Credit: Lansdale Historical Society.
A local icon, whose name is all over the town, has passed on.
Ray Walton, the longtime head of borough-based family business Clyde S. Walton Inc., died Sunday at 100 after a five-day hospitalization following a fall, according to his obituary by Williams-Bergey-Koffel Funeral Home.
“Ray Walton was a pillar of our community and certainly dedicated to the Borough of Lansdale. He left his permanent mark on our town,” said borough council President Mary Fuller.
Ray was the second of four generations to run Clyde S. Walton Inc., the Broad Street-based heating oil company founded by Ray’s father. Ray joined the company in 1940, then took over when his father retired in 1956, running it until 1986, according to MediaNews Group archives.
He also joined the Lansdale Rotary Club in 1962 and took part in many of that group’s activities over the years, especially the annual Lansdale Day celebrations, and was a member of the Lansdale Historical Society for several decades, helping that society collect and preserve relics like an 1890s-vintage map roller Ray helped restore for the society in 2013.
HIs lifetime of dedication to the town earned him high honors: Ray was honored by the historical society with their Edwin G. Holl Historic Achievement Award in 2016, and by borough nonprofit Discover Lansdale with their Lansdale Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021.
“I am extremely grateful Discover Lansdale and the Lifetime Achievement Award Committee got to honor Ray Walton in person with this special award. That was a beautiful day that I will long remember. Lansdale will miss him, but his legacy will continue,” Fuller said.
You’ll also see the family name in Towamencin: the Walton family lived on two properties in that township, one of which is now the site of Walton Farm Elementary School on Allentown Road, and descendants of that family have shared the history of the family and property with that school.
Longtime wife Pauline died in 2020 when the couple had been married for 76 years.
Ray had been born in 1923 on a farm in Upper Gwynedd, and “his formative years were on the farm doing chores and enjoying life in the country,” according to his obituary; the two were married in 1943, and after he served in the U.S. Army during World War II, Ray and Pauline built an excavating business, before taking over the family fuel oil company.
Aviation was also a hobby, and Ray became licensed to fly multi-engine aircraft, as well as collecting and restoring antique farm tractors, cars and trucks in his retirement.
Relatives, friends, and employees are invited to visit with the family on Monday from 9 to 11 a.m. at Williams-Bergey-Koffel Funeral Home Inc., 667 Harleysville Pike (Route 113) in Telford, and a funeral service will follow at 11. Burial will take place privately at Lansdale Cemetery. Memorial contributions may be made to the Lansdale Historical Society, 137 Jenkins Ave, Lansdale, PA 19446.
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