Walleman, Kenneth T.
Jesuit Father Kenneth T. Walleman died on September 15, 2014, at St. Camillus, in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. He was 91 years old, a Jesuit for 67 years, and a priest for 55 years.
Born in Milwaukee on July 30, 1923, Fr. Walleman attended grade school and high school in Milwaukee and graduated from Marquette University with a degree in chemical engineering in 1944. He served in the U.S. Navy for two years, spent another year studying Latin at Marquette University, and entered the Society at St. Stanislaus Seminary in Florissant, Missouri, on Feb. 4, 1947. Fr. Walleman had the usual Jesuit course of studies at St. Stanislaus, Saint Louis University and St. Mary’s College. He was ordained on June 16, 1959, made tertianship in Decatur, Illinois, and pronounced his final vows on Aug. 15, 1965.
Fr. Walleman did regency at Campion Jesuit High School in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, and for two years after tertianship taught chemistry and mathematics at Marquette High School in Milwaukee. In 1963 he moved to St. Francis Mission in South Dakota, where he did pastoral ministry for the next 34 years. In 1997 he moved to Marquette University and a year later to the St. Camillus Jesuit Community in Wauwatosa. During some of his years back in Milwaukee, Fr. Walleman assisted with the work of the Jesuit Partnership.
Fr. Walleman was a gentle, steady Jesuit priest. He struggled off and on with ill health during his years as a Jesuit. He lived simply and felt at home among the Indian people he served on the Rosebud Indian Reservation. He had some Lakota nomadic instincts and loved to travel — usually by Greyhound Bus.