Lowry, Leland

Leland Burl Lowry, 67

Memorial Services for Leland Lowry, 67 of San Antonio, Texas, will be held Thursday March 29th at 2 p.m. at Mary Ellen & Harvester Church of Christ located at 1342 Mary Ellen Street, Pampa, Texas 79065.

Leland Lowry was born in Pampa, Texas, on March 21st, 1940, to Elvin and Alma Lowry. He was a graduate of Pampa High and attended West Texas State University in Canyon, Texas. He retired in 1987 from Cotton Petroleum in Perryton, Texas.

He was preceded in death by his father, Elvin Shay Lowry, and his mother, Alma Searl Lowry. He is survived by his wife, Carolyn; five daughters and one son, Tammy Hawk, Robin Seer, Judy Avant, Chrystal Gray, Ronda Schilling and Larry Foster; 21 grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren.

Anecdotal Experiences (Responding to the webmaster's request of our classmates regarding their remembrance of Leland, Albert King had grown up in Pampa knowing and sometime "running with" Leland and even roomed with him in college. Albert relates these experiences)

I was saddened to hear of his death and shocked by the brevity of his obituary. From what I knew of him, he was destined for extraordinarily high achievements. Leland was a close friend of mine, Jerry Pope, Leo Potter, Otis White, Wayne Broadbent, Fred Broadbent, Gary Neil, Harlan Prescott, Burley Prater, Dicky Prescott, Tommy Turpin, Bobby Culberson, Jerry Culberson, Clarence Townsend and a host of others who went to B.M. Baker school. He and I played cornets together at Baker and were in many classes together throughout Junior High and High School. We both had paper routes for the Pampa Daily News and hired on at various "shape up" labor sites in the oil patch around Lefors, Skellytown, and Borger to perform oil field service jobs. We played countless games of football, basketball, baseball and soft ball on the open streets of Brunow, Scott, Albert and Malone on the south side of the tracks where, some days, we could play an entire game without a car coming down the road to interfere with our play.

Going swimming was a special privilege with Leland since his father, Elvin, was Pampa Water Commissioner, and the Pampa Swimming Pool was under his direction entitling Leland and his friends to free admission. It was all the more special since Leland did not have much affinity for swimming and his father was fond of saying, "If I don't see Leland, then it is fifty-cents!".

My first summer semester at West Texas State, Buddy Sharp (you will recognize him as a former quarterback for the Harvesters) was my Summer roommate followed by Jerry Watson (you may not recognize as another star from Lefors) in the Fall, 1958. Buddy and Jerry had athletic ambitions that transcended their desire to engage in ex cogitative activity and turned out to be short lived bunk mates. But when Leland came over to Stafford Hall from across the campus to be my roommate, I was at the height of my glory. Here was someone I already knew intimately well, someone I knew I could work with , be with, and hold high expectations for, and would value highly. We formed an academic and fraternal triad with Marvin Berry. Leland and I were both majors in Business with emphasis in Accounting and minors in Economics and Military Science. Marvin was a Pre-Med student with emphasis in Chemistry and minors in Physiology and Military Science. Besides our common course work in Military Science, Strategy, Military History, Weapons and Tactics we took a large number of courses together in the short period of 1959-1960: English Lit, Algebra I and II, History,
Psychology, Biology, Physics, Calculus, and just about any other course that Marvin was getting into since both Leland and I looked way up to Marvin who was unquestionably a paragon of academic and intellectual excellence. (To my knowledge Marvin Berry made only straight "A"s).

I could go on at great length about all the mischievous and credulous/ingenuous fun and frolic we had together in Stafford Hall but two episodes stand out distinctly in my mind. .In the Spring of 1959 all the men's and women's dorms were invited to enter decorated theme floats for the Homecoming Parade. In our dorm meeting Leland came up with the idea of "OLD STAFFORD" and our float would be a gargantuan sized bottle of whiskey, labeled as simply "OLD STAFFORD". The bottle was made of wire, coat hangers and crepe paper - 8 feet wide and 50 feet tall and built on a flat bed trailer. Clearly, it took a huge labor force of dorm denizens (which Marvin was so highly capable of recruiting) and the resourcefulness of Leland to assemble the materials that were needed for construction.

When the day for the parade came and we were lined up to enter the procession, the Dean of Men, Dean Jones, came around and "blew his cork" over the idea that "something out of the gutter of hell" would be allowed to be in the Homecoming Parade. "What a horrific disgrace, he shouted. You will not be permitted to show this abomination". So Leland ran to Dr. T. Paige Carruth, Dean of students and Director of the Stafford Hall dormitory to tell him of Dean Jones' objection. We were all elated when Carruth walked up and told him "ITS OKAY. I HAVE ALREADY APPROVED IT". We were all astonished that Leland had the foresight to realize that good ol' Dean Jones would try to throw a monkey wrench in all of our hard work.

Dean Jones still tried to block the float by changing the parade route and insisting that the float would not go under the telephone and traffic light lines. Quick-minded Leland had an answer for that when he pulled a spring loaded hoist out from under the trailer to attach to the top of the bottle for pulling down and retract for raising it up - a gadget no doubt he came up with as a result of familiarity with his father's water department equipment. Old Stafford did not come in first but placed third in the float competition. Still, it was a moral victory for the men of Stafford hall and made all the more felicitously so, since Leland , Marvin and I were all Tee-Totalers!

Those who remember Marvin Berry will recall that he was courageously motivated to become a medical doctor and motivated with all his heart. Those who know him well know that this is an understatement! And he would let nothing, absolutely nothing, come between him and that burning desire. When anyone in the dorm was sick, Marvin was there at their bedside with his books, stethoscope, sphygmomanometer, and OTC medicines. Among the multitude of healing and helping assists he performed, he used a scalpel to surgically remove a cyst from Leland's right wrist! It was a large growth, the size of a quarter and raised about 5mm. I knew that Marvin had taken a small biopsy, and Leland told me he was going to remove it. But I advised Leland to go to the doctor and reminded him that Marvin, among other things, was not licensed to practice!!

I will never forget coming back to our dorm room, and there was Marvin telling Leland to "brace and keep your mind on the other hand". The whole procedure took only about 10 minutes, but I stood in a state of shock for about 10 hours. The first live surgery I had ever witnessed and just aghast that Leland made not even a muffled murmur and watched with a tiny tear in his eye as Marvin used his
deftly developed dexterity to remove the benign growth. In less than a week, Leland was back to strumming his Gibson guitar and singing the old folk songs that he loved to go around playing.

In '61, Marvin and I became dorm supervisors in Stafford Hall, and Leland moved off campus to join a little band. Marvin and I continued on through our senior year to graduate in our respective fields, receiving the "gold bar" at commencement. Marvin went to Med school in Dallas, and I entered the Army. Leland dropped out of WT to pursue his musical interests, and we only heard about him from time to time.

Those of us who knew and remember Leland will never forget his cheerful alacrity and lively zeal. He was thoughtful, imaginative, resourceful and diligent in whatever he undertook - and always delicate to a fault. His plainly visible credo was that the only time to look down on someone was when you are reaching over to lift them up. He held gratitude over selfishness, humility over pride, discipline over all that is desultory, and his spirit will continue to live in all the hearts that he unquestionably touched. I may forget all the difficulties we faced together but I shall never forget the joyous friendship and loyalty we shared. Leland was truly a loyal and trustworthy friend and my family's thoughts, meditations and prayers are extended and magnified for his wife and six children. May God's Almighty love and blessing keep and comfort them ... Al, Linda, Kimi, Karisa, and Arren