Remembering LeRoy Hughes

For a 49-week period, beginning on Aug. 15, 1996, and ending on July 11, 1997, I was the managing editor of what I still believe was the best weekly newspaper this area has seen- The Lamar Press.
If you have read this blog for the past several months, you have probably come across a mention of it from time to time. It was a complete local newspaper with coverage of city government, county government, school, sports, and maybe the best stable of columnists a small-town weekly has ever had.
The newspaper featured general columns from Kim Earl, Katie Jeffries and Cait Purinton, a cooking column by Susan Davis Mabe, a religious column by Doug Oakes, and occasional guest columns by Amy Lamb.
Three people contributed columns to each edition of The Lamar Press. I wrote regular columns each week, and usually had a sports column, as well. Marvin VanGilder wrote historical tales of Lamar and Barton County.
But the most popular column by far in that short-lived but fondly remembered newspaper was the one Nancy Hughes wrote- and what a great sport her husband, LeRoy, was for he was a featured player in many of her hilarious columns about the Hughes family life. Other men might not have appreciated being a regular feature in the community newspaper, but LeRoy took it with a grain of salt. He knew his wife loved writing the column and that was good enough for him.
I never knew LeRoy Hughes that well and sadly, I will never have that opportunity. He died this week from a heart attack at age 56. I only had brief conversations with him when I ran into him and his wife at various ballgames and other school functions.
From what I knew of him, both from Nancy's columns and from talking with her, it was obvious that LeRoy provided the foundation upon which a wonderful family was built. He provided support for Nancy as she not only served as Lamar R-1 school nurse, but became a widely-respected proponent of abstinence-based sex education. She also helped start the highly successful Hi-Step program at Lamar High School.
LeRoy and Nancy also had great success with their three children, Tyler, Leigh and Lindsay, all of whom I had the pleasure of working with during their school days. Tyler takes after his father and is the quiet, hard-working type. The daughters inherited the hard-working part, but inherited their mother's infectious, outgoing personality.
I can remember the battles Leigh fought to restore the pre-game prayer at Lamar High School football games, and how when it was finally restored the year after Leigh graduated, it was Lindsay who said that first prayer over the stadium loudspeaker.
LeRoy Hughes was one of the few fathers who had the opportunity to see his daughter receive her first kiss and her marriage proposal. In fact, there were over 1,000 of us who saw that first kiss, since it was given to her by Brent Swearingen when Leigh was crowned Lamar High School Basketball Homecoming Queen in February 1993. Two years later, Leigh's boyfriend, Doug Kirkpatrick proposed to her in front of a homecoming basketball crowd, since he knew how much that first kiss, my story about it and the overwhelmingly positive reaction she received from it (after she got over the initial embarrassment) meant to her. The two were married in June 1997, (a wedding which I covered for one of the last issues of The Lamar Press.)
I just finished rereading the 49 columns Nancy wrote for The Press. Sometimes she had me laughing, and there was almost never a time when I didn't feel my face curling into a smile. From what I read in those columns and what was obvious when Nancy and LeRoy were together, I don't know if I have ever seen two people who still so obviously enjoyed each other's company after three decades of marriage.
What a wonderful example to pass on to their children and grandchildren.