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A 100-year-old Aggieby
Bob Bowman | |
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William B Holsonbake of Hughes Springs celebrated his 100th birthday last
May 15, someone asked him how he had managed to become a centurion. "Well," he
said with a twinkle in his eyes, "it could have been because I was an Aggie."
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William B Holsonbake of Hughes Springs, an Aggie for most of his life, celebrated
his 100th birthday recently. |
And, indeed, he was
quite an Aggie.
After growing up in Farmersville,
between McKinney and Greenville,
Holsonbake graduated from Texas
A&M in 1931 and became the long-jump champion of the Southwest Conference
in 1929 and 1930. Those "good old days" at College
Station grew into a lifetime love of the Aggies.
He still has his
scuffed Aggie boots and plans to hand them down to a great grandson when he becomes
an Aggie.
But, around Hughes Springs, Holsonbake is known for his life's
work as a conservationist long before people began thinking about water and soil
conservation. His passion started as a vocational-agriculture teacher in 1930
at Nevada in Collin County
and later at Rockwall.
He moved to Hughes Springs in 1937 where he taught until 1970.
His daughter,
Diane Johnson, said Holsonbake's students "were his boys, and they still are.
I always said if I got in jail, dad would not get me out, but he would get his
boys out."
In each community, Holsonbake taught his students the importance
of taking care of Texas' natural resources.
And
in 1976 when he became a director of the Northeast Texas Municipal Water District--a
job he still holds after 32 years--he started working on water conservation before
it was a recognized practice.
"It has been the focal point of his life,"
said Walt Sears of Hughes Springs, general manager of the district.
When
Lake of the Pines was built in Northeast Texas, Holsonbake was present when U.S.
Senator Lyndon B. Johnson and Speaker of the House came to dedicate the lake.
It
was one of the highlights of a devoted Aggie's life.
Bob
Bowman's East Texas
February 22, 2009 Column
A
weekly column syndicated in 70 East Texas newspapers
Copyright Bob Bowman |
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