Dale E. Watts

Ottawa – Memorial services for Dale E. Watts, 67, Ottawa, will be at 11 a.m. Monday at Lamb-Roberts Funeral Home in Ottawa.Mr. Watts died Thursday, Oct. 25, 2007, at Ransom Memorial Hospital in Ottawa.He was born Aug. 9, 1940, in Ottawa, the son of Charley C. and Nellie E. Wright Watts. He graduated from Ottawa High School in 1958 and Phillips University in Enid, Okla., in 1962. He received a master’s degree in history from Kansas University and a master’s in teaching gifted education from Emporia State University. He also received a master’s degree in museum administration from the Cooperstown graduate program of the State University of New York in Oneonta in 1972.Mr. Watts was an authority on Kansas Civil War history and recently served as president of the Franklin County Historical Society. He was an educator and founded the Lyceum gifted education program at Ottawa High School. He taught at Harrisburg, Pa., Area Community College from 1965 to 1968.He was curator of Sacket’s Harbor Battlefield State Park in New York from 1969 to 1973. He worked as a historian with the Kansas State Historical Society in Topeka for 12 years. He was project director for an architectural survey of buildings in Topeka and published “Remembrances in Wood, Brick, and Stone” in 1974.Mr. Watts then taught in the gifted education program at Ottawa High School for four years. He was active with the Franklin County Historical Society and was elected president of the society in 2006.He married Peggy J. Nordyke on April 21, 1962. They shared more than 45 years of marriage. She survives, of the home.Other survivors include a daughter, Brenda Harju and husband Don, Loveland, Colo.; and a brother, Wilbur Watts, Appleton City, Mo.; and a grandson, Tucker Harju.Mr. Watts was preceded in death by his parents; a sister, Eva Marie; and two brothers, Chester W. and Eldon C.The family will receive friends from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday at the funeral home.The family suggests memorials to the Franklin County Historical Society or Bea Martin Peck Animal Shelter, sent in care of the funeral home, P.O. Box 14, Ottawa 66067.