Machias merchant Bernard Walls dies Family business started 37 years ago

MACHIAS – Bernard Walls, owner of Walls TV and Appliances since he started the family business 37 years ago, died on Saturday from unknown complications, the family said Monday.

He was being cared for at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor, where he was scheduled to have surgery today.

Walls TV and Appliances, located at 12 East Main St., will be closed on Thursday in honor of Walls, who was 66.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Holy Name of Jesus Catholic Church. Visiting hours at the Bragdon-Kelley-Campbell Funeral Home will be 5-7 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 30.

Just on Aug. 16, Bernie and Vivian Walls celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary in his hospital room in Bangor, with cake in the evening.

Walls TV and Appliances has sold appliances, furniture and televisions to Machias-area households for nearly four decades.

Walls started the business in 1968 on Gardner Avenue in the old sea captain’s house, which burned in 1972. From there the store moved to Dublin Street, then to Main Street.

In 1985 he expanded Walls by buying out Geebo Gooch’s Machias Home Furniture and Gooch’s Western Auto business, across the street from where Walls is now.

“Geebo had the Whirlpool line and Dad had the General Electric line,” said Randy Walls, the store’s manager for the last five years. “Sears was next door to them, too.”

Bernie Walls grew up in Hermon and was working for Sears when he decided to start his own appliance store Down East. He had been coming to Machias on regular calls for Sears, and wanted to open an independent shop in the county seat.

Walls was a member of the Machias Rotary Club and served as its president. With Vivian at his side in the store, he was active in the community in other ways, too.

“They were giving in a quiet way; they didn’t want anyone to know and didn’t want the recognition,” Randy Walls said. “There was the elderly woman who needed a refrigerator, and Dad gave her one because she was desperate.

“If someone needed help, he would give it.”

A private pilot, Walls kept a small plane for years at the Machias Valley Airport.

As his two sons, Scott and Randy, grew, he took part in Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Little League, Pony League and high school baseball.

He had remained as active in his business as he could, although he was slowed by his illness the last three or four years.