Stub (Leland F.) Eshleman was born to Genevieve (Fix) and Lester Eshleman in Adrian, Minnesota on October 14, 1930, one year into the Great Depression. His parents didn't make hard times any easier for their second son by naming him Leland Francis.

When he was a schoolboy, a classmate told young Leland that he was so small that people could stub their toes on him. In keeping with times when Americans made the most of what they had, Leland took what could have been an insult and embraced it as a nickname. "Call me Stub," he always said when introduced to strangers, and they were invariably happy to have bumped into him.

Stub began working as soon as he was able-bodied, sometimes on farms, often on construction projects, once as an egg handler, and another time setting pins in a bowling alley. He recalled laboring one summer for enough money to buy a pair of shoes. After another summer, his uncles took all his earnings in a card game. During the winter of his junior year in high school, Stub unloaded rail cars, shoveling 30 tons of coal every weekend to fuel the heating stoves in his hometown. Stub served in the Navy aboard the U.S.S. Gordius and later joined the fledgling crew of People's Gas Light & Coke Company's Manlove Field facility when its offices were in a farmhouse, retiring there after thirty years, leaving it in better shape than he found it.

From his employment experiences, Stub learned the value of hard work, the worth of service to his country, how to swear like a sailor, a thing or two about human nature, and how to play poker. He was frugal but charitable, giving to charities and offering his strong hands to help those who were weaker.

Fortune smiled on Stub when he moved to Piper City for his senior year in high school and there met the beautiful, smart and funny Joan Sydenstricker, his "Babe," who he married on September 27, 1952. They filled their home with joy and children: Darla, Dirk, Danette, David and Daryl. Stub fixed their bicycles, motorcycles, cars, and skinned knees. Although he loved sitting on the couch surrounded by his babies, sharing a bowl of popcorn, and watching movies, Stub had a pathological distaste for The Wizard of Oz, which he called "The Odd Wizard" and went out of his way to avoid it every year.

Stub loved music. His collection of LP's included Roy Clark, Patsy Cline, Bobby Vinton, Conway Twitty, and the Ink Spots, among others. He played his Les Paul guitar and Hohner harmonica with foot-tapping fervor. Stub also knew his way around the banjo and mandolin. He discovered his greatest musical passion later in his life, when Joan coaxed him into dancing lessons. Thereafter, Stub was a regular at the Savoy ballroom on Friday nights, where even the instructors were impressed with his variation on the fast fox trot.

People who knew Stub commented on his warmth, loyalty, sense of humor, punctuality that would have impressed a Swiss train stationmaster, and scrupulous honesty. As to the last quality, Stub was known to lie on rare occasions, under extreme duress. In one instance, his grandson phoned to ask Stub if he would come over to watch the Wizard of Oz. "I can't Jake. I broke both my legs today." When Jake started crying about his grandfather's injury, Stub realized the harm his whopper had caused. Stub confessed to this sin on many occasions, and it nearly brought tears to his eyes, after he stopped laughing.

After being diagnosed with lung cancer, enduring chemotherapy and radiation treatments, losing all his hair and a third of his weight and becoming too weak to dance, Stub would always say, "I'm fine," when asked how he was doing. That wasn't true either. He wasn't fine.

Stub was exceptional.

Cancer took Stub from his loved ones on December 30, 2013, but they will always know that he is somewhere over the rainbow, dancing.

Stub Eshleman was preceded in death by his loving wife, his parents, his brother Duane, and his sisters Vonette, Valrahe, Lorraine, and Ardis. He is survived by his children, Darla Hoffmann of Edwardsville, Dirk of Fort Worth, Danette Hudson (Kurt) of Mahomet, David (Carol) of Dewey, and Daryl of Bellflower; by his brothers Ardin (Sandy) of Kempton, and Dallas of Waterford, Wisconsin, his sister, Sister Sharon Rose of Huntington, Indiana; by four grandchildren, Mason (Heather) Hoffmann of Seattle, Mia Hoffmann of Edwardsville and Jacob and Zachary Moore of Mahomet; two step-grandchildren, Koal Husdon of Mahomet and Eric Summers of Thomasboro; and two great-grandchildren, Natalia and Dominique Hoffmann of Edwardsville.

Funeral arrangements are private. Donations may be made to the American Cancer Society. Condolences may be offered at www.renner-wikoffchapel.com