Dell Wilbur McManus, 79
Dell Wilbur McManus passed away Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2011, at his home in Kalispell after a short battle with leukemia.
Dell was born Sept. 22, 1931, in Great Falls to Nathan and Gertrude McManus.
He attended school in Great Falls and Coram until the family moved to Rollins in 1944. He attended Polson High School until he dropped out of school to pursue a career in truck driving, hauling crude oil to a refinery in Kalispell until it closed that winter. He then bought a saw mill from Roy Commers and ran it for a year.
McManus moved to Great Falls to work on a storm sewer that was being built. If it was 20 below zero or warmer they worked; otherwise they could stay home. He worked there until the job finished in the spring of 1950. He then married his first wife and had two daughters.
In November of 1952 he was drafted into the Korean War. He served from February of 1953 until the war ended in July of 1954. He continued to serve as a member of the Army Boxing Club and traveled with it until he came home to Great Falls in October of 1954. In Korea, he gained great respect for the American flag and our national anthem. Throughout his life he had been known to get into a few (as Dell would say) “fisty cuffs” if you didn’t salute and honor the flag.
McManus began driving truck as soon as he came home, this time for Taber Brothers, hauling gasoline and road oil. He then went to work for Wilson Truck Lines, hauling gas. After working there for a couple years, he took a leave of absence to go to Alaska. He jokingly told his boss, Cheney Wilson, that he would make enough money in Alaska in two years to come back and buy him out. In Anchorage, Alaska he worked for Cummins Engine Company and even drove back to Montana once to bring a load of Christmas trees to sell in Fairbanks. McManus didn’t quite make the amount of money he had told his boss he was going to, and actually had to call him collect and ask to borrow the price of an airline ticket to come back to Montana. When he arrived in Montana, he went back to work for Wilson and met and married his second wife, Marvel Huseby, in 1958.
The McManus family moved to Kalispell and he continued hauling gas until the summer of 1960, when he opened a diesel shop called Super Stop Diesel Repair. He operated that business until he bought his first truck and set of trailers in 1962. In the first 11 1/2 months of owning his own truck he drove 150,000 miles by himself. While driving truck, he saved peoples’ lives on more than one occasion by rescuing them from vehicles stalled in winter storms. He rescued a family of four in 20 below weather just north of Glasgow on his way to Opheim. Dell would get emotional every time he spoke of it.
In May of 1964 he bought his second truck, and then his third in 1966. In 1967 he applied for his own authority to haul petroleum products and after two years he was denied by the public service commission. He opened Dell’s Truck Supply in 1973. The store was operated by his friend, Jim Ellis, until his son David graduated high school in 1976, and then David ran it until they closed in 1985. He was leased to a few different trucking companies until 1991, when he was finally approved for his own authority. He owned and operated McManus Transport, one of Montana’s leading liquid asphalt carriers, and ran it along with his son Leonard and daughter Alison, until selling the business to his son Leonard in 2010. Wherever he would travel, around Montana and throughout the Northwest, he would run into friends he had made through his work and business.
McManus had a love for all sports. He started boxing at the age of 13 in Great Falls. His first boxing gloves were bought for $12, and his parents had to put them on a one-year installment plan. If they couldn’t make the payments, Dell cleaned the store where they had been purchased, working off the payments. He met famous boxers, such as Joe Lewis, Sonny Liston and Roger Rouse. Dell was one of the most enthusiastic sports fans you could ever meet. McManus was a diehard Flathead Brave and Bravettes fan, and was a University of Montana Grizzlies season ticket holder for over 30 years. He attended thousands of home contests, traveled around the state watching the Flathead High School teams play football, basketball or wrestle, and traveled around the country following the Griz team. He had an almost photographic memory for certain plays and players. Dell also had a passion for stock car racing, watching his son David race, and more recently his good friend, Cory Wolfe. He also loved to watch motocross racing, where he followed his son David and his grandson Tyler.
When Marvel McManus, also a basketball fan, passed away in 2000, he started a scholarship fund in her name. McManus Transport also teamed up with Flathead High School to honor excellent young basketball players from area grade schools and the middle school through the “Future Braves and Bravettes” T-shirts, and an introduction and inclusion with the teams at home basketball games. There will always be a seat for him right below the press box at Legends Field, behind the east basket at FHS, and in the north end zone of Washington Grizzly Stadium.
McManus is survived by his children, sons David and wife, Cindy, of Anchorage, Alaska, and Leonard and wife, Shannon, of Kalispell; daughters, Coni of Big Lake, Alaska, Laurie and husband, Craig, of Ronan, Janice of Missoula, Jeri of Montgomery, Texas, and Alison and husband, Ryan, of Kalispell; 21 grandchildren; 20 great-grandchildren; and siblings, Dean McManus, Hugh McManus, and Carol Warnes.
He was preceded in death by his wife, Marvel McManus; parents, Nathan and Gertrude McManus; brothers, Harold and Glen McManus; and sister, Shirley Kline.
A celebration of Dell’s life will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 5, at the Flathead County Fairgrounds.
Dell’s family suggests donations to the Dell and Marvel McManus Scholarship Fund, P.O. Box 8600, Kalispell, MT 59904.
You are invited to go to www.buffalohillfh.com to sign Dell’s guest book and leave condolences for the family.