Albert Claude Wells, a long-time resident of the Sweet Home area, died at Milwaukee Convalescent Home on March 24th. He was 90 years old and was the 6th of eight children born to Albert Clyde and Nora (Robertson) Wells. His preschool years were spent on his father’s dairy farm, six miles north of Eugene.

In the mid 1920s Claude’s family moved to a ranch in the Condon area, where his father became a wheat farmer. The little country school house that he attended has been relocated to the Condon museum. During those years Claude struggled in school because of poor vision, which later was corrected by glasses. His older sister, Irene Wells Krogh, was his school teacher for at least one year. The Condon years were carefree years for Claude and he had many stories to tell of life on the wheat ranch riding Dixie, his horse. It was there that he learned how to farm, trap, hunt, and kill rattlesnakes with a pocketful of rocks.

Five years later, the family relocated to a ranch in the Wiley Creek area and later to a farm on the Sweet Home- Holley highway. After his school years, Claude worked in the Civilian Conservation Corps for a short period of time. He worked on farms, sawmills, and plywood mills.

On September 3, 1939 he married Agnes Crane at the Holley Christian Church. They had five children, one of which was still born and one, Nora Ellen, whose life was taken at six months of age in an auto accident in Holley. In the early years of marriage he continued his millwork and he and his father also operated a strawberry farm. During that time he served on the Holley School Board.

Claude had a remarkable singing voice and sang live on the radio station several times. In 1949 he moved his family to Arlington, South Dakota where he attended Dakota Bible College. Preaching ministries included Wessington; South Dakota, Brandon, Iowa; and several in Oregon, including Jefferson, Albany, and Falls City. In 1957 he started the North Dallas Church of Christ. Late life ministries include Myrtle Creek, OR and working on the staff of a church pastored by his son, Myron, in Spokane, WA. In the 1980’s he retired and moved back to Sweet Home. His last years were spent in a convalescent home in Milwaukie.

He is survived by his three children, Judy Word of Portland, OR, Myron Wells of Redmond,OR and Marlin Wells of Port Orchard, WA.

Services will be at 1:00 pm at the Highway 20 Church of Christ Thursday, 3/29, in Sweet Home. Interment will be at the Crawfordsville Cemetery.