the story for us.  She is 90 and looks great. 

(Susan)

Here is a picture of my parents, Jan and Ted Burch, the day after their wedding, March 17, 1957. It was taken in front of Charlotte and Truman Long’s house in Manasses.

I’ve been working on this all day and have finally succeeded in getting this site set up so that it works when you try to upload a picture. Click on the link right next to “add media”, in the bar above the box you type text into, after starting a new post.

Paula

Mom borrowed the money from Aunt Doyle to go to nursing school.  She attended the Baylor School of Nursing in Dallas/Ft. Worth.  After she graduated she joined the Army as a surgical nurse.  She was Second Lieutenant Ardis Derry.

Mom met Dad (Captain Claude Duke) in San Antonio in 1944, while she was stationed at BAMSI and he was training pilots.  Walter & Nell Scott introduced them.  Mom told me that they knew each other for four months and were engaged for two weeks.  When I went through Mom’s stuff I found her orders to transfer from San Antonio to Chickasaw, OK.  It itemized every item of clothing the army issued to her.  She thought she should pay back the money she owed Doyle before she and Dad married, but he didn’t want to wait. 

They married after she transferred. She met Dad, Walter & Nell Scott & Doyle in some town in Arkansas or Oklahoma. They made Nell loan her white suit to mom, so she could get married in white. It was too big, so they had to pin it to make it fit. I have pictures of her in her borrowed wedding suit.  It was August 18, 1944.

(Dana)

As to growing up in a depression - Daddy closed their bank in 1931 and they moved to Valentine. Daddy worked in a gas station for a while, became a county commissioner of Cherry County, and eventually got a job with the Federal Land Bank of Omaha and managed repossessed farms. He later went to work for the 1st. National Bank of Omaha and managed 365 farms for them - I think that is when we moved to Wayne in August, 1939.

Mom said that she always felt so guilty about Ardis because she couldn’t even spare a nickel to give her so she could go to the movies. Ardis knit her graduation dress (I’ve seen a picture of it and may have it but I’m not sure.) As y’all may remember, both Ardis and Doyle were beautiful hand knitters, and Doyle was also interested in weaving. She had a small hand loom and wove a beautiful shawl before Susan was born.

Doyle graduated from high school at the age of 16 and wanted to go to college but there wasn’t any money, so she worked for 2 years as typist and saved up $300 for the tuition to enter Nurse’s Training at the University of Nebraska in Omaha. She had to be 18 before she could start. She entered training September 1, 1933 and I was born at home September 4, 1933. I was kind of embarrassed because all my friends had been born in a hospital - so I asked Daddy one time why - and he said that it was a lot cheaper plus they had a good nurse and a good doctor so there was no worry… It made sense.

BTW, Granddad (Geo W. Derry) is someone to really be proud of - he was a very ethical, honorable man. He finished paying off all the people that he owed money to from the bank in Eli in 1955. When he died February 25, 1977, he was still owed money by people who had borrowed it from the bank. As you can tell, I was mighty proud of him.

Also as a point of interest - they took the last of the buildings away from Eli back in the early 50’s — but the town is still listed on all of the maps of Nebraska that I’ve seen - even the one that was published this year!

Aunt Jan

Ardis was an OR nurse and after she and Claude were married she went back on duty. After a couple of weeks she started fainting in the OR…. She was checked out and she was pg — the doctor said that he would put down that she was 6 weeks along but her reply was, “Oh, doctor, you can’t do that, I’ve only been married 3 weeks!” —- I don’t know if he did or not but she was soon separated from the Army Nurses Corp.

She really had a hard time of it clothes wise. This was 1944 and you couldn’t buy much of anything without coupons and she no real civilian clothes plus the fact she inherited Mom’s narrow feet (as I did), so not only did she have trouble getting shoes she had even more trouble finding shoes that fit her. I think she wore a 8 AAA or AAAA (I wore a 6 1/2 AAAA/AAAAAA hel)… I think (but don’t know for a fact) that all the relatives pitched in clothing coupons for her. I know Mama was worried about her and her clothes.

Aunt Jan

Ardis & Claude (married August 18, 1944) used to joke around saying that Waller and Nell went on their honeymoon with them. Yes, Doyle was there - in fact she is the only member of the family who was at each of the first marriages of us 4 kids. Doyle and her 3 kids came to Nebraska for Duke’s marriage to Marian in August 7, 1949, and she flew to DC to my wedding, March 16, 1957. Daddy couldn’t come to my wedding because he had already agreed to check cattle loans; Duke was going to fly back to DC in a Kansas Air Guard but there was some snag so he couldn’t come so Doyle came - I walked down the aisle by myself but when the minister asked who gave me away, she stood up and said she did for my mother and father. I thought that was pretty neat!

We also took her to National Airport so she could fly back to Ft. Worth - I was still in my wedding dress and veil - we walked into the terminal and a little 4 yr old girl saw us and exclaimed, “A BRIDE!” — A very favorite memory - I’ll never forget how that little girls eyes lit up.

Aunt Jan

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Paula