Lula Belle "Lu" Kershner

Lula Belle Kershner passed away on July 4, 2017 at her home in the Riverpointe Senior Living Center in Littleton, Colo. She lived a rich, full and happy life for 94 years and was a beloved wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and onetime secretary to two renowned World War II generals, George C. Marshall and Dwight D. Eisenhower.

She was born Lula Belle Davis in Houston, Missouri, on Sept. 15, 1922. Her father was Charles Edward Davis and her mother was Bessie Jane Davis (maiden name Wallace). She was the eighth of nine children.

The family was happy and fun-loving. At Houston High School, she was in the chorus and acted in school plays, and later said she considered herself “quite the actress!” She was elected president of her junior class and organized the Junior-Senior Banquet her senior year. She also liked to dance the jitterbug to jukebox music. She and her family were devoted members of the Baptist Church, which was an important part of their faith and social lives.

She mastered two skills – shorthand and typing -- that paid off after she graduated from high school in 1940. She got a job as a stenographer at nearby Fort Leonard Wood, an army training base. Shortly afterward she got a job as a stenographer at the Texas County (Mo.) Health Department in the courthouse in Houston. At age 19, she was promoted to a stenographer job at the State Board of Health in Jefferson City.

After working there for about three years, a recruiter for the U.S. War Department came to Jefferson City. He offered her a job in Washington D.C., and she and two friends “signed up for the adventure” of becoming stenographers at the wartime Pentagon. They lived in a boarding house in the bustling capital.

She was soon chosen for a job in the Secretariat, Office Chief of Staff of the Army. Her boss was Gen. George C. Marshall, later to become famous for the Marshall Plan. When the war ended, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was named the Army Chief of Staff and he became her boss. For the rest of her life, she proudly displayed her autographed portraits of both Marshall and Eisenhower, inscribed to “Miss Lula Belle Davis.”

One of her jobs at the Pentagon was to type up orders and radiograms. She remembered that one time she typed up an oddly worded message which was then sent upstairs to the coding room. The next day, she heard about the atomic bomb being dropped on Hiroshima. She realized that this was likely the order she had typed the day before.

After the war was over, she quit her job at the Pentagon and returned to Missouri to help her mother care for her ailing father. Her mother said she was worried that she had interfered with her daughter’s life, but Lu told her not to worry because “I only did what I wanted to do,” a motto that could be applied to the rest of her life as well. She returned to her job at the county courthouse.

In 1947, two high school friends asked her to move with them to Denver, and she said yes “because anything new seemed a good idea to me in those days” -- and also because her sister Allie lived there. She got a job at the telephone company. There she met Louise Kershner, who told her about her brother, Robert Earl “Bob” Kershner. He had been a Navy officer in the war, had a good job and a new car. “He sounded good to me!” as she later said. He asked her out on a date to the symphony and they hit it off immediately, launching a romance that lasted 46 years. She and Bob Kershner became engaged in March 1948 and were married on August 17, 1948, in Houston, Mo. They returned to Denver to a new house.

Their daughter Leslie Ann was born on September 18, 1950. She was followed by a son, William Robert, on May 15, 1952 and another son, James Earl, on August 17, 1953. They lived in a series of houses in Denver until 1959, when they moved to Washington D.C. for Bob’s job with the U.S. Postal Service. There, she was able to indulge her love of American history by taking her family to visit all of the museums and historic sites in Washington D.C. and the region.

While in Washington D.C. she went to John F. Kennedy’s funeral procession, Lyndon Johnson’s Inaugural Parade and Winston Churchill’s memorial service. She was also room mother for all of her children, as well as a Girl Scout and Cub Scout leader.

In 1965, Bob was transferred back to Denver and they bought a home in Littleton, where they would bring up their children and live the rest of their lives. She made a home that was always filled with fun, games, laughter and happiness. She was an expert bridge player and their social lives revolved around their various bridge clubs. She was also a devoted member of Grace Presbyterian Church, which she attended until the end of her life.

Besides bridge, she loved all kinds of card games, including her particular favorite, Spite & Malice, which she played with a ruthless glee. As a mother, she displayed an unfailingly cheerful and optimistic outlook and a can-do spirit that served her children well. She instilled in them a love of learning and love of reading. She was herself a voracious reader since childhood, and she said she liked to “read everything except magic and space story books.” She was an early fan of the James Bond novels, and she loved spy stories of all kinds.

After her children went off to college and professional careers, she took up crocheting afghans. When grandchildren arrived – seven, eventually -- she made afghans for each of them. She also threw herself into activities at Grace Presbyterian Church. After Bob retired, they traveled extensively in Great Britain and Europe.

Her beloved husband Bob died on October 20, 1993, after she had spent many years caring for him with unfailing cheerfulness and optimism. She moved to a condo in nearby Highlands Ranch, Colo. Her children had by this time established lives and careers away from Colorado, but she valued her independent life and her longtime friends and said she did not want to move out of state.

In 2012, she moved to an apartment at Riverpointe Senior Living in Littleton. She continued to drive and live independently well into her 90s. It was not until the last year of her life in 2017 that her health began to deteriorate. Even then, she continued to play bridge, tripoley and Spite & Malice with her many friends up until a few weeks before her death of congestive heart failure and pulmonary hypertension.

She was deeply loved by her survivors: Her children, Leslie Ann Deichl and husband Richard of Pembroke Pines, Fla.; William Robert Kershner and wife Nancy of Amherst, Va.; and James Earl Kershner and wife Carol, of Spokane, Wash.; and her grandchildren, Eric Deichl, Travis Deichl, Shane Deichl, Geoffrey Kershner, Philip Kershner, Michael Kershner and Kate Hinz-Kershner; and numerous great-grandchildren. She was also survived by her sister and closest confidante since childhood, Jean Hays of Bryan, Texas. She was preceded in death by her other siblings, Eula, Allie, Ruth, Wayne, Willard, Wesly and Chester.

She was able to fulfill her final wish by dying at home, with her son Jim by her side, with help from Porter Hospice. A memorial service will be held on July 29, 2 p.m., at Grace Presbyterian Church, 9720 U.S. Highway 85 North, Highlands Ranch, CO, 80125. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Grace Presbyterian Church. Arrangements are being handled through Olinger Hampden Mortuary.