Ellison L. Grimsley, Furniture Store Co-Owner, 85, Washington Post
DGH
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/07/AR2009100703843.html
Ellison L. Grimsley Furniture Store Co-Owner
Ellison L. Grimsley, 85, the co-owner of Brothers Furniture in the Baileys
Crossroads area of Fairfax County, died of bladder cancer Oct. 2 [2009] at
his home in Annandale.
Mr. Grimsley co-owned and operated the firm from 1949 to 1984 and was well
known for sponsoring dozens of local sports teams. He had been an athlete
and was elected to the American Softball Association's Greater Washington
Hall of Fame in 1971.
In his later years, he was a highly ranked croquet player, winning
tournaments around the nation and providing a backyard court that became the
training ground for the Georgetown University croquet team, among many
others. A 1980 Washington Post article noted that the Grimsleys and another
local family, the Moores, had dominated the sport in the area for the
previous decade.
It was the fun that his four sons had on an airborne sightseeing tour of
Washington in 1964 that prompted Mr. Grimsley to charter a jet for 94
children and young adults with mental disabilities and 20 adult escorts from
the Northern Virginia Association for Retarded Children's sheltered
workshop. Most had never flown before.
The jet "loafed along at 275 miles per hour only 2,500 feet above the
ground," a Post article said. The 45-minute joy ride was a big hit, and one
passenger gave the pilot a kiss upon landing.
Ellison Lee Grimsley was born in Remington, Va., and dropped out of high
school to enlist in the Navy the day after Pearl Harbor was attacked by the
Japanese on Dec. 7, 1941.
Serving on the newly commissioned ammunition ship Shasta, Mr. Grimsley
served the length of the war in the Pacific. He and his crewmates unloaded
ammunition while under attack by shore batteries at Iwo Jima, kamikaze
planes at Ulithi and drifting mines at Okinawa.
He was at the ship's wheel during a Pacific typhoon that sank three
destroyers and damaged nine others. On his own ship, he told his family, 27
depth charges rolled loose on deck and 250 rounds of 16-inch projectiles
broke loose and fell one deck onto 1,000-pound bombs. He kept the tattered
U.S. flag that flew over the ship during the storm.
After the war, Mr. Grimsley returned to Virginia and with two of his
brothers started a moving and transfer business until starting their
furniture store.
He taught Sunday school for years at Annandale Baptist Church and invested
in real estate after retiring from his business.
Survivors include his wife of 60 years, Martha Fielding Grimsley of
Annandale; four sons, Douglas Grimsley of Fairfax City, Ellison Grimsley Jr.
of Clifton, Andrew Grimsley of Blacksburg and Michael Grimsley of Annandale;
two sisters, Marie Travis of Ruckersville, Va., and Dorothy Jones of Burke;
and nine grandchildren.