| Alton F. Balkman | Margaret Ann Buckner | Gary Wayne Corpier | Harold Risselala | William Walker Jr. |
By Kitty Chism
Alton F. Balkman, a highly decorated World War II Army veteran who rose to the rank of colonel in the Army National Guard before his retirement in 1974, died Monday, Sept. 11, after a nine-month battle with lung cancer.
A twin and one of four children born to a Logan County farmer and his wife, he had graduated from Paris High School, Arkansas Polytechnic College and the University of Arkansas. He had taught high school in Paris, Ark., and had aaspirations of becoming a dentist.
Then the war broke out, and he would sign up rising to battalion tank commander with the 29th infantry by the time of the invasion of France on June 6, 1944, when he was among those who landed on Omaha Beach. He was wounded twice during the advance through Normandy.
After the war he would be stationed at Camp Robinson, where he and the nursing student from Russellville he had met at Arkansas Tech and married before he was sent overseas, raised a son and daughter.
His years at Camp Robinson would be distinguished by the responsibilities he held as the ranking, on-site guard officer when the president called in the 101st Airborne Division during the Central High Crisis, according to his then public affairs officer Bill Lawson.
In the early 1970's, the colonel and his wife nurse, working together at Camp Robinson, were also pivotal in Betty Bumper's "Every Child by '74" immunization campaign, Lawson said.
"Duty, honor, courage and love for family and country. That was our father," said his son, Bob Balkman of Dallas in the eulogy at his funeral.
"He was one of a kind, greatly respected, gregarious, loved to tell stories, and a real practical joker," Lawson recalled in a telephone interview.
Before his retirement, Col. Balkman was awarded the Legion of Merit, the Army's second highest peacetime award and the Arkansas Distinguished Service Medal, the highest state medal awarded to members of the Arkansas National Guard.
For his wartime service he was awarded the Bronze Star, the Presidential Unit Citation, Croix De Gurre awarded by the French government, The Purple Heart with clusters, the Army Commendation Medal with stars and arrow head, the American Defense Medal, the Normandy Campaign Medal, Northern France Rhineland Medal, Central Europe Medal, Holland Campaign Medal and Germany Campaign Medal.
His name was also permanently inscribed on the Wall of Liberty at Cannes, France.
Col. Balkman was a graduate of basic and advanced artillery school, basic and advanced armored school, the Army Command and General Staff College, the Army Command and Management School, The Army Finance School and The Army War College.
He held the position of U.S. Property and Fiscal Officer for Arkansas from 1960-1974, appointed by The Secretary of the Army. Later that year he accepted a position with the Federal Grant Program helping nonprofits around the state until his complete retirement in 1988.
He was a member of the Methodist Church. Americn Legion Retired Officers Association. The Purple Heart Association. The 821st Tank Battalion Association, The 29th Infantry Division Assoication and Veterans of Foreign Wars.
He was preceded in death by his twin brother Austin, his sister Mildred Wright, brother John Paul and loving wife Mary Nell Balkman.
Besides his son Bob of Dallas, He is survived by his daughter, Dr. Elizabeth House of South Carolina; son-in-law, Dr. William House; daughter-in-law, Karen Balkman; and granddaughter, Kristen House.
Funeral services were held Thursday, Sept. 14 in the chapel of Griffin Leggett-Rest Hills Funeral Home, with the Rev. Miles Cook officiating. Burial with full military honors followed at Rest Hills Memorial Park.
The Times - September 21, 2001
By Jeannie Nugent
Margaret Ann BUckner was by nature a perfectionist, insisting on order, even if it wasn't a popular concept with the rest of the people in her life.
"If the ledger was a penny short, she searched until she found that penny," recalled her son Charles Buckner, owner of Buckner Appraisal Group where his mother worked as treasurer for nearly 20 years.
"She insisted on using the old, column ledgers and recorded everything in ink. It drove the accountants crazy. They wanted computer sheets to print out, and she would only keep the books by hand."
Mrs. Buckner, died Monday, Apil 17, of pancreatic cancer. She was 85.
At home as he was growing up, she had been a strict disciplinaryian who didn't hesitate to dole out punishment if needed, her son said, a fact he didn't appreciate back then but now considers the essential ground of his life.
