Eleanor M Orme (Martin)

Eleanor M. Orme

January 6, 1917 ~ December 21, 2015

Eleanor M. Orme passed away peacefully on December 21, 2015 at the home of her daughter, Elizabeth O. Nava, where she had resided for the past 14 years.  She was born January 6, 1917, in Wichita, Kansas, to Thomas W. Martin and Ruth Smith Martin, who preceded her in death.  Eleanor grew up in the house Clyde Cessna built on Terrace Dr. in Wichita.  She had one sister, Carolyn, also deceased.  Eleanor attended school in Wichita and graduated from Wichita State University with a B.A. in Art and a minor in English.  She got her first teaching job at Coffeeville, Kansas.  While home for Sunday dinner, her sister Carolyn invited a young man, named Leonard G. Orme, who worked with her husband at Cessna Aircraft, to dinner to meet her spinster sister, Eleanor.  It was a match meant to be and six weeks later, July 5, 1942, they were married in the home of her parents in Wichita.  Leonard was also currently in pilot training to go into the Army Air Corp.  Eleanor continued teaching at Coffeeville, while Leonard was in training.  She later joined him in Roswell, New Mexico.  They also were stationed in El Paso, Texas, where she substitute taught, and their first child, Leonard G. Orme Jr was born.  When WWII was over they were stationed at Riverside, California, and once Leonard was discharged from the Air Force, they moved to Montrose, Colorado to join Leonard’s father, Karl, on the family farm and ranch.

In Montrose, Eleanor quickly took to ranch life.  She became a member of the United Congregational Church, taught Sunday school, became a member of the Leisure Hour Club, and the Cowbells, and substitute taught at Oak Grove School.  After her daughter, Elizabeth was in school, she started teaching again in 1957.  Her first year she taught sixth and seventh grades at Oak Grove.  In 1958, she started teaching Art and English at Montrose High School, where she taught for nineteen years.  In 1967, Eleanor graduated from Western State College in Gunnison, Co. with a master’s degree in Art Education.  A few years later she helped write the first art curriculum guide for the Montrose County School District.

In the early years of the Magic Circle Players, Eleanor painted and designed most of the stage backdrops and props.  She was the founding member of the Montrose Arts and Humanities Council, and was instrumental in starting the first community art shows which were held in the Montrose Armory building at 12th and Townsend Ave.

In 1977, Eleanor retired from teaching and joined Leonard in traveling and snow birding in Arizona.  After Leonard’s death in 1999, she spent her last winter in Yuma.  In 2001, she moved into her newly build apartment at her daughter’s house where she resided until her death.

She is survived by , her son, Leonard G. Orme Jr. and wife Pamela, daughter, Elizabeth O. Nava and husband, Douglas, her two grandchildren, Travis K. Orme and Laura R. Nava, and niece Linda Daniels and family, nephews, Leo Orme and family, and Thomas R. Kennedy and family.

A memorial service for Eleanor will be postponed until the Memorial Day Weekend, 2016.  Crippin Funeral Home & Crematory, in Montrose is assisting the family.