Floyd E. LeGalley, 1916-2013

Wood Co. clerk ran insurance agency, farm

6/26/2013

BOWLING GREEN — Floyd E. LeGalley, a former Wood County commissioner and clerk of courts who took over his father’s insurance agency and held fast to a generations-old family legacy on the farm, died Saturday in Wood County Hospital. He was 96.

He and his wife, Eileen, lived the last four years at Heritage Corner Health Care Campus, Bowling Green. His son, Doug, attributed his death to age; there was no catastrophic heart attack or stroke, he said.

“He had been healthy all his life. He was only taking one pill for cholesterol,” said his son, who owns the LeGalley Insurance Agency in Bowling Green.

A Republican, Mr. LeGalley was elected a county commissioner in 1960 after nearly a decade as a Plain Township trustee. Four years later, he was elected county clerk of courts. He continued to farm and run his insurance agency.

“You got up early, and you had things to do every night,” his son said. “He was always a hard worker and involved in a lot of things.”

He retired as clerk of courts in 1976.

“He liked the politicking and getting out and seeing people and the barbecues and everything that goes along with it,” his son said. “He was a public servant, and he enjoyed dealing with people.”

Born Aug. 3, 1916, to Blanche and Ray LeGalley, he took over the family farm after graduation from Bowling Green High School.

Mr. LeGalley grew corn, wheat, and soybeans, but for years he also milked cows and raised beef cattle and pigs.

“He was very proud of the fact that the [farm’s] history went back to 1856, and it has remained in the family to this day,” his son said.

His family was long involved in the Union Grange outside Bowling Green, and he was a past master there and of the Wood County Pomona Grange. His father was an early district agent for Grange insurance. Mr. LeGalley became an agent too and merged his father’s agency with his own in the mid-1960s.

He and the former Anna Laura Beck married Sept. 30, 1939. She died July 27, 1988.

Surviving are his wife, Eileen, whom he married Nov. 4, 1989; daughters, Judy Gilbert and Marilyn Riewaldt; son, Douglas LeGalley; stepsons, Dennis and Dana Smith; 12 grandchildren; 11 great-grandchildren; a great-great-grandchild; five step-grandchildren, and two step-great-great-grandchildren.

Visitation will be from 1 to 5 p.m. Sunday in the Deck-Hanneman Funeral Home, Bowling Green. Services will be at 11 a.m. Monday in First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Bowling Green, where he’d been an elder, deacon, and Sunday school superintendent.

The family suggests tributes to the church or a charity of the donor’s choice.

— Mark Zaborney