Weldon Thomas Duncan

Weldon Thomas Duncan, a 91-year-old Kansas City area resident, died at 10:25 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2006 at the Olathe Medical Center in Olathe, KS. He was a former Trenton resident and businessman.
Graveside services were held at 11 a.m. on Monday, Oct. 30, 2006 at the Green Mound Cemetery in Harwood. Bro. Tim Brewer officiated. MIiitary funeral honors were also held. Lewis-Hoagland Funeral Home in Schell City was in charge of the arrangements.
Mr. Duncan was born on July 30, 1915 on a farm near Halfway, the son of Thomas Luther and Minnie Anne Gordon Duncan. He attended rural elementary school and graduated from Bolivar High School. He spent two years at Southwest Baptist University before working for a time in retail business in Bolivar. He served in the Army Air Corps in the European Theater during the 1940s and was honorably discharged. He returned to the Vernon County area and married Jewell Aralee True on Jan. 19, 1946 in Kansas City.
They lived briefly in Harwood before moving to the Nevada, MO, area, where he worked for Production Credit. He was employed in sales with the Ralston Purina Company in northern Missouri. The family lived in Bethany for several years before moving to Trenton. He retired in 1966 and purchased Bryon’s Shoe Store in Trenton, renaming it Duncan Shoe Store. He opened a second store in Chillicothe in 1975. Nearing retirement in the early 1980s, he closed the Chillicothe store and sold the Trenton store. He ran a small shoe repair business until the death of his wife in 1985. He moved to Columbia to be closer to his brother. He met Geri Miller, with whom he spent nearly 12 years. He moved to the Kansas City area in 2000 to be near his children, who attended to his care since that time.
He was involved in the Trenton Rotary Club; served on the Head Start Board in Trenton; was on the Grundy County Civil Defense Board; was in the Trenton Boy Scouts, serving as both a scout leader and district commissioner; was a member of the Trenton and Columbia VFW and DAV; was a hospital volunteer at the Columbia VA hospital; was a member of the Trenton Chamber of Commerce; and served as a deacon for more than 15 years in the First Christian Church at Trenton. He enjoyed hunting, gardening, training hunting dogs, judging field trials and enjoyed raising cattle and horses on his farm as well as doing general farm work.
He is survived by three sons, Tom Duncan of Kirksville, Randy Duncan and his wife, Lori, of Overland Park, KS, and George Duncan of Blue Springs; one daughter, Lana Harvey of Rogers, AR; one sister, Geneva Anderson of Springfield; four grandchildren, Bradley and Ryan Harvey and Ashley and Sara Duncan; three great-grandchildren, Grace, Lilly and Rose Harvey; and several nieces, nephews, other relatives and friends.
In addition to his wife and parents, he was preceded in death by a brother, Russell; one sister Wilma; and a daughter-in-law, Melanie.
The family suggests memorials to the Olathe Good Samaritan Center in Olathe, KS.