The Eller Chronicles

ELLER DIES; WAS MAYOR 18 YEARS

-Asheville Times,
October 24, 1980

Former Asheville mayor Earl W. Eller, 87, died this morning at his home, 26 Lotus Place.

He served as a member of City Council from 1943 to 1969 and was mayor from 1951 to 1969.

An incorporator of the Western North Carolina Development Association in 1949, he was the first recipient of the annual J.D. Cooley Award. He also served as a director and as president of the organization from 1962 to 1965.

Active in civic and religious affairs, he served as president of the Asheville Agricultural Development Council and the N.C. League of Municipalities. He was a member of the First Baptist Church and was a former member of the board of deacons of West End Baptist Church.

He was associated with the Asheville Packing Co. and served as its president.

Active in Chamber of Commerce, he was a past president and member of the Rotary Club. He was also a member of the American Legion, the Mountain City Club, and the West Asheville Business Association and was a member of the board of directors of the YMCA.

In 1969, Eller was awarded a Certificate of Merit from the U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce, which recognized his service as mayor of Asheville. He was also made an honorary member of the Jaycees.

Born in Tracy City, Tenn., he came to Asheville in 1903 and attended Park Avenue Grammar School and graduated from Asheville High School in 1913.

He served with the Southern Railroad System from 1913 to 1921. An Army veteran of World War 1, he served with the 81st Division from 1917 to 1919.

Surviving are his wife Johanna Z. Eller; a daughter, Margaret E. Walton of Asheville; three sisters, Dorothy Thrash of Atlanta, Ga., and Alice Felmet and Kathryn Leeson of Asheville; and two grandchildren.

[J.G.E.-Note: I met and talked with Earl Eller briefly about our common name in 1978. Neither of us knew much at that time about our Eller ancestry. He said all he knew was that his parents came to Asheville from Tennessee. I have since learned that he probably traces back to Wilkes County, N.C. He was not a descendant of the Jacob Eller, Jr. line of Ellers that we often call the Buncombe Co., N.C. Ellers. His family is listed in the 1900 U.S. census for Grundy Co., TN and the 1910 census for Buncombe Co., N.C. - see below:

1900 Soundex census for Tenn. 23 39 19 64; Grundy Co., 11th Civil Dist.;
ELLER, THOMAS N., 37 yrs., b. Jan. 1863 NC;
Florence A.(W) 28 yrs b. Dec 1871 TN;
Earl W. (S) 5 yrs., b. Jul 1894;
Alice (D) 2 yrs., b. Jun 1897 TN;
NR (D) 6 mo., Nov. 1899 TN

1910 Soundex Census, Buncombe Co., N.C.
ELLER, THOMAS 48 yrs. b. NC
-Florence A. (W) 36 yrs b. TN
-Earl W. (S) 15 yrs. b. TN
-Alice M. (D) 12 yrs. b. TN
-Dorothy D. (D) 9 yrs. b. TN
-Douglas R. (S) 7 yrs. b. TN
-Thomas D. (S) 5 yrs. b. TN

Asheville Times
January 1, 1944

Earl Wilson Eller, city councilman of Asheville, head of the Asheville Packing Company, and prominent American Legionnaire, was born in Tracy City, Tenn., July 11, 1893; but life for him really began September, 1917, when he enlisted in the 81st Infantry Division for World War 1.

More than a year in combat fields of France, and then the Armistice, with Earl Eller's regiment under heavy fire in the Mouse-Argonne. Earl doesn't like to remember that 12 men of his company were killed and 45 badly wounded that last morning of World War 1. More than anything else, he hates to recall that his very best soldier buddy was killed that day, so uselessly and almost beside him.

But Earl Eller learned a lot from even the horrible days of that November 25 years ago. Above everything else he learned to understand his fellow men; and it is that sympathetic understanding that is the major guiding force in almost everything Earl Eller does...

After returning from France, Earl Eller went back to work for the railroad; but in 192 1, under the rapid changing conditions following the war, he joined his father-in-law, F. Zimmerman, owner of the Asheville Packing Company, and has been there since. Earl Eller learned the meat packing business the hard way, by doing every job in the establishment until he had mastered it. This in itself may account for the friendly, family-like impression a visitor gets at the Asheville Packing Company which Earl Eller has headed since 1936; Earl knows every job of every man in the place because he has done them all; so his understanding of the people who work for him is not based on theory; and his helpers know that Earl knows their problems...

The Asheville Packing Company, of which Mr. Eller is sole owner, is much like the man himself, important but not spectacular. It carries the unusual "Grade A" certificate of the State Health Department under whose close supervision it operates, and that means Asheville Packing Company is clean even as its boss, Earl Wilson Eller, is a clean, fine man- inside and out.