| Graduation Year | Class of 1953 |
| Date of Passing | Nov 13, 2015 |
| About | Doris Madalyn Wallace died November 13, 2015, at her home in Piketon, Ohio. She was 80. Born and raised in Pike County to Tom and Pauline Smith, Doris married Selby Wallace on June 27, 1953, just a few months after graduating from Piketon High School as her class’ valedictorian. The newlyweds moved to Dayton, then lived in Newport News, Virginia, after Selby was drafted into the Army and stationed at Fort Eustis. The Korean War separated the previously inseparable high-school sweethearts, at least temporarily, and Doris moved back to Pike County during Selby’s deployment overseas to Korea. Once the war ended, the reunited couple moved to the Dayton area, living in Englewood and Clayton. Doris worked for the Community Chest and TWA before becoming pregnant in 1965. After her son, Lewis, was born in 1966, she focused on raising him and helping out with various school activities. She returned to the workforce in the early ‘80s, working for Mumma & Mescher, CPA, then spending 15 years doing community relations for the Montgomery County Board of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities. She retired in May 1999. While living in the Dayton area, Doris and Selby became members of Riverdale Church of Christ, which later became Turner Road Church of Christ. They made lifelong friends in the church, where they helped out in the nursery and ran the food pantry, among other things. They left the Dayton area in 2003 and returned to Pike County, building a beautiful log home in Elm Grove. Throughout her life, Doris was an avid reader and a lover of animals and the outdoors. She enjoyed cooking, gardening and watching (and feeding) birds – especially the beloved hummingbirds that buzzed her front porch. She volunteered at the Pike County Heritage Museum, proudly worked at the polls each year, and prepared the bulletin for the Elm Grove Church of Christ, the hometown congregation she and Selby returned to when they came back to southern Ohio. Doris was preceded in death by her husband, Selby, in 2008; her father, Tom; and her mother and step-father, Pauline and Forrest Jordan. She is survived by her son, Lewis, and his wife, Suzanne, of San Francisco; her sister and brother-in-law, Kandace and Roger Cooper of Piketon; and many nieces, nephews, cousins, caregivers and other relatives and friends in Pike County and beyond. A viewing will be held from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday, November 17, at Botkin Hornback Funeral Home in Waverly, Ohio. A funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. Wednesday, November 18, at the funeral home, with a graveside service to follow at Smith Hill Cemetery in Piketon. All are invited to a dinner afterward at Elm Grove Church of Christ. www.botkinhornbackfuneralhomes.com |
