“My father was a good man,” Ms. Walker said. “He was a family man, and he loved his community, especially the city of Dayton.”
The family is working with Wheat Funeral Home on arrangements, which were pending Sunday.
Walker’s work with the Urban League “profoundly shaped” the city of Dayton, his daughter said. In that role, he was a contemporary of Jessie Gooding, former president of the Dayton Unit NAACP, among many others.
Dr. Karen Townsend, president of KTownsend Consulting, came from Columbus to Dayton with a desire to work for the Urban League and Walker.
“When I came to Dayton, I met Mr. Walker and I told him I wanted to work with the Urban League,” she recalled. Instead, over time, she worked with a mentorship program and came to serve on the Urban League board.
“Mr. Walker was a mentor to me in a way I didn’t even recognize,” Townsend recalled Sunday. She said he was a hugely positive influence in her life and her professional development.
“He saw something in me that I didn’t see in myself, and he has always been a supporter,” she said, adding: “He was an awesome leader in our community, and he will be sorely missed.”
Native Daytonian Stacy Thompson, senior vice president, West and Midwest regional corporate responsibility manager at Key Bank, knew Mr. Walker well, also as a friend and a mentor. She said Walker helped her tremendously as she first navigated the area’s business sector. “I would say the network I have today was clearly started through Willie Walker’s network,” she said.
“Just a champion, just an advocate, a connector of people,” Thompson said of him, also calling him a “quiet voice.”
“He was so much in love with the Urban League,” Walker’s daughter said. “He gave that to all the residents of Montgomery County. He worked fearlessly and tirelessly for the Urban League.”
“He was a true believer in Jesus Christ. He loved the Lord, and he loved his family,” she also said.
His first profession was a teacher.
The Dayton Urban League temporarily shut down about two years after Walker’s retirement, to be reborn as the Miami Valley Urban League.
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