Lee Roy Keys

Lee Roy Keys, 80, Dies Here Saturday

Lee Roy Keys, 80, many years a rancher near Neweastle and more recently a resident of Manville and Lusk, died Saturday morning at 5:00 at the Niobrara Memorial Hospital.

He had been ill since March and only three weeks ago had returned to his home in Manville after six weeks of treatment at Black Hills General Hospital in Rapid City.

Services were held from the Peet Mortuary Monday afternoon with the Rev. Jacob Nein, pastor of the Congregational Church, officiating. Mrs. A. F. DeCastro and Mrs. Emerson Bonner, accompanied by Donald Keys Jr., a grandson, as organist, provided the music. Local casketbearers were Eldon Lewis, Charley Scott, John Peterson, Del Alter, Sam Blaney and Fred Kettler.

Burial was in the Newcastle cemetery where Rev. Nein performed graveside services. Casketbearers there were John Fawcett, Dan R. Thomson, James Coates, Earl Bedell and Ernest Van Buren.

Mr. Keys was born Feb. 28, 1873 in Roca, Neb., the son of William E. and Eleanor Keys. His boyhood was spent on the farm near Roca and he attended school in Roca and the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. He then worked as a brakeman and yard foreman on the Burlington Railroad at Sheridan and Newcastle for eight years. In 1899 he was married to Isabel Smith at Newcastle. Five children were born to them.

In 1901 they moved to a ranch on Beaver Creek, northeast of Newcastle which was their home until 1951. They had a home in Manville and spent some time in Lusk where he was caretaker of the Congregational Church.

Surviving are his wife, three children, Donald C. Keys of Lusk; Beulah Norris, Manville; and Kathleen Osborne of Reno, Nev.; two brothers, Percy Keys of Redlands, Calif., and Bernard Keys of Worland. There are eight grandchildren.

One son, Newell, and an infant daughter, and a brother, Oscar Keys of Cripple Creek, Colo., and a sister Anna Maris of Newcastle, previously died.

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