DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Roy Bedichek, out here in Falls County. Now, some men leave a mark on a place. Roy Bedichek left a mark on a whole generation — maybe more than one.
Born on June 27, 1878, up in Illinois, to J. M. and Lucretia Bedichek, Roy came to Falls County at the age of six. And Falls County, it seems, was where the story really began.
His earliest schooling came from his own parents, right there at Blevins. Later he attended the Bedichek's Eddy Literary and Scientific Institute — and if that name alone doesn't tell you something about the kind of family this boy came from, I don't know what will. He went on to graduate from the University of Texas in 1903.
In 1910 he married Lillian Greer, and together they raised three children — Mary, Sarah, and Bachman. Now, before Roy Bedichek became the man history remembers, he wore a good many hats. Reporter.
Editor. Teacher. Homesteader.
A restless kind of mind, you might say, always looking for the next thing worth doing. Then in 1917 he joined the staff of the University of Texas. And in 1922 — that's when things got interesting — he became the second director of the University Interscholastic League, the UIL.
Twenty-six years. That's how long Roy Bedichek shaped the UIL, tailoring its policies to what he called the American ideal of education for every child. He saw educational competition not as a gladiator sport but as — and these are his own words — "a spur to industry and a whetstone of talent." The academic contests.
The athletic contests. The musical contests. Countless students passed through those experiences, and Roy Bedichek's hand was on the rudder the whole time.
But there was another side to this man, and you'd be selling him short to miss it. He was a lifelong outdoorsman, an animal lover, a man who could not look at the world without seeing the natural world underneath it. In 1947 he published "Adventures with a Texas Naturalist," a book that came out of all those years of watching and listening and paying attention.
His letters — and the man was an enthusiastic correspondent, to put it mildly — were gathered into two separate books. Two. People who knew Roy Bedichek remembered him as a conversationalist, a folklorist, a storyteller who had a way of running every human experience back to the natural world, like all roads led there eventually.
And his friend J. Frank Dobie, a man not known for handing out compliments carelessly, put it about as plainly as it can be put: "He had the most richly stored mind of any man I ever knew." Roy Bedichek died on May 21, 1959. But out here in Falls County, where a six-year-old boy from Illinois once arrived and took root, that mind of his is still doing its work.
What the marker says
(June 27, 1878 - May 21, 1959) Born in Illinois to J. M. and Lucretia (Craven) Bedichek, Roy came to Falls County at the age of six. Educated first in his parents' school at Blevins and later at the Bedichek's Eddy Literary and Scientific Institute, he graduated from the University of Texas in 1903. He and Lillian Greer were married in 1910; their children were Mary, Sarah, and Bachman. Bedichek was a reporter, editor, teacher, and homesteader before joining the staff of the University of Texas in 1917; he became the second director of the University Interscholastic League (UIL) in 1922. For twenty-six years he tailored league policies to the American ideal of education for every child. His use of educational competition as "a spur to industry and a whetstone of talent" has shaped the lives of the countless students who have participated in UIL academic, athletic, and musical contests. A lifelong outdoorsman and animal lover, Bedichek wrote "Adventures with a Texas Naturalist," which was published in 1947; his letters, evidence of his enthusiastic correspondence, were collected into two books. Bedichek is fondly remembered as a conversationalist, folklorist, and storyteller who related all experience to the natural world. "He had the most richly stored mind of any man I ever knew," said his friend J. Frank Dobie. (1998)