Fallon Eagle
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1943
Mrs. Ida Willis
Dies Here at Age
of Eighty-Seven
Was One of Earliest Settlers on
This Project to Which
She Came in 1905
Death came Wednesday, at the Fallon home of her daughter, Mrs. L.W.
Crehore to Mrs. Ida Willis, 87, one of the earliest settlers
on the Newlands project.
Mrs. Willis came to Nevada with her husband, the late William
Willis, from Missouri, in April, 1905. They were among the first
settlers here. They took up a homestead in the Soda Lake district
west of Fallon, before the project was completed and before water was available.
In common with the few others here at the time, they experienced difficulties
in establishing a farm, seeding, and getting the alfalfa up out of the
ground, only to have the wind blow it out or cover it with sand because
it was impossible to water it.
Abandoning the homestead a year later, they acquired raw land in
the Old River district and developed what is now known as the Whalen ranch.
Mr.
Willis died here in 1912.
WAS NATIVE
OF MICHIGAN
Mrs. Willis was a native of Michgan, where she was born Ida
Brown at Lansing, on August 30, 1856. She and Mr. Willis
were married at Chillicothe, Missouri, in May, 1877. To this union
were born seven children. She is survived by two sons, Virgil
Willis of California, and Jewell Willis of Timber, Oregon, and
by three daughters, Mrs. A.R. Straub of San Jose, Mrs. H.M. Knobloch,
a long time resident here who now makes her home in Los Angeles, and Mrs.
L.W. Crehore of Fallon.
There are thirteen grandchildren, of whom one, L.W. Crehore,
Jr., is a Japanese prisoner in the Philippines. Other grandchildren
well known here are the Misses Patty and Margaret Crehore and Mrs.
Robert Hoisington, the former Miss Harriet Knobloch, and Carl
Knobloch, all now living in Los Angeles. There are six great
grandchildren and one great, great gandchild (sic).
Mrs. Willis, a woman who reflected the true pioneer spirit,
was well known, particularly among the old timers here, as a woman of courage
and character, who, until very recent years, continued active. She was
reared in the Methodist church and Methodist funeral services are to be
held at the Roe and Kaiser chapel here."
FUNERAL SERVICES
HERE ON SUNDAY
The son Jewell Willis is expected to arrive today from Timber,
Oregon, and funeral services will be held at the Roe and Kaiser chapel
here Sunday afternoon at two o'clock.
The Rev. Lorne J. Mee of the Methodist church will officiate and
burial will be in Fallon cemetery. Pallbearers will be Percy G. Dobson,
P.A. Bailey, H.A. Pinger, E.W. Blair, Claude H. Smith and Robert O. Weede.
Mrs. H.E. Shierson will play the piano. |
