THE DIGITAL REPOSITORY FOR THE BLACK EXPERIENCE
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Businesswoman Delories Dell Ricks-Wallace was born on August 28, 1933, in Huntsville, Alabama. She moved with her family to Fort Wayne, Indiana, when she was 10 years old. By the age of 11, Ricks-Wallace was earning money by altering clothes in her uncle Norvel Ricks' dry cleaning business. She has combined her innate creative talents and sharp business acumen to become a true entrepreneur.
After high school, Ricks-Wallace attended Lockharts Tailoring School and obtained the skills needed to open her first sewing business. Her business prospered, and Wallace's business expanded to include a designer men's clothing line, WenDell's World Manufacturing Co. in Indianapolis, Indiana. The garments created there were sold in clothing stores she owned in Indianapolis and Bloomington, Indiana. In 1975, Ricks-Wallace founded Impulse Florist in Fort Wayne and showed the world yet another talent.
Ricks-Wallace's son, Kim, died in 1982. She closed her businesses, but two years later opened Luxury Limousine, Fort Wayne's first limousine service. Together with her husband Charles "Charlie Bob," Ricks-Wallace has owned and operated many other businesses, including Charlie's Tap, Kim's Korner, Wallace Maintenance, Club Zimmer and Blackman Prairie Subdivision-a collection of single-family homes located in Fremont, Indiana.
Over the years, Ricks-Wallace has been active at Turner Chapel A.M.E. Church, the Old Fort YMCA, the Fort Wayne Urban League Guild and the Ladell Traveling Club. Wallace and her husband raised seven children: Yvonne, Charles, Kim, LeeAnn, Emmett, Clifton and Wendell, as well as Kim's three children: Tara, Kim Jr. and Delories. Their grandchildren number twenty-four, not counting their seventeen great-grandchildren and one great-great grandchild.
Ricks-Wallace passed away on February 15, 2011.