Richard Alan McLellan of Claymont

Richard Alan McLellan, 88, of Claymont, died at home on Wednesday, Dec. 11.

Rich was born in 1925, and, until age 10, lived in the village called Maple Heights, near Cleveland, Ohio. Rich graduated from Harlan Elementary, Warner Junior High, and P.S. DuPont High School class of 1943 in Wilmington. Then in 1945, he served as a corporal in the U.S. Army. After earning a bachelor of accounts degree in 1947 at Beacom College in Wilmington, and an advanced diploma from the International Accountants Society in 1948, he received his bachelor of science degree in commerce at Rider College in 1950/ During summers he worked for Janes Burns & Co., and Desmond Lyons & Co. Certified Public Accountants and, upon leaving Rider, he became an accountant in the E.I. DuPont Company Polychemicals Department, and returned to the Army at the outbreak of the Korean War. He then served as chief clerk for the 3rd Army Area Food Service School in Columbia, S.C., and later became assistant post sergeant major for the Far East Logistical Command at camp Drake near Tokyo. After two years of additional service, he was discharged as a sergeant first class.

While a youth, he was a Boy Scout (later a Scout Advisor) and played the snare drum and clarinet in school bands and orchestras; and in the Sons of the American Legion Delaware Post Number One marching band and Wilmington Clippers professional football team band.

After his second tour of duty in the Army, Rich joined Atlas Powder Company at its headquarters in the Delaware Trust building, Wilmington, as accountant for the company's White Haven Dynamite Plant, and soon transferred to its then new Fairfax headquarters. From there, after other assignments, he traveled for seven years, visiting sales offices, chemical, dynamite and blasting cap plants, and explosives magazines as company auditor throughout the United States. He was then named senior budget analyst for the company's chemicals division and later supervised essential accounting procedures related to its mergers with Stuart Pharmaceuticals in Pasadena, Calif. and Imperial Chemical Industries, Inc., of Great Britain, from which he retired in 1981 after 29 years of service. He then held the position of controller for Jonald and Lordon Freon packaging corporations in New Jersey and Kentucky for 13 years.

During personal hours, he was a Junior Achievement of Delaware business advisor and for many years served as accountant for Corps Line, Inc. and created medals commemorating that company's Bluegrass Junior Drum Corps National Championships held at the University of Kentucky and Richmond University. In 1977 he designed and produced the Sanderson Battle of Brandywine Bicentennial Medal in honor of historian Chris Sanderson and America's largest land battle of the Revolutionary War. For 28 years he volunteered as a director of the Christian C. Sanderson Museum, served as its president for six years, and continued until September 2013 as chief financial officer for the museum in Chadds Ford.

Throughout life Rich held a keen interest in fine art, and met the artist Karl J. Kuerner of Ring Farm in 1980, which led him to write The Land of Truth & Phantasy published in 2005; concerning the Brandywine Valley area and the Kuerner-Ring farm in Chadds Ford, where Andrew Wyeth painted nearly one thousand works. Wyeth wrote the book's foreword. At age 81, Rich began work on a sea-novel, set around the time of the American Revolution.

Rich is survived by two daughters, Maureen McLellan and her partner, Jim Slocum of Newark, Del. and Kim Famularo and her partner, Roy Tolley of Pocono Pines; three sons, John of Claymont, Mark and his wife, Judy of Middletown, Del., and Paul and his wife, Rachelle of Newark; 12 grandchildren; 12 great-grandchildren; one great-great-grandchild; and two brothers, Donald McLellan and his wife, Johnnie of Jupiter, Fla. and Kenneth McLellan and his wife, Jackie of Nampa, Idaho. He is also survived by his long-time friend, Elizabeth Gam Stewart of Wilmington.

Funeral services will be held at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 17, at the Chandler Funeral Home, 2506 Concord Pike in Wilmington. Friends and family may visit from 6 to 8 p.m. on Monday evening at the funeral home. Interment will be at Lafayette-Birmingham Cemetery off Birmingham Road, Chadds Ford, PA on Tuesday.

The family would like to suggest contributions to the Christian C. Sanderson Museum Annex Fund, P.O. Box 153, Chadds Ford, PA 19317.

For online condolences, please visit chandlerfuneralhome.com

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