W0FDY 1948 Garden City, Kansas

Almon "Duke" Lane Ellington, W0FDY, ex-W5AUN (1931) and W5CDQ.
Almon "Duke" Lane Ellington, 95 of Garden City, Kansas died Saturday, June 26, 2010 in Florissant, Colorado.
He was born on February 5, 1915 in Gilmer, Texas, the son of Wylie and Margaret (Palmer) Ellington. Interment: Valley View Cemetery in Garden City, Kansas.
Almon acquired the nickname “Duke” later in life.
His father died when Almon was about 1 year old and he knew very little from that side of the family.
Almon and his mother lived mainly with relatives in East Texas, and he attended school at Mings Chapel through the 8th grade.
He was a good student and participated in the county high jump and chinning Bar- winning first place at the meet in four events.
Almon and his mother left East Texas when he was about 14 years old and lived with his Uncle Alvie, his mother’s brother.
He graduated from Abilene High School in 1932. Almon then worked for the F.W. Woolworth Company, starting out as “stock boy”.
He was transferred to Roswell, New Mexico as assistant manager and this is where he picked up the nickname “Duke”.
He was later transferred to Clovis, New Mexico; Altus, Oklahoma; Omaha, Nebraska and finally to Beatrice, Nebraska as store manager (at the age of 25).
Duke met Elise Jean Perry in Beatrice, Nebraska and they were married September 1, 1940 in Crete, Nebraska.
Duke decided to change jobs so he applied for work with the Federal Aviation Agency and was hired.
He and his family were sent to Hayes Center, Nebraska. It was Duke’s first government job and after being sent to Garden City, Kansas he would remain there until his retirement on December 28, 1974.
During WWII, Duke volunteered to go to the south pacific as a code operator, since he had been a radio operator since 1931 and was very good at code.
He spent about a year there working for the services.
He was a member of the First United Methodist Church and the Builders Sunday School Class.

QSL from the estate of W3MPK
Info courtesy of W5KNE