Born in Knox County, Kentucky, on October 19, 1898. Died, April 3, 1990. Engineer. Businessman. University of Kentucky, B.S., 1921.
His rise in the business world was steady. He was an engineer, manager and Director with the Petroleum Exploration Company until 1942 when he became a Vice President and Director of The Standard Oil Company (Ohio) at Cleveland. He was President of the Sohio Petroleum Company, a Standard subsidiary. He left in 1953 to become an Associate of the Wall Street investment banking firm of Dillon, Read, and Company, where he was in charge of private investment in oil and gas properties until 1965, when he retired. Although he worked in other cities and traveled throughout the Western Hemisphere, he always commuted from his home in Lexington.
In the early 1960s, he organized a group of central Kentucky and Louisville citizens to acquire and restore the historic Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill in Mercer County. He raised substantial funds from private donors in several states and arranged for a $2 million loan from the U.S. Economic Development Administration. He is Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Shakertown at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, Inc., and Chief Executive of this nonprofit corporation. He is also Director-Emeritus of the Second National Bank and Trust Company of Lexington, and Director of Great Eastern Energy and Development Corporation of Denver, and an emeritus member of the Board of Curators of Transylvania University. He has received the Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Transylvania University, the University of Kentucky, and Centre College of Kentucky. In 1963, he received the Kentuckian of the Year Award from the Kentucky Press Association. In 1982, he was presented with the Governor's Medallion, the highest award the State can give to one of its own. In 1985, he was given the Bluegrass Trust for Historic Preservation's John Wesley Hunt Award.
Earl Dickens Wallace was named to the Hall of Distinguished Alumni on May 10, 1985.