"She led my and brother and me down a straight path and we were not allowed to deter from it," he said. "She taught us to do what you're supposed to do and do it today. She was absolutely not a procrastinaator. She wanted it done and she wanted it done now."
Despite the regimen she incorporated into her life, Mrs. Buckner was know by her friends and family as "outgoing and warm," her son said. "Mother was a great lady. Most everybody loved my mother," he added.
The great joys in her later life were her three great-grandchildren, and she grew especially close to her only geat-granddaughter Emma Margaret Buckner, who as an infant she had brought with her to the office to babysit three days a week.
In any additional spare time, traditional hobbies took a back seat to Mrs. Buckner's passion for Bridge.
"She lived to play Bridge. That was her pastime, recreation and hobby. She didn't need anything else," Buckner said.
A native of Altheimer, Mrs. BUckner moved to North Little Rock from Hazen in 1982 to be closer to her sons after her husband, Charles "Chili" Stowall Buckner, passed away. The couple met while attending Pine Bluff High School and were married in 1938.
She was a member of First United Methodist Church of North Little Rock.
She is survived by two sons and their wives, Charles and Zane Buckner and Joel K. and Debra Buckner, all of North Little Rock; one brother and his wife, Alex and Katherine Leftwich of Forrest City; six grandchildren, Charles (Trey) Buckner III, Brandy Buckner, Andrew Buckner, Collin Buckner Threash, Rebecca Wilson and Laurabeth Wilson; three great-grandchildren, Hayden Buckner, Sydney Buckner and Emma Margaret Buckner.
Funeral services were Wednesday at the North Little Rock Funeral Home Chapel with Rev. Don Nolley officiating. Burial was at Graceland Cemetery in Pine Bluff.
The family requests that memorials be made to First United Methodist Church or Arkansas Hospice, both of North Little Rock.
The Times - April 20, 2000
By Matthew Hodges
Gary Wayne Corpier, avid hunter fisherman and business man, shot from the hip, Literally. Rifel and Shotgun included.
"He was such an expert," said Peri Doubleday, his sister-in-law, "and he loved to hunt. His habits would change with the seasons. If conditions were ripe for duckhunting, he would many times be 'out of the office".
Then again, he could be: He owned the sporting goods store and firearms dealerships where he worked.
Corpier, a native of Levy who had resided in Little Rock for some time, died suddenly Sunday, April 30 of heart disease at age 58.
He was the only child of Alvin B. "Doc" Corpier, Leta Fay Bates Corpier and later Hazel Corpier, who actually raised him.
He graduated from North Little Rock High and Little Rock University, then worked for awhile for General Electric. But he always like to quim that "the definition of an entrepreneur is when you don't work for someoe else." and pursued that way of life, founding first the Razorback Shooting Shop, a local sporting goods store, and later helping to establish the Interstate Distributing Co. and Alpha Trading Co. wholesale firearms and ammunitions distributors.
Family and friends say his business was simply an extension of a great love for the outdoors that he inherited from his father and that infused his every fiber. But those were not the only qulities that defined him. Outgoing and affable, he had a droll sense of humor and a propensity to spin the most garrulous yarns.
"He was really fond of Gary Larson's "The Far Side," said Doubleday. "He owned every one of he books and loved to post copies of its off-beat cartoons around work."
But everything he did he also did with great gusto, other who knew him say. "When he like something, he liked it a lot," remarked George Ikard, a close friend who delivered the personal witness testimony at Corpier's memorial servce last Thursday. "When I would answer the phone and hear,"Ikard, my boy. Corpier, here, I knew I was in for a story. It would have a beginning, several middles and maybe we would get to an end, but you did not want to miss any of it. Doubleday agreed.
"It took Gary 30 minutes to tell a three-minute story, just to mae sure every detail was together," she recalled. "So when he started a story, you really had to get ready to live through it. Corpier served a combined 10 years in the U.S. Army including his time as a reservist. Not surprisingly, he was also a big fan of war movies and westerns, especially those that featured John Wayne. His favorite nickname for others was even "pard," and homage to the Duke's oft-repeated wranglerease.
Corpier and his wife Paula were married in 1990, settled in the Leewood neighborhood of Little Rock and were the proud owners of two dogs: Sasha and Jo-Jo. And although he had always been an outdoorsman, it wasn't until Paula came into his life that he added gardening to his crowded list of hobbies.
