Sidney M. Ulan | Men's store owner, 86

Sidney M. Ulan, 86, formerly of Wallingford, a decorated World War II pilot and retired men's store owner, died of pancreatic cancer Tuesday at Maris Grove, a retirement community in Glen Mills.

Mr. Ulan graduated from Chester High School and attended Temple University. During World War II, he served in the Army Air Corps in Europe. He volunteered to be a bomber pilot but instead was assigned to fly C-47 cargo planes. His experience dropping paratroops behind enemy lines was included in historian Stephen Ambrose's book D-Day: June 6, 1944. Mr. Ulan also supplied paratroops trapped at Bastogne, delivered gasoline for Gen. George S. Patton's tanks, and flew wounded soldiers to hospitals in England. He was awarded the Air Medal with two oak-leaf clusters.

After his discharge in 1946, he hoped to return to college. But his father had died while he was overseas, so he took over the family business, Henry's Men's Store in Chester, to support his mother and sister. He operated the store until 1982.

Mr. Ulan was a past commander of Jewish War Veterans Post 134 in Chester and was a member of the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars. He was a volunteer with the Chester-Wallingford chapter of the American Red Cross.

He is survived by his wife of 56 years, Isabel Hicks Ulan; a daughter, Beth Galperin; a sister; and two grandchildren.

The funeral will begin at 11 a.m. today at Congregation Ohev Shalom, 2 Chester Rd., Wallingford. Burial will be in Brookhaven Cemetery.