Edwin Houston - Age 102 - Los Alamos Harrison

Edwin H. Harrison\r\n \r\nEdwin Houston Harrison, 102, a long-time Los Alamos resident, passed away Tuesday, August 3 at the home of his son Ron Harrison, in St. George, Utah.\r\nThe oldest of nine children, Edwin Harrison was born on January 19, 1908, in Olustee, Oklahoma, to John Henry and Lella Belle Lamb Harrison. His father was a farmer and homesteader.\r\nAfter graduating high school, Edwin attended college at Oklahoma A&M, where he studied business. He left school after one year to become a farmer.\r\nEdwin married Verna Van Cleeve, his high-school sweetheart, in 1928. A son, Jimmy Dean Harrison, was born in 1933 but died at birth. Three years later, in 1936, Verna gave birth to Eddie Van Harrison at the family home. Verna passed away suddenly two weeks later.\r\nNot long after the death of his wife he started work in construction, primarily on roads throughout Oklahoma. The construction work took him to New Mexico in 1940.\r\nIt was in Gallup, New Mexico, where Edwin would meet his second wife, an 18-year-old waitress named Paula “Polly” Gonzales. They married on December 9, 1941, two days after Pearl Harbor. The couple moved around for the next several years and Edwin worked on military bases in Roswell, Hobbs, Fort Sumner, and Clinton, Oklahoma. Polly gave birth to a son, Ronald Harrison, in 1943. On Thanksgiving Day in 1944 the family landed in Albuquerque, where Edwin found work rebuilding heavy machinery. That’s when he heard about a job opportunity in the then-secret city of Los Alamos.\r\nEdwin and his family arrived in Los Alamos in February of 1945, where they started out living in a $1,200 Schultz travel trailer with no bathroom and a gasoline stove. He was one of the first eleven civilians working in Los Alamos at the time, and he began working in the Army transportation department as a mechanic for the first year before moving over to the Zia Company when it was formed as a support company for the lab in 1946. Polly gave birth to a daughter, Barbara, in January of that year.\r\nThe Zia Company hired Edwin as a supervisor working on the roads section. He stayed with the company until he retired as Superintendent of Roads, Labor and Mechanics in January, 1973. He supervised the cutting of Diamond Drive past the First Baptist Church and the construction of Pajarito Road in the 1960s, two of his biggest projects.\r\nEdwin retired in 1973. He and Polly moved to Albuquerque the following year, and they used that as a “headquarters” while they vacationed around the country in a travel trailer. Edwin and Polly discovered Vallecito Lake in Southwestern Colorado in the late 1970s. They moved permanently to Vallecito Lake in 1986 and stayed there for the next twelve years until coming back to Los Alamos to be closer to their family in 1998.\r\nPolly died suddenly in October of 2006. She was a wonderfully social person who loved the Lord Jesus and devoted much of her energy to spending time with and helping others. Polly, Barbara, and Ron began organizing Edwin’s 100th birthday celebration during the summer of 2006. Barbara and Ron continued with the plans after she passed away. Approximately 100 people attended the party, including many out-of-town relatives, which was held at Fuller Lodge on January 19th, 2008.\r\nEdwin survived his five brothers and two of his sisters. He is survived by one sister, Johnnye Greenhood of California, his three children, Eddie V. Harrison, Barbara Milder and husband Marty, both of Los Alamos, and Ron Harrison and wife Judy, of St. George, Utah. He leaves seven grandchildren and eight great grandchildren.\r\nEdwin was a long-time faithful member of the First Baptist Church of Los Alamos, where he served the Lord many years as a deacon. In his later years he was a member of the Baptist Church in Vallecitos, Colorado, where he was a deacon and a Sunday school teacher. \r\nFuneral services will be held at 10:00 a.m. Thursday, August 12, 2010 at the First Baptist Church of Los Alamos with burial to follow at Guaje Pines Cemetery in Los Alamos. Friends and family are invited to a reception at the church immediately after the burial service.\r\nThe family of Edwin H. Harrison has entrusted the care of their loved one to DeVargas Funeral Home & Crematory of the Española Valley, 662-2400

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