But hunting was Corpier's true passion. He belonged to the "Aim "n Claim" duck club in the Brewer Bottom area outside Stuttgart and went bass fishing and trapshooting with gusto. But guns were his specialty, and his knowledge and expertise were so phenomenal that several rare Colt handguns were designed and produced in accordance with Corpier's recommendation.
Ikard likes to recall the time he was trying to determine the value of one owner's collection and contacted a prominent Colt associate in Birmingham, Ala.
"When I described the items, he told me that he thought a fellow named Gary Corpier in Little Rock, Ark. had made the up. He told me to try and find Gary and ask him about the. My 'expert' referred me to the guy responsible for the items and who lived two blocks away!."
Others prefer to recall the birth day parties, barbecues, and other social events, where Corpier was invariably the one to take care of the grilling and smoking and lively banter.
And smoked turkey was his trademark, the centerpriece of countless Thanksgivings.
One particularly memorable Thanksgiving, he even tried in vain to rent a whole cafeteria to serve his fixins up to the homeless. The owners refused, arguing that it would drive away their clientele.
But that's just the way he was, said Roy and Chee-Chee Fischer, who knew Corpier for more than 40 years.
"For every annual event involving the Old Main Class of '59, he was always the first on to automatically send in $100, even on the years where he couldn't attend. Whatever the cause, he always did anything he could to help," Roy Fisher said.
"Gary had an extensive amount of people he loved and took care of," said Doubleday, pausing to keep her composure. "I really miss him," she said.
He is survived by his wife, Paula Corpier; mother-in-law, Dorothy McMillan; sister, Pamela McMillan; sister and brother-in-law, Peri and Bob Doubleday; niece Samatha McGehee; and his extended family of Louis and Betty Hoty and family, Daphne and Mike Baker, Valerie Davis and Pete and Guy Maris.
A memorial service was held Thursday, May 4, at the Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church. The family requests that memorials be made to the Humane Society of Pulaski County, 14600 Colonel Glenn Rd., Little Rock, Ar 72210
The Times - May 11, 2000
HAROLD RISSELADA
By Eunice J. Hart
As a deacon, a Sunday School teacher and a longtime greeter at the door leading into the Sunday School of Baring Cross Baptist Church, Harold "Hap" Risselada had a way of making sure people felt welcome and adored.
"He would hug the adults dnd the kids would give hm a high fie," said he wife of 50 years, Dorothy Risselada. And when he wasn't there, people noticed.
Mr. Hap is not standing outside the door so I can't go if he isn't there," Risselada said one tot told his parents after her husband got sick.
Three days before his 82nd birthday, Mr. Risselada died on Friday Dec. 26, of heart failure following complicaitons of surgery.
Born in Holland, Mich., four days after Christmas, he was the youngest of eight children of a furniture worker and a stay-at-home mother, who died when he was a teenager.
Growing up, he had lots of friends his own age, his wife said and he had wonderful tails about how "they built sail boats and sailed on Lake Michigan," instead of doing their chores, she said. "He loved to sail."
But his was also a strict family, and he also told her of dinners with all eight children, around the table there were ironically very quiet.
"The children never said a word during meals, their parents did all the talking," he told her.
After his mother died, his father made him and his sister keep house while their father was at work, she doing the cooking and he doing the cleanup, though he'd sometimes slip off and played basketball, she allowed.
He was in his early 20s when the Great Depression hit, so he joined the Civilian Conservation Corps.
"He was sent to upper Michigan where they cleared brush," his wife said.
In 1941, he joined the Army and was sent first to the Aleution Islands than to Camp Robinson as a discharge point.
His future bride was then a part of the Baptist Soldiers Center, which was like a USO for church members in the military, she said.
At the center, people would play board games with the soldiers and invite the soldiers home for dinner or to church on Sunday.
"It was real nice because you felt like the young men who came there were all Christian men," Dorothy Risselada said.
The two were married on July 11, 1947, and soon thereafter he was discharged from Camp Robinson and the Army. Their only child, Sybil, was born in 1950.
After being discharged from the Army, Mr. Risselada went to work as a clerk in the main post office in North Little Rock, first on Main Street and then at the headquarters on Pershing Avenue.
There his good humor was a natural asset. He was a master of puns, his wife said."He could come up on with the best play on words."
