Eleanor Jane Zins Walker

eleanor zins walker

Ellie Walker, Colorado artist, loving mother, and widow of W.Z.F.  (Fred) Walker, passed away peacefully from respiratory failure on  July 27, 2021 at her home at the Village at Belmar in Lakewood.  She was 96.  

Ellie was born Eleanor Jane Zins on November 11, 1924, a native of  State College, Pennsylvania, where she lived for her first 23 years,  until the day she was married.  

Ellie went to Penn State, just blocks from her childhood home, and  was active in the Penn State Players and Thespian drama groups  designing theater sets, costumes and stage posters. She designed  brochures for the Ag School and worked at the Ordinance Research  Lab, a WWII torpedo lab located on campus. It was at Penn State  that she met and then married her husband, Fred, at St. Paul’s  Methodist Church in State College. They were together for 73 years  before his passing in 2020. 

Ellie graduated “early” from Penn State in 1944 with BA degrees in  Art and Drama. Rather than remain for her June graduation, she  took a trip west with her brother’s wife and her nephew, to pick up  her brother returning after WWII into California. This was her first  exposure to the beauty of the West, and the thereafter the Rocky  Mountains became the favored subject of her paintings. 

A resident of Wheat Ridge for many years, she was an active  member of Mountainside Art Guild and Foothills Art Guild. Besides  painting, Ellie was an avid birder, loved gardening, decorating, the  Homesteader group at church, and swimming at the Rec Center  with friends.

Ellie was a Realist artist, and lives on through over 800 paintings  now hanging in houses all over the world. Known for her distinctive  treatment of trees, her paintings involved elements of nature,  mountains, clouds, birds, butterflies, flowers and fauna. She had  broad interests in geology, architecture, and archaeology that she  often incorporated into her artwork.  

She is survived by her three children, Tamie Walker Bulow, Ted  Walker (Annie), and Wendy Walker Erich (Dave);  her six beloved  grandchildren Justin Walker (Katie), Nick Bulow (Erika), Katie Hays  (Wes), Whitney Walker, Jed Walker (Allison) and Scott Erich  (Emily).  She was a great-grandmother to eleven children.

Funeral  arrangements will be postponed due to Covid.

 

In lieu of  flowers, donations may be made to:

Wheat Ridge United Methodist Church

7530 W 38th Ave, Wheat Ridge, CO 80033

 

 

 

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  1. Ellie loved to come over to our house and bird watch .Ellie joined some of our family barbecues . What a wonderful lady she was .


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