Civil Rights champion, business owner, noble family man
by Tom Milhollan
For New Pittsburgh Courier
The barrier-breaking achievements of Louis Edward Waller during life are immeasurable. The honors and awards he so deservingly received are seemingly innumerable.
Indeed, Lou Waller was a beacon of civic leadership for an entire community.
He was a pioneering leader…in civil rights… in business…in philanthropy and community service. This one man’s name means so much in Washington County…but how did it come to be that way?
Lou Waller’s grandfather, Luke Waller, was born into slavery in rural North Carolina and then became a sharecropper, raising tobacco. Lou Waller’s father, Louis Thomas Waller, came north to work in the coal mines in the 1920s, and married Hattie Davis. They settled in Marianna, Pa. And there in Marianna, in 1928, Louis Edward Waller entered the stage of Washington County’s history.
The Waller family moved to the city of Washington in the early 1930s, and young Louis Waller attended school there. As a student, Lou excelled most in those subjects that called for his creative talents. But Lou’s school years were not only academic learning—there were also hard lessons in racial prejudice. Pre-World War II America, including Washington, Pa., was still a highly-segregated system and Lou grew up as a witness to that destructive system.
Upon graduation from Washington High School, Lou earned a degree from Dean Tech in Pittsburgh. After serving in the U.S. Army, he entered the business world as a draftsman and then spent a decade in the sales of fabricated steel products.
However, professional competence did not shield Lou from racial bias. Lou was among many that suffered this reality first-hand. At one job, for example, Lou was told to go in the back so he wouldn’t have to be seen by customers. In another case, when Lou’s wife Shirley gave birth to their first child in the hospital, she was not permitted to recover in the same room as a White mother who had also given birth. Instead, Shirley recovered in the hallway.
So, as Lou Waller climbed the business ladder in the late 1950s, he also felt the need to ascend to a higher calling when, at the age of 31, he took office as president of the NAACP’s Washington Branch in 1959.
Among the many initiatives of his tenure at the NAACP, Lou Waller helped bring about a public discourse toward the elimination of de facto segregation in Washington’s school system, which had persisted even after Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. The swimming pool at Washington Park was integrated in 1961. And in 1964, Lou Waller organized and led the “March to the Post Office” to urge passage of Civil Rights legislation. The march was the first organized civil rights demonstration ever held in Washington, Pa.—Lou Waller was just 35 years old.
Louis E. Waller, center, leads the march to the U.S. Post Office on Main Street in Washington, Pa., on May 10, 1964. (Photo courtesy of the Waller family)
The official history of the NAACP’s Washington Branch recorded that “at a time when communication was sorely needed between the Black and White communities, Lou Waller’s talents surfaced and were invaluable. He was able to communicate the needs, frustrations and problems of the Black community…”
When describing his particular approach to the cause, Lou himself said: “Yes, you can get people’s attention by throwing pebbles at the window, but you get more attention if you are able to be where the decisions are made.”
Lou Waller at Post Office with letters. (Photo courtesy of the Waller family)
In recognition of these accomplishments, Lou Waller received the NAACP’s Human Rights Award in 1965. In 1970, he was appointed as President of the Pennsylvania State Conference of NAACP branches.
Meanwhile, Lou Waller’s remarkable business career was flourishing in the 1960s and 1970s with McAnallen Corporation, where he became general manager and then president. In 1986, his extensive experience in the building contracting sector led to his founding of Waller Corporation. Under his leadership, Waller Corporation became an award-winning contracting firm engaged in projects across Southwestern Pennsylvania.
Lou Waller’s strong religious faith guided his course in life—he was a life-long member of Nazareth Baptist Church in Washington and served the church as a deacon and trustee. In addition, Lou enjoyed the immeasurable happiness of being a devoted husband to his wife Shirley and the father of three remarkable children.
Lou Waller was also devoted to his community with the firm belief that “the only way to serve God is to serve people.”
In addition to the NAACP, nearly 40 different organizations benefited from his direct leadership and philanthropic efforts over the years, including Washington Hospital, Washington Financial Bank, Waynesburg University and the Washington County Community Foundation. Lou’s advocacy for education led to him being awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Waynesburg University (the first African American to receive such an honorary doctoral degree in the institution’s history), and his philanthropic leadership was recognized with the creation of the annual Louis E. Waller Humanitarian Award by the Washington County Community Foundation.
Posthumously, Waller was recognized with the Human Rights Lifetime Leadership Award by the NAACP’s Washington Branch, and most recently, the Washington County Historical Society created the Waller-McDonald Collection of African American History, in honor of him and fellow civil rights leader James R. McDonald.
Shortly after his passing in 2009, Shirley Waller described her late husband quite well with three simple words… “Joiner. Artist. Builder.”
Indeed, Louis Edward Waller’s life was a testament to what can be built…with a strong faith, a pure heart and a willingness to serve.
On March 11, 2020, Louis Edward Waller, along with five other honorees, was posthumously inducted into the Washington County Historical Society’s Hall of Fame.
FEATURED IMAGE: LOUIS E. WALLER, shown in this 2001 photo.
(Tom Milhollan is the operations and development coordinator for the Washington County Historical Society.)
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