He woked for the post office for about 25 years, retiring about 15 years ago.
We talked about trying to buy a small said boat and sailing around Lake Maumelle," his wife said. But his memorials of Lake Michigan were still strong, and he said the lake was too small," she said.
Just as steadfast and strong was his connection to his church, according to the Rev. Marty Watson, pastor of Baring Cross Bapist, where Mr. Risselada served as a greeter for more than 20 years.
He was a wonderful man, a very faithful man, open and very loving...with a great sense of humor," Watson said. "Even when physically he could no longer stand at the door, he continued to welcom people and shake their hands...in a wheelchair at the door. He had a neat spirit that was supportive and uplifting.
Besides his wife and daughter, Mr. Risselada is survived by a son-in-law Bill Adams of Hot Springs, one granddaughter Stephanie Belin and her husband Michael of North Little Rock, and a sister, Ella Prins of Holland, Mich.
Funeral services were held at 2 p.m. on Dec. 29 at Baring Cross Baptist Church with the Rev. Marty Watson officiating. Interment was at Edgewood Memorial Park. The family asks that memorials be made to Baring Cross Baptist Church.
The Times - January 8, 1998
WILLIAM WALKER JR
By Stephen Ursery
He was known for most of his 90 years as Shanga or Shanga Boy, but friends and family say they never thought to ask William Walker Jr. how he happended to acquire that name.
Remembered by friend and family as a man of generous spirit with a sharp wit and a fight for conversation, Mr. Walker died at his home on Melrose Circle of natural causes on Sunday, Jan. 5, at the age of 90.
He would talk to anybody at anytime. He was a big joker, and always smiling. Everybody like him," said his niece, Gonzella Rhodes.
He had a simple dignity. He really exuded that quality, said neighbor Paul Pyler.
He was born in the rural contryside outside of Scott, the youngest of three children, of William and Lizzie Walker. He would get a fifth grade education and then farm until he was well into his 30s. Family members say many of the farm workers around Scott at the time had nicknames, and somehow Mr. Walker's evolved into Shanga.
In 1926 he married Willie Lee Radliff, also of Scott and now deceased. The marriage would end in divorce in the mid-1930's, after which Mr. Walker would move to Pasadena, Calif.
Not much is known about his life on the west coast, but in 1943, he joined the Army, where he worked as a sewing machine operator, earning an American Service Medal, a Good Conduct Medal and a World War II Victory Medal before his honorable discharge in Jan. 1946.
After the Army, Mr. Walker returned to Arkansas, living and working in North Little Rock on the city street department. In the 1950's he took a job working as a welder for International Business in Little Rock.
He retired in the mid-1960's, at which time he moved back to Scott, where he became reacquainted with Mary Russell, a friend from his growing up years who would become his companion for the rest of his life.
They had a very special relationship. They were always joking with each other, teasing each other. They kinda reminded me of Jackie Gleason and his wife on The Honeymooners, said Gonzella Rhodes. You could sit and laugh all day long watching them together.
The two spent most of their time together on Clear Lake near Scott, fishing, drinking coffee and chewing their favorite tobacco, Levi Garrett. Although they caught their fair share, they preferred to give the fish away to friends and family. When he was not fishing, Mr. Walker loved to go squirrel and rabbit-hunting with his friends.
In 1987, Mr. Walker and Mrs. Russell moved back to North Little Rock settling on Melrose Circle in order to be nearer Mr. Walker's widowed sister, Jessie Moore.
He Mr. Walker quickly established a rapport with the neighborhood children, filling the pockets of his overalls with peppermints to hand out to the kids.
He loved to wander over to the Kroger store, where he and some friends would pass the time sitting on an outside bench and talking, often about Razorback basketball, a passion of Mr. Walker's. He also liked to pass time at the Arkansas College of Hair Design and Barbering, and he and Mrs. Walker made regular trips back to Scott, which they still considered home.
Mr. Walker was a member of Ebenezer Methodist Church in Scott. Beside his sister, Mr. Walker is survived by one son, Ernest McCoy; two grandsons; 17 great grandchildren; and various nieces and nephews.
Funeral services were held on Friday, Jan 10, at the N.B. Carter Memorial Chapel in Little Rock with Bishop Carl Ratliff Sr. officiating. Interment was in the National Cemetery.
The Times - January 16, 1997