Price, Valmah Tupelo Jr. 1910 - 1959

PRICE, PEERY, KELLY, CARPENTER, THOMAS

Posted By: Reid R. Johnson (email)
Date: 7/10/2018 at 09:55:44

Clayton County Register, Thur., 2 July 1959.

Valmah Tupelo Price Jr. was born in Elkader, Iowa, July 2, 1910, a member of one of the pioneer families of Iowa, and died June 22, 1959.

His great-grandfather, Eliphalet Price, came to the state when it was opened for settlement in 1833, and two years later settled in Clayton County. Over the following years he was active in the service of his community as probate judge, member of the state legislature, and county judge.

Eliphalet's son, Valmah's grandfather, R. E. Price, was born in Clayton County in 1840. Actively practicing law in Elkader during the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, he, like his father, found time to be interested and active in community affairs.

Realto's son, Valmah T. Price Sr., was born in Elkader in 1867.

A graduate of Elkader high school and the State University of Iowa (both in Arts and Law) he entered the practice of his profession in Elkader in 1891 and continued actively and prominently in that practice until his death in 1931. It was to Elkader that he brought his bride, Nelly Peery, of San Diego, Calif. - also a lawyer, although she never engaged in practice. She remained a resident of Elkader for some years after the death of her husband, but in later years returned to her family in San Diego, where she died in 1948.

Of this ancestry Valmah T. Price Jr. was born in Elkader in 1910. He commenced his education in the Elkader schools, but ill health overtook him at an early age and he was forced to continue his education in a more favorable climate. He attended the public schools in Phoenix, Ariz.; the Webb School in Claremont, Calif.; California Preparatory School in Pomona Calif.; and completed his education at Urban Military Academy in Los Angeles.

On October 4, 1933, he married Mildred Kelly Carpenter, of Strawberry Point, Iowa. For a year or two they lived in Jefferson, Iowa, but his health was still unable to withstand the rigors of the Iowa climate. They returned to Los Angeles where he was engaged in the hotel business for a number of years.

Finally, about five years ago, even the Los Angeles climate failed him, and he moved to the desert community of Cathedral City, Calif., where he practiced as a public accountant until the time of his death at his home on June 22, 1959.

He was a member of the Rotary Club of Palm Springs, Calif., a 32nd degree Mason, and a member of the Al Malaikah Temple of the Shrine.

He is survived by his brother Peery Price of Los Angeles, and his step-daughter, Darlene Carpenter Thomas of Fresno, Calif., and by his widow.

The pallbearers - all friends of his youth - were: Harold Griffith, Jack Donlon, Melvin Glesne, Malcom Stoops, Dan Barton and Milton Wolf.

He was escorted to his final resting place in the East Side cemetery in Elkader, by his brothers of the Masonic fraternity, as were his father, grandfather and great-grandfather before him.

Funeral services were last Saturday afternoon at 2 o'clock at the Congregational Church.