“The Geo W. Derry, Sr. family - Doyle, Geo, Ardis, Alice, Duke with Janis in front. I think this was taken just before Duke and Marian were divorced - but I’m not sure what year that was. This was taken at Doyle’s house in Ft. Worth.” -from Jan
posted by Paula
Duke, Ardis, Doyle, Geo, Alice & Jan (in front of Doyle) - August 1952
“This was when everyone came home after we had moved to a 4 room apt the previous fall. Duke & Marian (she was pg with Mike) lived in Norfolk and didn’t stay overnight. It was crowded but a lot of fun. Paul was 16 months old.” -from Jan
posted by Paula
This was taken soon after their marriage which took place August 18, 1944. Ardis was 26 and Claude was 24.
posted by Paula
I heard a lot of stories that Doyle, Ardis and Duke told about their growing up years. Here are a few of them. These events took place after 1931 which is when they moved to Valentine.
1. Mom was in the hospital with phlebitis (legs packed in ice) and Daddy and the kids decided to make strawberry jam, with Daddy telling Doyle and Ardis how to do it. They thought he was so smart since he knew how to do this. What they didn’t know was he was going to the hospital and asking Mom what and how to do it.
2. Doyle was driving the car (she was 15 or 16) and a black cat started to cross her path. She backed the car up around the block so it couldn’t cross and so she wouldn’t have any bad luck.
3. Ardis and Duke were having an argument and Ardis became totally infuriated and threw the butcher knife at him. At the last second she hollered DUCK! - He did - because the knife went into the door in back of where his head had been. (Every time I heard this story, I could just see that knife moving back and forth in the door!)
4. Duke’s real name was George William Derry, Jr., and he got the nickname after they moved to Valentine. He said he was walking along, all dressed up and this man (whose name I don’t remember) saw him and asked him why he was all duded up - some how Duke came out of that.
5. When we moved to Wayne in 1939, Duke enrolled at Wayne City High School as Duke Derry. Mom didn’t find that out until it came time for graduation - at that time his name in the records was changed to his real one.
6. When they lived in Eli, there was a 1 room schoolhouse that Doyle and Ardis attended. Duke was 4 and bored - he wanted to go to school, too. He’d sneak in after school would start and the teacher would chase him out. One of the last times he got chased out she took the broom to him and hit him below his left shoulder blade. I think he was allowed back in school after that. When he was in the Army Air Corps, he had surgery on his back and the tumor that was caused by that broom hit was removed.
I never quite understood why but somehow in the transition from Eli to Valentine, he was dropped back a grade so he didn’t graduate until he was 18.
Jan (Janis Derry Burch)
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)
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